Dirty Dozen April Christmas

 This month's photo prompt can be found in the special forums set aside for Fan Club members at SCS here. I had decided to do the angel as my focus and stamped her ( Stampendous WireWorks Angelicia) with some Versamark on Papertrey Ink vellum cardstock and heat embossed with some Ranger detail white powder. ( the tips of her top wing did not get inked and I didn't notice that until the powder melted.)

I knew I wanted a sparkle from the lights so, I grabbed a copper and gold gelly roll pens and colored spots and lines on her both on the top of the vellum and on the back side. I did die cut this with a The Greetery arch die and then ran her through an Xyron to make her have solid adhesive on the back side like a sticker. The printed paper night sky treeline paper is unknown, ( my best guess is either Recollections or I really don't know. I don't save too many Blue papers and so it was a lucky find in the drawer. I trimmed it down to just slightly less than 5 1/2" square.) I wrapped some vintage lace across that and added the same glitter gelly roll pen dots to the sky and stars as well.

 

I decided I'd add some pearls to the wing and I came across these translucent ones in the stash from SU.  its kind of an in between copper and gold and had two sizes so I just plunked on a trio of them. 

The sentiment here is from Red Lead paperworks and was diecut with a Tim Holtz labels die. The base here is some textured linen Navy Cardstok. It's not quite this dark in real life but, I was messing with the contrast so you could see the colors in the gown and the gems. That's about it from me, if you'd like to play along with us, we would love to have you. Thanks for stopping by.

Snow for Polly

 This week the featured stamper challenge is sharing PollyPeeps gallery she had passed away recently and everyone is free to choose anyone's gallery that was also taken too soon but, I did start looking at Polly's gallery and smiling over quite a few things that I had saved over the years but, I finally stopped at this snowman. It seemed appropriate as it is snowing here and I love them as well. 

I loved the colors, textures and patterns of Polly's card so those were the things I tried to keep. I did change the stamps, no stenciling, added in the sparkle in the form of liquid pearls and stickles glitter glues over the watercolor paints when they were dry. 

because it is snowing, this is a little darker than it is in real life. The snowman (Whipper Snapper snowman circle) was stamped with some Versafine clair Nocturn ink on Arches hot press watercolor paper which has a cream tint to it to my eye. I did use Daniel Smith watercolors on him and the white snow drops are some Windsor & Newton white gouache ( straight from the tube to be thick enough to dry 3-d ish) This panel was cut with a deckled edge rectangle die and the edges of that were inked with some DOX vintage photo ink. The blue texture paper came out of this package found on Amazon. I just love that stuff and the colors are pretty in person, so I tend to cut it into pieces and use small amounts. It's on the wood grain print with some liquid glue. This is A7 in real life. The sentiment here is from ah heck, I forgot again. sorry. That's about it from me I am hoping to perhaps do a second one later. If you'd like to play along you can find this challenge here at SCS. Thanks for stopping by.

Inspired by {Antique Farmhouse}

 Sometime last winter I had came across this site as an alternative to one I had been considering for the Inspiration destination. And at that time I looked mostly at the Christmas offerings and even though it's months later I still want to have a few Christmas things done well in advance of the holidays. I just need that less stress in my life, so with that thought in mind I chose this Santa with the wood background as the jump start for this card. 

I am kind of amazed about this as I tend to take out my cell phone and shoot a couple shots of layers of paint going on images and with this one I have none. Yep, surprised me as well. The image here is an old one from Stampington & Company called Jolly Basket. I did stamp it on some Arches hot press watercolor paper and then diecut it with an Impression Obsession Anna Wight stitched circle die ( it has you know, its not a perfect stitched circle, the stitching varies and I like that I think it plays well with the folk art vibe the image has and the rustic layer the printed woodgrain paper print brings. The burgundy ribbon is unknown and I left off a sentiment for the moment because, as much as I like to color Santa images there are not actually that many people on my Christmas card list I mail Santa cards to. This one is 5 1/2" square in real life. If you'd like to play along with us you can find this challenge here at SCS. Thanks for stopping by.

Enjoy Lavender

 I recently had some happy mail, I mentioned that right? one of the stamp sets that came is from Picket Fence Studios called fresh lavender stems. 

So I stamped one of the images with the water pitcher as a vase with some Versafine Morning mist ink on Arches hot press watercolor paper (smooth) this paper is not quite white in real life it has a creamy tone to it and this is first round of paints. (last night) then this morning I had seen there was a dots or doodles challenge and thought as I was adding more paint to it this afternoon to add a few flicks of paint around the flowers for "dots" and then when I went to upload it I seen the challenge really was to use ink to make dots and or doodles so. I did not link this up to that. 

The base is some SU wisteria cardstock cut to A2, that lace is vintage. the photocorners were cut from textured bazzill scraps 15-20? years ago and I am guessing that is a hand held punch ( that I probably gave away years ago when dies came out, they are so much easier on your hands right?) but, I have little zip lock baggies of such punchies in my color embellishment boxes in the closet so, I used them. The sentiment here is from the Ellen Hutson warm fuzzies set. Interestingly enough they have re opened their store as an "Amazon" store so, I had an email from them that there was a new release out on Amazon the other day. I did not see this particular stamp set in the line up for sale there though. That's about it from me, Hope you are having a happy Friday Also. thanks for stopping by.

Easter Tulips

 I've been wanting to color some things for spring and or Easter and I opened up one of the drawers of Flower stamps a couple of days ago and started out with this old one from Stamps Happen.

 I decided to do the background in shades of browns as when I bought this stamp ( used on eBay years ago) the scripty "tulip" words were not visible in the photo of the index art to my eye. I can see them now but, they were a surprise to me when the stamp arrived so, this is the first time this stamp has seen ink in my space.

 So I seriously added more browns to that background every time it dried for a couple of days.

I ended up finishing this with some coral-ish crocheted looking lace and tied on a Stampin' up sentiment on a justrite tag die with some aqua lawn fawn hemp string. the Stripe printed paper is very vintage and from My Minds Eye. That has some foam tape under it from the base which is A7 in real life. It just struck me funny how forward the tulip print is for my eye on this and I really don't care for it all that much. I did have fun adding shadows to the leaves and stems though. The tulips themselves were hard to decide where the shadows should be and or the colors. That's about it from me, thanks for stopping by.
 

Watercoloring a 4 stroke Bird

 This week Brenda is sharing this video from Debbie Walker art on YouTube called paint a 4-stroke watercolor bird. I did watch the whole thing, if you are short on time the painting starts around 10 minutes in. there is discussions of her paints, palettes and papers before that. along with some practice S curve strokes that are used on the bird. As always you can click on these photos to view them larger then hit your browsers back button to continue reading.

So I had my little sketch pad handy and I sketched on a branch. my thought when I was watching the video was she made it harder on her self then it didn't have to be when she started with the bird and did the legs straight down, my brain said. do the branch first it will make the legs do their angles to perch. 

I decided to do the background before the bird thinking I was going to overlap the bird over the very faint background foliage. ( well that was the thought anyways) 

Decided to add a little golden brown to the foliage areas with more water while it was still wet.

 And more water to soften some of the lines.

Then I came back after that was dry, did the bird. ( his head was too hunchback looking) kept going , did some splatters, and blue in the background, some smaller branches.

Decided against the gold shimmer paint and used some ocean instead. 

 

added some ocean leaves to the skinny branches and a black dot for the eye and decided it wasn't that bad for a practice thing. and then thought, do the bird again. 

this time around on a scrap of Arches cotton cold press used the same sap green to do the hint of where the branch should be on the panel. 

After the foliage in the background dried, I added in the branch, bird, skinny branches and leaves. splattered it a little with the ocean shimmer paint. I thought my bird has a quail look to it. ( the way the head is shaped and I am OK with that, its better than the hunchback look ha ha. )

I used some Mellow Moss card stock for the A2 base here and the sentiment is also something SU as well. ( from one of the not too old Chicken sets I am guessing) and that's about it from me. If you'd like to play along with us you can find this challenge here at SCS. thanks for stopping by.
 

Mr. Dapper Bunny

 Angie is hosting the Free for all this week at Splitcoaststampers and when I was working on uploading my Snowman Friends card I seen that she was asking for Bunnies, Chicks and maybe one other spring critter you could do and I thought I have not colored this bunny in a long time. So I dug him out. This is Mr. Dapper Bunny from Stampassions Designed by Dianna Marcum. I do have the clear sets that came out from Adornit not too long ago but, When I have a stamp on a wood block that I love the art of I tend to use those and then glance at the colors ideas on the index sticker. (less stress I think) 

I started with stamping him on some Arches cold press cotton watercolor paper with Morning mist versafine ink and adding pale washes of color to his fur. I did drop in some very watered down coral/salmon colored pinks into the ears and cheeks but, I did not want it to be real obvious so, I did it while the tans were wet. (this is a wet cell phone shot)

When I started adding paints to the clothes is when I looked at the block and Thought OK you can do pink and blue. I did change the tones of the shades and mostly left the Daisy white paper with some grey shadows along the edges and a yellowish center. I did think at this point the shadow under him was too wide and I should have stopped it before the edge of the paper and then just decided to trim the panel down.

 When the 2 house mouse stamp sets came in the mail this week this pretty paper from Simple Stories was also in the envelope. (it's called Simple Vintage Flower shoppe) and since it's new my guess is you could still find it out there somewhere. I had found it at Simon Says Stamp. The papers are double sided and as much as I love the colors in that floral its a little busy for my actual taste so, I knew I wanted some layers in there to distract from that as well. The pink plaid is the drop piece from cutting the floral ( its the flip side of it) that yellow & white scalloped ribbon is Vintage. The Happy Easter is from Impression Obsession and was stamped and diecut a while back. The mini brad came out of a baggie labeled Joann's CK so it's very old. The white shimmery textured paper came in one of the Hero Arts kits of the month and was diecut with a Waffle flower lacy square die. That pale purple cardstock is something old from Stampin' Up! ( I hardly buy purple so, I am sure they don't make that color anymore) and This one is 5 1/2" square in real life. If you'd like to play along with us you can find this challenge here at SCS. Thanks for stopping by.

 

Happy Mail {First day of Spring}

 Lucky me, I received this Anna Wight Sweet Miss Daisy Stamps Cozy Snowman set in the mail as a gift from a sweet friend and (it was snowing that day and even yesterday  it was snowing here) (You can find Anna's store here on Etsy)

and I seen that the Ways to use it challenge this week at Splitcoaststampers was to do something in celebrating International Happiness day. ( Thursday was the first day of spring here & it was happiness day everywhere) so, I decided that since I am a collector of snowmen stamps and I do like to color as my makes me happy thing, I would do this guy in Spring tones. 

I started by stamping him with some Versafine Clair morning mist ink on Arches cold press 100% cotton watercolor paper. and adding very pale washed tones of Daniel Smith paints.

 After a few layers went on I went digging in my printed paper pads looking for something with multiple pastels and came across an Lawn Fawn pad ( its old there is no style name on it) from years ago and thought this would work and then I started tweaking the orange-ish Peachy tones to blend better with the paper. 

I wanted to do something "fancy" with him but my snowflake brads were just wrong scale & color wise and then I found these previously diecut snowflakes in shimmery blues and whites and scattered some of those around and added liquid pearls to the centers.

I diecut the snowman panel with a Penny Black die and the Sentiment here is from Inky Antics cut with an waffle flower rectangle die. That ruffled green ribbon is an older one from Stampin' up and the base is also old SU blue cardstock. This one is A6 in real life. If you'd like to play along with this challenge you can find it here at SCS. Thanks for stopping by.
 

Inspired By {K. Van Bourgondien}

 Hi & Welcome, this week Amy has chosen the K. Van Bourgondien site and Pinterest Boards for inspiration and I had some happy mail arrive mid week and I was hopeful I could use some of it and I found an entire board of just Tulip flowers Where I came across these beauties. I love that color combo. So, I used that as a jump start for these. The color I used on the tulips is Coral from Daniel Smith.

 I knew that in the past I have liked live things as no line but, the other things really need that definition so, this time around I first stamped this Spellbinders image with just morning mist ink in the Misti and after a couple rounds of that I used the Nocturn pad in the center of the image and the pieces of the right side of it so the card base and scissors with that black. and I thought OK you can work with this. This is first round of paints on some Arches cold press watercolor paper. 

I know it would probably be better to stamp these highly detailed images on the smooth hot press paper but, I like how the paints pool on the textured so, after a couple more layers of paints I did grab an Fineliner pen and add some details to the edges of the card and the eye of the mouse. 

This sentiment was stamped directly on the Basic Grey printed paper and its also from the same Creative Day set as the image. The base here is some Stampin' Up! Soft seafoam and the finished size is 5 1/2" square. I am finding that the envelopes of that square size are going for just a couple stamps instead of parcel prices like 6" square cards so, there is that. The more I look at this the more I think it needs just a bit more shadow around the mouse and his hands on the stems so, I may tinker with it just a tad more. That's about it from me, if you'd like to play along with us you can find this challenge here at SCS. Thanks for stopping by.

Painting a Rainy Window

 Hi, It's my turn to host the water coloring tutorial prompt at SplitcoastStampers this week and I had chosen this rainy window that has a heart drawn in the condensation with a finger scene. You can find this video here on YouTube by Nianani called Rainy Window Water Droplets with Watercolors. I thought that was really cool. I did use the exact colors that she uses in the video, Payne's Grey Blue and Lamp black my white is Bleed Proof white from Dr. PH Martins. 

This is Arches cold press watercolor paper and I did start out wetting it and then building layers on the edges and this was the first place I stopped but, sometimes seeing the photograph gives my brain more of a oh do this next thing than just looking at the painting does. so, I immediately added more paint to this while it was wet.

 Like so. So this is the end of the first layers of paint while wet.

 I did add more paint to the edges of the clearing and the bottom. 

The next day ( so I know it was completely dry ) I added the finger drawn heart and more color to the edges and the bottom wet on dry this time.

When I first started Drawing the water drops I started with the Payne's grey blue but, then I realized I was supposed to be making them black for some more detail/depth so, I did switch to black and painted over some of them, left some of them more faded.

I did then break out the bleed proof white and start adding that to the bottoms to close the droplets and such. and I walked away from it like this last night.

 This morning I added just a little bit more bleed proof white to the maybe the highlights section of the tops of the drops and the heart trail and a few just white drops in the glass. I know I have a sentiment that reads I miss you Most on Rainy days but, I am trying to decide if I want to take away from any of the painting to add that to a front of a card with this. I may just add that to the inside of the card. We shall see today after work.

What it looked like when the tape came off I could see there was a tiny leak of paint at the top left corner and right corners soo, I am not so sure what I am going to do with this. I have been giving some thought to putting some of these paintings I like that I don't need as a card into a Smash Book or something. 

So, I did press it inside the bigshot all day so it is a little flatter. And this is where I stopped. If you'd like to play along with us you can find this challenge here at SCS. Thanks for stopping by.
 

Inspired by {Ballard Designs}

 This week Denise has chosen the Ballard Designs store as the inspiration site and I have actually ordered from this one. ( that's a rare thing I think) most of our tag lines in the site say no one has bought from some place its just an eye candy thing. But, I have a bench a table and a copper colored boot tray that I bought years ago from them that still look and work just fine. So there is that. At any rate I was curious to see what they had now a days and I started in the mirrors and art section and came across this cute Hare. 

And I thought oh, he doesn't look that complicated for painting one with watercolors. 

 Sometime last week I used this um Reverse Confetti triple stitched square die for the last week's Inspiration card and while I had it out I cut one of the drop pieces of the studio loft watercolor paper with it also and so this had been sitting on the table when I started. So I sketched a kind of triangle face/neck shape and added to loopy ovals out the top for ears. and side eyes near the base of the ears. I had in my head I think I have seen over the years people do these cartoon style bunnies with this kind of a shape and they make me smile so, already changes were going on.

 First round of paint layers ( Daniel Smith here) 

filled in some more color while it was still wet.

 when I came back to it, I decided those original eye lines were more like bug eyes and I erased them and made smaller ones. sketched on a nose/mouth lines. 

This morning before Work I added in some eyes and nose/mouth lines and a few eye lashes and whiskers. which then lead to adding some stray fluffs of hair to be sticking out as I remembered that original art painting as being a fluffy type of a bunny. And so, it is heavy on the inspired by side. I did make him shades of browns. 

This is 5 1/2" square in real life, the base is some Kraft cardstock and that brown printed paper is from the BoBunny Serenity Pad. The kraft gingham ribbon is from May Arts and that's about it from me. If you'd like to play along with us you can find this challenge here. Thanks for stopping by.

 

Sleeping in Crocus

 Who knew but, the day after time change is "national nap day" or something like that so, Jeanette picked sleepy as a theme for the Clean & Simple challenge at SCS earlier in the week, so I decided to go with this sleeping in crocus Stampa Rosa House Mouse image.

 So, I stamped this with some Versafine Clair Nocturn ink on Arches cold press watercolor paper and proceeded to add layers of paint to it off and on all week. I'm not real thrilled with the skin tone on the mice but, I think the rest is "ok" 

I finally decided if it was going to be a card, I needed to stop messing with it. So I trimmed it with one of the rectangle dies in the Waffle flower A7 set and used a texture Bazzill for the base. This is A7 in real life and the inside is lined with some smooth Neenah. I do not have a single clue who I would give this to so, I have left the words off for now. That's about it from me, hope you are doing well. Thanks for stopping by. I have entered this into the House-Mouse & Friends Monday challenge blog found here. If you'd like to play along with that The theme is anything goes or Food. . #housemousechallenge 

A few Bunny Cards

 So, I finished what I started last week and finally got around to shooting the cards. 

This is the Penny Black Bunny friends done with Daniel Smith watercolors on some Studio Loft watercolor paper. That sentiment is from Stampa Rosa and this is A6 in real life. That gold foiled plaid is from a Memory Box pad. 

This is the Whipper Snapper Designs chick magnet also same papers the Sentiment on this one is from the Stampin' Up! set called Well scripted and it was cut with one of those MFT pierced tag dies. the purple lace is vintage. And this one is 5 1/2" square in real life. I am planning to give it to hubs. 

I this strip of watercolor paper on the table yesterday and I had seen the color challenge this week is kinda green,purple, blue and I thought this bunny would fit but, he'd need cut out after so, I did that but, my colors are not really even close to the challenge so, I did not link this one up to that. The Sentiment is from the Newton's Nook Cottontail Cuties set and it was heat embossed on that scrap. the shimmery heart stickers are from Hobby Lobby. I did add some stickles glitter glue to the dots on his Feet and ears here. This one is 5" square in real life. That's about it from me, thanks for stopping by.