When Shay of w&w said "delve into a topic... whatever makes you giddy" I decided I'd be delving into trends and techniques. They make me giddy! Hope you like what you see this month. I'll be posting a "Take" every Saturday. Today we'll talk WATERCOLOR.
Watercolor is not a new trend, but judging by the plethora of watercolor mediums on the market, it doesn't appear to be going out of style any time soon. What can you use to watercolor? Well, watercolors for one - the tube or pan kind. Or dye inks. Or water-based markers. Or, or, or.
Card #1
On this card I've used turquoise and pink Dylusions spray inks spritzed with water for a smooshing with an acrylic block technique (a la Mayuri!) to create a watercolor background. I stitched that onto a card and added a Flawless Diamond cutaway cut from silver cardstock. I left a few pieces in for some extra brightness to go with my sentiment. It's from Wishing You.
Card #2
Notice the background colors and their placement are similar to card #1, just softer (and vertical). That's because after smooshing card #1's background, I spritzed the leftover ink on the acrylic block and smooshed it onto a second piece of watercolor paper. Stamped a few tweeties from the delightful, recently released So Tweet and a sentiment as well as a snippet of stamped woodgrain from Into the Woods at the bottom too. What do you think - are the birdies falling from the sky or bouncing on a trampoline?
Card #3
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| Source: Adrienne Vita |
Modeled this card on an inspiration piece and stamped flora and fauna from In Bloom: Addie's Garden, Elsa's Flora and Anna's Flora in gray and then heat embossed My Precious gems. TIP: Stamp with black Versafine and heat emboss with clear powder to avoid stray black embossing powder bits all over your card.
I did some messy application of color to the stamp images. Distress Inks pressed onto an acrylic block as a palette were my watercolor medium. I applied some water and dropped in ink with a brush. Splattered the leftover ink and even used Wink of Stella on the gems to add some sparkle to this one-layer card.
And meet card #4. Watercoloring an image "rainbowed" seems popular lately. I've created an ultra-CAS wedding card using Sugar Rush and sentiments from The Big, The Bold Party and Extras. Gave it a huge portion of fun topping the cake using Distress Inks to watercolor.
Remember to leave a comment on my four Leading Lady posts (today I'd like to hear what your preferred watercolor medium is) to be in the running for the w&w gift card. I'll announce a lucky winner on April 6th.
In Take Two, we're gonna talk about the ILLUSTRATED trend...
67 comments:
Congratulations Maria! And a BIG thanks for the wonderful watercolor inspiration!
Congrats on being a Leading Lady ! Gong by todays cards I am very excited for your next takes ;) Loved the vibrant smooshed bg on first one..I think the birds are bouncing on a trampoline,Fab combo of two most precious things nature and gems on third one and The rainbow cake looks Yummy !
Maria...congrats on being a Leading Lady! Love the bold color sprays against the large dots, the softly smooshed background on number two, the messy watercolor on number three and that cake is just the bomb!!! I love to watercolor with so many mediums...Distress Inks, Kuretake Gansai Tambis, Zig pens...the list goes on and on - Distress Inks are probably my go to though.
What a treat to see these beauties from my Michigan girl this morning!!! LOve all four, of course, but the tweeties [oh most definitely jumping on a tramp] just stole my heart in my favorite un-colored way! I will love seeing you on Saturdays, Maria ... or any day of the week! Any water-based inks are my favorite water-coloring supply...
=]
Congratulations on being a leading lady. Love the vibrancy of the water-colouring on your first card against that die cut diamond all set off beautifully with the black. What fun the second card is...thought they where falling out of the sky until you mentioned about the trampoline and I'm going for that! Card three is quite delicate with gorgeous water-colouring techniques. Super CAS card for number 4 with clever water-colouring, really love the rainbow colours, so very pretty. My preferred water-colouring medium is distress inks and pens but I've bought Kuretake Gansai Tambi's recently and loving them for their vibrancy and just learning to use The Zig Pens....Thank goodness for so many different mediums out there to try and experiment with. Learning all the time...thank you very much for your inspiration today x
Beautiful cards and perfect watercolor inspiration. Hugs ;)
Maria!! I'm sooo excited you're Leading Lady at W&W ... what a stunning debut! Dazzled by those vibrant sprays and sparkly diamond ... and charmed by those bouncing (yep, on a trampoline) sweet birdies! What a gorgeous take on the gem inspiration ... and oh my, that rainbow wedding cake amid all that glorious white ... sigh! Looking forward to next Saturday's post already! Tend to use Distress Inks for watercolouring, although a new-ish set of Zigs gets in on the action too! Hugs, Anita :)
WOW - I love all the different watercolor looks in these cards!!! So different but all are amazing and beautiful! Thanks for the inspiration!
congrats on leading lady! They are all great but that last one takes the cake! :)
Wowzers, Maria...You're definitely Leading Lady material if this first episode is any indication. Shay has made an excellent choice. Just viewed one card to the other with my mouth hanging open like a grouper (the fish, NOT the Kardasian fans).
Congrats on your LL, so well deserved. :)
Fun uses for watercolor!
Fun uses for watercolor!
Oh, my! That cake! (They're all gorgeous, but that cake!)
Beautiful backgrounds! I really love the deep colors on the gems!
Such pretty cards! Love your background techniques! And that fabulous watercolored cake on your wedding card... love it!
Congratulations on being a Leading Lady (hope you'll behave "lady-like", hehe)!
Your cards are fabulous and very inspiring!
Can't tell you what my favorite watercolor medium is. Like them all. Use mostly my cheap Pelikan ones. Don't know, why. Also love DI.
Congrats on Leading Lady!:-) Your wedding card is gorgeous!
My favorite watercolor medium are distress inks.
Congrats, you Leading Lady! What fun too se your fabulous cards! Especially the first one is a real stunner!
Love your fabulous use of colour! The wedding cake card is my favourite of them all.
Beautiful cards! I love this amazingly fresh color! Great design and very cheerful!
Take care!
Michele
So many awesome techniques and equally awesome showcase of cards!
Huge congratulations Maria! You are a fabulous choice for Leading Lady, love all your watercolour inspiration!!
Beautiful cards! Can't wait to see the rest of the month.
Fabulous backgrounds on your cards and love the rainbow wedding cake.
You really worked those bright colours perfectly. Cant believe all the colours you got into that cake image that is so small and yet the colours are so clear and no spillage, brilliant. Love the vibrancy of the first card and the sotness of the second, trampoline I think :)
Oh I love watercolouring Maria and you have given us a lot of inspiration. I especially love the wedding card - so sweet.
Wow! Gorgeous cards! The colours in your first card are simply stunning and that cake is so beautiful! Thanks for such fabulous inspiration. Love all my watercolour mediums & use them equally.
A big congratulations to you! And all of your cards are simply amazing, love your use of watercolors, so beautiful.
WOW these projects are simply elegant and gorgeous
I am having a celebration on my blog...please do drop in when you can.Here is the link : 5 Million Page-views Celebration
Congrast on being a Leading Lady ... you are always inspiring with your innovative designs and techniques! Love all four of you watercoloured beauties. I love all kinds of watercolouring and couldn't possible narrow it done to just one ... watercolour spritz, smooshing, brushos, watercolour sprays ... are the ones that make me the happiest. :) xx
Congrats on being the Leading lady this month Maria!
Love all your cards.. the backgrounds! Well done :)
Love all the different styles of watercolour you've shared with us. My favourite would be the wedding card - so clean and cute!
Lovely cards esp the wedding one.
Congratulations for being the Leading Lady! I'm really hoping to be able to get some W&W this year. All your cards are inspiring, Maria, but I especially love the super modern & fun wedding cake & how you did the messy coloring of the gems!
Dang girl! Congrats and all that goes with it for being the LL at W&W! Very cool and they've chosen one of the best crafters out here in blogland, if I may say so! Yummy watercolor card collection. The first one has a great background, and I'm loving those little birds on that bluey-purpley sky. The background you've created beneath the gems is utterly brilliant; LOVE it!! And the wedding cake... Oh my goodness! Super card. I can't wait to see what's next! Bev
Those birds are simply adorable! So very colorful!
Cheering and applauding wildly in seeing you in a well-deserved Leading Lady role...and oh, what dazzling water-colours you've created to WOW us! A ginormous sparkly diamond, sweet birds, an array of marvelous gems and a yummy cake: talk about innovative and ingenious, each one! I'm so incredibly water-colour challenged that...well *drops head in shame* I don't have a favourite medium. Oh wait...yes I do...the medium used by talented designers, like YOU, who create magic for me to enjoy! These truly are fantastic! Excited to see what other marvels you have in store....
Hugs~c
Herzlichen Glückwunsch!! Die Karten sind toll, besonders die ersten beiden finde ich wunderschön! <3 LG Rosali
I'm sorry, I thought you were German, now I read your originally from Michigan, oups! :D I was just saying how much I love your cards, especially the first two! :)
CONGRATULATIONS on being Leading Lady Maria!!!
Your work is ABSOLUTELY FABULOUS, LOVE your STYLE!!!
THANK YOU for sharing the story of your watercolour cards ... I confess that I am a slow starter on this trend and need all the help I can get => feeling INSPIRED and looking forward to practising with your pretty colour palette :)
Wow!!! Absolutely gorgeus!!!! I love the fantastic colours and thefabulous techniques too!!! My favorite watercolor medium are distress inks.
Lovely cards. I really love the watercolor backgrounds you created and I particularly love The flawless diamond die.
Your watercolor backgrounds looks amazing! :)
I was so excited to see you over at W&W! You are awesome...these cards are awesome...I love them all! Your first card totally knocked my socks off and I super adore you rainbow cake.
Congrats and awesome cards! Love the look...my fav is the cake, love how you coloured the cake, amazing.
Awesome cards. I'm still experimenting with watercolor in various forms so my favorite is the one I am am currently using which changes daily. I like Derwet intense watercolor pencils and seem to have the best control with them when I want control. Distress inks are fun when I want "paint outside the lines".
Congratulations on the guest gig! What gorgeous cards, I am loving the watercoloring in all of them!
COngrats Maria!! I loved all of your cards. I know, I am lagging behind in comments this time because I am pretty busy with my office! My fave is the first one and the watercolor medium that I prefer is using DI. :)
Suchi xx
Congrats on being the leading lady Maria! I love these cards...so many beautiful ways you used these stamps and dies.
Congrats on being the leading lady!! Beautiful cards!! Love the watercoloring!
-Berina
Moxie Craftie
Lovely cards!!! They look pretty and they are a great inspiration for using the new release products!
WOW!!! I just love all of your watercolor designs, but that faceted jewel really caught my eye, as did the cake image. The colors POP, and that cake design is so unique and fun that I'm going to have to remember to use it as well. My usual watercolor technique is with watercolor pencils but I'm going to give pan watercoloring a try for more brilliant colors. Thanks for sharing these gorgeous ideas with us.
Congrats, Maria and thank you for the lovely inspiration. All four cards are just beautiful. I love that you didn't "waste" the ink, but instead made two cards with it. I don't know if I have a favorite way to watercolor, but I tend to use my distress inks the most.
Love your beautiful cards. The only thing I have used is watercolor pencils which I really like. But I do want to try other forms. Your art is definitely an inspiration.
I love your watercolor style and the beautiful layouts. At the moment, I am experimenting with Color Burst watercolor powders. I pinned my favorites today. https://www.pinterest.com/pin/415386765612273542/
https://www.pinterest.com/pin/415386765612273558/
https://www.pinterest.com/pin/415386765612273569/
GAH! these are to DIE for! get it? ;) i'm not as familiar with watercolors as i'd like to be, but distress inks seem to be a great place to start.
GAH! these are to DIE for! get it? ;) i'm not as familiar with watercolors as i'd like to be, but distress inks seem to be a great place to start.
Really awesome coloring on all of these. The wedding card is so fun! Love the unexpected coloring on that one. I usually use my Derwent pencils for watercoloring but have some Peerless colors that I'm anxious to try. Thanks for all the inspiration!
Really awesome coloring on all of these. The wedding card is so fun! Love the unexpected coloring on that one. I usually use my Derwent pencils for watercoloring but have some Peerless colors that I'm anxious to try. Thanks for all the inspiration!
My favorite watercolor medium would have to be either Gelatos or Aqua Huez by Shimmerz! :0)
I am loving all the watercolored cards these days and really like that layered cake! It's such a fun way to color one of my favorite desserts. I like using watercolor pencils because they aren't too messy but still give nice color.
I don't have many watercolor choices, so peerless!
Love all these watercolor techniques and choices, such beautiful cards! Love these layouts and color combos.
Gorgeous watercoloring, Maria! I love that you created such diverse projects...my fave is the wedding cake ~ So clever and beautiful!
Gorgeous watercolor cards, Maria! Love those gems :)
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