Lovely as a Tree ~ A Stampin' Up! Card

Today I thought I'd share a card I made for my nephew's birthday using one of my favorite stamp sets that's retiring and using a "technique" that I love...watercolor with ink pads.

Lovely as a Tree Take Two ~ Stampin' Up! Cards

Last week I shared a group of cards I created using the retiring stamp set Lovely as a Tree.  Today I'm sharing a few more...

If you look at the collage I'd say I favor the color blue for most of my cards!

If you would like to purchase this set make sure you do it soon!  May 24 is the last day this set is available.  After that it's until supplies last.

Thanks for looking and have a great day!

Sara

Remember all products used are listed at the bottom of each post.

 If you have questions feel free to contact me. 

Just click "Contact Me" at the top of my blog. 

Supplies used on this card:

Lovely as a Tree ~ Stampin' Up! Cards

It's that time of year!  
Stampin' Up! has their retired list out. 
 I thought I'd do a flash back of one of my favorite sets  that is retiring...
Lovely as a Tree.

Stampin' Up ~ Lovely as a Tree in Watercolor

I had a little time to play in my craft area and I wanted to try my hand at a bit of watercolor...again.  Over at Sunday Stamps they had the perfect challenge...creating a scene along with their sketch.  I got busy and ended up creating two cards instead of one.  I have to build a stash since I have a LOT of birthdays in June and still a few left yet this month.  

To create this scene I started by stamping my tree.  I actually inked it up 3 different times and stamped them over each other using the stamp-a-ma-jig from Stampin' Up!.  I didn't move the handle after I stamped so it was in the same position each time I needed to stamp again so I had perfect placement...whew! lol  The first time I inked up the stamp I used the Stampin' Write markers soft suede and pear pizzazz covering the whole trunk and tree.  I spritzed it with a bit of water and stamped it.  The second time I covered a bit less of the trunk and leaves using chocolate chip and old olive, spritzing it again and stamping over the first one.  The last time I put just a touch of color here and there using early espresso and mossy meadow and repeated the process for the last time.  Then I used a damp paint brush and carefully blended the colors together.  Next I used a graphic HB pencil to draw in my scene.  If you have no idea what to draw just google some images and you'll get thousands of ideas.  I think I googled trees and hills.  Nope I didn't copy any particular picture, just got a few ideas and drew it out.  I am in no way an artist so I need pictures in front of me to come up with an idea.  I just knew I wanted water and hills.  I started by drawing where I wanted my water to be.  Once that was done I continued the lines to the water's edge that were already under the oak tree.  I drew in a couple more hills and was ready to start painting.  I painted the pond first and that was the hardest part for me.  I really like how it turned out in the first pic below and was just OK with how it turned out in the second pic.  Guess I like the reflections better in the first one, but my daughter liked the second one better...guess it's all in the eye of the beholder! :)  Back to the pond...I started by completely wetting only the pond area and adding marina mist and island indigo letting the wetness of the paper pull the colors for me.  While that was drying I wet the whole sky and used soft sky to paint that.  I didn't put color over the whole sky, but let the water pull the color for me so I had blue and white areas in the sky.  Then I wet the area under the tree and started with pear pizzazz, then added old olive and a touch of mossy meadow.  Since that's the area closest to me I wanted it to be just a tad darker than the area behind it.  Next I filled in the area to the left of the tree using the same colors, but not applying it quite as dark.  While those two areas were drying I wet the top hill and mixed pear pizzazz and soft sky to give this hill a lighter look since it's off in the distance just a bit.  I did the same with my second card, but I must have used more pear pizzazz than soft sky because that hill is darker.  No biggie since I like how they both turned out.  I did the middle hill last and used pear pizzazz and old olive for this one.  If I wanted anything darker I just added more color.  To finish things off I put a few dobs of old olive (I think) to continue the grassy hill line that was a part of the tree stamp.  Then I added grass all over.  I started with pear pizzazz (and added the reflections in the water with just pear pizzazz), then added old olive and a bit of mossy meadow over top to finish off the look.  

When I make two cards I like some things better on one card and other things better on the other card.  Anyone else ever have that problem?  I don't think there's a time that it hasn't happened to me yet!  Do you have a favorite?  Let me know!

These are all the colors I used on my cards...

Soft Suede

Chocolate Chip

Early Espresso

Pear Pizzazz

Old Olive

Mossy Meadow

Soft Sky

Marina Mist

Island Indigo

Thanks for looking and have a great day!

Sara

I would love to be your demonstrator! If you like what you see and want to order anything just click on any of the products that I've listed at the bottom of my blog or click on the "Shop Now" tab at the top of my blog. Any of them will take you directly to my website! If you have questions feel free to contact me. Just click "Contact Me" at the top of my blog . If you're thinking of becoming a demonstrator click "Join My Team". I'd love to have you join me!

Supplies used on this card:

Watercolor paper and paint brushed from local craft store

Lovely as a Tree - Stampin' Up!

Today I have a pretty CAS card to share with you.  I can say it's clean, but I'm not so sure it's simple with the angled pieces of card stock on it!  Actually it wasn't too hard to work with at all and I really like the look of it.  My inspiration came from this week's sketch challenge over at Try Stampin' or Not on Tuesday.  

Make sure you check out all the other great cards created using this sketch HERE.  It does have the optional theme of April Showers which I couldn't fit in because I really needed an idea for a masculine card, but I think most of the other cards fit in really well with that!  

As you can see I have pretty simple colors for this card...

Very Vanilla

Crumb Cake

Basic Black

Thanks for looking and have a great day!

Sara

I would love to be your demonstrator! If you like what you see and want to order anything just click on any of the products that I've listed at the bottom of my blog or click on the "Shop Now" tab at the top of my blog. Any of them will take you directly to my website! If you have questions feel free to contact me. Just click "Contact Me" at the top of my blog . If you're thinking of becoming a demonstrator click "Join My Team". I'd love to have you join me!

Supplies used on this card:

Basic Black Candy Dots made using Crystal Effects

Lovely as a Tree in Watercolor

Today's post is just about me playing around with a bit of water coloring.  I haven't used the set Lovely as a Tree much lately and thought I would try a scene with it.  It's not very colorful, but it's pretty clean and simple.  

I was really trying to work on my trees' shadows and the sun and sky.  The sun is not bright at all and that's what I was going for.  The shadows also aren't very dark, but I kind of like the look of that.  The middle tree's shadow didn't turn out at all so that's where I stuck my sentiment. :)  

Since I thought it was a little boring and too light when I made it I added the candy dots for just a little extra something.  At first I was just going to dump it, but thought I'd sleep on it first and try to  make something out of the next day.  I'm glad I did because it's really growing on me. :)

Thanks for looking and have a great day!

Sara

I would love to be your demonstrator! If you like what you see and want to order anything just click on any of the products that I've listed at the bottom of my blog or click on the "Shop Now" tab at the top of my blog. Any of them will take you directly to my website! If you have questions feel free to contact me. Just click "Contact Me" at the top of my blog . If you're thinking of becoming a demonstrator click "Join My Team". I'd love to have you join me!

Supplies used on this card:

Watercolor Inspiration

Do you ever look at other peoples' cards and just get inspired?  I'm sure most of us have and that's what today's post is all about for me.  I  needed both a birthday and an anniversary card and  had just happened to be looking at a bunch of cards by Birgit.  The first card in her post HERE definitely inspired me.  Fascinating colors to be using together.  I grabbed a few of my ink pads, watercolor paper, aqua painters and went to work.  Two cards, same colors, totally different looks.  That's what so fun with watercoloring...you never know what you're going to get.  Her cards are just wonderful, especially if you're looking for a watercolored look.  Plus they are so clean and simple.  She sure makes water coloring look easy doesn't she?  

The first card I made into a birthday card.  I taped off the edges on this card and after I stamped and embossed the trees I did add more color on.  I didn't want the trees to look like they were floating around on the paper. lol

The anniversary card was a little more flexible as you can see! lol  It just did not want to stay straight, but flop all over when I was taking picutres.  It's hard to see here, but the water colored piece is actually framed and popped up with dimensionals.  I definitely added more color after I embossed these trees because they really looked like they were floating! lol  I guess that's the fun with water coloring.  You can change things up a little if you're careful. :)

Thanks for looking and have a great day!

Sara

I would love to be your demonstrator! If you like what you see and want to order anything just click on any of the products that I've listed at the bottom of my blog or click on the "Shop Now" tab at the top of my blog. Any of them will take you directly to my website! If you have questions feel free to contact me. Just click "Contact Me" at the top of my blog . If you're thinking of becoming a demonstrator click "Join My Team". I'd love to have you join me!

Supplies used on this card:

Built for Free Using: My Stampin Blog

2015 Stampin' Up! Convention Swaps

Today I'd like to show you the cards I made to swap at this year's convention.  I wasn't going to make swaps this year, but at the last minute decided to "quickly" whip out 30 of them.  I designed this one to be similar to the birthday card I made for my husband last month.  Since I had used all the other stamps from the great new masculine set The Wilderness Awaits  I figured I'd make a card using the one stamp I hadn't used yet.  

The first thing I want to show you is the "candy dots" I made to put on my card.  I love using them as an embellishment, but don't want to buy all the sheets I would need to keep up with so many of one color so this is what I do to make my own...

Punch out a bunch of circles the size you want (I used the three circles from the cupcake punch).

Next cover each circle with crystal effects.  Make sure it is FULL.  It shrinks drastically when it dries.

I punched out Soft Suede and did up a bunch as you can see.

This is what they look like when they've dried overnight. :)  I really like using them and hope you might too.  Just make sure you have a pair of tweezers handy!

Now onto the main picture of the card.  First I stamped the dog with Black StazOn onto watercolor paper 3" x 4 1/2"...simple right? :)  

Next I stamped with StazOn again like we had demo'd during the first general session...just ink up part of the stamp.

Here you can see it added to the bottom right of the card.

Then I did it again to the bottom left.

Now it's time to add the tree.  I only inked up part of the stamp since I wasn't using the whole thing anyway.  Less mess to clean up that way. :)

First tree...

Second tree...

Third tree.  Pretty simple so far isn't it!:)

I know it's hard to tell in the pic, but my dog is completely wet using an aqua painter.  I got him wet because I want the ink to bleed.  It needs to be damp, but not covered in water.  

I used my Soft Suede ink and aqua painter to start things out.

He's just a light brown for now since the water dilutes the color.

Yes, this looks like the same picture, but if it's big enough on your screen you can see that the dog is wet again.  I did that so I could blend in more colors.

As you can see I missed a picture.  I didn't realize I forgot it until my cards were done. :(  What I did was add Basic Black here and there on the dog while it was still damp, then go back over it again with more Soft Suede.  I didn't cover the black with the brown, but got just close enough so the started to bleed together.  If you look at all the cards piled together you'll see that each dog turned out a little differently, but that's OK!

Now it's time to start adding in some green...Garden Green.

I made sure my aqua painter was damp, but not too wet and quickly added it to the trees and grass.  I did this very quickly and didn't try to be precise at all. 

I did the same thing with Always Artichoke.

It's little more green, but I didn't put quite as much on.

Now for the last green...Mossy Meadow.

I know it's hard to tell in the pics, but I did dab it on the grass and trees, but didn't do it out quite as far as the other greens so the other colors aren't completely covered.

Now it's time to start the hill or mountain.  I ripped a used piece of paper to make my mountain shape.  You can make it any shape you want...round or pointed.

Here I used my sponge and dragged downward with Mossy Meadow.

I pulled the scrap piece off so you can see the shape it made. :) 

I did the same thing again with Always Artichoke, making sure I only pulled the sponge downward.

In this picture I added a touch of garden green.

And here's what it looks like with all three colors after I take off the scrap piece.

Now it's time to add the sky using Soft Sky. 

If you look in the top left corner you can see I got the paper wet again.  I got everything above the hill wet.  I actually went into the hill just a touch.

And now I've added some blue in the top corner.

Keep on adding more blue on until the sky is covered.  If there are a few spots that don't get it that's ok.  That's just the nature of water coloring.

Now on to finishing it up by adding water to the hill.  As you can see I just blobbed it on.  I was just getting it wet so it starts to spread.

Here I've done the whole hill.  

It's hard to tell in this picture, but I actually pulled the green down to go around the dog.  I also pulled some of the green from the grass and trees to do the bottom and behind the trees.

I took this picture to show you the difference in both the hills and the dogs.  I like them both, but water coloring is always going to turn out different even if you're trying to make them the same.

I have the main picture done!!

Finally a completed card. :)  I used Soft Sky as my card base and Old Olive 4" x 5 1/4" as my first layer (even though I never used Old Olive ink! lol).  Then I ran the Old Olive through the Big Shot using the Woodgrain Embossing folder, but I made sure I didn't do part of the bottom so I could stamp words onto it...

I layered my watercolor paper onto Very Vanilla 3 1/8" x 4 5/8" and attached both to the Old Olive card stock.

For the final touch I added the three "candy dots", then stamped "birthday and happy" (yes, in that order) and now I have a finished card!

Thanks to all of you who swapped with me, and took the time to read how I made my card on here!  I hope you enjoyed my picture tutorial and are inspired to make something of your own using any of the great stamps from the set The Wilderness Awaits.

Sara

I would love to be your demonstrator! If you like what you see and want to order anything just click on any of the products that I've listed at the bottom of my blog or click on the "Shop Now" tab at the top of my blog. Any of them will take you directly to my website! If you have questions feel free to contact me. Just click "Contact Me" at the top of my blog . If you're thinking of becoming a demonstrator click "Join My Team". I'd love to have you join me!

Supplies used on this card:

Built for Free Using: My Stampin Blog