May 19, 2017

Watercolour Floral Anniversary

Amy Jasper As You See It Challenge, Techniques 2017, anniversary, As You See It, card, challenge, photopolymer, Stampin' Up, technique, thinlits, tutorial, watercolour 2 Comments

I admit. There are many times when I find a great card online and I shamelessly copy it. In the stamping world, of course, we call it CASEing: Copy And Share Everything! My design for you today is a CASE of a card I saw and loved; simple and elegant, with a touch of whimsy. If you want to see the inspiration, click here.

And who doesn’t love the look of some watercolouring, anyway!?

The As You See It Challenge Blog has a theme challenge this week.

My card design uses the lovely Flirty Flamingo for the card. I used the Flirty Flamingo cardstock for the base and I used the Flirty Flamingo ink for the sentiment from the Number of Years photopolymer stamp set from Stampin’ Up!

To create the watercolour background, I first used an Aqua Painter to wet the entire surface of the Watercolor Paper from Stampin’ Up! It needs to be wet enough that the water sits on the surface without pooling, but not so wet that your colour just slides to the edges of the paper.

Then I picked up Flirty Flamingo Ink with my Aqua Painter and spread out a few brushstrokes of colour here and there on the Watercolor Paper. I wiped off the Aqua Painter before picking up some Tempting Turquoise ink and added some random swashes of it to the Watercolor Paper. Again I wiped off the colour before moving on to add some Daffodil Delight to the page until the page was full. With each colour that I added, I also took the time to carefully pull a little bit of one colour into the other on the page so they would blend together a little bit rather than having a sharp line between colours. This gave me some soft green, hazy purple and quiet peach tones in my palette.While I waited for my watercolouring to dry, I used my Detailed Floral Thinlit dies, my Big Shot (you definitely want the Precision Plate with these dies!) to cut the floral detail out of the Whisper White cardstock. I stamped the sentiment from the Number of Years stamp set by Stampin’ Up on the card with Flirty Flamingo ink.

When the watercolour was completely dry, I adhered the die cut Whisper White piece of cardstock to the Watercolor Paper with some Multipurpose Liquid Glue (not too much!). The Crushed Curry Baker’s Twine was then tied around these adhered layers before attaching them to the card base using Stampin’ Dimensionals. Basic Pearls were added to a few of the flower centers as a finishing touch.I also used the same technique for the inside of the card, but only used the smallest of the two floral dies from the Detailed Floral Thinlits.

Seriously folks, if you haven’t done any watercolouring by now, you MUST. Go right now and order some Watercolor Paper and some Aqua Pens. You won’t regret having these tools in your supplies!

Be sure to also play along with the As You See It Challenge using this anniversary theme. You never fail to inspire me with your creativity. So bring it!

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May 5, 2017

Stormy Weather

Amy Jasper As You See It Challenge, Techniques 2017, As You See It, card, challenge, framelits, photopolymer, sketch, Stampin' Up, technique, umbrella weather, weather together 4 Comments

Hi all. It was pretty hot here today. It almost felt like summer! We have an amazing thunder and lightening storm this evening. Crazy!

It’s that time again for a card designed for the As You See It Challenge blog. Here’s the sketch:

My card has an umbrella and two clouds in place of the balloon images in the sketch. I used the Weather Together Stamp set and the Umbrella Weather framelits from Stampin’ Up!

I’m actually not going to go into detail about this card, but will just share a couple elements with you. I started with a piece of the not yet available Wood Texture Designer Series Paper stack. It is a very light, almost white wood pattern that I sponged with Soft Sky ink using the Sponge Brayer, just to make it a little less stark.

The rounded corners framing the wood texture patterned paper was created by using my Layering Circles and Layering Squares framelits with my Big Shot. I simply chose one circle framelit and one square framelit that were close to the same size. Then I cut out first, the square from a piece of Crumb Cake cardstock. Then I lay the circle framelit over the newly cut square piece of cardstock, dead center. Then I ran it through the Big Shot again, so that the circle cut off the corners of the square, giving me four corners to adhere in the corners of the woodgrain patterned paper.

The card base is Pumpkin Pie cardstock. I used a thin matte layer of Soft Sky cardstock and another layer of Crumb Cake cardstock.

I am IN LOVE with the Wood Texture Designer Series Paper stack! I can’t wait until all my customers can buy it when the new catalogue comes out in June!!

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March 24, 2017

April Showers

Amy Jasper As You See It Challenge, Techniques 2017, As You See It, card, challenge, framelits, love you lots, photopolymer, Stampin' Up, technique, watercolour, woodland folder 2 Comments

What do you get when you combine the Woodland Embossing folder, Watercolor Paper and the Watercolor Pencils from Stampin’ Up? Well, scroll on, crafty friends, and find out!!

The As You See It Challenge Blog has a new challenge every two weeks. Sometimes it’s a sketch or a colour combination. Sometimes it’s an assortment challenge or a theme challenge. This one is a fill in the blank challenge! Whoohoo!!

Though autumn is my favourite season, there is something about every season that I love and there is no season that I dislike. Although, of all the months of the year, I dislike February the most. By the time February comes around, I’m very “done” with winter. February is so dreary and dirty as the snow starts to disappear and the dirt and brown grass becomes exposed. Yuck!

But usually, part way through March and moving into April, we start to see more sunshine and the green leaves of spring bulbs show signs of life and renewal. Soon the colours of spring begin to appear. But it’s the spring rain, that I love the most. It’s the rain that helps wash the old winter dirt away and makes the plants grow and become green again. It’s the rain that makes the earth smell so vibrant, so fresh!

So, for this challenge, I focused on the rain and the colours of spring.

The beautiful background with the Woodland Embossing folder was inspired by my lovely friend and adopted team leader. She showed me how she used the de-bossed side of the paper (where the trees were indented rather than raised) and coloured the indented tree images with her Watercolor Pencils from Stampin’ Up. Once coloured, she used a Stampin’ Up Aqua Painter to blend the colour with water. It was so pretty, I had to try it! I love the look, don’t you!!?

I added a touch of the Clear Wink of Stella on the right side of each tree trunk to indicate the glimmer of rain in the spring sunshine. The Clear Wink of Stella spatter over the Watercolor Paper also makes me think of raindrops sparkling in the sun.

The rest of the card is all about layers and paper cutting, really.

The ladybug duo is from the Lots of Love Hostess set. I stamped them on Watermelon Wonder cardstock with Jet Black Stazon ink and used the Real Red Watercolor Pencil and a Blender Pen to the outer edges of each ladybug. Then I fussy-cut around their bodies (cutting off their arms, legs, and antlers … I mean antennae). I drew in their arms and legs with my Project Life Pen afterward.

The umbrella canopy image was stamped with Momento Tuxedo Black ink on Daffodil Delight cardstock and the handle image on Smoky Slate cardstock. Both were die cut with the coordinating Umbrella Weather Framelits.

The sentiment is from the Love You Lots Hostess stamp set and is stamped with Momento Tuxedo Black ink on the Bermuda Bay cardstock.

As for the rest: Basic Black cardstock for the card base. A layer of Basic Gray cardstock. A few Basic Rhinestones. And a flourish of looped Silver Metallic Thread.

Be sure to try the Watercolor Pencils with this Woodland Embossing folder. So pretty!!

Happy Spring!!

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