Watercolour Wednesday - Men's Cards - Beautiful Balloons

 Well!!! Did I get messy making this card today! I was very impressed how messy I was. Cary would be very proud of me I'm sure! I didn't know when I started this that I was going to use the Beautiful Balloons stamp set but I am so pleased that I did. I started by taking a piece of A4 white card and soaked it thoroughly in water. While it was still puddly, I dropped lots of ink all over the paper. I did have to re-add some at different stages. There was in fact so much liquid on the paper in the end, that I saved some in a little jam jar! Needless to say, I had to leave it to thoroughly dry before I could start to work with it and I had no idea if it would work but it did! 

I stamped several of the balloons in Versamark ink in several areas on the now coloured card. I poured Clear Embossing Powder over it and once I removed the excess powder, I heat set it. I love the way that the colours have popped with the clear powder. 

I embossed a piece of the coloured Holographic foil and embossed it using the Metal Plate dry embossing folder. I took a card base in Lemon Lime Twist, a white mat and then added the foil before I decorated the balloons over then added a sentiment. 

It was simple and messy...very. Fun...yes. But please don't tell Cary!

 

Here is my dry mat of colour with the Versamark stamped balloons on.

The paper while it was beginning to dry.

the puddle of colours, above and below

 

Here is the paper once it was dry and before I stamped on it.

Watercolour Wednesday - Peaceful Deer

 Today's card is one that I had great fun making. a little fiddly but it was great fun to make. I started with a piece of White card and took a large acrylic block and stamped it onto the soft blue of Balmy Blue. This enabled me to get lots of ink onto the block. Using the large waterbrush in the set, I dropped a few drops of water onto the ink on the block....picking up the ink with the brush I literally spread it from the outside of the white card mat to the centre from left to right and repeated it until I had the colour that I was happy with. Yes, I could have used a piece of Balmy Blue card, but there wasn't any mixed texture showing on the mat which I have now.

For more information on the products that I used on this card, please click on the link HERE and it will open a new page for you. 

 

I took a piece of the Stampin' Up! white velvet paper and cut to half a C6 mat then ripped the edges of it to soften it and make it into the background. Stamping the deer and trees onto scrap white card then using Stampin' Blends, I coloured them in. 

Yes, it had to be done. I fussy cut the trees and deer. I then fixed them onto the card using dimensionals to add more texture. A piece of the cotton ribbon and a message inside and out completes this card.

Tips, Tricks and Techniques Tuesday - Peaceful Deer

 For today's card using the Peaceful Deer stamp set, I have used one of my favourite simple techniques and that is Heat embossing. It is so simple to do as long as you have the heat embossing tool, embossing powder and ink pad such as the amazing Versamark. This is really an upgrade of the card I made for yesterday's Make It Monday or #simplestamping project. I have used another of my favourite techniques called matting and layering. I love the layers on a card as it always adds dimension to any card. 

My first action was to use the embossing buddy (a very fine powder to clean up finger prints from the card) and wiped it across the whole of the card that I was going to ink onto. Instead of using the Memento ink pad as I did yesterday, today I used the Versamark ink pad and stamped the deer first and then the stars repeatedly over the upper half of the card. Versamark is Watermark stamp pad and will stay wet for quite a while, even a day or so! Once stamped all over, I poured white Embossing Powder over the wet ink and then heat set it using the Heat tool. It literally takes less than 30 seconds to heat set all of that powder. Watching it change from very dull greyish-white to the shiny white is AMAZING!!! I love it! I stamped a further deer onto the blue card scrap in the same way and once heat-set I punched it out using the matching punch that goes with the stamp set.

I used the Misty Moonlight card and Basic white once again keeping to my monochrome look again. A strip of the gorgeous cotton ribbon, loads of Rhinestones (a big change for me) and a few messages, completes this card for today.  

For more information on the products that I have used today, please click HERE The link will open up in a new window for you.