Watercolor Bouquet of Love - a Must Have Set!

I looooove this stamp set, Bouquet of Love, from the July Collection. Yep - it is from the July collection, not August, but guess what?! It's still available and it's worth picking up!

First, it will fill an A2 card. Yep - full-sized right there and isn't it fantastic!

Second, it has a matching die, which is also still available!!

Third, it has awesome sentiments that fit in the space on the pitcher. I didn't use any of them on this project but you totally could. :)

4th, this stamp set will work for get well, sympathy, anniversary, birthday, thinking of you, hello, just because, friendship, new baby and so much more!

And, you can watercolor it in so many different colors. Check out some variations. I can't get enough of the Peerless Watercolors!

Hope this inspires you to play with your watercolors or think about making a super small investment in some. The more you practice, the better you'll get with them. I cut the Peerless sheets into fourths and use a quarter sheet at a time. They last so long as you barely have to dab your waterbrush in them to pick up the color - super concentrated! And, they're so easy to travel with and use wherever you go. I watercolored both the grey pitcher and red pitcher images above in the Chicago O'Hare airport while our plane kept getting delayed and delayed and delayed. It was a great way to pass the time. And, I also watercolored on a balcony in the Smoky Mountains. Isn't this a great place to color?

All supplies are A Muse Studio and are available in my webstore: www.amusestudio.com/seleise
To find the Bouquet of Love, click on the web link, then click on stamps and you can either search for bouquet or you can click on past collections and scroll down. Happy shopping!

Have a wonderfully creative day!

Watercolor Pitcher - July Collection

The July Collection is here and it's wonderful! If you're a cardmaker, there are beautiful berries, shells and this gorgeous floral filled pitcher. If you're a scrapbooker, there are travel, alphabet and date sets. And, there are digital pocket scrapbooking materials too! (which are also awesome for cardmaking!) If you're a planner/smash booker/journaler, there are labels and time stamps and it's all fabulous!
Check it out: July Collection PDF

I adore pitchers with flowers! I have several stamp sets like this and they're all so great to use for friendship, get well, sympathy and thinking of you cards. They make fabulous birthday cards too!

This image is stamped on Bristol and watercolored with Peerless Watercolors. Do you have those yet? They're so easy to use and so transportable. Here's a photo of the work in progress.

The watercolors are those flat bits of color. The Peerless sample pack comes 2X2 and I cut them in four pieces and mount them with glue dots on watercolor paper. It's scored in half so you can fold it up (with a bit of acetate between the colors  - that you can also use to mix colors on). Take that, a paper towel, a waterbrush and some pre-stamped images and you're able to watercolor almost anywhere and there's no mess beyond a little water. :)

By the way, the single flower is featured on my previous blog post. :)

Hope you'll give Peerless a try. I'm sure glad I did! And, check out the July Collection. There's something for everyone!

Have a super day!
www.amusestudio.com/seleise

Watercolor! Sunset Expressions

I have been way busier this January than I originally thought I would be so my blog got pushed to the back burner. But, I've got cards to post and so am going to jump back into my blog in a big way with tons of pics in this post!

In December, there was a sympathy card swap with some fellow consultants. I make a lot of sympathy cards but was looking for a new way to approach them. It was bitterly cold outside so what better thing to do than sit with a warm cup of tea or coffee and get some stamping on, right?

The inspiration for the card happened as I drove home from work. There in front of me was the most amazing sunset. The sky would light up with colors and shades of oranges and golds and purples and pinks. Amazing! Don't believe me - here you go:

I searched through my camera and found a few other sunsets for inspiration.

 I posted about it on facebook and a couple of friends sent me their favorite sunset pics:

Aren't they amazing?! So glad they shared!

So, that was it. The cards had to have awesome sunsets with something stamped in silhouette. What could be better than that? I looked at my different coloring mediums and there in the front were my Peerless Watercolors. Perfect!

I took a rectangle piece of Bristol cardstock (our watercolor paper) and spritzed it with some water, picked up some color with my waterbrush and went to town adding colors. The sky was the limit (no pun intended - lol!) as the colors of a sunset in Kansas can be any color. Layers of colors- dabs of this  and that were added in. If the paper started to pill up, more water was added and back to blending and adding of colors. Here's the batch of swap cards:

As you can see I played around with colors, dark/light, blending/not blending, etc. But, I love all the variations. This had to be a class card but the design would have to be modified a bit:

I left the inside simple. And, if the class peeps chose, they could leave the sentiment off because this is also just a perfect notecard to have on hand. 

I watercolored first, dried it and even ironed it and then stamped the Sunny Side of Life image with Versafine Black ink. Versafine is a great ink to use when you have a lot of detail on your stamp. It's an oil-based pigment ink and dries fairly quickly. It's acid-free, archival, non-toxic and fade resistant.

So, this card turned out to be a favorite of many at class. It was fantastic to see all the variations of sunsets so I want to share - here you go:

Aren't they great! I just love the different variations and different layers of color and the joy shown in all of them! It was fun because many didn't care for the backgrounds until they stamped their image and then it was a wow moment!

I was asked if you could stamp first and then watercolor. I wasn't sure outside of embossing the image first, if this could be done. So off to the A Muse message boards to ask and got responses right away - so great to have helpful peeps! The answer was yes. If you stamp with an archival ink such as Versafine or Ranger, you can stamp first, let the ink dry and then watercolor. Other inks may start to bleed when wet and trust me, you want the color to move so you want the paper to be wet.

These cards are so easy and fun to make. I'll be back with more watercolor posts soon. I do want to tell you that the Peerless Watercolors are just great. You can make a carrier to make them easily portable. The color lasts a really long time. I've taught several watercolor cards in class and have also done a bit of watercoloring myself (ok - more than a bit) and I'm just now starting to replace my first sheets. I cut mine into fourths to use and those are the sheets I'm talking about so I still have three more to use before I need to buy a new set. After this class, I'll probably have to replace a few more but it will be totally worth it.  Here's a post that will tell you more about them and show you how I have mine mounted: http://amethystcat.blogspot.com/2014/10/simple-swirls-watercolor.html

Visit my webstore to pick up some bristol paper, a waterbrush and your Peerless Watercolors: www.amusestudio.com/seleise

I hope you've enjoyed this post of watercolor and sunset love. Have a wonderfully creative day!

Shimmery Season's Greetings

Peerless shimmer inks are AWESOME! They are shimmery and lovely and you get a whole bottle of their fabulosity. I watercolored the background with the gold and silver shimmer and also painted the flowers with the shimmers. With my classes this month, I gave them the choice of painting the backgrounds or putting some shimmer blobs on a craft sheet, mixing in some water and smashing their watercolor paper in the shimmery puddles. There were so many cool backgrounds. So fun!

After the background dried, the season's greetings stamp was stamped with ranger ink and the leaves and berries were outlined with the gold and silver signo gel pens. Isn't that pretty?

Two of the paper forget-me-not flowers were attached with glue dots and one was popped up with 3D foam on top of a piece of blackberry card stock wrapped worth silver edged organdy ribbon. Pearl stickers were added to finish off the flower. Aren't they pretty in their shimmery state?

Finally, there's the fantastic font on the Merry Christmas on the inside of the card. That's from Handwritten Holiday. 

Want to get some peerless shimmers of your own? They're in my webstore: www.amusestudio.com/seleise

Have a wonderfully creative day!!

Watercolor Poppy with Gold Shimmer and Champagne Glitter!

 When you have this much glitter, it's hard to get a great picture. But, it's all good because this card has shimmeriness from the watercolor to the glitter. Such sparkly wonderousness! Yes, those are words....maybe...not so much...lol!

First the Stained Glass Poppy stamp set was watercolored with the Peerless watercolors and then some peerless gold shimmer was watercolored on top and then champagne glitter was added on the edges. fabulous!! Isn't it pretty on the papaya and onyx cardstocks! The top layer is the Bristol watercolor paper.

A little corner rounding and a round sentiment piece was added. I know the picture looks a little brash and bold but in real life - it's not too much. It's a beautiful sympathy card to send to someone.

The inside is simple as the front says it all.

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Have a wonderfully creative day!!

Simple Swirls Watercolor

Simple Swirls has pretty little flowers that are so cute! But, what's great is that they're even easier to color with the Peerless Watercolors! We carry the 40 color 2X2 pack. The colors are so vibrant and wonderful. And, so easy to use!

One note is that it's important to use watercolor paper as regular cardstock can warp and tear when water is added.

Here is how I use my peerless watercolors. I cut each of the 2X2 squares into quarters and then assembled one set of the quarters on a sheet of 9X12 Bristol paper (a watercolor paper that we also carry). I just used a glue dot to stick each color down in order from left to right, top to bottom. I did the left and then the right. When I was finished gluing down the pieces, I used the waterbrush (below) to put a swoosh of color under each square.

I also put a piece of acetate that stays between the colors when it is folded shut so if any of the colors are still wet, they won't blend into each other.

So...What's so great about these watercolors?

• easy to use
• easily portable (you're basically just carrying around a folded piece of cardstock and you have a myriad of colors at your disposal!!)
• they last a long time (I've used these at four classes so far and have done some personal watercoloring and am still on my first quarter of the pack. this will vary, of course, based on your level of coloring but I find that a little dab of color will do ya. ;) )
• they're fun! (they make me feel like an artist!)
• very economical method of coloring
• easy to make backgrounds and color images
• and so much more!! 

I hope you'll give the watercolors a try as they're super fun!

I forgot to take a picture of the inside but I used a smaller matching flower on the inside and just shaded the outline with tombow markers that matched the watercolors used. I didn't watercolor inside as regular cardstock doesn't stand up well to watercoloring.

Simple Swirls Notecard
Stamps: Simple Swirls
Cardstock: Bristol Paper Pad, Onyx Shimmer, Bermuda
Ink: Memento Tuxedo Black, Versamark
Emboss: Onyx Embossing Powder, Heat Tool
Other: 3D Foam, Peerless watercolors, Tombow markers, water brush

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Have a wonderfully creative day!