This Little Piggy - Danced a little jig

For our June my fab friend Kelly Acheson in the USA has chosen No Line Watercolouring for our technique in our international Stampin' Up! demonstrator blog hop.  I haven't used this technique very often so I'm learning with you.  I am quite happy with my Little Piggy dancing a jig though. I teamed my watercoloured image with one of the new Heirloom embossing folders and it's coordinating Heirloom framelit.  They are really easy to use and create either an oval or rectangular frame which could be used for cards like this or photo frames or scrapbooking.  The possibilities are endless. I created my frame with my new fave colour Pretty Peacock and matted it onto a Very Vanilla embossed layer too.  This was embossed with the 3D Tin Tile folder.   

To show you the basics of no line watercolouring I have taken some pictures whilst using the technique with this pot of paintbrushes from Stampin' Up! set Crafting Forever.  

Step 1

Ink your stamp with a very pale colour like Sahara Sand or Petal Pink. Stamp off on grid paper a couple of times leaving very little ink on your stamp and then stamp onto watercolour or shimmery white paper.  

Step 2
You'll have an only just visible image and you can now use ink from the inside of your ink pad lids to colour your image.  You may need to blend colours on an acetate sheet or clear block.  I find that painting the section I wish to colour first with water only from my aqua painter then allows the ink to flow and cover the moistened section.  You can remove excess water with a paper towel.

Step 3

You can once you've finished a section dry your image with a heat tool to set the colour.  

You can then come back and add shading neat ink that you can wash with the aqua painter to create shading. 

This is where I come unstuck as I'm not very patient and you need to be to build up the coloured sections and complete the image. 

You need to try to work on sections not connected to avoid bleeding of the colours so with this image move from one paintbrush on the right to another on the left and so on.  Mop off excess water and revisit each section when dry.  I also find having one aqua painter for just adding water and one for adding ink works well.  You can clean the inky one on kitchen paper between colours.  It is very satisfying and for me will need more practice, but you can become a faux artist and have fun colouring in.

Please visit the other ladies in the hop as I know some of them will be far more skilful than me. To see their designs click on each picture link below. 

Thanks for visiting and I'll be back with more designs and tips soon. 

Happy crafting 

Zoe x

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Stampin' Up! Botanical Bliss Birthday Cards

September is a busy month for birthdays in my calendar and so I made a selection of girly birthday cards using Stampin Up Botanical Bliss set.  It's one of those sets with an eclectic mix of stamps, but they blend together really well and the sentiments are in a fabulous font.  The design team at Stampin Up are really talented and often their own hand writing has been used to create some of the scripted fonts.  It could be the case partially with this set.

I used the vine stamp as a starting point with all these cards stamping it twice overlapping it in Mint Macaron and Soft Sea Foam.  If you are not a 'green' fan then you might be persuaded to like it more with these two subtle shades.  I also used Blushing Bride, So Saffron and Calypso Coral to add elements from the stamp set.  In the top image I used the no line watercoloring technique to colour the focal flower on watercolour paper.  I stamped the flower in Smokey Slate to add an outline which hasn't disappeared completely with my watercoloring, but I think is faded enough not to overpower the delicate flower.  I've added different embellishments of pearls, ribbon or self adhesive sequins and also 'flicked' ink using the marker pen lid to take up some of the 'white space' that you may find difficult to leave and these spatters just soften it for you.  

On this final image I modified the sentiment by using washi tape to mask the happy on the stamp from the set and then added in a Happy from the winter catalogue set Merry Christmas to All.  Using masking and marker pens you can adapt sentiments to suit your needs.  Also a left over piece of ribbon too short for a bow or knot can just add a little sparkle and detail to a flower by folding it in half and adhering it behind the flower.  It helps to draw the eye across  the card and with the iridescent sequins there is just enough bling!

My card base is Blushing Bride and I've used just a layer of whisper white for my stamping and punched embellishments.  

Happy birthday to you if you are a September baby. 

Hugs Zoe x