project | watercolor card

Once upon a time I saw this post on Oh So Beautiful Paper and bookmarked it for a rainy day.

This isn't so much a novel idea as it is one worthy of being revisited often. As of late, I have noticed a lot of watercolor out there and I kinda sorta love it. It conjours up a wistfulness I associate with springtime and newness.

Now, like any self-respecting papercrafter, I own both watercolor paper and rarely used watercolors. They have gathered dust in a bin waiting for their fickle owner to scoop them up and actually make something.

I give you the incredibly basic watercolor card with guest appearance by "love you" rubberstamp.

fig.1: Gather your supplies. Some of the items you will need that aren't pictured...scratch paper to mix paint, paper towels to blot excess water, and a stamp pad.

 fig.2: Cut and score your watercolor paper. I made this 4Bar size which is 3 1/2" x 4 7/8". This is the smallest size you can safely send through the mail.

 fig.3: Create a wash of color. This is a totally freestyle exercise, so just experiment and have fun. If you are using watercolor paper you will get much better results. I tried using thick smooth paper and I couldn't get it to blend well. Perhaps human error.

stamp designed and sold by the talented Tina of LifeLovePaper

fig.4: Stamp your chosen image on a piece of smooth cardstock and cut out. I left a thin border around the edge.

TIP: Okay...so i tried to stamp this image directly onto the watercolor paper and, well, I should have known better. It's difficult to get a sharp result on textured paper. I was pretty mad at myself since I was really happy with the watercolor background and I didn't want to have to scrap it. Don't be like me:) Test your stamp on the same background you intend for your project...FIRST.

fig.5: Adhere your image to your card. I used a pop dot.

fig.6: Write a sweet note on the inside.

NOTES: I plan on making a version of this card about a million more times because I loved the result. I would really love to do it on smooth paper but it just didn't work for me. I used Papertrey paper since that's the heaviest stock I had on hand. I think it works fine if you just want color...but I wanted to achieve more of a wash effect with subtle gradations. I guess I can always do it digitally and print it out onto smooth paper like I did with the  sweetheart mini mini, but that's not quite the same as getting messy is it?  I would really love to try a resist effect with text and embossing. Maybe it's time to bust out the mists and distress inks...God knows they could use some love.