Happy Birthday Beautiful Blossoms

Happy happy 1st Birthday to the Beautiful Blossoms Challenge! We are 1 year old! To celebrate we have 5 prizes, so we will have 5 randomly drawn winners.

This was such a fun card to make. I used 2 retired sets: The pitcher and flowers are from Gina K's Life with Zest and the balloons are from Honey Bee Stamps Celebration Box.

The images were stamped on Ranger Ink Tim Holtz's Watercolor Card Stock with Altenew's Obsidian Black Pigment Ink and sprinkled with Altenew's Crystal Clear Embossing Powder before the pigment ink had a chance to dry.

Once heat embossed, I watercolored with Mungyo Professional Half Pan Watercolors. Just lovely lovely colors!

The background was a watercolored panel I had in my stash. I "audition" panels I have made previously to find just the perfect match. I liked this one with green, blue and yellow with gold splatters. 

The Happy Birthday die cut comes from Pink and Main Stamp and Dies set called Surprise. One of those really good basic sets you can use for multiple occasions.

Happy 1st Birthday, Beautiful Blossoms Challenge! Come join us and play along!

*Some of the links in this post are affiliate links. This means if you click on the link and purchase the item, I will receive a small affiliate commission at no extra cost to you. All opinions remain my own.

Jan 2024 Blue Challenge

Hello my friends and welcome to January 2024 Beautiful Blossoms Challenge where Anything Goes as long as a floral image is the main focus.

We have a blue theme with our inspiration photo:

I started with Penny Black's Florescence stamp. I love this image! It's simple and yet easily takes up most of the real estate on an A2 card.

I stamped the image with Altenew's Obsidian Black Pigment Ink and sprinkled Altenew's Crystal Clear Embossing Powder immediately on it. Obsidian Black Ink stays wet for a period of time, so if I am not not heat embossing over it, I just let it sit for about 15 minutes. When I'm crafting, I am not usually in such a hurray that I can't wait for the ink to dry.

For this card I used Acquarello Watercolor Paper - Artistico Extra White 100% Cotton Hot Pressed 140 lbs. Hot Pressed has a nice smooth finish and it is very good for stamping images.

To watercolor I used Mungyo Professional Half Pan Watercolors for the blue background and Distress Watercolor Pencils for the leaves and the dark blue colors. A little splatter with a gold is from Kuretake - Gansai Tambi Starry Colors helped to break up the background. The sentiments are from Hero Arts - CM136 Birthday Messages Clear. This one is a keeper - it seems to be discontinued on the Hero Arts site, but I did find it several places including Walmart.com.

Thank you for joining me today and I look forward to seeing all the beautiful flowers at the challenge!

I will also be submitting to NBUS Challenge, for this is the first time for this Penny Black Stamp and the Distress Watercolor Pencils!

And also Penny Black Saturday Challenge:

*Some of the links in this post are affiliate links. This means if you click on the link and purchase the item, I will receive a small affiliate commission at no extra cost to you. All opinions remain my own.

Angie Blom for Paper Funday

Welcome to the first Paper Funday Challenge for 2024! Another year...more opportunities to create, create, create!!!

The sponsor I choose this month was Angie Blom Digital Designs. I was in a Valentine's Day mood and wanted to work with her image called Sprinkle Love SK-200. If you love digital stamps, check out this shop. The downloads include a pre-formatted set of 4 images. You just print them off, cut apart and you have 4 cards! This is what I did with this set of 4:

If you follow me, you know I print the images with a laser printer and Ranger Ink's Tim Holtz Distress Watercolor Cardstock. To paint I only use one brush - #8 Silver Black Velvet. It holds a lot of paint and comes to a very tiny point, so I don't need various sizes of brushes.

Today's cards were watercolored with Mungyo Professional Half Pan Watercolors. I watercolor at lunchtime at work...I do get quite a bit done every day in only 1/2 hour. I always look forward to my coloring time!

I like to add some extra details to a simple image on my card. Besides Glossy Accents on the hearts, I've used Penny Black's Creative Dies - Textural on the card above and the cut out border on the card below is from Spellbinder's Winter Border Etched Dies from the Tinsel Time Collection:

You can see the Glossy Accents better here. I bought the smallest bottle - .5 oz., for I found it has a tinier tip and works better for me than the larger bottle - 2 oz.

The heart edges are dies from Penny Black's Happy Heart Collection - Lovely Border:

This heart border on the card below is from a retired company called W Plus 9, Heart Border Die. Also, the stitched lines on the bottom of the cards is from the Spellbinders Winter Border Etched Dies from the Tinsel Time Collection run through my Sizzix Big Shot Die Cutting Machine 3 times. I like that texture on my cards.

Thank you for joining me today and come join us this month at The Paper Funday Challenge - Anything Goes!

*Some of the links in this post are affiliate links. This means if you click on the link and purchase the item, I will receive a small affiliate commission at no extra cost to you. All opinions remain my own.