Botanical You + Create-A-Wreath Cards

Hello, Altenew friends!

I want to begin today by saying how thrilled and delighted I am to be invited to the Altenew Design Team and to be able to bring you inspiration and ideas that come from playing with an array of exciting and unique products from Altenew! This is definitely a dream come true!

The cards I'm sharing today showcase a couple of techniques that are easy and fun and produce lovely results. One of my favorite things to do is watercolor paint. I'm no expert; far from it, but I've found you don't need to be to still achieve something very pretty!

I began creating these cards by stamping the layers of the Botanical You Stamp Set onto watercolor paper. I chose the color schemes of Parrot, Olive, Blush, and Rouge for the Kraft card, and Parrot, Just Green, Peach Perfect, and Autumn Blaze for the white card.

For the Kraft card, I simply stamped the layers and die cut the letters. I wanted a clean, crisp look so I left them alone at that point.

I die cut 3 more layers of cardstock to add dimension to the stamped layer and to give the letters more visual weight than the die-cut foliage tucked beneath.

I did the YOU letters on the white card a little differently. As I stamped each color layer, I also smeared some of the ink onto my craft mat and, using a water brush, picked up some of that color and painted it around the shapes that I just stamped. As I stamped each consecutive color, I restricted the painted color to just the area on top of the stamped ink and slightly beyond. I didn't want the painted colors to turn muddy because of being layered too much.

For both cards, I painted some watercolor paper to match the inks and then die cut a variety of leaves and boughs from the Create-A-Wreath Die Set. I also did a color wash of soft subtle color for the background of the white card above, complete with speckle spots of the same paint colors. For this card, I die cut the word YOU, adhered the letters to a piece of vellum, and loosely hand cut the shadow shape.

Each of the cards got a stamped, white, heat-embossed sentiment strip with one of the sentiment stamps from the Botanical You set. Then I arranged the leaves and branches and adhered them to the card front, finally layering the YOU and the sentiment over the top.

The addition of a few coordinating sequins on the Kraft card was just what it needed.

Thanks so much for stopping by today! I'll see you again soon.

SUPPLIES USED:

Botanical You Stamp Set [ ALTN ] Botanical You Die [ ALTN ] Botanical You Stamp & Die Bundle [ ALTN ] Create-A-Wreath Die Set [ ALTN ] Parrot Crisp Dye Ink [ ALTN ] Olive Crisp Dye Ink [ ALTN ] Blush Crisp Dye Ink [ ALTN ] Rouge Crisp Dye Ink [ ALTN ] Just Green Crisp Dye Ink [ ALTN ] Peach Perfect Crisp Dye Ink [ ALTN ] Autumn Blaze Crisp Dye Ink [ ALTN ]