Sixth Street Sundries

Emily Midgett

Simon Says Stamp Hello Gorgeous Blog Hop, Day 2!

Hi there! I’m thrilled to be part of the Simon Says Stamp Hello Gorgeous blog hop on Day 2 of the hop! You should have arrived here from Tina Smith, and your next stop is Jennifer Kotas. You can also start back at the beginning at the Simon Says Stamp Blog. This new Hello Gorgeous release is chock full of fantastic new products perfect for springtime crafting, and I am so excited to have designed a new stamp set for this release: Mother’s Day Tulips. I shared a Copic colored project in this blog post using the new Mother’s Day Tulips set, but today I thought I’d share some inspiration doing some no-line watercoloring, as well as another watercolored project using the Mom’s Spring Flowers set. Let’s get started with the details!

I designed the main floral image in the Mother’s Day Tulips set to cover most of a slimline card front. In my book, the bigger the flowers, the more fun they are to color! These huge tulips are great for really digging down into the nooks and crannies of the image. I began by trimming a panel of Arches cold press watercolor paper down to slimline size, then stamped the Mother’s Day Tulips image using Contour Ink from Hero Arts.

Next, I used the Altenew Artists’ Watercolor 24 Pan Set to paint the tulips a beautiful coral-y red. I love adding lots of touches of contrasting color around the edges of the petals of large images like this, hoping to convey reflections of surrounding colors and add some variation to the images. After I’d painted the flowers their main shades of coral, with touches of lavender shadows, I added some very diluted glazes of bright yellow to the edges of the petals. I also added a wash of cerulean blue behind the flowers, just in the opposite corner and allowing it to fade out completely so that the flowers had a white halo around them.

Once it was dry, I trimmed and mounted the watercolored panel onto a navy blue full size slimline card base. I added a greeting from XL Spring Greetings, which I embossed in silver on some heavyweight vellum and die cut with the coordinating die. The final touch was to add a few Something New iridescent white pearls from Trinity Stamps.

My second project features another new floral: Mom’s Spring Flowers. I thought these looked like wild roses, so I decided to color them in shades of vivid fuchsia and plum using Karin Brushmarker Pro watercolor markers. I began by heat embossing the beautiful floral swag image onto the back of a panel of Arches cold press. I used the slightly less textured “backside” of the super textured cold press paper so that the detail in the flower image would be nice and smooth!

I used some super vibrant shades of purple and pink Karin markers to add tons of intense color to these flowers. With the Karin markers, I like to keep a ceramic palette nearby, so that I can scribble the color onto the palette and pick the color up with a damp paintbrush, then apply it to my watercolor paper. I find that I can get better control over the color and intensity by starting out with the first layers in this way, then going directly to paper with the marker for any areas that I want to make super intense and vibrant, like the petals tucked behind and underneath. I trimmed the watercolored image with my sharp scissors, but there are coordinating dies available!

For the card base, I wanted those beautiful, intense blooms to really pop, so I embossed the floral bouquet a couple of times on a a hunter green card base using platinum embossing powder, the same embossing powder that I used to emboss the flowers themselves, so that they were peeking out from behind my watercolored bouquet. I then used a blending brush to blend Concord and 9th’s Evergreen ink over the embossed corner, adding a touch of extra contrast between the embossed image and the deep green card base. I adhered the flowers to the card front using foam adhesive, then added a greeting from Spring In My Step, which I heat embossed using some more platinum embossing powder onto vellum. The final touch was to add a few Sparkling Champagne Metallic pearls for some shine!

Well, that’s all for my projects today! Now, for some fun giveaway information:

To celebrate the new Hello Gorgeous release, Simon Says Stamp is giving away a $25 coupon to every stop on the hop. The winners are selected from the comments section, then announced on the on Simon Says Stamp blog on Wednesday, the 30th of March. Be sure to check back on the Simon Says Stamp blog and email them if you’re the winner! The more comments you leave, the more chances you have to win!

Your next stop is Jennifer Kotas. You can also check out the Simon Says Stamp Blog for all of the hop stops, as well as the Day 1 Blog Hop! Thanks so much for stopping by today, and happy hopping!

Reader Interactions

Comments

  2. These cards are both gorgeous! These are my favorite stamps from the new release and you used them so beautifully!

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  8. Love your color choice. The second card flower is, I believe, a clematis vine. The color is spot on from a plant I have growing in my yard. I Need to buy this!

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  23. You made these flowers look so realistic on your cards. Just lovely and the colors blew me away. Thanks for sharing your talents with us.

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  28. Gorgeous cards. I love the colors. The Mother’s Day Tulips set is definitely one of my favorites from this fantastic release.

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  40. Stunning cards!
    My favorite is the Purple combined with Pink and the heat embossing gives it that little something extra!

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  41. Hi, Emily – It’s astonishing to me that you can make flowers look so life-like. These are gorgeous!! I love both cards. Thanks so much for sharing your exceptional talents w/ all of us!!
    Lori S in PA

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  55. Stunning cards! I am in love with how beautiful the purple and dark green look together! They are so perfect!

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  64. Amazing spring florals! You’ve made your flowers really come alive. Thanks for sharing your creative card designs.

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  67. Just so beautiful! I struggle with no line watercolor (ok… I struggle with watercolor in general!) but love the look! Thanks for the inspiration to go and give it another shot!

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  70. I am in awe of you fabulous designers who can water colour or use markers etc to create such beautiful cards!

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  76. Both cards are so gorgeous and I especially like the slimline tulip design. Your color choices are perfection

    Reply

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