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Sixth Street Sundries

Emily Midgett

hexagon thin frames

Video: No Line Watercoloring with Pinkfresh Studio!

Hi there! I have a new video up on the Pinkfresh Studio YouTube channel today featuring a few tips on how to achieve good results with your no line watercoloring. You can watch the video below or HERE on YouTube.

For this card, I wanted to create a frame for some watercolored botanicals, so I began by stamping the beautiful Botanicals and Butterflies stamp set onto some watercolor paper using no-line coloring ink. I then taped one of the large Nested Hexagons dies to the same stamped watercolor panel and used my pencil to lightly trace around the edges, avoiding drawing over the stamped images that were peeking out around the edges of the frame.

Next, I used my Holbein watercolors to add lots of color to the image and add a bright, duck egg blue background to the botanical image. This Botanicals and Butterflies stamp is heavy on the foliage and light on the flowers, which gives us time to focus our attention on how to really make those leaves look awesome! The key with any no-line watercoloring is to keep the wet sections separate. If you paint two sections that are right next to each other, they will bleed into each other and you will lose the definition of each individual image. You can speed up the drying time with your heat gun, as I have done in the video, but you can also just move around from section to section, allowing some dry time in between.

Once I had finished watercoloring, I added a Fancy Script Words Hot Foil die cut sentiment with some foam tape. I will periodically take an afternoon naptime craft session and spend the entire time hot foiling things to use in the future, especially the beautiful hot foil sentiments from Pinkfresh. I do a variety of foil colors and cardstock colors and just put them all in a bowl to pull out when I need a quick greeting! I added a few Ocean Breeze jewels for some sparkle.

Well, that’s all for today’s project! I love finding new and unexpected ways to use products. I hope you’ll try using your dies to create unique frames for your stamping projects! Thanks so much for stopping by today, and have a marvelous day!

Honey Bee Stamps Hello Summer Release!

Hi there! I have a special post for you today featuring some of the newest goodies from the Honey Bee Stamps Hello Summer release! This release truly has something for everyone, and it’s chock full of some fantastic new stamp sets that totally scream “summer”! I’m not back to blogging full time yet (between Covid-19 keeping my big kiddos home 24/7 and my new babies, I have no idea when I will be totally back), but I wanted to share some of my creations with this latest release! One of the most exciting parts of this release (for me, anyway) is that I collaborated my fourth stamp set design for Honey Bee Stamps. I can’t wait to show you!

But first, I have a few cards using the new Freshly Picked stamps and dies. For my first project, I did some good, old fashioned stamping, using colored inks to create some custom, fruity patterned paper! I stamped the strawberry images from Freshly Picked using the rock’n’roll technique, which basically uses two different shades of ink to create a bit of a shadow on your solid stamped image. I stamped the black outline layer, then the lighter pink using the solid strawberry image, then added a second layer of the solid image by tapping my darker pink ink pad along just one edge of the solid strawberry image. The result adds a hint of shadow to the strawberries!

To stamp custom patterned paper, I like to start with my largest image and work down to my smallest image to fill in any gaps in the pattern. I took this even one step further by using my black pen to add tiny dots, finally adding a black frame around the edge using my T-square. I trimmed the patterned panel down and matted it on a panel of black cardstock to add the contrast of a stark black frame. I added a greeting from Pear-fect Sentiments that I heat embossed on black cardstock using white embossing powder, then die cut it with the coordinating Pear-fect Sentiments Honey Cuts. A few pink jewels finished it off!

For my second project, I again used the Freshly Picked stamp set, this time stamping only the outline citrus images on some watercolor paper. I then used Karin markers to watercolor them in some sunshiny citrus colors and die cut them with the coordinating Pear-fect Sentiments Honey Cuts.

For the card base, I die cut the Hexagon Thin Frames from some black cardstock. I blended some orange ink around the edge of a yellow A2 card base using blending brushes. I adhered the black hexagon frames using the new Bee Creative Liquid Adhesive (which will be in stock hopefully next week! Seriously, it’s awesome.) then added the watercolored fruit and a sentiment from Pear-fect Sentiments. I added a few jewels to help fill in any holes in the visual cascade.

Now, I have the pleasure of introducing Paradise Blooms, my latest stamp set collaboration! had so much fun drawing these tropical floral images, and they’re just as much fun to stamp and color. For this first project, I did some no-line coloring using the hibiscus and monstrera leaf images. I stamped them on Copic-friendly white cardstock using Ink on 3 Fadeout Ink, then colored them with Copic markers and die cut them with the coordinating Honey Cuts.

For the card base, I blended some emerald green ink along the edge of an aqua A2 card base, to which I added a white die cut Palm Frond cover plate die cut. I layered the floral die cuts over the top using foam adhesive, adding a congratulations sentiment die cut and some jewels to add a bit of sparkle.

For my final project today, I paired several blooms with the new Lattice Cover Plate (top and base). I colored some more blooms from Paradise Blooms using the same no-line coloring method. I also stamped a greeting from the Paradise Blooms and die cut it with the coordinating Honey Cuts.

For the card base, I die cut the Lattice Cover Plate (top and base) from some coral and white cardstock, then layered them together with the new Bee Creative Liquid Adhesive and adhered them to a white card front using foam adhesive. I arranged the flowers in a bouquet in the corner of the lattice die cut, then adhered them using more foam adhesive. (Lots of dimension in this one!)

The final touch was to add some iridescent jewels to the card front for a bit of sparkle!

Well, that’s all for my projects today. I am so excited for this Hello Summer release… it’s so gorgeous, with so many wonderful new products. A very well-rounded release, and definitely something for everyone! Thanks so much for stopping by today, and stay well!