A Year of Card Techniques ~ May Blog Hop ~ World of Watercolors!

Welcome to A Year of Card Techniques Blog Hop where each month we feature a different card technique. We’ve assembled a team of card makers who range from new to advanced, so you’ll see a great variety of cards and ideas. 

For May, we are venturing into the world of watercolor. There are so many watercoloring techniques available to us today; far too many to list here. But actions speak louder than words; so our team has worked with their favorite mediums to bring you lots of examples and loads of inspiration. 

If you would like to check out our past technique hops, you can do that here:
January-Shaving Cream Marbleizing
February-So Sketchy
March-no hop this month
April-Stamp Set Showdown

We have an amazing sponsor this month, Jodie Park of Close to My Heart:

Please take a moment to check out the great products Close to My Heart has to offer. To visit Jodie on Facebook page, just click here.

And the awesome prize this month is:

We really appreciate feedback, so please leave a comment on each of the blogs in the hop today. One winner will be chosen from all comments on the hop as of May 26, 2017. The winner will be announced in our June hop; so be sure to come back next month.

And speaking of winners, the lucky hopper from last month is Golden Goddess Designs; picked by Random Name Picker. Congratulations! Please get in touch with last month’s sponsor, Wilma Payne at wpayne@email.com, to claim your prize.

You should have arrived here from my wonderful friend Sharon. If you're visiting here first, you might want to start at the beginning so you don't miss a thing and increase your chances of winning by commenting on each blog. 

Watercolors are one of my favorite mediums to work with. I know some people have a hard time to us them, but there is really nothing difficult about them. You can find them as pencils, paints, markers etc....

For this months hop I thought I start with a simple palette of watercolors, like the case we offer at Close to My Heard...click here!

It is important to use a good watercolor paper. I like to use the Canson XL Watercolor Paper 140 lb. It is relatively inexpensive and you can find it at most craft stores. The paper has a nice weight and thickness...because if you paper is too thin it will wrinkle really bad.

I started with a bunch of watercolor paper pieces measuring 5" x 4" or a little bigger.

Card 1: For the first card I simply draw a rectangular with clean water on my paper. This helps to saturate it and keeps the color somewhat confined. I used three different blues. A wide brush and a few strokes across the paper in each color and this one is ready to dry.

Card 2: The second card is even easier to make. I used lots of water and some yellow, orange and a little pink watercolor paint and added it on my paper. I did added clear water over the whole piece before I started adding colors. You can do this in strips, dots and fill in the blanks. Just try it :-) Once dry, I cut them in squares and created my own little quilt. This tile technique is perfect if you have some of your pieces were you only like part of it.

Card 3: Here is an example of watercolor background were I added water onto my paper first. Next I dabbed watercolor paint on it and let the color run. While wet, the color looks more intense then when it is dry. Cut to size for your card, mat it and place some die-cut flowers on it and one more card is done.

Card 4: For the next example I used a wide brush lots of water and different hues of yellow and red. I brush each color in one stripe. Some colors flow more than others, but I tried to start and end in one line.

Be careful when you stamp a phrase on your watercolor paper. First off, make sure your paper is absolutely dry. Second, use an ink that dries really quick, since the paper will absorb the ink and therefore your stamped image will be a bit fuzzy, as you can see here with my "so very sorry".

Card 5: Here is another example of a simple striped background. Like in card 1 I painted with clear water a rectangle onto my paper. I then added stripes of three different colors to the wet area. After the color was dry I stamped my giraffe, the stones and phrases in StazOn ink onto the paper. Well and on the inside too...

I hope these little examples will help you get a start on your watercolors. Just try and have some fun. I created more samples than I have shown here, but I will try to get them done for my follow ups. I will have more detailed descriptions on how to make these cards and more pictures in my follow up posts in the next two upcoming Fridays. 

Make sure to check back often and please let me know when you have questions. There are so many more techniques with watercolors but this would be too much to show them all here... but if you are living close by, contact me for a water coloring class or let me know if you would like to see more posts of the different water coloring techniques.

Now you’re off to visit with my talented friend Kim. Hope you had fun and thanks for stopping by. See you next month with another technique! 

Claudia

Always remember:

"Art comes from the heart.

So there is never a right way or a wrong way;

there is only YOUR WAY."

Here’s the full line-up in case you get lost: 

Sharon 

Claudia ... you are here

Kim 

Wilma 

Jearise 

Amanda 

Card A Day Challenge Team 

Lisa Frederick 

Sandy Bell Hentzel 

Jodie Park 

Candy Spiegel 

Debbie Rumrill Bonczek