This is Macra-made Specially for You! A Happy Little Stampers Watercolor Challenge

Happy New Year! I’m so glad the last year is over. Saying it was challenging would be an understatement. But I came out whole and I’m better for it.

I’m quite excited to be chosen to be in the Happy Little Stampers (HLS) design team. The wonderful Kylie over at HLS has been so generous with her time and patience 💕 This month’s Watercolor challenge has a twist to it – die cuts!

I am pleased to share with you my latest project – watercoloring die-cuts. For this project, I am featuring the wonderful die-set from The Greetery called Macra-made for You and the versatile Pot-pourri stamp set.

I took some watercolor paper and proceeded to add colors to them using Distress Oxide Inks. The technique I used is called ink smooshing. Ink smooshing is a popular technique crafters use with Distress Oxide. If you would like to explore this further, cardmaking guru Jennifer Mcguire explains it all here. I created panels of browns and tans with dots of colors I will use for the pots and grays and blues for the macrame rope.

I created my background by ink smooshing three different shades of Distress ink colors: candied apple, ripe persimmon and squeezed lemonade. Instead of clean water, I used water mixed with Perfect Pearls to give the sunset sky a slightly shimmering effect.

I used Hero Arts wood grain infinity dies to create the frame for my window. I ink blended Antique Linen and Gathered Twigs using a blender brush on the window frame just for added dimension. After I created my window, I adhered a piece of acetate at the back of the “window” for the “glass”.

As for the plants, I did some faux watercoloring with Tombow Waterbased Markers. I scribbled different shades of green marker directly on the the stamp, then gave the stamp a couple of spritzes of water to activate the color, then stamped it on watercolor paper. I have a video of that technique here.

After I stamped out all the images I needed, I die-cut them out using the coordinating dies. Then I used Prismacolor pencils to add additional details and depth to all my watercolored die-cuts.

I then adhered all the elements onto the window of the card, making sure that the plants stayed mostly within the window frame. I placed foam tape behind the frame and mounted it onto the card to give it more dimension.

For the Happy birthday sentiment, I placed it on the bottom frame of the window. I kept the card base a neutral color so as to make the plants with the macrame holders the main focus of the card.

Hope you enjoyed this tutorial and make sure you hop on over to the Happy Little Stampers webpage and join in the HLS watercolor challenge fun! You just might be the lucky winner!

‘Til next time!

❤️

Anna