Park Bench mostly Watercolor Card

I recently spent a bit of time watercoloring a few cards.  I quite enjoyed it, but while working on this card I decided to do a bit of experimenting.  In my last post I talked about the ease of watercoloring with Distress Inks.  On this card, I still used a variety of Distress Inks, but I also used a couple of dye-based inks, Copic Markers, AND...Picket Fence Distress Stain!  A couple unusual ingredients in watercoloring, I'm sure, but I wanted to try something a bit different -- I did...and it worked (at least I think so). 

I watercolored the card as I described in my Forget Me Not watercolor post, but I was very curious as to what would happen if I used the Picket Fence Distress Stain to add a touch of white wash.  The stains have a dabber top and you can just literally swipe over the area you are wanting to color.  I really wish I had a before and after picture to show you, but I can tell you the colors became a bit softer after using the stain.  Scrap Time has a great video featuring Tim Holtz on how the Picket Fence (PF) stain reacts with other colors that may help give you an overall picture of what this fabulous stain can do.

After I used the PF stain the first time, I really liked it and decided to add one more coat of the white wash -- which turned out to be a bit too much for the brown park bench.  Sooo, I pulled out my Copic Markers (alcohol ink) and add a bit more color to the bench which really helped.  The hat & daffodil flowers I watercolored with dye-based inks, because I didn't have the yellows I wanted in the Distress Inks.  My final coloring was with the Copic Spica markers -- these markers have a fine mica glitter in them that just give the card a bit of shimmer when tilted back & forth.  I used the Spica markers on the hat, daffodils, & blue bird.

If you click on this photo you can really see the Spica mica!

To complete the card I pleated the ribbon by folding it in half, adding a staple, and folding the ribbon back over the staple...repeating three times.  The last pleat is held down by a glue dot and adhered to the back of the mat.  I don't know who the stamp was made by, as I've had it around for quite a while...and it's a bit embarrassing to say I've not even used it until now.  =) 

You might really enjoy giving watercoloring a try too.  And don't worry about being precise, as I think it gives it just a bit of an artistic flair -- that and the fact I don't enjoy anything too tedious.  =)

Thanks for stopping in...hope you'll come visit my blog again soon!  Lisa