more nature scenes (Moon Lake)

Similar to my previous tutorial post (the one right before this post) this is that same Canada Goose from Moon Lake. A slightly different scene as you will notice if you follow my previous instructions. No two are ever EVER the same just as no two lakes or geese are exactly the same! In this one, it needs more cattails since those look kinda plunked into water way too deep for them and usually, speaking from experience, if you have one cattail, you have several hundred! LOL! Also the left hand tree is too small for the foreground. So my tutorial lake turned out better. Practice makes perfect!

The boys say this looks like it could be a scene from The Hardy Boys. Kinda' mysterious and a little scary. Aaawww, I'd thought it was ROMANTICALLY mysterious!

I'm still loving Beautiful Butterfly's fern! Can you tell?!

And this dear brave sparrow (or WHAT is this bird anyway?) sits high amidst cliffs that are sponged onto masked off areas.

If anyone wants a step by step tutorial on any of these, let me know and I'll see what I can do! I had a lot of fun with them!

Canada Goose Sunrise tutorial

 Ever since Moon Lake arrived in my creative space I have wanted to get this lonely mama goose out on a lake at sunrise. She's got a nest in the weeds somewhere and soon she'll have goslings following her around the swampland. But for now, she's taking a quiet break on a cool springtime morning.

 First stamp the goose and her cattails in black StazOn ink on the bottom right hand corner of a 5 1/2" by 4 1/4" whisper white cardstock. Ink only the cattails on the stamp to get a fuller patch of them.

 Tear a mask from a large-ish sticky note. This will be the far edge of the swamp.

Stamp the tips of trees from Lovely as a Tree above your mask. These are the shrubs on the horizon of your lake.

 Unmask your horizon.

Stamp a stand of evergreens on the bottom left corner of the lake.

 

 Using Tempting Turquoise sponge in the water, leaving some white spaces. Lightly sponge Lost Lagoon into the sky, also leaving white spaces.

 

In those white spaces, sponge Pink Pirouette. (My sponge had a smirch of Calypso Coral on it where I thought was pink, so it turned out a bit warmer looking than I'd planned, but I figured I'd fly with it anyway!)

 

 Now here's a favorite tip of mine! Using the edge of your green (I used a variety of greens) inkpad, drag it lightly up and then down in  short straight sweeps to make distant grasses on the edge of the lake. (You might want to practice this on scrap paper first to get the feel of it.) I added a peninsula on the right side as well. Imagine the little fishes out there among the weeds? Wow!
 

 Using the straight side of your already marked up mask, repeat the stamped shrub idea from earlier on that peninsula, using Lovely as a Tree.

 Unmask it. Using your white gel pen, scribble in some horizontal lines for ripples in the water. Stamp grasses to partially shield the goose on bottom right hand corner. Color in the cattails and using a marker draw in a few definite lines to define and ground the distant land forms.

 Using a brown marker, draw in the tree trunks of your evergreens and lightly sponge a variety of greens among all trees to make them come alive.

Trim your picture and adhere it onto a Tempting Turquoise mat. Add ribbon and rhinestones. You have one happy mother goose out there on your swampy lake edge, enjoying a gorgeous spring morning.

I will be adding several other cards shortly that I used similar techniques on. Enjoy getting inky!

The Challenge Spark (all-white with pop of color) baby card

For this week's Challenge Spark I challenged Tara and Jane to show us their version of an all-white card or it could also be all-white with a pop of color. I'm not sure my little teeny bit of newsprint paper behind my baby carriage passes as a pop since it doesn't pop at all! But hey, I had to do the vintage thing again!

For this card I used "Baby's First" framelets dies and just punched a smaller circle out to add dimension to each wheel. It was really simple, but I like how elegant it turned out.

butterfly thanks

It's an addiction, folks! And I'm not about to stop it either, with spring only three or four short months away! (LOL) Here in the north we don't take that gorgeous season for granted, hence, we start celebrating in February already! With...BUTTERFLIES!!!

This butterfly is from Butterfly Thinlits and if you purchase the Butterfly Basics stamp set and thinlits dies together as a bundle you get 15% off. Furthermore, this qualifies you for a saleabration item for FREEEEE!!! Just click on the catalogue pictures on the top right to see what all you can accumulate from now till March 31st! Just drop me an email and I'll gladly place an order for you! Remember for every $60 you spend (before shipping and taxes) you qualify for a free item from the saleabration catty!

vintage collage in pink

I don't usually think "pink" when I'm creating cards. But this card turned out fairly pink, I'd say! I had no plan in mind here, just stamped, masked and stamped some more and this is what came from it! I couldn't even tell you what colors I used, but I'm quite sure Rich Razzleberry was the "pink"! I like using green ribbon loops for leaves...

People Like You...in watercolor

Okay so the whole design isn't watercolor, but the background is---on Whisper White cardstock. I used Stampin' Blendabilities on the flowers and then after the background was painted in, I masked off the flower and stamped on some flourishes and ferns from my ever favorite Butterfly Basics. AGAIN!!!

I fell in love with People Like You long ago but only made a couple cards with it since I couldn't get past that the quote on it. While I don't mind what the original image says (the world is a better place because of beautiful people like you) I'm only going to give that away once or twice. 

One day I had lots of time to think (yes, I was in my recliner due to back issues again...) and I thought, "Hey, there's a punch that matches that shape! I'll use THAT and change what it says!" And since I was in the water color mode I figured those ferns and flowers would be awesome against a pond setting!

So there you have it!

simple watercolor focals {effortless}

One day when my Lupus kept me in my recliner, I surrounded myself with a few stamped images and my aqua painter and ink pads. These are very simple cards, really, but I prefer my watercolor cards to be that way. Basic. About nature. And restful.

Just vary the sizes of the pictures and use a different ribbon style for each and you've got a set of cards you can give away as a gift. Just stack them and tie a bit of twine around the package!