A Little Southwestern Watercolour Weekend

I have a Southwestern scene to share this week for Art Impressions' Watercolour Weekend!  

For most of my cards (but especially this one!) I like to plan them out on scrap paper ahead of time.  I usually sit down in front of the TV and design a whole bunch of cards, planning the layout, the stamp sets and even colours/paper if I can.  I don't like to just sit down in front of a blank piece of watercolor paper and try to start stamping - I find I'm much more productive if I have a sketch and a plan.  Here's what my sketches look like:

With my sketch beside me, I planned out what the cactus cluster was going to look like on scrap paper, mixing and matching stamps, and trying out colours to get it just right.  I started stamping it on Bristol Smooth Watercolor paper from the bottom up, using the rock cluster from 4763 Southwest, colouring them in my Tombow Dual Brush Marker #N55 Cool Grey 7, then I added the smaller stones from 5196 WC Desert Set in #947 Burnt Sienna.  I masked the stones, and stamped the prickly cactus from 4763 Southwest in #228 Grey Green, masked it - and stamped the spiky greenery in #312 Holly Green.  With all of the masks in place, I added the larger cactus from 5196 WC Desert Set in #177 Dark Jade in the background.

I put my watercolor paper into my Misti, along with the frame from 5269 Wood Frames Set from the Bible Journaling line.  I coloured about 3/4 of the frame with #969 Chocolate - just enough to stamp the left side of the frame.  Then I repositioned my paper, moving it about 1/2" to the left and coloured the portion to the right of the cacti, and stamped it.  I did this to make the frame longer than it is, about 1/2" extra so that I could fit the scene in the background.  I used the smaller rock formation from the 5198 WC Mountain Set coloured in #947, stamping it in the upper left, and after masking the frame, a portion of it in the lower right.  I stamped the tiny rocks from 5196 Desert Set around the base of the mountains several times in #947.

Now that the stamping was done, I finally grabbed my #4 paintbrush, and pulled the colour out of all the images, concentrating it in areas where the shadows would be, and leaving plenty of white highlight areas.  I purposely kept the frame very streaky, adding warmer and darker browns to achieve a worn wood effect.  The river was painted in with #565 Deep Blue, picking it up off my palette, and then using it to add shadows in the mountain crevices and on the rocks & cacti.  I added touches of #676 Royal Purple all over my painting to liven it up a bit!  Finally the sky was added with #493 Reflex Blue, and I added touches of it to my scene as well.  I die cut my painting with a 5063 Rectangle A2 Double Stitched die, matted it with kraft cardstock and adhered it to my base with some thin 3D adhesive.  A few sequins finished it off. *I had intended to hand write a sentiment just below the frame - but chickened out at the thought of maybe messing it up after all my hard work!  I may think about it a little longer and add it in... 
Before I painted today's card, I actually did a "Pacific Northwest" version using a pine tree & mountains:

 I created my tree with the WC Tree Set 2, added a few rocks around the base, and a touch of grass.

 I used the twig frame in the Frames set, using the same method of stamping and moving my cardstock before stamping the right side.  I used the other mountains in the mountain set to stamp my scene in the frame, and painted the rest in with my brush.