A Wreath for Watercolour Weekend

I haven't made a wreath in a while with my Art Impressions watercolour stamps, and after seeing inspiration on Pinterest, I decided to try something a little different from my usual style.

I began by lightly drawing a 3" circle in pencil on my Bristol Smooth Cardstock, and marked the points at which I wanted the sprigs to end.  Using my Tombow Dual Brush Marker in #312 Holly Green, and the two skinny sprigs from 5126 WC Foliage Set 4, I stamped them in several directions at each end of the wreath.  Using the largest sprig in the set, and #158 Dark Olive, I stamped the branch upwards from the lower right corner, several times, and again in the opposite direction along the lower side.  Next it was time to work on the cluster of flowers.

I used the triple rose cluster from 5258 WC Flower Set 4 and my #533 Peacock Blue marker to create the flowers, sometimes colouring only one or two of them.  I placed several more flowers sporadically around the wreath.  After dabbing them with my damp #4 paintbrush, the flowers needed to be darker, so I used my #565 Deep Blue picked up off my palette, to deepen their centers.  With the larger vines from 5126 WC Foliage Set 4, I stamped in greenery around my cluster using #373 Sea Blue - but the colour was too harsh, so I went over it with #249 Hunter Green, which was a better choice.  With the tiny Foxglove stamp from 4052 Flower Set 1 and my #606 Violet marker, I stamped it 3 or 4 times moving the stamp out slightly each time, to create trailing blooms coming out of my cluster.  After touching them with my damp brush, I added another few dots off the end of the flowers to make them appear to be a pointed shape.  Finally, to create the strings of flowers coming off the bottom of the wreath, I used the image from 5009 - WC Mini Flower Set that has 3 heart shaped flowers.  Colouring just one of them with #565 Deep Blue, I carefully moved it straight downwards and stamped numerous times without reinking (If I had moved the stamp away to reink, I would never have gotten it back to the same spot to continue).  I used my TT42 - Twintone Blue Marker - 42 Navy to draw in the stems, and to add dark centers to the roses.  Anywhere there were spaces needing to be filled, I stamped in a little greenery, or used my markers right on the image to draw in a leaf.

The sentiment is from 5266 - Greenery Invites, stamped in Versafine Onyx Black Ink.  I used my sewing machine to stitch the image to a black mat, and adhered it to my blue base with 3D Adhesive dots.  Be sure to check out the Ai blog on Saturday to see what Dot & Tricia have to share!

Watercolor Weekend Wreath

I have been painting a lot of scenes lately with my watercolor stamps, and decided to try something a little different this week - a wreath.  I was inspired by the botanical style of graphic artwork that I've seen on Pinterest from a lot of stationery companies, and wanted to see if I could achieve a similar look with my stamps.  I'm pretty happy with my first effort:

I started by tracing a faint circle in pencil on my Canson XL watercolor paper to use as a guide.  I began with the leafy green image from 5126 WC Foliage Set 4, and #249 Hunter Green, stamping it around the circle in both first and second generation.  I wanted to have a strong contrast of greens, so I coloured the stem of a flower from 5008 WC Flower Set 3 in #126 Light Olive, and the petals in #565 Deep Blue.  To fill in a few areas, I used the tiny foxglove (quite possibly my favourite Ai watercolor flower!) from 4052 Flower Set coloured in #533 Peacock Blue.  I love the versatility of this stamp, I can stamp it repeatedly to be as long as I like, and because it's so tiny, it allows me to bend the blossom one way or another to suit my design.

Using two of the branches from 4964 WC Branches Set coloured in #969 Chocolate, I tucked branches in and around the wreath to finish it off.  I very lightly used my damp #1 paintbrush to dab the leaves and blossoms, keeping them mostly intact (I didn't want to lose the image definition).  I used a TT42 - Twintone marker in 42 Navy to add a few dots around the foxgloves to finish them off.  I looked at several of the birds from different sets, and found that this one from 5030 On The Sparrow Set in the Ai Bible Journaling collection fit perfectly inside the wreath - so I coloured him with #969 and used my stamp positioner to set him just inside the bottom of the wreath.  I pulled out the colour with my brush, and added in touches of #533 on his wings and tail.

I kept my wreath quite loose and open, making it slightly irregular - and really love the look! I can hardly wait to try a fall version.  I matted the image on some periwinkle cardstock and stitched it down with my sewing machine.  I tied some twine around my kraft cardstock base and attached the image with some pop dots.