Happy Little Stampers December Watercolor Challenge

The holidays are here and designing Christmas cards to mail or give are a tradition for me.

I began using Tim Holtz Distress Cardstock and a Penny Black Slapstick/Cling stamp (Alight).   My "loose" plan was to use Distress Inks to color the image with the "direct to rubber" technique.  I decided to grab Tombow Markers instead to color directly onto the rubber.  Rather than color the entire stamp, I began coloring one leaf at a time with a green marker that I spritzed with water and stamped using The Misti tool.

Here's where the "experiment" happened.  Because the paper is textured, the stamped result was very mottled looking.  I picked up a small round brush and using just a little water, began painting the Tombow marker color that blended beautifully! 

I continued the direct to rubber coloring technique with each leaf and blended each one with the brush and water.  As the leaves dried, I worked on the berries.  The bird was colored a section at a time starting with the brown tones and then his belly.  To add more color, I scribbled Tombow color onto glass and "painted" using the small round brush mostly to the leaves. 

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​Red Wink of Stella added a little pop to the berries.   

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 To warm up the stark white of the paper, I blended the edges with Distress Speckled Egg ink.  When it was completely dry, I picked up a Micron pen and decided to doodle everything to better define the overall appearance.  A simple stamped sentiment (Stampendous Holiday Words) mounted with foam tape is all it needed to complete the look.   A stitched border (Lawn Fawn) added texture and framing.

So many experimental decisions went into the process of creating this card and I love the result!

​Thanks for stopping by!

XOXO

LYN