Watercolor Birthday Card with lots of shine.

Seize the Birthday.

What a great idea for a blog challenge. Seize the Birthday Challenge blog. Focusing on Birthday cards is what I need. You know.. a card maker who never has a card for that birthday that just sneaks up on you. I am so happy to have found this challenge it will certainly help me build up my supply of needed birthday cards. No more making them in the morning of the day it is needed. YaY!!!

I made this one over this weekend. It seemed to take me forever to get it done as it was a two step process because I let the card front panel dry overnight. Then my granddaughter came for a visit today. After we went down town and got a little ice cream, when we were checking out a food truck festival, I was showing her some of the latest cards I had recently made and getting some advise about how to finish up this card. She will be surprised as it is a bit different from what we talked about. That is how it goes with me and my creative process. Start with a rough idea and changes are made as I go along. I am sure many do the same.  On with the design and ingredients.

The beautiful panel was created with a large lattice background rubber stamp by Hero Arts. Stamped on watercolor paper with Versamark ink and white heat embossed. Then did some coloring with Tim Holtz distress marker coloring with 15 colors. I think it was all but 2 that I own. It looks like a lot of coloring but very easy to do as you don’t have to be exact when your planning to spritz with water. I used a spritzer that I have water and some biscotti colored Perfect Pearls in. That is what gives it that pretty water colored shine. I let this dry overnight.

So I originally was going use the whole panel and do a black circle with a stamped or die cut happy birthday in white. It was still lacking something. Then I remembered I had this Martha Steward Border punch that punches out a row of Happy Birthday. I used the punch but cut off the Happy so I could pop up just the word BIRTHDAY behind the panel that I trimmed down. I white heat embossed Happy to the red card front. Popping up the panel and letters took a bit of time as I had to trim the foam tape into extra thin pieces to back some of the letter. I also cut a strip of black card stock to trim the top of the panel and give the letters something to anchor to. Then used some clear Wink of Stella on the lettering and black strip. Topped it of with some clear sequins.

I am really happy with how this turned out. The picture just doesn’t do it justice. I hope you can see all the beautiful shine on the watercolor panel. I have a good size strip left over that I will use on another card. You may see that one in the future too. I will probably hand deliver this card. To be honest I am not sure how the lettering would hold up going through the mail. Here’s a photo of just the panel. Maybe you can see the shine and demension here.

Make sure to check out this blog challenge the crafters have some great cards and inspiration to share.

http://seizethebirthday.blogspot.com/2017/04/anything-goes.html

Thanks for stopping by.

Enjoy ~ Pat