Hi crafty friends

The short answer to the question in the title – stop sneezing! I’m so allergic to wattle, and I dreaded them flowering every year. However, they are so beautiful, that it seems a shame not to celebrate them! I’m even feeling quite fond of them now that I’m living in Japan and am out of reach of their pollen!

I have three cards for you today using the Wattle I Do stamp set from Paper Rose Studio.

The first card is a very clean and graphic take on the colours in wattle. I’ve painted watercolour stripes of yellows and a grey, and stamped the main image from the stamp set, a lovely large wattle design over the top. I used Distress inks in Wild Honey, Squeezed Lemonade and Weathered Wood for this design.

This next card used a very loose watercolour technique. I stamped the image onto Fabriano watercolour paper using Versafine ink. Once this was dry, I taped the paper to a board, and lightly wet the whole panel. I dropped in patches of Payne’s Grey and Hansa Yellow Light and allowed them to spread. When the panel was slightly drier, I went in again with the Payne’s Grey, sweeping it in the direction of some of the main leaves, but not following them exactly to keep the look loose. Once the panel was completely dry I used a little Terre Verte and Olive green to give some definition to the leaves. Finally, I spattered the whole panel with white gouache and black Gansai Tambi paint. Both these two paints are creamy and opaque and work well on top of other colours.

It wouldn’t be my blog post if I didn’t champion the little guys, would it? For my final card, I stamped the wattle bird images randomly over a white panel, and coloured them with Copic markers, in very non wattle bird colours. The colours I used were Y04,G43, G46, R20, R000, and of course my trusty 0 marker for all the mistakes!

The sentiment for this card is from the same stamp set, and is cut with a banner from the Banners and Stars die set.

If you’d like to see more of my cards, I post regularly on Instagram. Feel free to pop over and have a look.

Until next time,

Blessings,

Donna