E is for ENCOURAGEMENT (in watercolor)

I have been trying my hand at using watercolor pencils to create color and shading on some of my cards.  Things like this are a big challenge to me because of my lack of artistic skills, but I figure I'll never learn if I don't at least try.  I have watched some YouTube videos to help me understand the principles of shading and color, as well as how to wet the pencil marks to turn them into the watercolor effect. (I have not gotten brave enough to take any art courses yet!)

I also have not kept up with my effort to make a whole series of alphabet cards, as I had planned to do way back in September.  I had made an "A for Anniversary" card (you can see that one HERE), "B for Birthday" card (look HERE), "C is for Congratulations (HERE) and "D is for Dream" (HERE).

This past weekend I tried my hand at this by following the directions to make two cards.  The first one is an "E is for Encouragement" card for the next installment of my alphabet cards.

On this card, I stamped the lines and leaves on a piece of watercolor paper in a dark grey ink, then colored the leaves and water-washed them.  I squirted some green spray ink on the plain area before I stamped the message.  I attached the panel to the card front using foam squares to add a little extra dimension and when it was all put together I found it interesting that the effect of the coloring on the stamped panel made it look like the panel is a cream color against the white card background, even though the panel is actually white also.  All in all, I liked the way it turned out.

On this second card, I covered the card front with the daisy paper, then colored the flowers and stems using the watercolor pencils, then painted with the water brush.  I "fussy cut" the petals before layering them on top of the flowered paper.  For the "hello" I die cut two white and one black word and layered them on top of each other, off-setting the black word just a tiny little bit so there would be some contrast to show up the word better, and popped the word up on the card using foam squares.  I really like the way this card turned out.

Both of these cards were made using specific instructions/ideas from a kit for doing watercolor cards, but now I think I'll be brave enough to do my own original ideas.  My biggest challenge turned out to be controlling the amount of water I used on my brush, and only practice will improve that~