make it new again...

Trends in stamping come and go. There are new supplies, new techniques that we all have to have. I am sure that your stamp rooms, in my case the corner of my basement, are well stocked with supplies you had to have because it was the biggest thing, but now those supplies sit unused on a shelf or in a box.

One of those supplies, for me, is the Twinkling H2O's. Lovely little sparkling watercolor paints that I saved my coupons for to get at my local craft store way back when. I loved using them to add sparkle to my watercolored images and painting them right onto my stamps for really neat watercolor effects. My Twinkling H2O’s have sat unused for probably years…

Back when I first got the Twinkling H2O's, I didn't own an acrylic stamp. Now that I use my acrylics all the time, I wondered about using the Twinkling H2O's with them and how they would work... and I really love the results!

I pulled out the Beautiful Blooms set, the Everyday Blessings set, a 1/4 piece of Papertrey white cardstock, a watercolor brush, a few colors of Twinkling H2O's (I used Pink Azalea, Orange Peel, and Moss Green), a water spritzer, and water to clean my brush.

You can see my sample piece above, which is what I am going to recreate. Keep in mind that the paints are just wonderfully shimmery - an effect that is really hard to capture on a camera.

Get your brush wet and really work it into the paint. Then simply paint right onto the stamp. The color is not going to spread evenly, and that's okay. Just get it covered the best you can.

 

Then use a water spritzer to mist over the painted stamp. This is kind of the same idea as "huffing" on a stamp that you have inked with a marker. It gives the paint enough moisture to be stampable.

Stamp your image, spritz the stamp again, but you don't need to necessarily add more paint inbetween stamping images. Each stamped image will be lighter image each time, which adds depth to your final stamped image. The paints will flow around on the stamp and really create a wonderful watercolor effect. And, with the twinkling H2O's everything just shimmers!

Do the same steps again for the leave image. Paint the green over the stamp, mist and stamp, and then mist and stamp again. I did find that with the lighter green hue I did add more paint after stamping twice. Just play around and experiment. You will discover what works best with the colors that you choose.

 

I like to build my image from the inside out. I stamped 3 of the flowers for my focal point and then added the leaves around them.

I added my centers for the flowers the same way as I stamped the flowers and the leaves. Let your image dry a bit. One thing I love about the Papertrey white cardstock is that I really don't have to worry about the paper warping when I get it wet. The weight and texture work beautifully for this and other techniques involving water or paint. If your paper that you use does curl or warp, place it under a heavy book for a while to flatten it out.

After the image is how I want it, I trim it down. I do this quite a bit when I stamp - start with a larger piece and then trim it to the size that I want or what feels right.

The best way to describe when the size feels right is about how the image is balanced and where my focal point is, what sentiment I am going to use and where it is going to go, the size of card I am making, and even the colors that I am putting my card together with. It's not exact answer, I know, but the more you stamp and create the more you are going to know this feeling.

I chose a sentiment from the Everyday Blessings set. I can't say it enough, how much I really love acrylic stamps for lining things up where I want them to go without the extra tools.

I used the Papertrey white cardstock for my card base, matted my image with the Spring Moss cardstock, and tied on the Spring Moss satin ribbon.

There you have it! An old paired with the new for a beautiful effect. The wonderful shading that you can see on the flowers just happens with this technique. You become a watercoloring artist, without having to paint a petal on the paper.

Go dig out those Twinkling H2O's and dust them off, your Papertrey Ink stamps are waiting!

Twinkling Blossoms card

Supplies:

stamps: Beautiful Blooms, Everyday Blessings (Papertrey Ink)

Ink: Archival Black (Ranger)

Cardstock: Stampers Select White, Spring Moss (Papertrey Ink)

Accessories: Pink Azelea, Moss Green & Orange Peel Twinkling H2O's (LuminArte Inc.), watercolor brush, water spritzer, Spring Moss satin ribbon (Papertrey Ink)