watercolored die cuts

Watercolor incorporated with paper crafting continues to be a huge trend and I love it! There are so many ideas and techniques out there and I am hoping watercolor sticks around for a while. I even invested in some good quality paints and have great plans for lots of experimenting and playing.

One technique that I have loved using watercolor is painting up cardstock and then die cutting shapes from the painted papers. It is such magic to see how the colors fall on the die cut shape. 

With the release of the new Life is Beautiful butterfly dies, I brought this technique out to share the magic.  I gathered up my supplies to get started: white cardstock, a water brush (you can use a plain brush and cup of water as well), something for a palette - I save the acetate that your stamps come on for this, ink refills in the colors you want to use, and the dies for cutting out shapes.

Then just play and paint your cardstock with the ink refill colors. For this example I used Raspberry Fizz, Berry Sorbet, and Pure Poppy ink refills.

I painted up several 4 1/4" x 5 1/2" (card front size) pieces of cardstock in different patterns. Don't stress too much about perfection, because remember that it is going to be cut up enough that imperfections will not be noticed. The other color combination I used to paint cardstock is: Tropical Teal, Ocean Tides, and Simply Chartreuse.

When your cardstock is dry, die cut your shapes from the watercolored cardstock pieces.

Nothing is more happy than colorful butterfly die cus all over my desk!

I also went back and cut some solid colored butterflies so I could embed the detail pieces into them that I had punched out of the watercolor die cut wings. Cut a solid butterfly base, add adhesive, add the detail die cut piece on top, and then add the detail pieces into the wings.

It took a little time, but so worth it!

I used basic Classic Kraft card bases, added a strip of left over watercolor paper strips to the bottom edge of the card front. I stitched those down as well as the butterflies to the card fronts.

The sentiment I used is from the Framed Out #12 set and is stamped in Smokey Shadow ink. This is such a pretty set of cards. They are great to send out individually or would be so great bundled together for a gift set.

And how beautiful are those watercolor butterfly die cuts and butterflies with the watercolor wing details. So pretty.

So don't be afraid to play around with the watercolor trend and don't worry about perfection (watercolor is NOT about perfection anyways!) The result are going to be magic, you just wait and see.

Supplies:

all supplies from Papertrey Ink unless noted

Pink Butterflies Cards

size: 4 1/4" x 5 1/2"

stamps: Framed Out #12

ink: Smokey Shadow, Raspberry Fizz ink refill, Berry Sorbet ink refill, Pure Poppy ink refill

cardstock: kraft, white, Raspberry Fizz

other: Life is Beautiful dies, water brush (Pentel)

Teal Butterflies Cards

size: 4 1/4" x 5 1/2"

stamps: Framed Out #12

ink: Smokey Shadow, Tropical Teal ink refill, Ocean Tides ink refill, Simply Chartreuse ink refill

cardstock: kraft, white, Tropical Teal

other: Life is Beautiful dies, water brush (Pentel)