Hello crafty friends! I’ve been playing with a new set from Paper Rose, and I’ve made three cards to share with you today. I’m so proud of the last card – I just love how it turned out!

The set I’m playing with today is the Artist’s Tools stamp set from the Arty Love collection. This collection has a bunch of fun art and craft images. The stamp set I’m working with today has brushes and paint trays so I chose to watercolour for all three cards.

For the first card, I lined up all the brushes and paints along the edge of my card, making sure I had a range of heights, and stamped them in Versafine ink in Onyx Black. I then chose a rainbow of Distress Inks to use as paints. The colours, from left to right are Candied Apple, Ripe Persimmon, Wild Honey, Mowed Lawn, Peacock Feathers, Mermaid Lagoon, Blueprint Sketch, Wilted Violet and Seedless Preserves. I also used Weathered wood to add details to each of the paint tubes.

I painted each of the brushes and paints in three layers, light, medium and dark, covering less of the image each time. I then used clean clear water to make the shape of the paint flow before dropping strong pigment in near the top and tilting the card to let it flow down the wet portion of the card. Once everything was dry, I stamped the sentiment from the same stamp set.

For the second card, I used just one paint stamp, one Distress Ink colour (Ripe Persimmon) and one sentiment. I stamped the image and sentiment in Versafine Onyx Black ink and coloured the paint tube. I then painted the large paint blob in water first to gauge the size and shape I wanted before adding colour to it. I then added some spatters by flicking the paint onto the card.

Finally, I used the little paint palettes to make a field of flowers. I stamped the ‘flowers’, starting from the front and masking them before stamping the images that would come behind. Once again I used watercolour paper and Versafine Onyx Black Ink. Once the flowers were stamped, I masked the bottoms of each flower and stamped the ‘stems’ – which are actually paintbrushes! The leaves are a small heart from the same stamp set.

I used almost identical colours to the first card, but added in Twisted Citron and Squeezed Lemonade for the two flowers on the right, leaving the Mowed Lawn for the …well, lawn actually!

Once the flowers were all painted, I cut around the tops of them all. I popped them up with foam tape onto a card. I used the Half Tone stencil and Broken China Distress Ink to make the dot pattern on the card for the sky.

I hope these cards inspire you to think outside the box with your stamps. . I’d love to see your creations. If you post on Instagram, please tag me so I can see them. @donnadoll74.

Until next time,

Blessings,

Donna