When I first started watercoloring a few years ago, I always thought it would be cool to paint a poinsettia. It took a while for my skills to get up to par, and even though sometimes I still feel like I don’t know what I’m doing, I was able to complete a poinsettia this month.
Hope your December is going well. We have the tree up now, but it is not decorated yet. Thank goodness the weekend is coming up!
Here are the prompts from the last week. There are still a few days left to paint along for World Watercolor Month if you’d like to join us!
Day 22-Under The Sea, Octopus – Tutorial from a Walter Foster book
Day 23-Furry Creature, Yellowstone Bison
Day 24-Monochromatic Mood, from a YT demo by Small & Simple
Day 25-Christmas in July, Poinsettia
Day 26-Splashing Around, Chain Catshark, another painting inspired by a photo taken by my friend Libby, who enjoys Shark Week with my dear daughter-in-law, Maura
Day 27-Clouds in the Sky – created with a paper towel rolled lengthwise
Day 28-Nature Hike, Bee
Again, here’s a little more info on World Watercolor Month and the mission to help young artists through The Dreaming Zebra Foundation. This is a charity providing support so that children and young adults are given an equal opportunity to explore and develop their creativity in the arts.
Have a great weekend! See you soon to recap the last few prompts!
I have wanted to watercolor a poinsettia ever since I started painting about a year ago, and I finally made one worthy of sharing. 
I know this week leading to Christmas will be busy for many, so I am taking the opportunity to wish you all a blessed Christmas!
Yes, I know I have neglected this blog but that doesn’t mean I haven’t been extremely busy with my crafts. After taking the Watercolor Online Card Class for Card Makers, I found that I really enjoyed this medium. As mentioned previously, I always wanted to learn to draw freehand and how to use watercolors successfully without making a bunch of mud, which unfortunately is remarkably easy to make! I scoured various websites, YouTube videos, Pinterest, library books and magazines, etc., and I practiced many months and created projects that I now jokingly call abstracts. I finally found a real class to take where I could get some feedback and learn firsthand.
After 7 weeks of classes I finally have been able to make something I feel confident enough to share. The joke with my instructor was that the first week I used tons of paper towels, and each week I used fewer and fewer. The last class I used only 1 so maybe I got the hang of it a little. Here is my last class project. I know it is simple, but most of the paint is where it is supposed to be!
Watercolor Snowman – class project
Also, because we are two days away from Christmas, I am sharing two Christmas cards I previously made.
The first one is a poinsettia image stamped on a piece of vellum and heat embossed in gold. I then took a second image, cut out the center portion, and pop mounted it on top of the base image to give it a little dimension. These cards were a lot of work but I enjoyed each step in the process and was happy with the elegant look.
2103 Christmas Card
Because the making of this year’s card coincide with my watercolor classes, of course I had to use a little watercolor technique on this card. I made a panel with a simple multicolored wash background and let it dry. I then stamped the snowflakes, heat embossed them with white powder, and mounted the panel to sparkly white paper. The sentiment and chain of gems were also heat embossed in white. I thought a little more sparkle was needed and because sequins were all the rage this year in the world of cardmaking, I opted to add just a few.
2014 Christmas card
May you be surrounded by the love of family and friends this Christmas!
