Watercolor Wash Backgrounds

This morning I was asked by a close friend to make some thank you cards for her to use to send to those people who have been sending her and her family lots of love and support during a difficult time.  I jumped at the chance to be able to help her out and immediately knew what I was going to create.

Daffodil Card - Used Dark Room Door Stamps, SU Sentiment & Cardstock, SU Ribbon and Small Oval Punch, 

Clear Embossing Powder and Brown Archival Pigment Ink.

Butterfly Card - Uses Unity Itty Bitty and KOTM Background Stamps, SU Sentiment & Cardstock, 

Black Archival Pigment Ink and Purple Chalk Ink

Both Cards Backgrounds were created using SU Markers and Ink Pads

  

This gave me the perfect excuse to play and I made the background papers using a Water Colour Wash with Felt Tip Markers Technique.  This technique will give you a totally random and different result every time you use it,  and it is quite a quick, easy and fairly mess free one to try.

A QUICK HOW TO - WATER COLOUR WASH WITH FELT TIP MARKERS 

To start you need a Plastic Page Protector Sleeve that you use in your Ring Binders/Folders, and some Water Based Markers.  I have used my Stampin' Write Markers.  For my backgrounds for today's cards I have chosen colours similar in tone.  Eg various purples and various yellow/orange tones.  But playing with mixed colours etc will give you totally different effects.

I have put a white piece of cardstock behind my plastic sleeve to enable better viewing of this technique in my photos.  The second step is to randomly scribble and colour all over the plastic sleeve with your chosen colours.

Once you are happy with your scribble, using a spray bottle, spray some water over your design on the plastic sheet.  Again experiment with different amounts of water to achieve different effects and results.

Once you have sprayed the water, its time to take your piece of paper/cardstock you want to create the background on and press it face down over the wet design on the plastic sheet.

Keep pressing into the wet design until you have covered all your piece of paper/cardstock, you may even like to scribble and repeat the process to add further interest/colour.

You may like to use your piece of paper/cardstock like this, but for today's cards, I went one step further by taking out my Re-moldable Rubber Stamp, which I had some designs already pressed into it saved.

This side had been pressed into chicken wire.

This side was pressed into the seed pods of a plant

Using a darker colour in the similar tones of my water wash background piece I randomly stamped over the surface to achieve the following effects.

Using the side of the stamp that had been pressed into chicken wire

This was using the side of my moldable stamp that had been pressed into the back of a rattan chair

This was using the side that had been pressed into the seed pods of the plant.

This Watercolour Wash Technique is one of my favorite background techniques.  I use it often, and adding to it by random stamping over the top truly does give you infinite possibilities.  You should try it.