Mousey Mousey (and an ickle tutorial)

I've used one of the new cute mice images from Lili of the Valley called Three Kind Mice. I've water-coloured him with reinkers and added lots of lovely embellishments from The Ribbon Girl including this gorgeous textured Hessian ribbon.

I've done a mini photo tutorial of how I've coloured some of the flowers to match the colour theme of the card.

I've used plain white lily flowers and coloured the ends of each petal with a Zig Real Brush watercolour pen. I'd just got half way around the final petal before remembering to take a photo, but hopefully you can see what I was doing.  I'd already gone around with a pale pink underneath the lilac to give it a bit of depth so you may be able to see a bit of pink under the lilac if you look closely.

It looked quite 'harsh' so I then dabbed a small wet paintbrush onto the colour to blend it a bit.  When it was dry, this was what it looked like:

I also colour some of the mini rose buds. The one below was coloured pink using the same Zig markers technique as above, but instead of using a paintbrush to blend the colour, this time I dunked the tip of the rosebud into water for a fraction of a second, (literally in and straight out again, even quicker than dunking a digestive biscuit in your cuppa so it doesn't disintegrate and end up as mush at the bottom of your mug!).  The colour blended perfectly into all the detail of the rose bud.  

The photo below was taken just after I'd dunked the pink one, so it's still wet and a bit dark. The white one had not been coloured at this point. Of course, it would have been a better idea to colour them before I'd inter-twined them, but again, I was not thinking logically and only decided to do the tutorial half way through the process!  Next time I'll plan it better! (famous last words!)

Copics can work too, but I find that water colour inks are perfect as the water moves the ink into all the creases of the flower, where you could never get the marker tip to reach.




Card Recipe:

From Lili of the Valley:

• Three Kind Mice

From The Ribbon Girl:

• 25mm Faux Hessian Ribbon
• Cherry Blossom
• Small Lily
• Hip Roses Lilac
• 15mm Purple Open Roses
• 10mm Cream Open Roses
• White Pearl String
• 5mm Lilac Crystals

From Dies To Die For:

• MFT Dienamics Stitched Oval Stax
• WRS Antique Library Paper Pad

Other:

• Watercoloured with Ranger Distress Ink Reinkers
• Flowers coloured with Zig Real Brush Waterbased Markers
• The Langton Watercolour paper
• Spellbinders Floral Oval Nesties

I've been inspired by:

• Simon's Wednesday Challenge - Anything Goes
• Creative Inspirations - Petals and Pearls

Happy crafting
Annette
xx