Whimsy Stamps ~ I Need Vitamin Sea

Hey crafty friends, I'm back with another crafty creation I made with a beautiful rubber stamp from Whimsy that at first I was a little daunted to know how to work with, as these very arty stamps are not my usual style. But I felt a little like that with the rubber stamp that had the beautiful sweeping staircase and flowers and I ended up loving that stamp. I know I'll use it again and I feel a little like that with this stamp. Now that I've tried it, I'm looking forward to the next idea! Something about these rubber stamps, perhaps the extra details, makes me want to water colour them. I didn't actually water colour this one, but I did do some ink blending which I splattered water over to get a more textured effect. 

I went through a bit of a process to get this card to the look the way I wanted and if I could do it over again, I would have chosen a much darker blue ink for the sea area of the stamping. I used several different colours for laying down the base layer of colour. I used Spellbinders Betterpress Inks for this as they're permanent and waterproof and I was thinking at that stage I'd watercolour the scene. 

In the end, I opted to ink blend the scene, as there was such a large water area. But downside of this, is that some of the details of this beautiful stamp got a little lost, so I would absolutely use a darker blue ink next time. I otherwise love how it turned out, it feels very dreamy and serene and reminds me so much of the beach up North our family has a bach on. It used to be my Grandpa's farm land and is quite an idyllic little spot. Blessed to have had that passed down to us kids when my grandpa passed away, as it's a really special spot and reminds me of him and of my daddy so much.

After ink blending the sea with Salty Ocean and sand with Antique Linen, I splattered the sea with water to create some texture and interest in the water and I used two different distress inks, pumice stone and tea dye to splatter the sand to add a little texture there too. I covered each area when I was splattering the other area. I loved the way the water looked at this stage, but wanted the sea foam to be a little more prominent and I wanted it white! So I pulled out a white ink refill from Scrapbook.com and mixed it down a tiny bit with water, then using a natural sea sponge as it has awesome texture, started pouncing it over the areas where the sea foam was depicted in the stamp and added this white detail. I needed to come in afterwards, once the white was dry and add in some more depth and shadow to the blue to show the wave pattern better. I did this with Promarker Alcohol markers. I possibly should have been a bit bolder or used darker markers, but I didn't want to overdo it an ruin everything, so kept if very subtle.

I added some adhesive foam behind the panel to help flatten it out as the water had warped it a little. This worked a treat to flatten it out again. I then just wrapped the panel with some fine twine from May Arts and added a cute little sea-star charm to compliment the shells and sea-star beneath in the stamping. I matted the panel with a toning cardstock and then added that to a cream coloured textured panel before adding it to a white A2 card base. I used one that has the score on the longer edge, so it was still a top folding card, but landscape rather than portrait. Final detail was the sentiment, which I just love the script font of this, it's just so lovely and was a perfect finish for this card. This red rubber stamp comes with 3 beautiful sentiments, I cut them apart from the main image to make stamping them easier. This is easy to do with a good sharp pair of scissors. I used VersaFine Clair ink in Pinecone to stamp the sentiment, this is a lovely warm dark brown ink, which is great for stamping sentiments and I felt would sit better in this scene than a stark black ink.

We've just had a really fun release at Whimsy, with a rustic country theme and some hilarious stamps and sentiments and we have another coming really soon! I know I say it pretty much every time, but I love Whimsy's releases, I don't know often until the release goes live what's coming and I always get so excited! But I've had a sneak peek at this one and it's gonna be so good! I've been designing for them for years now and I love their range so much. Deb, our Creative Director has such a wacky sense of humour, her releases are always such fun and with talents like Dustin Pike, Crissy Armstrong and Krista Heij-Barber offering regular contributions, it's a fun company to design for! I will be back again soon with another crafty adventure, I'm super busy right now with admin stuff behind the scenes, but hopefully will get to some creating tomorrow. Until then, have a wonderful weekend, it's already Friday night here and I'm looking forward to a fun and crafty weekend. I wish you happy crafting adventures too. Hugs, Wends xoxo

(If you like any of the elements I've created with, I've added thumbnails to make your shopping easier. I do use affiliate links where possible, which gives me a tiny commission but costs you no extra whatsoever, though more importantly it helps the companies I design for to improve their marketing practice and track my contributions. I am deeply grateful if you use them for these reasons. I only design for companies whose products I absolutely love and buy for myself. My opinions are always my own.)

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