Last weekend I had the privilege to attend a workshop taught by Studio Calico design team member, Shanna Noelle. Not only is she as sweet as she seems online, she’s a kind, funny, and very talented girl in person as well.

She shared her tips and tricks on using watercolors in your scrapbooking. Watercoloring is so on trend right now and I loved playing, mixing different colors, and seeing the effects that it can create on paper. It is really hard to pre-plan how this was going to go so I just started adding water, then paint, then more water and more paint. It really started coming together once the paint dried. For this layout I used  watercolor paint tubes and I mixed the white and green to get the aqua color I wanted.

Once I had the color down and I was ready to embellish, I discovered a happy mistake. I went to color the wood veneer stars with watercolor but when I put it down on the paper it landed on the wrong side. When i lifted it up i saw it made a pretty watercolor stamped image of the star that I loved. So I began “stamping” with these watercolor painted wood veneer stars to make the background look more dreamy. I also took a clear outline star stamp and added that in a few places as well.  I added a bit of Mister Huey’s calico shine for some shimmer and accented with a glitter pen here and there. I also added the painted wood veneer stars I used to stamp with.

The stamp phrase (from Lawn Fawn)  was the added little touch. After I stamped the phrase I took a light wash of the watercolor and painted around and in the letters of the phrase to make it melt into the layout more. I added a bit of star washi at the top of the photo and a shooting star at the bottom of the stamped phrase and left it alone after that. I love this photo of my little girl and really wanted it to take center stage.

After having so much fun creating this layout in class I decided to play a bit more at home. I was thinking of ways that I might incorporate this into my project life and remembered that I had some 4×6 watercolor postcards! I got mine on Amazon but they are in most art supply stores. I played with some warm colors (red, oranges, yellows) to create a sunset look. This time I used the Peerless watercolor films which I LOVE! the color is so rich. I sprayed a fine mist of water on the paper before I started painting. I recommend picking up a water brush with these watercolor films to make painting even easier. After the watercolor dried, I lightly sprayed on some Mister Huey’s gold ink spray to give it more shimmer. The glitter sticker letters are from Pink Paisley and I cut out the sunrise word from my silhouette. This will make a perfect title card for my daughters Senior sunrise breakfast she had at the beginning of her senior year.

If you have been afraid to try watercolors and painting in your scrapbooking in the past, give yourself permission to play. You will be happily surprised at the results!

If you haven’t heard, Shanna, along with a fabulous team of talented ladies are teaching a class called “Toolbox” over at Studio Calico in the month of August. There is also a great bunch of contributors to the class as well! I am determined to learn some digital scrapbooking techniques and this class has that and MUCH more. Check the class out HERE! You have until July 31st to sign up. I hope you’ll join me!

Thank you Shanna, for expanding my scrapbooking to include more watercoloring technique. I have a feeling I will be doing many more watercolor backgrounds in the future!

Happy Painting!