My newest obsession...

Brush lettering!  I saw a couple people showing their work on social media and decided to give it a try since I've loved the look for a really long time, but didn't know how to go about teaching it to myself.

Random Olive has put together a printable guide so everyone can learn (with lots of practice!) how to do brush lettering.  I've been doing it for a few days now and can already feel and see myself improving!

To start, I printed out the entire guide on my laser printer.  I knew I wanted to be able to trace directly over the printing and didn't want the ink to smear so that's why I chose laser.  It's not absolutely necessary though.  Then I punched holes in all the sheets and put them in a big binder.  I'm using page protectors as dividers for the different sections, and have been dating all the sheets when I do them so I can keep track of my progress.

Not only does Random Olive have a complete guide (including numbers) to learn the lettering, but she also has monthly challenges with a new word prompt each day to help you practice.  You can either just practice the words on your own, or you can buy traceable sheets of all the words.  Even though I haven't completed my brush lettering course, I'm also doing the word challenges to get even more practice.  I printed out 3 copies of each word so I make sure to get lots and lots of practice!

You can see in the top photo that I'm using a real paintbrush and some really old Radiant Pearl paints that I haven't used in ages.  It's helping me to get rid of that paint, and it's fun to play with different colors, especially when they sparkle!  But I'm also trying it with my Tombow brush markers because they give a very different look for me.

If you're interested in learning brush lettering, I highly recommend the guide and monthly challenges!  You can learn a fun new skill and by using my affiliate links in the sidebar (at no extra cost to you!), I'll get a little commission: Win-Win!!

I'm sharing my work on my Instagram account and if you get into it, I'd love to see your work there too!  TFL!

You're A Real Gem

Hi all! Today I have a card that uses powdered watercolors, specifically Brushos, but you can definitely use Color Bursts instead. I was playing one day when I came up with a result that looked kind of mottled and really cool so I kept playing until I figured out how to recreate it. Here's the card I made using the technique:

And here's a closer look at the effect:

I did a video so you could see how I did it:

And here's THE LINK to the video in case you can't see the video player above.

And here are some other results that I got:

The first shows the perfect effect with the water, but a little too much powder, making it very dark.  Still a nice effect though.  The second sample needed a little more water, especially on the left side.

On the first sample, I used a little too much water so it blended more than I liked, but it's still nice.  On the second sample, I dampened the watercolor paper first so that the powder would stick better, but it ended up blending way more than I wanted.  I wouldn't do this in the future.  The powder on dry paper definitely gives better mottled results.

This is also for the MFT Color Challenge.  I hope you like it and TFL!

YNS Challenges

Hi all!  It's time for new challenges over at the Your Next Stamp blog.  For the next 2 weeks we have this sketch:

And this color challenge:

I decided to go with the color challenge and came up with this:

I used the YNS set Cats and Dogs stamp set and its matching die set as well as the Stitched Rectangle die set.  I used Brusho powders on watercolor paper to make the blue background.  Then I used my MISTI to stamp the sentiment in Versafine ink.  I stamped the cat on white cardstock, colored with Copics, and cut out with the coordinating die.

We hope you'll play along with us!  All the details can be found on the YNS Blog.  TFL!