And Now For Something Completely Different!

Sometimes it's good to get out of your comfort zone.

Eleanor Roosevelt said "Do one thing every day that scares you."

Well, clearly Eleanor didn't live in Texas, because that's just normal life for us here. Blearily entering the bathroom at 4:30 without your glasses and having to kill a wolf spider the size of your cat generally qualifies for something "that scares you."

However, I don't think this is what she had in mind, because she obviously lived in a blissfully predator-free environment and was free to focus on her personal development.

I will join her in that space AFTER the spider killings when you try to test your own boundaries, because I did that recently.

On March 12th, I sprinted through the Ladybird Johnson Wildflower Center in the rain - looking for early spring inspiration photos for a watercolor class I was taking with my friend Lori.

I texted them to her, and one in particular stood out to her, and she suggested that we sketch it, along with our sweet friend Lisa Spangler - who was already a daily watercolor sketcher, so that wasn't intimidating at all. #not

We all agreed, and over the next three weeks, we worked on it bit by bit. First, as taught in our class, I did a quick value sketch - not capturing details - just figuring out where darks, mediums and lights are. I did this in Payne's Grey - probably my favorite watercolor color. I also took the opportunity to swatch out some colors I felt like matched the original scene and photo.

Here's the value sketch.

I love this sketchbook - strangely enough, Lisa and I ended up buying the same book - it's really nice because it lies flat and has a built-in bookmark.

Even in this loose rendition, the scene was intimidating. All the plant life was scaring me.

But I pressed on for a few weeks and eventually ended up with this.

InLinkz.com

And here's the original photo.

Somehow, Lisa and I both missed that notch out of the building on the left. Oh well. We survived!

At many points during the sketch exercise, I thought I had ruined it, but I reminded myself that it was practice. No one was going to be hanging this in the Louvre. I was just learning. And it became so fun and challenging.

It was so inspiring that Lisa and I, who were together in Ohio last weekend, decided to try a few more sketch exercises with no expectations of finished work. It was very fun. Well, except for our skies exercise, which I totally ruined. :) But I learned a lot.

After that I did smaller cloud/sky studies - masking them off with washi tape and trying different colors and techniques.

Then, because Gina Krupsky from Gina K Designs was sitting next to me, I got to play with a new release called Stately Flowers. It's part of a state flower series illustrated by Melanie Muenchinger, a fellow Austinite and friend. Lisa and I abducted the Indian Paintbrushes and bluebonnets and did a challenge with May Park at our table. Here's that page. I went for no-line coloring..

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I really enjoy just taking a page, trying something, and taking notes. It's like a visual diary. I'll always remember laughing with Lisa when I look at these and that is worth as much as the lessons.

Anyway - it's just really different, and that's why I love it.

So speaking of different, I was super excited to see some new stamps that were designed with the MISTI in mind. SUPER innovative and creative, these really blew my mind when I saw them and how they worked, and so I was stoked to be invited as a guest to hop with a sneak peek for them. The level of engineering this took amazes me. I hope there are more coming.

The premise behind them is this - take a stamp that's designed for the MISTI, and rotate it 90 degrees for four iterations of stamping to create a cohesive, multi-colored design that is perfectly aligned. NOBEL PRIZE PLEASE.

SO - here is the card I made with the amazing Triangle Turnabout background stamp and the Say Hello dies.  The black triangles are embossed and shiny.

YES - that is ONE background stamp, rotated three times. SQUEEEEEE! So many possibilities.

InLinkz.com

And yes, of course I have a video, but you can't see it until you look at the next card with the Many Mandalas set - I designed this to be a wedding card. I did a progression of blacks and greys and used all the matching dies to telescope the images.

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Hard to see here - but there's glitter at the tips of each side of each mandala, and a rhinestone in the center. It's very sparkly and fun. The sentiments are from the same set - it's a ginormous set!

This set comes with an acetate guide to help you align the images totally perfectly. It's so easy to use in the MISTI. I started with black, then went to Basic Grey, then Smoky Slate, then Smoky Slate stamped off once, then the smallest die cut.

It's so clean and graphic. I had so much fun creating these, and they are super quick and easy. You can see everything in this video. Then come back for the blog hop and your chance to win some goodies from Concord & 9th and My Sweet Petunia.

These stamps release tomorrow at Concord & 9th, so this is just a sneak peek of the full release. Be sure and comment on all the blogs in this hop for a chance to win THEIR FULL RELEASE! That's worth $130. You can also win an original MISTI, so get those comment fingers ready! And you will not believe what people have done with these products - so fun. I've seen some peeks already.

So here's the list of everyone sneak peeking today - have fun!

Iliana Myska of My Sweet Petunia
>>Lydia Fiedler of Understand Blue<<
Ilina Crouse of Creativity Within
Jeanne Streiff of Inky Paws

Maureen Wong of My C.A.S.E. Studies

Ceal Pritchett of Simply Beautiful

Concord & 9th

Many thanks to the C&9 and My Sweet Petunia teams for having me as a guest - I had a blast. I'm actually at OnStage in Louisiana today, so I will have some FUN things to show you when I get home. I look forward to your comments and I hope one of you wins these crazy prizes. Good luck!

Get out of your comfort zone today - you will be glad you did! 

Loveyameanitbye.