How to Make Floral Watercolor Cards

Today Chasity has the most beautiful floral card making tutorial for you using Kelly Creates stamps and watercolor inks!

SUPPLIES from Kelly Creates: Watercolor paper pad, Watercolor Inks Set 1 and Set 2, Watercolor Lettering Brushes, Daisy paint palette, Moonlight marker, Ink Pads & Blocks Stamping set, Dream pens, Deluxe Lettering Kit, Floral Stamp Set 

Other Supplies: Paper trimmer with scoring board, glitter enamel dots, adhesive

Hello Lettering Friends! It’s getting warm here and summer is upon us! Summer for us means graduations and weddings. Lots of events to celebrate! If you’re like me, you will need cards for these events. Today I am sharing a tutorial with you that is fun and florally and perfect for all the celebrations in your life!

Gather your Kelly Creates supplies and let’s get to it! I created these card bases from Kelly’s watercolor paper. You can easily stamp on this paper, and of course her watercolour inks look amazing on it. I used the floral border stamp from the Kelly Creates Acrylic Traceable Stamps- Floral set. Did you know this stamp is repeatable? That means that the stamp lines up perfectly and can be stamped again and again to create a border as long as you want! I love that! I repeated this stamp two times to create the border.

Did you know there is a Kelly Creates Ink Pad and Stamp Block Set? I used it for this project and it is perfect for all your stamping needs. You can find it HERE.

This Kelly Creates Floral Stamp set is gorgeous! The variety of flowers and leaves are so pretty and versatile for so many projects.

Place the stamp on an acrylic block and ink the stamp with the black ink. This ink is permanent and fast drying. Then re-ink the stamp and line it up with the end of the stamped image to repeat the image.

I used a piece of scrap paper under my watercolor paper since the image extended off the paper to protect my work surface.

I stamped the border across the bottom of the paper, then repeated the same steps by rotating the stamp 90 degrees and stamped it about 1” above the first row.

Look how fun the image is with the space between for a sentiment! This card size called ‘slimline’ is trending and can be multiple sizes. Some of the most popular sizes are 3½” x 8 ½” and 3 ⅝” x 8 ⅝” and 4” x 9”.

Because my paper is 8 ½” wide, my cards will be 4 ½” x 8 ½”.

Now it’s time to start painting the stamped image. I used a variety of Kelly Creates Watercolor Inks to paint the flowers and leaves. One thing to keep in mind since these flowers are so close together is to let each flower dry before painting the flower beside it if you don’t want your watercolors to bleed.

We will be painting everything in layers. I start by painting the entire flower with a very light base coat of the watercolor ink.   This is accomplished by adding water to the watercolor ink in the palette. Kelly’s watercolor inks are so vibrant and pigmented, but by diluting with water, you can achieve  lighter hues giving you so many more color options.(In the example above, I started with diluted Rose ink, then added another layer to darken the centre).

I then painted the leaves. Have some fun with mixing cool watercolor inks for the leaves. I used the Emerald and the Teal watercolor inks. You can always add more of either color and adjust as you work. That is the great thing about these watercolor inks – they can be changed with just some water or mixing them together!

I alternated colors to make the flowers bright and fun, using Rose, Deep Yellow, Orange, Poppy and Violet Watercolor Inks. As you can see, I went back and painted more layers on the areas that I wanted to be darker or the “shadow”on the flower. This really adds dimension to the flowers.

Once that side is finished, repeat the same steps on the other side!

Now set that card aside to dry. While mine was drying, I stamped another card and painted it with different watercolors to show the difference you can achieve just by changing up colors. This is a great way to custom match colors to a holiday or party!

Repeat by painting the same watercolours on the other side. I love how you can layer more watercolor on certain parts of the flowers to get a different look and add that dimension to make the flowers really pop.

Set both cards aside to dry. As you can see with the second card, I increased the space between the borders, giving more space for the sentiment. Make sure you try different widths as well before you stamp so that your sentiment fits in the negative space.

Now that these are dry, let’s add some sentiments! As usual, I penciled in my sentiment first so I could get my spacing correct.

I used the Kelly Creates black medium brush tip pen to write “Congratulations” then used the Stone Dream pen to add shadows to the letters. The finishing touch was adding the white highlights inside each letter with the Kelly Creates Moonlight marker.

Be sure to erase your pencil lines. A ‘Congratulations” card can be used for so many celebrations and is great to always have on hand for last minute gifts. With the second card, I repeated the same steps, but added “Best Wishes”. This is also a very universal sentiment that can be used for a lot of different occasions!

These are great cards to make multiples of and have on hand. I enjoy watercoloring while watching TV; it’s a great way to paint the florals and add the sentiments later.

Using the Kelly Creates Floral stamp is a great way to make watercolor floral cards and already having the floral stamping done! I find I have much more confidence using watercolor inks with stamps, which takes the guesswork out of the layout.

Give these a try and be sure to share your results on Kelly’s social media using the hashtag #kellycreates.

Shop for the supplies Chasity used by visiting Kelly Creates Store or her Amazon storefront, or click the products below for affiliate shopping links.

  .