{Spotlight Project} Shery Colors Color Blooms with Aquarelle Oil Pastels

Hey, everyone! Have you checked out the special event we're hosting to celebrate National Coloring Book Day? The STAMPlorations girls and I took out our favorite coloring mediums and colored a page or two from our first coloring book, Color Blooms. (FYI, there's a sampler you can download so you can print it out, color, and link up to our coloring party linky for a chance to win a copy of Color Blooms.)

Anyway, I shared 4 different pages I was coloring. One of them I ended up turning into a fridge magnet:

STEP 1

I tore off one of the pages from Color Blooms

...and cut the top to the size of my balsa wood (2.5" by 5.5"), saving the rest of the page for another project. I adhered it with matte gel medium and then applied a coat of clear gesso on top. 

STEP 2

Once the clear gesso was dry, I colored the blooms with Cretacolor Aquarelle oil pastels, layering the colors starting from the lightest (yellow) to darkest (red). By applying clear gesso on the paper, the paper was able to take in wet techniques. Without clear gesso, the paper would simply warp and pill if you use coloring mediums that require the use of water.

For the background, I used a black Caran D'Ache Fancolor watercolor pencil and applied some light shading outside the flowers. Then I took a waterbrush to create a watercolor effect.

STEP 3

I stamped the bird from Trendy Birds 2 on a brown paper bag and fussy cut the image.

Then on white tissue paper, I stamped the sentiment from Bold Sentiments: Create. I decoupaged the bird and sentiment with matte gel medium.

STEP 4

For a bit of texture, I selectively applied coarse texture gel through a stencil.

And added some color so the texture gel blended in with the background.

I added some finishing touches and applied matte gel medium to seal. Then I took a self-adhesive business card size magnetic sheet and attached it to the back to finish the project. Here it is again:

I hope my project has inspired you to do some coloring. I'd love to see what you make based on today's spotlight project. It could be using clear gesso, coloring a page from a coloring book (or an image you stamped), creating a functional item (e.g., fridge magnet), or anything in today's post that sparks you. Then link it up to the Spotlight Showcase.

Products used in today's project:

      

Color Blooms | Trendy Birds 2 | Bold Sentiments: Create | Nestled Circles

Other supplies: clear gesso, matte gel medium, and coarse texture gel (Liquitex); Cretacolor Aquarelle oil pastels; Caran D'Ache Fancolor pencil; archival ink (Ranger); self-adhesive magnet