Memories of Tuscany

I have a special place in my heart for Tuscany.  My husband and I were blessed to spend our 30th wedding anniversary in Italy.  So when I saw the "Tuscan Vineyard" stamp set in the new Stampin Up annual catalog I just had to create a card.



If you ever wanted to try your hand at watercolor, here's your chance.  With this image, it is so super easy, anyone can do this.   Here is a list of everything you need to create this beautiful card...

Stamp Sets used are "Tuscan Vineyard" and "Gorgeous Grunge"

Inks: Elegant Eggplant, Crumb Cake, Cajun Craze, Soft Sky, Marina Mist, Baked Brown Sugar, Old Olive, Always Artichoke, and StazOn Black

Cardstock : Old Olive, Crumb Cake, Elegant Eggplant, and Watercolor paper

Also you'll need: scissors, adhesive,sponge daubers, Stampin Up Ovals Collection Framelits, Stampin Dimensionals, Stampin Up Linen Thread, and Aqua Painters (I used the medium size for this image)

Using Old Olive cardstock, cut your card base at 8-1/2" by 5-1/2".  Fold and score at 4-1/4".  I then used a sponge dauber and sponged old olive ink around the front of the card base.   Using Crumb Cake cardstock, cut your first layer at 5-1/4" by 4".  Take the grape cluster stamp and with Elelgant Eggplant ink, randomly stamp all over the Crumb Cake cardstock. Open up your scissors and run the edge along the crumb cake cardstock to roughen up the edges.  Adhere this to the cardbase using adhesive.

Take the scene image and using StazOn Black ink, stamp image onto watercolor paper.  I used the third oval framelit from the center to cut this image out.

Using the fourth oval framelit from the center, cut an oval out of elegant eggplant cardstock. I then used a sponge dauber and sponged elegant eggplant ink around the edges of the oval. Now adhere this to the card front.

Now fill the barrel of the Medium aqua painter brush with water.  Squeeze gently until water comes out of the tip of the brush.  Have a paper towel handy and wipe the tip of the brush.  Now, did you know that all of your Stampin Up ink pads can be used as watercolors!  Before you open the ink pad, give it a couple of squeezes.  This will put ink in the lid of the pad.  Now open it and you have ink to use for watercoloring.  With the tip of the brush, pick up color and apply to image, when you want to change color, simply wipe the brush onto a paper towel and squeeze until clear water runs out.  Then you are ready for the next color.  After you apply color to each section, let it dry for a couple of minutes so the colors do not run together.

I used old olive for the rows of grapevines and the short round trees.  Always artichoke for the tall cypress trees. Soft sky and marina mist for the sky.  Crumb cake to highlight the dark sides of the mountains.  Baked brown sugar for the flat land.  Cajun craze for the villa.  Now to get the illusion of sunlight hitting the villa, I used very little cajun craze to highlight the left side of the villa and corresponding roof side.  Then I picked up more color to finish off the rest of the villa.

To get the illusion of grapes growing, I used the spotted image from the stamp set Gorgeous Grunge and stamped it using elegant eggplant.  Using a sponge dauber, sponge the edge of the watercolor image lightly with elegant eggplant.  Add dimensionals to the back of the image and center over elegant eggplant oval.


Using baked brown sugar ink, stamp the wine jugs onto a  piece of crumb cake cardstock.  Cut it out and wrap some linen thread around the top of the jug and tie a knot.  Using dimensionals, adhere to front of card.  Cut a piece of crumb cake cardstock at 4" by 5-1/4".  Using baked brown sugar ink, stamp wine bottle opener and corks.  Adhere to inside of card.


I always decorate the front of my envelope.  Using baked brown sugar, stamp swirl and using elegant eggplant, stamp wine bottle seal.

Use sentiment of your choice for inside of card.

If you would like to purchase the products to create this beautiful card, please visit my Stampin Up website.

http://www.onepaperchick.stampinup.net