With Christmas behind us, it’s time for me to focus on the next big greeting card holiday, Valentine’s Day! Today, I’m sharing a card I made for the Newton’s Nook Designs Inky Paws Challenge. Ladies and Gents, this is such a fun challenge. I’ve been doing it since September and just love it. There are two challenges a month, each lasting two weeks. Today begins a new challenge using a combination of colors – black, white, sky blue and red. I love this color combo. You can read the details at Inky Paws Challenge. If you participate, you have a chance of winning a gift certificate at the store. Oh, by the way…there’s a sale today for New Years so buy your Newton’s products and come along for the ride. (Note: You can participate with other products, too. Simply read the rules to learn more.)

I almost forgot to mention the exciting part…I’m part of the Inky Paws Challenge Inspiration Team! Today is my first day on the job. 🙂 I will be offering some inspiration along the way to help you in your creative process. Here’s my first card as a team member. I used the following sets to create this one. 

I created a simple watercolor background using Canson XL watercolor paper and my watercolors in a sky blue. I used my watercolor brush to flick black spots all over the blue, too. I like the organic look of watercolor and wanted to add a little more black in the design for contrast. I added some tiny hearts colored with Copics in red. I added my feature girl and colored her with my Copic Sketch markers in the challenge colors. Her skirt is plain so I created a few polka dots to her outfit.

The balloons are done in blues and reds. I like using a darker shade towards the bottom of the balloons followed by a lighter color at the top and then adding a few highlight marks in the top right using my Signo Uni-ball white gel pen. In this case, my light source is coming from the top right in this design. Lastly, I added a few balloons floating in the air and hand drew the strings with a black fine marker. I like how these balloons came with a small heart in them to fit my “love is in the air” theme.

This is a 5″ X 7″ card (my fave size) so if you like doing an A2 sized card (4.25″ X 5.5″), your feature image will appear much larger and you’ll have less sky to show. 

Oh my gosh…this is so much fun! I hope you give the challenge a try with me! I love to see what everyone makes. Come on… have fun with me! Bobbi