Author Archive: Vicki Achard

Spring Flowers in D.C., My Practice Painting, & Sale on Pressed Floral Accessories

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Hello Everyone, I thought I would share pictures of the Spring flowers in bloom we saw on our recent trip to D.C. It cheers me up to think of Spring weather coming soon!

Due to a foot injury two days before our trip ended, I rested my foot in our motel while everyone toured D.C. I had brought watercolor pencils and cards to draw on just in case I had time to paint. They were a Christmas gift from my sister-in-law. I had fun practice painting cherry blossoms and a cardinal.

You can also visit my Watercolor Gallery on my website to view past Spring flowers I painted. Each year I learn a little more about painting, what an exciting journey it’s been.

2019 Mother’s Day Sale on All Pressed Floral Accessories – 30% Off – Now until May 5th

This week’s Accessory Listings:

Art & Quotes by me

I have enjoyed combing my thoughts on nature & serenity. My hope is that these Art & Quotes are inspiring and brings you, your loved one, or friend a little serenity.

We have 14 of these remaining, comes in various designs, quotes, and frames wrapped in a plastic bag with a gold band.

Was $20.00 ea – Now $14.00 ea

Dishwasher Magnets – No more guessing if you have dirty or clean dishes in your dishwasher!

Simply turn the magnet around before you put dishes in and out of the dishwasher to help remind you and everyone in your household if the dishes are clean or dirty. Works on magnetic dishwashers only.

We have 20 of these remaining.

Was $4.50 ea or 3 for $12.50 – Now $3.15 ea or 3 for $8.45

Hope to be able to help you with your shopping needs or for you. Makes a nice gift for your Mom, Grandma, Aunt, or Friend. 

Just give us a call, 248.321.7460 or email us if you’d like to visit our studio.

I will list more Pressed Floral Accessories for sale for the next two weeks! Hope you will continue to visit my blog this month. This is our biggest SALE we’ve had!

Happy Shopping & Creating!

Vicki & Tom

“Sale on All Pressed Floral Accessories”

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Hello Everyone, We are having a BIG 2019 Mother’s Day Sale on all our Pressed Floral Accessories. Sale starts Now until May 5th.

It’s a nice way to remember those special Mom’s, Grandma’s, Aunt’s, and Friends. These accessories also make a great end of the year gift for those special teachers too!

Each week I will be posting different accessories.

You don’t want to miss this, it’s our biggest sale yet.

Please share this information with your friends and family.

Happy Creating,

Vicki

“Let’s Paint Grapes in Watercolor”

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Hello Everyone, I’ve been wanting to practice paint these color grapes for a while now. Grapes can be green, dark blue, maroon, purple…so many different colors.

Having a color chart is essential when painting. It will be an exciting day when we learn how to make a video with audio. I will show you how I made my color charts then.

I hope you can also check out my painting of my “Basket of Fruit” Design #207 in the Watercolor Gallery of our website. I love the fruit arrangement and the basket. This design has lots of beautiful colors. I have found I absolutely love painting pictures of food!

So, let me know what you think is the best shadow under the plate, the lighter one or the darker one. After thinking about it for a while, I think if I just lighten it up a bit (now that I have made it darker), it would look a little better, do you think?

Happy Creating,

Vicki

“Let’s Paint an Eye in Watercolor”

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Hello Everyone, I want to paint so many things. My craft room is full of inspirational ideas to paint, as is my photo collection and lessons I have learned from Lindsay Weirich, my favorite YouTube Artist.

I have wanted to paint this lesson of Lindsay’s for quite some time now. Each step to making a painting is so enjoyable to me. It’s not fun if I try to make the painting perfect. I’m finding I learn something every time I paint.

Using the beautiful paint colors, exploring and finding materials that help me make the painting… it’s so exciting!

I have so much enjoyed painting Newborn Portraits. Saving that precious memory for someone of what that sweet baby looked like and what the baby wore coming home from the hospital is such a special memory for the parents and for the child in later years. I have saved two examples of my Baby Portraits on our website in Custom Services.

Hope you too have many exciting ideas to make your day happy!

Vicki

“Let’s Paint a Carnation In Watercolor”

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Hello Everyone,

This week I’m practicing painting a carnation – one of my granddaughter’s birthday surprises! Carnations brighten up the room and are so cheerful!

All the paints I used were M. Graham except Viridian hue which is Reeves. The Pro White is from Daler Rowney. Some people do not use white paint when they watercolor, they instead leave the paper white, or mask areas so that no paint will get in that area. I usually leave the paper white instead of using white paint. In this case I didn’t have any pink, so I opted to add white. If you don’t want to add any white, you can always purchase a pink color. I put the Pro White on my palette, added a little water and mixed it well with the Pyrol Red that was already mixed with a lot of water to get pink. My favorite watercolor paper is Arches, 140#, cold press, but when I’m practice painting I use Strathmore. If you buy this paper, buy it in the brown cover. It has a bit more “tooth” in it than the yellow covered one.

Thanks for watching this fun painting today, I hope I have inspired you in some way.

Next week I will post another painting for my “Let’s Paint” month. Hope you can join me.

Happy Creating,

Vicki

Let’s Paint Sunflower Leaves in Watercolor

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Hello Everyone,  I started practicing painting sunflowers awhile ago and wanted to finish the painting in this video. I added the leaves and it will now be the front of a greeting card.

I love sunflowers, they are so cheerful, especially seeing a painting of them in the middle of winter!

Hope you enjoy this video. I had fun finishing the painting.

Happy Creating,

Vicki

Week 3 – Scraps to Showstoppers/Making Greeting Cards

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Hello Everyone, Week 3 and final week, until June, of making cards in my craft room – so much fun. I could get lost on cloud 9 making these cards, so many pretty papers and materials to work with!

I actually wanted to make three years worth of cards, however, that was a little too ambitious, but I made cards for most of the year. I have Father’s day and Thanksgiving I need to make cards for yet.

Thank you to all of you who stopped by to take a look. I enjoyed these past three weeks. I hope if you are a card maker I shared a few techniques or tools I use to help make your card making a little easier. Most of all I hope it gave you some ideas of how you can use your scraps and decorative papers to make inspirational cards. Sharing the love.

Happy Creating,

Vicki

Week 2 – Scraps to Showstoppers/Making Cards Out of Scraps

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Hello Everyone,

This week I made a few more Anniversary cards. I also made Sympathy and Thinking of You cards. All these cards I make for fun to send out throughout the year. Having these cards available when I need them is great. I love the idea that others will be touched by a little inspiration or comfort or that these cards will bring a little happiness to someone.

It’s always amazing to me how scraps and embellishments can look so nice when they are color coordinated and cut and made to fit on each card. This week I enjoyed creating the card designs as I shuffled papers, stamps, ribbon, washi tape, my pressed floral and watercolor scraps, sentiments and more. I was delighted to be spontaneous not knowing what the final outcome would look like. It’s so much fun to discover the possibilities as I create and use the materials I have.

My pressed floral scraps are designs that were slightly the wrong color or size and never were used. My watercolor scraps are the solid colors you will see on the video. I used my left over paint to create those scraps not wanting to toss my paint I had left on my palette after I painted several designs this past year. Nothing is wasted in my craft room! I’m thrilled that the watercolor scraps blend so well with the other papers and embellishments.  If you do not do watercolor, you can simply use any color paper you have.

I was able to use my embossing powder I haven’t used for awhile, I love the colors! They are made by Stampendous and I bought them at Michaels long ago. I highly recommend them. I also recommend stickles and liquid pearls. If you purchase them make sure they are made by Ranger.

You will see that I use my self-healing cutting mat as a guide for measuring where to place the papers at times. This mat sets on my table as I am working with this project.

Don’t forget to place a lighter color paper inside the card for your sentiment when you use a dark color card base. Also, don’t forget to sign your name on the back of your card!

Next week I will be making Get Well, Easter, and Mother’s Day cards. Hope you can again join me next week to take a look at what designs I will come up with…so much fun!

Until next time… Happy Creating,

Vicki

Scraps to Showstoppers – Making Greeting Cards

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Hello Everyone,

I love making greeting cards for fun from materials and scraps I have accumulated all year in my craft room. It’s great to recycle old cards, calendars, my watercolor and pressed floral scraps, anything I think would look nice to embellish cards. I make 5 x 7 greeting cards, so the paper is cut 7″ x 10″ and scored at 5″.

Hope you will have fun recycling your scraps. My goal is to make about 140 cards in the next few weeks. We will see how many I actually do. One year I made 80 cards and gave 20 each to my two daughters, my daughter-in-law, and my oldest granddaughter as gifts. It makes me so happy to know they enjoy  receiving and sending my cards and others will me touched by their sentiments.

If I can answer any questions you have about card making, please let me know.

Happy Creating,

Vicki

A Morning In The Life Of A Working Artist – Part 2

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Hello Everyone,

First, I’d like to announce the winner of the craft supplies and thank-you cards GIVE AWAY; Erin. Congratulations Erin! I will be mailing that to you soon.

Wanted to share a morning with you; Part 2 thinking about Valentine’s day and what Nature’s Best has to offer.

  • read more about Fun Cupcake Holders in my 2/28/18 blog
  • to see what happened to Charlotte’s scarf (design #186 “Romantic Walk on a Snowy Night”) read my 1/12/18 blog
  • you can find more about my spaghetti sauce recipe in my 11/20/17 blog

It’s hard to believe Valentine’s day is next week already.

Hope your travels are safe, and your worries few.

Happy Sharing, Giving, and Creating. Hope you have a happy Valentine’s Day! What do you do to celebrate Valentine’s Day?

Vicki