My Favorite Season at Aurora Wings

Yes, you read it right.  We have a brand new challenge at the Aurora Wings Challenge Blog with hosted by the new Stella Design Team.  From now on, the Stella team will be inspiring you the first Monday of every month, while the Aurora Team will continue, with a new challenge, on the third Monday as usual.

Our new theme, My Favorite Season, is special to me.  I've lived in California for 36 years now, but still miss the true 4 separate seasons I knew from my years growing up in the Midwest.  Fortunately, here in Livermore wine country, we still have somewhat of an Autumn, with cool crisp air, the changing leaves, especially in the vineyards, and a bountiful harvest season.  I love every sight, every smell, and every feel of this magical time of year.  No surprise I've chosen the gorgeous Harvest Elf for my project today.  I've made a wall hanging using a number of Spellbinders dies and DP from K&Co.

Here is a closeup of the gorgeous Harvest Elf.  She's colored with Copics with a bit of shading and depth added with Prismacolor pencils.  I've loved this image from the start but because if it's intricacy found it a bit intimidating, until I broke it down into doable pieces.  

First I began with the things that I knew, skin and hair.  In some places I wasn't sure where the hair ended, but I started with the obvious and left the unknown uncolored.  From there I went to like leaves and similar foliage and laid down the basic base color for each, adding additional colors and shading as I went along. With each grouping, the intricacies of the image became more apparent, until I was able to fill in the whole design. WooHoo!  Once the entire image was colored, I added additional highlights and shadows for more contrast and depth. Although I went over this image many times, over several days, until I was satisfied, it was not nearly as intimidating or difficult as I had originally imagined and I can't tell you how pleased I am with my accomplishment.  Try it. Stretch yourself.  You'll be amazed what you can do when you take your time. 

This quote is a favorite of mine, as well.  I used a digital post card from Lilac 'n Lavender and added the quote in my printing program, then ran it through my printer on some design paper with this result.  The Autumn leaves were part of the postcard, but the DP had some subtle open details.  Pretty cool how the design of the DP showed through a bit.  Totally unexpected.

Finally, my bouquet is a mixture of velvet leaves and punched ones, all colored, or at least shaded, with Copics to match those I've colored in Mitzi's gorgeous image. The fabulous lace die cut is also Spellbinders and the seam binding and Card Candy is from my stash.  Please be sure to visit the Aurora Wings Challenge Blog, leave some love for the new Stella Team, and come play along.  We can't wait to see what you come up with.  

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I'm entering this in the DL.Art March Linky Challenge, 613 Avenue Create ATG (using sponsor's image), Polkadoodles Crafting Tic Tac Toe using Wings, Nature and Sentiment, Dragonfly Dreams Use a Die Cut, Di's Digi Design Use 2 or More Dies (I've used 4 different ones), the Outlawz Twisted Thursday Use Dies or Punches, Crafting with Friends ATG, Craft your Passion ATG, Creative Fingers ATG, Crafting from the Heart ATG, Our Crafty Corner ATG and Inspiration Destination ATG.