Pretty Pink Posh: Watercolour Blog Hop!

Paulina is hosting a blog hop on her site Pretty Pink Posh and it's all about watercolour! 

This is a huge hop and the only real requirement? There needs to be some kind of watercolour element on your project. The inspiration is amazing! So many gorgeous creations. But I'm going to link up anyway. ;) 
I recently bought a beautiful necklace from a local jewellery designer to give as a gift. It has a starfish, a sand dollar and a small Swarovski pearl as pendants, and I decided to decorate the gift bag to coordinate: 

I thought the "ink smooshing" technique would be perfect for adding a shoreline/ocean feel to the background. Using three different shades of blue distress ink, I tapped one at a time onto an acrylic block, misted with water, then smooshed it on my watercolour panel. Then for a little more, um, splotchiness, I sprinkled the damp paper with coarse salt. Then waited (and waited) for it to dry. Since I was going all artsy anyway, I got a couple of sprays out and flicked some blue (sparkly) and gold (matte) onto the white areas of the panel. That had to dry, too. Finally I was able to gold emboss my three images over the blue. I really like how they turned out! Here's a close-up of the embossed goodness and watercoloury background: 

If you've been playing with watercolours lately, too, you have the rest of the weekend to link up! I'm off to admire more of the entries. ;) 

Supplies: white gift bag, Stampin' Up basic black cardstock, Fluid hot press watercolour paper, Unity/Iron Orchid Beach Cottage Collection stamps, Versamark & tumbled glass, salty ocean & mermaid lagoon distress inks, pirate's gold embossing powder, Sea Kiss Smooch Spritz, Timeless Art Anthology Colorations spray