Come join me and Maria from Art Toolkit for a live demo on Tuesday, December 6th at 1pm Pacific to create colorful cards for the holidays! The demo will be HERE on YouTube and we’ll save the recording so you can watch it later.

Bring your 4” x 6” watercolor paper, watercolors, a pencil, brush pen, or parallel pen, and your favorite paintbrush.⁠ We hope you can join us!

Here are the colors I used — but please use what you have:

  • Reds: quinacridone rose, quinacridone coral, organic vermillion, perylene red
  • Greens: chromium green oxide, phthalo green (blue shade), cobalt turquoise light
  • Christmas black: Quin coral and phthalo green

Thanks to all who joined — it was so much fun!


13 Comments

Bob Cochran · December 2, 2022 at 6:55 pm

Hi Lisa, this sounds like an interesting workshop. I will just be finishing my workday when this starts, and the commute home is a bit time consuming, so I will look for the YouTube link later that evening and enjoy it. Let me thank both you and Maria for providing this wonderful opportunity. I really appreciate it.

I also hope you are enjoying the holidays.

    Lisa Spangler · December 4, 2022 at 7:34 am

    Hi Bob! Enjoy the video — hope you’re having a wonderful December as well!

      Bob Cochran · December 6, 2022 at 5:00 pm

      Hi Lisa! I brought up the video on YouTube, but unfortunately there is no closed captioning available. I need that feature. I will wait a day or two and try again. Sometimes videos like these show up with captioning the next day, other times there is no captioning at all.

      Going by the first few minutes of the opening video, you and Maria look very well! I will be sure to watch the video at a later date.

        Lisa Spangler · December 6, 2022 at 6:48 pm

        Hi Bob! Thanks for tuning in! I checked with Maria, and she said there should be captioning but it might take a while to show up like you mentioned. Hope it works!

Mary · December 2, 2022 at 9:36 pm

If I can’t make it in person, will be sure to catch the replay. (tip for those considering attending: watercolor post cards are an economical purchase of 4×6. But, mail out cards in envelopes in order to avoid dirt or watery weather!)

    Lisa Spangler · December 4, 2022 at 7:35 am

    Hi Mary! Good idea on the envelopes! And yes to postcards, or cutting your own from a 9×12 sheet of paper — you can get 4 cards per sheet and then have some strips left over for testing colors.

Kim · December 6, 2022 at 4:14 pm

Hi Lisa I joined you on the Arttoolkit demo with the wreath exercises and really was engaged in your color mixing. You had mentioned that at the end you would have a list of all the color combinations that you demonstrated but I missed that somehow and I was wondering where I could locate that information for example how you mixed Christmas black and the color combinations that you mixed while you were painting. Again love your demos and glad I got to join in

Kim · December 6, 2022 at 4:19 pm

Hi Lisa, Enjoyed the wreath demo but was wondering where could I find the list of the color combinations you used when mixing. You mentioned that you would have this the color combinations listed out at the end of the demo, but for some reason I did not see that. I really enjoyed the video but would love to get the swatch mixes if those are available. thanks for sharing and demonstrating your tips and treasures.

    Lisa Spangler · December 6, 2022 at 4:22 pm

    Hi Kim! Thanks so much for joining us! Here you are:

    Reds: quinacridone rose, quinacridone coral, organic vermillion, perylene red

    Greens: chromium green oxide, phthalo green (blue shade), cobalt turquoise light

    Christmas black: Quin coral and phthalo green

    I updated the blog post, too!

Carrie · December 7, 2022 at 7:41 pm

Thank you for this! I always learn so much about color when you do one of these videos. And,am inspired. I hope you both have a very happy holiday season!

    Lisa Spangler · December 7, 2022 at 8:09 pm

    Thanks for your comment — you made my day! Happy holidays!

Bob Cochran · December 9, 2022 at 8:34 pm

Hi Lisa, I have a question about making these holiday cards. I seem to commute to my workplace a few times a week. I take the bus if the weather is good. What equipment and approach would be needed to do a quick painting during the bus ride? The route to my office is on “acceptable” roads, but several streets need repaving and and guarantee a bumpy ride at this time. I have not tried doing this yet — it would be an interesting challenge. Perhaps the same question could apply to painting while on a subway car. Subway rides are not necessarily quick. It can easily take 20 minutes more depending on my destination. So there is time to paint. I was thinking that the chance to do some quick painting might be enough to decide someone to take the bus or train to work rather than drive a car.

    Lisa Spangler · December 10, 2022 at 11:40 am

    Hi Bob! I would take some postcards, a pocket palette, waterbrush, shop towel or paper towel, and several binder clips. Cut a piece of cardboard from a box and use it for a support board. I’d clip the postcards, palette and paper towel to the cardboard to make everything easier to hold. And then I think I’d make a scribble tree or wreath in case of bumps — google for inspiration. Or you can use waterproof ink to do some quick sketches before you leave and then add color on the bus. I’d love to see what you do!

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