Flower Attribute Notecards - Gray Set & Tan Set

As mentioned, I have several new notecard variety packs available in my Etsy shop, including new designs from my "Flower Attribute" series. Today's blog post is featuring two more of those sets - the "Gray" set, which includes scans from the six colored pencil drawings I've completed on gray paper as part of that series, and the "Tan" set, which includes 8 colored pencil drawings on tan paper (seven from this series, and the eighth titled "White Poinsettia," originally created as a holiday-themed notecard).

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The "Gray Paper" set:

The 6 designs included in this notecard set are:

• Prophecy (Heliotrope)
• Loyalty (Daisy)
• Balance (Enchanter's Nightshade)
• Modesty (Violet)
• Frigidity (Lithodora)
• Attachment (Delphinium)

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The "Tan Paper" set:

The 8 designs included in this notecard set are:

• White Poinsettia
• Anticipation (Anemone)
• Shame (Peony)
• Constancy (Bluebell)
• Strength (Ginger)
• Fragility (Azalea)
• Union (Myrtle)
• Folly (Geranium)

If "Folly" looks brand new to you - it's because it is! "Folly" is a recently 2021 drawing that I haven't even created the blog post for yet... look for that blog post next week!

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Love the style of these notecards, but wish you could swap out a few for other floral designs I have? I also have a U-Pick listing where you can mix-and-match among all my floral colored pencil design and color options and build the perfect stationery set for your preferences!

"Attachment" Colored Pencil Drawing

This next colored pencil drawing is also 8"x10" on Strathmore gray paper: delphiniums, a.k.a. larkspur. These tall flower stalks come in blue, purple, or white - or all three! They symbolize "attachment," which is where the title of this drawing comes from.

I started with a sketch just to lay out on the page where I planned to draw each of the flower stalks in this delphinium field:

Then I started the long process of adding detail to each of the flowers on each stalk. It took me several days (though, granted, I only could work on it for 30 minutes - 1 hour at a time, once or twice a day, while my daughter slept). :)

Here is the step by step process:

I just love how this one turned out - such gorgeous colors, and so much detail! Here are some close-up shots of the final drawing:

"Sexuality Bouquet (Stronger Together)" - In Progress 6

When I say this drawing is a celebration of differences in sexuality, I'm including differences in libido, sexual behaviors, frequency, desire, willful abstinence, asexuality, sexual orientation, and relationships. For more discussion on sexuality (and definitions of related terminology), please visit this blog post.

For a description of the specific symbolism of the 24 flowers used in this drawing, check out this blog post.

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Sometimes I wonder if I should come up with more creative blog post titles, instead of just saying "In Progress #6." But then I rationalize that I already spend too much time planning and writing these posts as it is. I could probably just post once, with photos of the finished piece, and everyone would be happy - but if there's at least one person out there who likes seeing these step-by-step pics, I guess it's worth it to show them off. :)

Today's post is all about the step-by-step pics of the yellow section, as well as half of the blue section.

I started with the pale yellow chrysanthemum. Yellow pencils don't always show up super well on black paper, so I put down a layer of white pencil first, and then layered the yellow on top, to make sure the yellow was nice and bright. I added some orange into the shadows, and used the black pencil to define some of the petal edges a bit better. Altogether, I used white, cream, yellow, orange, "artichoke" (which is that ugly sort of dark yellow-green pencil in the middle), two shades of green, and black.

The next yellow flowers I tackled were the daffodils. I used white, cream, yellow, orange, green, brown, and black pencils.

For the yellow freesia, I used white, cream, yellow, and yellow-orange. For the stems and leaves, "apple green."

The bright yellow sunflower needed cream, yellow, yellow-orange, orange, yellow-green, light green, and black pencils.

Once the yellow section was complete, I moved on to the blue flowers. I did this simply because I'm used to working left to right (being right handed), and I didn't want to smudge the completed flowers while I worked on the next ones.

These little pale blue forget-me-nots used two shades of light purple, two shades of light blue, a medium blue, two shades of green, and yellow and orange for the centers of the flowers.

The delphinium stalk was created with four shades of blue and a green colored pencil.

Only six more flowers to complete (plus the large, fishbowl-shaped vase at the bottom of the drawing)! My next post will cover those "in progress" photos.