Salary cut

Trying to use what I have in the house, meal wise & using my stash. I can't even go in the stores because I will be tempted to see things I can't have.
I finally pulled together my botanical cards. I colored the botanical flowers from Dover last summer with my watercolor pencils. I cut them out of the c/stock they were printed on. I didn't know what b/ground to mount them on,so they sat in my file on my shelf.
One afternoon I decided to get out my alcohol inks & glossy card stock & play w/it. I luv putting drops of the ink on the c/s & picking it up & let it run in different directions as I turned the c/s. Then I took the applicator w/the blending solution & began pouncing it to blend the colors. I made orange ones w/ 2 of theRanger colors. I really liked making the purple ones with the blue @the yellow inks. I added some pearl& silver late to them. I made sky color ones by adding blending solution to the c/s to get a cloud like look I luv the pink b'ground I made with the red pepper ink by adding blending solution till I got the color I want. The carnations look so great on this pink b/ground. I spread them out on the table to look @ when I walked by them.
Later on I was bored,I sat down & was looking at them , I grabbed my folder with the cut flowers in it. I got out some green cards in my drawer, placed some of the green alcohol strips on them & placed one of the flowers on it. It was amazing what a b/ful contract the a/inks made for the flowers. I also laid out some on white cards. I'm out of blending solution,I've to wait before I can make some more b/grounds. It's taken about 10 mo's to pull together my orginal idea for these cards. I want to get some more DewDrop pads to use for my card edges. I love these since they are small enough for me to hold onto while inking card edges. I also don't get ink on my hands or places where I don't want on my card. Plus the cost means I can have more colors of ink pads on my budget. I like these better than the Color Box Cat Eyes. The pad is better,I had to glue down the sponge pads on the Cat's Eyes This is 'on hold' for right now. I'm wondering if some of these will be masuline enough for my Iraq card project
I have other clip art copied for me to color this summer. When the heat hits here In June,I can't work in my room. I pull up to the potable a/c & color. Allen gave me a new set of Prism w/color pencils that match my Prism pencils I found 2 books on Amazon @ C-mas for .1 plus s&h. to color this summer. I really like how my whimiscal c/art turned out w/both of the pencils. I used the pencils for the outlines. I used the w/c pencils for areas I want to blend & shade.