My mom loves loves loves homemade cards. It is hard for me to keep them creative for her birthday and for mother's day. I've probably made over forty now.

Actually, I've probably copped out and bought a few in my days.

Cardmaking is easy, but it's also easy to go overboard on the task. The key to making cards is the concept. It's like abstract art. They say abstract art is like this:

Abstract Art = "I could've done that" + "But you didn't."

So for this card's concept, I thought back to fourth grade, to a project where we colored with crayon and painted over it with black watercolor paint. It looked like stained glass. This can be done on wax paper I think, and hung up in the window. But I decided to try it for my mom's Mother's day card today.

Water, watercolors, the card, crayons, and good music (Gillian Welch!). I forgot--you might need newspaper for the painting part.

Draw a something that looks stained-glass-esque. Symmetry seems to work best. Google Image "stained glass," that can help you steal a pattern. Keep it simple! Keep it bright, too. You'll see later that the brighter the colors you use, the better the outcome.

Use light colors to color the front completely. Press hard, use that crayon up, don't leave any white space if possible, except at the edges. Then, be brave and paint the card completely, over the entire thing, with black watercolor paint.

It ended up a little dark. My love for indigo did not help me out here. But I still think it's pretty! Don't forget to write a sincere and unsappy note inside. Have a happy Mother's Day!