Painting in watercolour & Pastel

Last weeks theme for the Mamma group was An English Country Garden ATC ,
http://www.flickr.com/groups/815984@N23/

Right up my street LOL ,Its been a long time since I painted a cottage,but the challenge was set,never ever created one this ATC size,I just had to give it a go,I have always worked in w/colour and pastels for the publishers,as the pastel colours are so vibrant and take the print well,thats what I was told :0)I can see their point though.It got me back in the mood for painting !
I always paint the background in watercolour first,its like laying down a sketch of how you want it to go,then I attack it with Pastels lol, I leave parts of the watercolour showing through,like this one the sky, and some parts of the path,doing it this way,it gives me a colour guide too.The white of the cottage is the white watercolour paper,I forgot to say I always use 140LB w/colour paper.