Experimenting with Mandala Stamps

I recently purchased some mandala stamps by Kelly Creates and decided to experiment with them before putting them in my drawer.

I grabbed an Island Indigo Stampin'Up stamp pad and stamped a page of 8 1/2" x 11" piece of white cardstock using all three of the images. I cut the page up into four after the original stamping was complete and then did a few more touch up stamping with any blank areas edges to the pieces. Kind of a backward way of going about it but it made for four different random pieces of background paper.

I am not a fan of colouring, as it hurts my hand, so this time I experimented using my Stampin'Up sponge daubers and my oldest ink pad, ColorBox Pigment Ink Option Pad in various blues and a dusty rose. I like the effect and it was super quick and painless, so win-win!

Here are the cards I made from this background. The other two look pretty much the same, so I only included two snaps.

Dsitress Ink Monoprinting

Zoo sent me a link to a video from Jennifer McGuire Ink, on how to do a background using distress ink and heat embossing. It made two backgrounds for each inking, so of course I had to try it out.

Jennifer McGuire Ink

Distress Ink Monoprint (and 25+ Cards)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NsySZEPT8HI&feature=youtu.be

Zoo had given me three of her old Tim Holtz distress ink pads, and as they are the only ones I have it was an easy colour choice to begin experimenting. The colours are: peacock feathers; vintage photo; and tea dye.

In the top two and the bottom left you may notice a faded area where I taped the two pieces of card stock together. I used some masking tape I had sitting beside me and it turned out too thick and affected the way the ink transferred. In the other three I removed the tape before spritzing with water and just made sure I held the pieces together without moving them.

I lost track of the video theme for a few minutes when I used copper embossing powder on some of the backgrounds. I like the effect but I think I would have liked it as a more mono colour style, as well.

I look forward to making new cards with these backgrounds. I will wait awhile though, as I have all but two of my cards for 2019 already made : )

More Washi Tape Cards

I attended a Stampin’Up party a week ago and the demonstrator showed us how to do a card using washi tape.

It was fun and easy and so in my usual fashion I came home and experimented with supplies I had on hand to make a bunch more. I made rather a lot, as I have a whole box of washi tape (all from dollar stores) and wanted to see the results with a variety of tapes. The hardest part was finding a die cut or punch that would fit the space without covering up too much of the washi tape and still looked good.

Here are my results.

Washi Tape Easter Cards

Awaking one day with an idea for an Easter card turned into inspiration for 15 cards : )

I am trying to use things I have on hand and washi tape is one thing I haven’t used a whole lot. The following card is super easy and turned out adorable.

I ran each card through the Big Shot with the Stampin’Up dot embossing folder, inked on a goofy chicken poking his head into the space and the sentiment from the same stamp set (Stampin’Up ‘Hey, Chick’). I cut egg shape out of plain printer paper, covered it with Easter themed washi tape, and attached it to the front of the card. Some of the same tape was used to decorate the inside with a big Hero Arts Happy Easter stamp.

An easy, quick card that turned out pretty cute.

 - on the pink card I goofed by pushing too hard when stamping the sentiment and decided it would be OK if I coloured and highlighted it. I am sure my niece won't care one way or the other. There are no mistakes in crafting, right?

Happy Easter everyone!

Using Left Over Paint From a Pour

Morn'n. One more post about the paint from rock painting.

As you may have learned from past posts, I do not like wasting things. Along this vein, when we were doing rock pours last year, I was in a state with the amount of paint pooling under the rocks after a pour. So I ran into Zoo's craft room and pulled out a bunch of circle punched paper and 8 1/2' x 11' white card stock. I went ahead and dipped the circle punches in the pooled mixed paint and then used a plastic spoon to pick some up and smear or drip onto the various card stock.

The resulting paper ranged from cool to baby poo. Zoo's sister thought I was insane and I told her she would be receiving a baby poo card from me in the future. Below are the cards I made with the various punches and paper.