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 : )