Stencil Monoprint Technique

Hello my crafty friends!

I'm here to share a card I made using a pretty simple technique for the background - stencil monoprint. It's one of my favourite techniques and I use it for cards, scrapbook pages and in my art journal. Here is a close up of the background.

I started with a 6"x 6" piece of Superstock from Creative Scrapbooker Magazine. My friend, Nicole, insisted I give it a try since I love mixed media. I had my doubts since I have tried many smooth heavy cardsock before and wasn't thrilled with the results. This Superstock is amazing! It can take a lot of abuse from wet media and still look smooth. I'm definitely a Superstock convert.

I took a couple of my Distress Oxides ink pads - Fossilized Amber & Fired Brick, and swiped them diagonally across a Tim Holtz Layering Stencil - Coundown, from Stampers Anonymous. I was careful not overlap the colours so as to not contaminate my ink pads.

After a few sprays of water over the ink I took a paper towel and wiped off the ink from the sides of the stencil. I didn't want to see any hard edges on my background.

Now its time for the magic - I flipped my stencil over on to the Superstock, and pressed it down lightly with a roll of papertowel. I let the stencil sit on the Superstock for about 20 seconds before removing it. I love how this background turned out. I took my spray bottle and gave the ink a quick spritz before drying with my heat tool.

My background is done and now it is time to work on my stamped images.

Thanks to my Misti & Versafine Onyx Black ink I get some beautifully crisp stamped images. I love my Misti. I stamped a Crazy Cat, a few balloons from the Crazy Accessories set and a Happy Birthday sentiment.  I used my Distress Ink and water brush to colour in my images. Then I diecut them out with the matching dies from Sizzix. 

I used dimensional foam to adhere them down to my background.

Here is my finished card.