I guess I’ve been in a stamping mood lately. I made these sometime last week as “thanks yous” for my swap paticipants.

I really like being able to use several different stamps for layering.

The front of the bookmark has a house, bird, paisley and swirls and the back has the upside down queen with pigtails (that I drew in).

I think Super-E and I will be collaborating on bookmarks for his class mates at the end of the school year. He can draw up the images he likes, I’ll carve them out and then let him stamp away.

This weekend though, we I get to work on an Egyptian costume for a play that he’ll be in for school. Fun!

A few people have asked how I care for and store my hand-carved rubber stamps, so I thought I’d share what I do.

Cleaning:

1. After using your stamp, stamp any excess ink off onto a scrap piece of paper.

2. Rinse stamp off under running water (room temp), with or without mild soap. Be careful not to rub while rinsing. Small pieces of detailed carving can be lost this way.

3. Gently blot water off with soft cloth. Many inks will leave your stamp stained, especially dark inks. This is okay and won’t affect future stamping. Test stamp on a blank piece of scrap paper to make sure it is completely clean of ink.

Storage:

1. I store my stamps in a plastic covered, storage bin. This keeps them safe and in one place.

2. Carefully stack larger pieces making sure they remain flat. Any bending or overhang will eventually lead to cracks and breakage. I lost one of my favorite stamps by carelessly tossing it in the bin without giving it a flat surface to rest on. Smaller stamps don’t bend very easily and are less worrisome.

3. Keep stamps away from extreme heat and cold. I keep my stamps in a covered shelving unit, in controlled temps, protected from sun and dust.

Pretty basic stuff, but it makes a difference. These stamps won’t last forever and can eventually harden, crumble or crack. I spend a lot of time carving my stamps and want them to last as long as they can. Many of my stamps are over 2 years old and still work great. Some inks can affect their longevity, but as long as you stick to craft/scrap book quality inks, you should be okay. My favorite inks are VersaCraft and VersaMagic Dew Drops.

Hope this is helpful

Packages of beautiful notecards have slowly been making there way to me. I have received 7 sets so far, and lots more are on the way. It is so exciting and fun to receive packages in the mail everyday. Opening them up is my favorite part. So far, I am very blown away by the talent and creativeness of you swappers!

This is my contribution to the swap. Lots of carving and lots of stamping. It was a nice, quiet, relaxing project.

Adendum:

Don’t forget to check out my Rubber Stamp Tutorial for tips on making rubber stamps.

Blick E-Z Cut,  Speedball Speedy Stamp and Speed-Cut Blocks are all excellent choices for making stamps.  They are high quality, soft and easy to cut with linoleum cutters.  Very safe too.

These are the cards I made for my 3 winners. They are carved linoleum stamps on a pretty speckled recycled paper cardstock. I had tried different colors of ink, but the black seemed to work best.

I also have had 3 half-finished pincushions lying around my craft room for a while, and finally decided to finish them up today. I made little heart straight pins for them and I think they add the perfect touch. They are polymer clay shaped around the ends of straight pins then baked. A nice simple and fun little project to do while juggling the sad woes of my three sick guys.

The three pincushions are in my shop, since I won’t be doing that little craft show this weekend with my new group, Sonoran Artisans. This is all I’ve been able to make all week and it would look pretty sad having three little cushions on a table for a craft show.  Aw, well. There will be more shows I am sure.  I will definitely go visit the group to see what they’ve got.  Better to meet them first anyway,rather then jump in head first, I think.

Some of these bird cards were sent out with my bird ornaments. I’ve also been making gifts cards sets with them too.

These house cards were made up today, also for gift cards sets. The stamps have been used to decorate envelopes and also the packages for my little house ornaments that were sent out.

I love notecards. They can be so handy when wanting to send a message or add to a gift. I always try to have several different cards on hand at all times, just in case. They just make the gift or message a little more special. Which reminds me that another notecard swap should be in order (maybe Jan, Feb?)

These will be sent out tomorrow. I just loved the collage of my guys on the last post, so that’s how I printed them up. I love how they turned out. I also did a little tree/ornament illustration for this year’s card.

It only seems like a couple of months ago that he started school and now the year is over. I’m not sure my Super-E really truly understands what summer vacation time will really be like. Lots of time with good ol’ mom and pop that’s for sure! He loved going to school and seeing his friends. Summer vacation will be boring in comparison. Which is why I’m going to have to come up with a BIG calendar chock full of things to do to keep him busy. It’s hard when you live in the dry, HOT, desert. Outside activities are somewhat limited. I’m talking 110 degree weather coming upon us.

This is a little bag I made as a farewell gift for his teacher. The inside is lined with this hand stamped fabric. I just had to have apple fabric! I think the apple may have made its way into the gift bag this morning and off to Miss S.

By special request, here is a quick little tutorial on the art of easy rubber stamping.

Supplies:

#2 Pencil, ball-point ink pen, linoleum cutters, paper, ink pad and rubber printing block.

1.  Draw your image onto a piece of paper with #2 pencil. When you are happy with your image, go over again with pencil to make sure the lines are strong and dark.  If you want to do a very simple image, you can draw directly onto the rubber printing block with a pen and skip to step 4.

2.  Now transfer this image onto the rubber printing block by putting image face down onto block and rub with pencil. You will have a backwards image. This is especially important when using images with words, letters or numbers.
3.  Once the image has transferred, go over penciled lines with ink pen.  This will give you a good image to carve around.

4.  Now start carving using the smallest cutter (size 1) and carefully go around all the lines.  Make sure you have good light and a steady hand.  You don’t want to loose a nose, eye or very important line.  *You can cut directly over the lines if you want a reversed image.
5.  Once the image lines have been carefully carved around, use a larger cutter to get rid of the excess rubber.

6. When you are done carving, gently wash off little bits and dry thouroughly.  Start stamping on a practice piece of paper to see your finished image.  You may need to go back and carve any missed areas.

I’ve used my new stamp for making thank you cards.  I hope this was helpful to those who have not yet played with rubber stamping.

I made this fabric for Moki’s hand stamped fabric swap.  We were to design a stamp (about 3 inches) and stamp a yard of nice cotton fabric, cut it into fat quarters and send 3 away (keeping one ). I couldn’t stop at one stamp-so I did three stamps.

I did a flowery design using Fall inspired colors.  Since I was all stampy, I made coordinating twill tape “ribbon” and notecards.  Fun fun fun!

Then I packaged them up real pretty and sent them on their way.Here is how I did it: (Moki gives instructions too)
You’ll need:  fabric of choice (pre-washed), 1 sheet of super thick craft foam, 1 sheet of thin self-adhesive craft foam,  acryilic craft paints (you can use fabric paints/ink), exacto knife or very sharp scissors, a brayer and an iron for heat setting.

You can use a paint brush for applying the paint onto the stamp, but a brayer helps decrease the amount of excess paint that could potentially glop up your pretty/clean fabric.  Plus, the thinner the layer of paint is, the better the outcome for a softer feeling fabric vs. a stiff painted feeling one(especially if you are using acrylic craft paints).

1)  Cut out design using the thin self-adhesive craft foam.   Peel off adhesive backing and stick onto a super thick piece of craft foam (see picture).

2) Spread out paint, using the brayer, onto a 6″ x 6″ (or larger) piece of super thick foam.  This gives you a nice flat surface for an even, thin layer of paint.

3) You can either roll the paint onto the stamp using the brayer, or just press the stamp into the paint.  I found that I got better coverage using the brayer, but smaller stamps are easier to just press into the paint.

4) Start stamping away, using even pressure when pressing the stamp onto the fabric.

5) When the  fabric is covered with the design, allow to completely dry.  Heat set with iron.

*I have not tried washing this fabric yet, but I do know that when I accidently get craft paint on my clothes- It NEVER comes off once it has dried.

We are deep in boxes packing up for our big move. I wanted to finish a few things before packing up my sewing machine, paints and all of my craft materials. First, I had to finish my littel I-guy’s outfit for my sister’s wedding. Super-E and my nephew are also in the wedding and are wearing white short-sleeve dress shirts with black shorts and red suspenders. I couldn’t find anything similar for an 18 month old (well, anything that I could afford) and so I made this using McCall’s pattern #2033. It’s one of the very few boy patterns out there, by the way. I-guy looks quite addorable in it, kind of like a little penguin. I added red and black grograin ribbon for a more formal look.

I also made these little thank you cards to send out for Super-E’s birthday gifts that he received. He made little pictures of himself and I transfered them to rubber stamps. He loves how the stamp turned out and has been beggin” to do more.

We have lots more packing to do. My postings will be pretty sporadic from now on until we get settled in our new digs.

I made this little box and these cards for my sister’s wedding. The idea is to have these cards (hand carved rubber stamp + digital text) available at the reception so that people can jot down best wishes for the bride & groom. Then she can keep the cards stored in this pretty little mosaic box. Later on down the road, when my sister and soon-to-be brother-in-law are feeling sentimental, they can read the cards together and maybe even to their children someday.