Saturday, December 15, 2012

Making a Good Impression

I am so excited to share the news that I have finally begun carving my own rubber stamps!

I purchased the materials to carve stamps over a year ago at Dick Blick--a Blick Lino Cutter Set with six blades, one piece of Speedball Speedy-Cut carving block, and one piece of Speedball Speedy-Carve carving block.  I also have a variety of erasers from the dollar store and office supply store, which work pretty well, too.
It wasn't until I purchased Making an Impression by Geninne Zlatkis that I finally sat down to make the first cut.

I have had so much fun over the past couple of days carving stamps, using images from Geninne's book, as well as images from my daughter's Hello Kitty sticker book and The Rubber Stamp Album by Joni K. Miller and Lowry Thompson.  Let me take you on a little gallery walk through my new stamps:
This tree is a modified version of an image in Geninne's book.  I don't have a small enough blade to cut the kind of detail she has, but I have that smallest size blade on my Christmas list, so check back for some more detail in January!
These flowers are another design from Geninne's book, again modified (fewer flowers) for my larger blade.  To make the little dots, you just have to stick an Xacto knife straight down into the rubber and turn it a couple of times.
This mushroom, also based on Geninne's book, is one of my favorites.  I had no idea how that underside was going to look until I inked it, and I was pleased with the results.
I tried leaves from Geninne's book a couple different ways.  I think I'll return to try leaves again when I'm more experienced with the process.
I got this umbrella design from a book of Hello Kitty stickers.  Who knew?  It's also one of my favorites.
This heart key, as well as the crayon, hat, mustache, and footstep images below all came from the same sticker book. 
On scrap rubber from the larger stamps, I carved my initials:
On another piece of scrap rubber, I used an Xacto knife to dig out three little holes to create a brick impression, while I used a dollar store eraser to practice carving a grid at the beginning of this whole stamp-carving adventure:
These pages contain the practice impressions of my stamps:
I carved a heart, as well as some little legs that can be added to other images, but I guess I forgot to photograph them.  You can see them on the practice page above, though.
 
And here are all my newly-carved stamps nestled in their rubber stamp home:
I store my stamps in plastic box photo frames that you can find at most craft stores.  Since that's where I keep my store-bought stamps, I thought my hand-carved stamps deserved a similar home!
 
I'll probably never know why it took me so long to finally try carving my own stamps, when it has been on my Creative To Do list for such a long time.  Hopefully I won't let that kind of procrastination to keep me from any further creative fun!
 



11 comments:

uncustomary said...

These are great. I like the mushroom and the umbrella and the dotted rectangle the most. Carving a rubber stamp is #83/100 Ways To Be Creative.

Karenann Young said...

Wonderful stamps!!! I have made about a dozen of my own! JoAnn's used to sell the kind of material that I really liked to carve. Before that, I tried them all and didn't like them. JoAnn's stopped selling them though. I then tried a white eraser called "Magic Rub" by Sanford. It's the size of a regular eraser like the pink one, but I like it. I don't even know if Michael's carries it anymore, but I don't carve much anymore. It's fun though! I used for my tools some really cheap woodcarving tools that worked just great! I don't think they sell those anymore. It was years ago. Just like the big box of cheap pastels I got years ago. They were really cheap and lots of colors!!! Haven't gone through any of any one color so I'm set for life! Have fun!

Bree said...

These stamps are awesome! I'll never be able to carve my own stamp. :)

scrapwordsmom said...

Okay...so this is soooo fun!! you have been inspired...AGAIN:)

I LOVE stopping by here always!!

Merry Christmas!

Leslie

alexandra s.m. said...

They're wonderful!
Can't wait to see more ;-)

TFS~

VivJM said...

Andria - you are such a talented lady! These are gorgeous, I especially love the mushroom.

Parabolic Muse said...

These are so cute! Congrats for realizing another ambition!

aprilmariecole.blogspot.com said...

Hip, hip, hooray!!!
Love your stamps, Andria. Great job carving them out!
I recently purchased this book too, we think alike. ~xx
Now, to just find the time... to carve away. I am hopping to have a little more time, once the Holidays are behind us.
Thank you for sharing, you have inspired me. :]

Anne with an e said...

oooh I have been wanting to try this! But I don't have a craft knife yet.. Your stamps came out so cute! I especially like the little mushroom :)

laurie said...

oh, this looks like such fun! and i can just imagine you using your stamps on all kinds of projects. i remember making block prints in junior high, many years ago, and how much i enjoyed the process.

Adriann said...

Wow...love them all! My fav is the mushroom. So groovy!