Thing-a-day.com

 I am really enjoying carving stamps.  It’s kinda like a mediative activity where I just think about carving.   Today I did a heart feather!

Started new proj:  Rubber stamp.  Chopped out a chunk and considered trying my red uakari monkey face logo then bagged the idea.  I figure I need to start with a less complicated thing to carve.

… so I went with text only.  I printed it in reverse and normally so I could have a reference of what it would look like during and after carving.

I got it traced onto the rubber block by penciling-in the logo on tracing paper and rubbing it onto the block.  Then came the carving.  Then came the delicious slicing.  Then came the me getting carried away.  Then came … I gotta start over.  Ha ha.  Moral:  Don’t drink and carve intricate rubber blocks with razors.  I’m fine but the block is quite rogered.

Pile of debris.  Ha.  It was fun to scrape it all off and plan a new attack on the reverse side.  yay.  Good night and Happy VD!!

Here’s the Cubs clingy I made on Day 06 of 29.  It turned out great and sticks to the sliding-glass door like a champ.  I’m going to make some reversal clingys for my pals’ cars.  Go Cubs!

Remember TAB soda? It is a bit of a joke between us, so I made this stamp this morning for my daughter to take letterboxing. It is also my first handcarved stamp.

Then on her first box ever we found a hitchhicker! She is so excited about this now.

Today I was inspired to try carving again.  And why not try with one of my favorite animals.  Here is my carved bird.  I love the orange ink and pairing them on my one card.  Tweet tweet and happy day to all!

Today was round two of cutting a stamp for my sales tags.  (Because I am impatient and my camera battery is dead you get to see why today had to be round two.  Round one , below, consisted of me merrily chopping off the last “e” on the first try.  Geez.)

Looks a lot rougher than it actually turns out.  And this is much easier than one might expect.

1.  Print your text or image in reverse.  [Black and white with no gradation works best.]

2.  Use rubber cement to attach print-out to stamp material, image facing up so you can easily see it.  [Could use eraser or buy new from craft/art store.]

3.  Slowly score around the part you want to stamp with a sharp Exacto blade.

4.  Remove outline of paper template and start carefully removing excess rubber from around image.

Pie.  Easy as.

 (Somehow I didn’t get this posted on the first day, only drafted.  But here you go!)

Here’s my first installment.

I made 4 of these swirly valentine’s cards. I’m in love with these stamps!

Day one.

Mustache Stamp.

(Future plan to use on business cards, with information on the back in a dot matrix font.)