After much lurking on the GPP Street Team site, I’ve joined the crusade for March. This month is all about making your own tools, through carving your own stamps. I’ve approached it a little differently, as I don’t have any carving tools and have been saving all my offcuts from UMs for ages now, with the thought that I’d be able to turn it into my own stamp (and I’m not good at throwing potentially useful things away!)
So here are the results: a triangular mosaic stamp, attached to a mints tin (35mm x 70mm). I didn’t allow for the flexing of the tin when inking and couldn’t get an even coverage, so I prised the lid off and now it’s like a finger puppet stamp. This allows me to get my fingers into the tin and press into the middle of the stamp.
I used my stamp to create a border for an image I had done ages ago. The technique of mosaic images was shown to me by Maria, at our local stamping club (South Eastern Rubber Stampers). Images from art-e-zine, a great place for images and ideas.
These pages came together quickly. I stuck the scrapbooking paper in with double sided tape and added a wash of gesso in a swirly pattern to look like waves. Stamped the shell border. “The Sea” was written with Twinkling H2Os and an aqua pen (like I had done here). Wrote in the text with things about the sea and added the last image when the ink ran out in my pen (simply an unexpected design change). Found a grungeboard heart in blue, so added that as well.
Looking forward to next months crusade (stencils),
Michelle
Michelle Ward said,
March 30, 2008 at 2:26 am
Michelle – thanks for joining the crusade and sharing your clever invention of making a stamp from rubber scrap! You’ll have all of us hoarding our bits and pieces now *grin*. Makes a great border on your page!
audrey h. said,
March 30, 2008 at 7:31 am
Michelle…your mozaic stamp is wonderful and so versatile. Love how you used it to frame the pic.
Kathy McCreedy said,
March 30, 2008 at 8:56 am
Hi Michelle… your border stamp is lovely and so versatile! Isn’t it amazing what we can do when we set our creative minds to work?!? Love the colors, and I actually really like the variations in the colors, from uneven stamping… gives it lots of interest, I think! Great job, thanks for joining us!
Kim Tedrow said,
March 30, 2008 at 1:02 pm
Great idea about saving rubber! Love the mosaic look you achieved with the geometric shapes. -Kim
Julie said,
March 30, 2008 at 7:48 pm
Oh I love this, it looks great as a border on that page. Well done!
Nicole said,
March 30, 2008 at 9:26 pm
Looks great….
Hugs
Nicole
Rosie said,
March 30, 2008 at 10:32 pm
Wow, that’s such a great idea… you’re even thriftier than me!! It looks absolutely great and I’m sure the applications are endless! I must admit, I’m new this month too and it’s been such fun, can’t wait to try stencils.
Cindy said,
March 31, 2008 at 8:32 am
What a neat way to reuse supplies. Thank you for sharing the process on your journal pages, too. I love how you put gesso on scrapbooking paper!
ArtKat said,
March 31, 2008 at 11:50 am
Great stamp, I’m sure that you’ll find lots of uses for it! Your pages turned out lovely!
carin.c said,
April 1, 2008 at 8:45 am
INGENIOUS IDEA! A rubber scrap mosaic stamp… makes for such a wonderful border and I’m sure has lots of other possibilities as well. What a unique technique!!
Paula said,
April 2, 2008 at 10:45 am
You win for most origional idea! Cute bathing beauty piece!
Fiona Whitehead said,
April 17, 2008 at 3:18 am
What a great idea – it looks incredible – love the LO too