Tag Archives: rubber stamping

Rubber stamping tip: tiny stamps on paper strips

Paper Crafts, Rubber Stamping, , , , , , , , , , , , ,
Narrow strips of paper attached to a piece of scrap plexiglass.

I work on a lot of small scale stamping projects and I stamp a lot of tiny stamps, many unmounted. Sometimes I stamp things like little words for collages, mini greetings for tags and cards, or dates or days of the week for planners and journals. I like to stamp a lot of extra paper pieces for future projects when I get my stamps out – it saves a lot of time.

When I stamp a lot of tiny stamps at a time, the task is a lot easier if I tear a bunch of paper strips with a ruler then temporarily attach the ends to a piece of scrap plexiglass with rubber bands or tape. Otherwise the paper strips are kind of hard to keep in place for a clean print since they are so light and the ends tend to curl a bit.

Here are some of my tiny stamps next to the acrylic blocks I use for mounting them temporarily with double-sided tape.

I use the fronts and the sides of small acrylic stamping blocks to temporarily mount my tiny stamps with double-sided tape. I’m not that fussy about keeping the blocks clean since I usually stamp in black. But every once in awhile I’ll scrub them with stamp cleaner or Simple Green cleaner when they get too inked up to see what I’m doing. One of the reasons to use clear acrylic blocks is to see where you are stamping! If it’s not that critical to be precise you can use any small object that you can tape a stamp to and don’t mind getting inky as a temporary mount, for example I often use the lids of pill bottles or the edges of Tic-Tac containers.

Have fun with your stamping!

Paper Crafting Fun With Tag Art

Paper Crafts, Rubber Stamping, Tutorials, Upcycling, , , , , , , , , , , ,
Make your own decorated paper tags for a variety of craft projects! This is a good project for using up a lot of paper scraps.

Tools and Materials

Tag Art Template (scroll up and alt-click to download or get PDF – PDF Tag Art Template)
Ball point pen
Medium weight black marker
Black rubber stamping ink
Rubber stamps with sentiments
Light colored, light weight paper
Assorted paper scraps in a selected color scheme – I used neutrals in this demo
Clean scrap paper
Ruler
Bone folder or squeegee
Scissors
Glue sticks
Hole punch
String, twine, or embroidery floss

Instructions:

  1. Download my .jpeg graphic Tag Art Template above. If you prefer a PDF file here is a link – PDF Tag Art Template. Print it out onto cardstock if you can, or print it on regular paper and glue it to cardstock for stiffness and durability. Cut around the tags and punch the holes. Now you have a set of tag templates ready to use.
Here is a selection of tag templates I made for myself out of various scrap card stock and chipboard. Besides my pattern, other good sources of potential tag shapes are cookie cutters, commercial stencils, and tags from gifts you get than you can trace. There are also clear and colored plastic tags for sale where craft supplies are sold. Those could be traced and also used as the covers for tag books.

2. Trace the tag shapes onto assorted cardstock pieces. If you have scraps this is a good way to use some up. Cut out the tags close to the lines you drew, but a little outside. That will help you cut a clean edge later.

3. Pick out some light-colored paper that complements your chosen color scheme. Use a ruler as a straight edge to tear the paper into strips. Stamp greetings and sentiments onto the paper pieces with black stamping ink.

I stamped neutral pastel color strips of paper with assorted sentiments in black rubber stamping ink. Most of the stamps you see here are from my unmounted stamp set Assorted Greetings and Sentiments. You could use any sentiment stamps that you have around or tear words out of found papers or old cards.

4. Place the tags on your work surface with the outlined sides down on clean scrap paper. Glue a sentiment on the front of each tag. Fill in the rest of the tag with paper scraps. Tear them into narrow strips with the ruler if you need to.

Adding stamped sentiments and strips of decorative paper scraps to my cut out tags.

5. Trim the tags following the pen line on the back and punch out the holes.

6. Outline the tags with a black sharpie marker

What they call a Sharpie Fine Point I think of as a medium point marker because they make much finer ones. Any black marker will do if it gives you the kind of line you want around the edge. If you like, experiment on scrap cardstock or chipboard before you outline a finished tag.

7. Select two or three strands of string, twine or embroidery floss and thread through the holes with a lark’s head knot.

Once you have made the tags, what can you do with them?

  • Put one on the front of a greeting card.
  • Decorate a gift package.
  • Use as a bookmark.
  • Make a tag book.
  • Enhance a shadow box.
  • Incorporate into scrapbook or journal pages.
  • Make a decorative seasonal garland.
  • Make motivational notes for yourself.
  • Create decorative door hangers.
  • Label bottles or jars.

What else can you think of? Have fun with your tag art!

Paper Art and Crafting Technique – Making Templates From Chipboard

Art, Mixed Media, Paper Crafts, Rubber Stamping, Upcycling, , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Directly above is a faux postage stamp sheet collage I started almost a year ago. Here is how it began. I was sorting through some old papers and I found two computer printouts that another artist, nonlocal variable, had sent to me as mail art a long time ago. The printouts were of faux postage designs featuring computer manipulated photos of Ray Johnson – an artist who is considered by many to have been the founder of the modern mail art movement. Ray Johnson is the subject of a lot of mail art projects. I participated in one such project myself in the fall of 2019. I also featured some pictures of Ray Johnson in my #12daysoftomsbeard art project because when my husband Tom is clean shaven, he looks so much like Ray Johnson that when I was working on the mail art project, Tom thought at first glance that I was using pictures of him!

In the same stack of old papers, I found an advertising booklet that had black and white portraits similar in size to the Ray Johnson portraits in the old printouts. At least they were close enough in size to possibly be used together in a faux postage design. I took a faux postage base I made a long time ago and use a lot and started laying down the portrait pictures on it to get ideas.

I originally had the idea to put the smaller portraits inside silhouettes of the Ray Johnson images and alternate the two on the stamp sheets. I made templates from scrap chipboard to help me cut multiple silhouettes and negatives of silhouettes from colorful paper scraps to play around with. I ended up saving the smaller black and white portraits for a future project and I kept the Ray Johnson images for this set of stamp sheets.

When I make chipboard templates for a collage or other project, I keep them in folders named after the project they were made for so if I want to I can use them over and over for related art projects. If I’m really turned on by the designs, I am likely to use the templates many times. I also made a bunch of rectangle templates to go with my faux postage stamp background, using tracing paper as an aid to finding which piece goes where on the collage. I numbered the chipboard pieces and their position on the tracing paper to help me get organized the next time I use the templates.

I arranged the different colored small rectangles on my collage sheets where I wanted them. I glued on the Ray Johnson images, some miscellaneous found images, and used black permanent Sharpie markers and stencils to draw on some bold designs in black marker. I printed out postage stamp related words, phrases and images with black permanent stamping ink onto white blank sticker paper, cut them out and stuck them on my collages to make them look even more like sheets of imaginary stamps.

I thought they needed more texture to look finished so I used freehand drawing plus stencils again to apply marks with paint markers and colored pencils. The final marks I applied were a bit of colored pencil outlining the white sticker pieces to make them look more integrated with the whole.

Here are the commercial stencils I used in the project. They were designed by the Crafter’s Workshop company:

Mini Patterns

Mini Shape Landscape

Mini X Trail

Mini Rows of Lines

I probably will display the resulting “stamp” sheets as framed collages some time in the future. I’ve scanned them into the computer where they will be reduced to a smaller size so that they look more like real postage stamps. Then I’ll print out and distribute the finished stamp sheets to some other mail artists. Many mail artists collect faux postage as art or use the resulting stamps as part of another piece of mail artwork.

Instructions for #12daysoftomsbeard

Art, Events, Holiday Crafts, Marketing, Mixed Media, Paper Crafts, Upcycling, , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

WHAT: If you have ordered something from my Etsy store recently, or if you get a Christmas card from me, you will find inside one or both of the following invitations for #12daysoftomsbeard.

Invitations with tags to decorate. Sometimes I include a little packet of paper ephemera to help people get ideas or inspiration, if they need it. If you want an invitation and did not get one in the mail, you can download one at this link – #12daysoftomsbeard tag invite.

These tags are intended for drawing on or decorating, then sending back to me, so that I can hang them on Tom’s beard each day from December 25 to January 6. During that time I will take a crazy picture of the results to put on social media for people to find when they search for the hashtag #12daysoftomsbeard. Last year Tom and I experimented with different lighting effects, backgrounds and filters to come up with something unusual each day. Last year I tried to group the beard art items, background and filters by color because bright colors usually go far toward cheering and inspiring me.

Here are some examples of tags I decorated last year, a couple that people sent in to me, and a few images that resulted.

WHY: We mostly like to do this because it’s a lot of fun, and it makes us laugh! You should have seen my MIL’s reaction when she saw the orange picture of Tom! “What have you done to my son!!!” We could do this without any participation from others, but we appreciate it whenever anyone wants to join in. It’s an extra creative challenge to use something someone else sent in, and it’s a way to connect with people who are sometimes separated by distance or who I don’t even know in “real life”.

Why do people paint rocks and leave them for others to find? Why do Jeep owners put rubber ducks on random other Jeeps? Why did I put a banana peel on my head earlier this year and have my picture taken with it on? Why did people in Toronto make a memorial display for a dead raccoon and share it on social media? Group activities and performance art projects are a satisfying activity for some reason, for quite a few people. I will probably write more later about the psychological reasons why that is the case.

Earlier this year I started a SWOT analysis of #12daysoftomsbeard to try to use some of what I learned in marketing class to try to increase participation this year. I didn’t finish the analysis yet, but I will keep adding onto it in the future as I finish sections. Here it is if you want to read what I have written so far – SWOT Analysis of #12daysoftomsbeard.

HOW – One idea I want to try for increasing participation is to provide some more specific instructions. The wording on the invitations reads: “To play, color, glue, punch, stamp or otherwise decorate this tag.” For some people, that will be enough guidance, others might feel comfortable with something more specific.

I am going to suggest techniques to try, and post examples here on this page. Watch this space as I add them! Since I like to use mixed media a lot, it will be a challenge for me to use just one technique at a time, so maybe I’ll try that. Enjoy!

Drawing

Coloring

Stenciling

Stickers

Hole punches

Design tape – also known as Washi tape or Paper tape

Collage

Rubber Stamping

Image Transfers

?????????? – What other techniques could be used?

Here are four examples of beard invitations I made for the 2022-23 season. They are meant to look a bit like chunks of hair that when assembled and applied to Tom’s face, will resemble a beard. I added a QR code to this web page so people could quickly find out what it is and what to do with it. Here are links to all six variations.

Beard Parts 1

Beard Parts 2

Beard Parts 3

Beard Parts 4

Beard Parts 5

Beard Parts 6

To participate, print out one or more of these sheets. Color or decorate the beard pieces with the designs and materials of your choice. Mail the pieces to Tom and I. Then check the hashtag #12daysoftomsbeard on Instagram between December 25 and January 6 each year to see what happens!

For more inspiration

Here is a link to a slideshow of images from the web page of IUOMA – The International Union of Mail Artists. I’ve been uploading the beard pictures to this gallery as I go. Intermixed are images that other people are uploading of conceptual art that they are both sending and receiving. This slide show changes daily as new images get added and older ones drop off. It might give you some ideas! Sometimes I put this slideshow on the screen while I’m working for extra inspiration!

Slide show of photos from IUOMA

Easy Thank You Cards

Paper Crafts, Rubber Stamping, Tutorials, , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,
Rubber stamps by Rubber Stampede (Thank You), Hero Arts (flowers) and unknown (passport stamp collage).

My Dad and I are making Thank You cards following the funerals of my uncle Dave and brother Larry. Tom helped a lot too with the gluing. I’m feeling the effects that a lot of people feel after serious grief and trauma: disrupted sleep, fatigue, brain fog, joint pain, muscle pain, etc. These symptoms are normal for some people after trauma and severe stress, apparently, but of course make everyday functioning relatively difficult for a time. A bike ride on Sunday with friends helped a lot. I asked Tom to be my coach and help encourage me to do the ride. He pumped up the bike tires and pumped me up emotionally and took a hot epsom salt bath with me before we got dressed for the ride to help loosen up my stiff and sore body. With that I didn’t need any pain meds like ibuprofen which I had taken from time to time the previous week. He helped me break through a big barrier and function better. I was really discouraged and scared by how sore I was and how bad I felt. I’m very grateful to have a loving husband to help me get over some rough spots and build on little victories to gradually improve over time. This is extremely hard even with help. I hope and pray that people out there who need support can get it from somewhere. As I find grieving and mental health resources online I’ll keep adding them to my self care Pinterest board.

In the meantime, Dad and I are extending the effort to make cards because we have abundant supplies on hand we enjoy using and we find the activity healing and therapeutic. But with not feeling terribly well I had to come up with a card design that was relatively simple so that we would not tax ourselves beyond our current abilities to make them. They are just challenging enough to force us to concentrate a bit but not so hard we want to give up in frustration. I have to take a lot of breaks, but I’m not giving up! Of course if you want to make your own similar cards you could use any suitable sentiment in place of “Thank You” to fit any message you want to send.

Supplies You’ll Need

Blank cards with envelopes – Dad had a whole bunch of envelopes in different sizes already on hand, so we cut plain white paper to the envelope width and folded the pieces in half to fit. If you prefer, you can buy blank cards with matching envelopes at craft stores.

Assorted papers in light, neutral colors for the two largest areas on the card, with subtle patterns on them. The design on the paper should be light enough to stamp on in medium to dark colors.

Assorted papers in more contrasting neutral colors and patterns for the narrow stripe on the front of each card.

Rubber stamping ink in a “harvest gold” color, a taupe color, and black.

Clean scrap paper to help with gluing

Optional – interesting die cuts, design tape (also known a paper tape or washi tape) and stickers for extra interest

Tools You’ll Need

Paper trimmer

Metal ruler for tearing paper

Scissors

Glue sticks

Squeegee, bone folder or burnishing tool

Rubber stamps. My friend Kate recently gave me a large collection of pre-owned stamps. I will gradually be offering some for sale in my online shop as I have time to get them listed. I did set aside some of my favorites to keep for my own collection (of course). To start out my Dad and I selected for these cards two Thank You stamps, two postage related designs, and three wildflower silhouette stamps. Unfortunately I’m not selling the exact stamps I used in this card because I really love them and there were no duplicates in the pre-owned collection Kate gave me, but you can use similar stamps in their place.

Instructions

  1. Glue a narrow strip of paper that is from the higher-contrast selections about 1/3 from either the left or right from the side of the card.

2. Cut and tear out pieces of paper in light neutral colors with subtle background patterns and glue them to the fronts of the cards on either side of the strip you glued down previously. I tore the edges that overlap the central stripes for visual interest. On some of the cards I added some stickers and design tape for a little extra interest if I thought it was needed. As you’ll see in the final graphic featuring variations on the original design, I added some hexagon die cuts I had made some time ago. When I was designing the prototype card, I asked Dad to pick out stamps he liked from my collection, and he also took out these hexagons, so I looked for ways to use a few and I liked them on some of the cards. Trim the paper to the edges of the card front when done gluing.

3. Stamp three flower stamps on the wider background side of the card in harvest gold or similar ink color. My Dad switched to a red-brown ink later in the process which also looked very good.

4. Stamp a Thank You stamp in black, and if you think the card needs a little more interest, stamp postage related designs or some other accent stamps of your choice in a taupe ink color as in my example at the top of this article. You might decide your card needs more or less done to it depending on what background papers you choose. See the graphic below for a bunch of variations that we made.

Here is a collage of some of the cards we made showing how many different ways you can use the same stamps. The additional lower case thank you stamp you see here is by Tim Holtz. Dad did most of the stamping and decided some of the cards didn’t need so much on them which is a fine design choice you can make when the papers are interesting. If you would like to download a high-res version of the above graphic (with more designs on it) to use in projects like stickers or faux postage sheets here is a link:
Printable Thank You Graphics

Additional Resources:

My Pinterest board for Greeting Card Idea and Sketches

My Facebook album for free coloring and paper crafting downloads

With more time and energy, I probably would have created a card that uses stamps that I actually sell, some of which I designed. For now the important thing was to make something nice that is also fast and easy. But if you want to browse my collection of stamps in my Etsy shop here it is: Stamping

Low tech transitional collage from the ’90s

Art, Graphic Design, Mixed Media, Rubber Stamping, , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,
Collage made from computer printouts and clip art.
Collage homage to the Beatles Anthology, from Lime Green News #16.

My current class in graduate school and other projects are pretty demanding right now, so I don’t have a lot of time to make new art. I do still enjoy looking at some of my old art from time to time. Here is a collage I made for my old ‘zine the Lime Green News #16, circa 1996-1997. It’s a tribute to the Beatles Anthology album covers, designed by Klaus Voorman. I was inspired by the use of torn images and how they can strategically reveal what’s underneath. On the Anthology 1 album cover, Voorman ripped out the head of Pete Best to reveal Ringo’s face underneath to “replace” him. This was a mean but clever technique so I did the same thing in my collage in approximately the same spot to enhance my “homage”, only I replaced John with John. If you want to see the Anthology 1 cover and the clever use of the torn out part on a Pete Best album cover, here is a link to an analysis – “The Beatles Anthology 1 Album Cover Cropped Out Original Drummer Pete Best”.

I made the above collage in the year between getting a computer with a black and white laser printer that would print up to 300 ppi, and taking my first class in Adobe Photoshop. At the time I was enjoying the novelty of being able to print out pictures to use in collages instead of just finding images. I printed out pictures of the Beatles that I found online, and printed out a bunch of clip art that I liked, and used those printouts to build the collage. A lot of the clip art came from my Corel Draw clip art library. How I used to love to pore over the printed book that came with it to get ideas!

The covers of Lime Green News 16, 17 and 18. I think those are the last three I published. The middle cover is an altered piece of art by Bill Whorrall. I don’t remember if I asked permission from him or not to do that. I might have, even though it’s very common in Mail Art and ‘zine culture to “remix” other people’s art work. I tried to get something lime green on each cover, so I used to carve a rubber stamp and hand-print it in lime green in a designated spot.

The black and white laser printer was a major step forward in the production quality of my ‘zine, even though by today’s standards it was still very primitive. It wasn’t until much later than I learned software like Publisher and InDesign to help me produce professional quality booklets. At the time of this image I was still following my old practice of printing out text on a printer and cutting and pasting the text among collaged elements. With the text coming from a laser printer instead of a Commodore 64 with a dot-matrix printer, it looked better and was a lot easier to read.

With access to what seemed like unlimited clip art and display fonts, I had tons of fun transitioning from low to high tech. For my ‘zine and collages, I printed elements for headers and body text along with images. Then in 1997, I learned Photoshop and how to make web pages, and that changed everything! But I still enjoy the old methods too and I like to make collages out of whatever is there, whenever I get a chance.

Finishing Touches For Mini Accordion Books

Art, Mixed Media, Paper Crafts, , , , , , , , , , , , ,
Photo by Carien Van Hest. Both sides of the mini accordion book I sent her with it's two-sided envelope.
Photo by Carien Van Hest. Both sides of the mini accordion book I sent her with its two-sided envelope.

Back in 2019, I made a couple of square mini accordion books, 2″ x 2″ in size when folded up. While sending out my 2020 Christmas cards, I finally made envelopes for holding four of them and I sent them out to a few people in my Mail Art network. Here is an article I wrote about how I made that batch of little books – Made From Scraps: Mini Accordion Books.

In the spring of 2020, shortly after the pandemic started, my husband Tom and I started hosting a #virtualartparty online for several weeks in a row to help ourselves and people we know cope with loneliness and anxiety. During the second session, I demonstrated how to make these little accordion books since they can be made from scraps and supplies many people already have around the house. At the end of this article is the archived video of that accordion book session. I started two books that afternoon, which I finally finished recently.

The image below shows the first book, titled “The Wonder of Life”. The top two images are of each side semi-folded. Below that are some close-ups of different sections of the book. To make these mixed media collage compositions, I combined found paper scraps, rubber stamping, design tape, stencils, marker drawing, and image transfers made from clear packing tape. Here is an article I wrote about how to make the image transfers – Art Journaling With Stencils and Image Transfers.

mini_book_wonder_of_life
Mini book by Carolyn Hasenfratz Winkelmann called “The Wonder of Life”.

The next image below shows several examples of image transfers I was making next to sections of the stretched out accordion books that I was trying to coordinate with. I knew I would not know exactly how the semi-translucent transfers would look when they were laid over the underlying paper collage, but to make sure they were at least somewhat harmonious I looked for images for my transfers that reflected the colors and shapes of images I used in my first layer.

Coordinating transfer images to lay over collaged images.
Coordinating transfer images to lay over collaged images.

I made a template for an envelope to fit the books or any thin 2″ x 2″ object for people to download and use to make an envelope for their book if they so wished.

Mini Book Envelope Template
Mini Book Envelope Template

I used the above template to trace two envelopes onto cardstock. I cut the envelopes out and made folds where the dotted lines are in the template so that the envelopes would be thick enough for the little books. With a circle punch I cut little circles to use for making a string closure. I made extras knowing I was going to put transfers on these circles – I wanted to be able to choose from several to get ones that looked good with the finished envelopes.


cutting_and_folding_covers

My next step was to paint the fronts and backs of each envelope with clear acrylic medium, letting the medium dry before I flipped them over to coat the other side. This step was for three purposes – to increase durability, to reduce wrinkling when I later applied layers of transfers and paper, and to make the paper more receptive to the slick tape transfers. When all was dry, I applied transfers to the outsides of the envelopes using clear medium as the glue and burnished them well to remove any air bubbles. After they were dry I trimmed the transfers to the edges of the envelopes.

Applying tape transfers to cardstock envelope.

folding_covers
Envelopes after trimming.

For the insides of the envelopes, I used the acrylic medium to laminate a pieces of paper with a matte finish to the insides of the envelopes. I wanted a matte finish for the insides instead of a shiny finish so that the envelopes would not stick to the books when stored.

The final steps in finishing the book covers were to attach the small cutout discs I made earlier with small brads, and wind embroidery thread around the discs to make a string closure.

Below is the other book I made, “The Wonder of Creativity”. Both books are for sale here on Etsy: https://www.etsy.com/listing/977853529/mini-artist-books-collage-and-mixed?ref=shop_home_active_1&frs=1

mini_book_wonder_of_creativity
Mini book by Carolyn Hasenfratz Winkelmann called “The Wonder of Creativity”.

Helpful links for Virtual Art Party #2: Mini Accordion Books, for further exploration into different ways of making handmade books.

Make a Greeting Card With a Star and Arrow

Paper Crafts, Rubber Stamping, Tutorials, , , , , , , , , , , ,

mixed media greeting cards

I designed this project around some collaged stars I had made awhile back while working on my previous tutorial, Making Greeting Cards From Scrap Papers. If you don’t want to make your stars in that style, you can use any paper or cardstock star of your choice.

This card design uses quite a few tools and materials, so if you are going to get them all out you might as well make several. Having extra cards on hand is a real time saver sometimes!

matching_stars_with_card_colors

Supplies:
Cardstock
Assorted small paper scraps
Decorative paper large enough to make envelopes
Tracing paper
Tape, single and double-sided
Pencil
Scrap chipboard
Glue stick
Black rubber stamping ink
Clean scrap paper
Envelope template – free download here for a template that fits a 5.5 inch x 4.25 inch card – Envelope template for Rectangular Card

Tools:
Greeting Card With Star and Arrow Template (free download here)
Paper cutter
Metal ruler
Self-healing cutting mat
Scissors
Rubber stamps with sentiments
Colored pencils
Prismacolor art stix or similar product (like Conte crayons in more than just basic colors)
Sharpie Pen
Sharpie Twin Tip Marker Fine/Ultra Fine
Squeegee or bone folder tool
Rubber stamp Bubble Border Small or other border stamp
Rubber stamp Rounded Squares and Rectangles Border Large or other border stamp
Stencil for the “awesome” arrow – Mini Word Arrows 6×6 Stencil – if you don’t have that stencil, you can use a stamp, stencil or paper of your choice for the small arrow portion of the card.

star_greeting_card_with_arrow

Instructions:

Download and print out my free template, Greeting Card Sketch – Star With Arrow.

Tape tracing paper over the printed out template, and make tracings in pencil over the star portion, the arrows and the shapes on either side of the star.

Write “front” on the tracings before you remove them from the template.

tracings

You’ll use these tracings to transfer your pencil markings onto the the backs of scraps of chipboard to make templates for tracing and masking.

To transfer, place your scrap chipboard pieces face down and flip your tracing paper over so that the back is facing up. Tape in place and go over your pencil lines. When you lift the tracing paper, you’ll have lines you can follow as you cut.

Out of one piece of chipboard, use a utility knife and a metal ruler to cut the two side shapes and the star out.

cutting_from_back

Make yourself templates for the large and small arrows as well.

cut_outs

Put the front of the card on your work surface and tape the stencil/mask over it. With a thin, light pencil outline the star and two side shapes. These light pencil lines will help you line things up in the later steps. Place the large arrow template where you would like it and trace around it too.

outlining_in_pencil

Stamp in black through the mask onto the front of the card, alternating the border stamps you are using.

stamping

Lift the mask to see that portions of the front of the card are partially filling the cut out shapes. This is a technique you can use with stencils or masks you cut yourself or with purchased stencils.

stamped_template_lifted

At this point, you can choose to erase your pencil guide lines, or disguise them by drawing over them with a marker or color pencil. I drew over mine with harmonious colored pencil colors.

green_web

Choose an art stick color and go over your outlines heavily, and the insides of your shapes lightly.

green_web_2

Choose a 1″ x 5.5″ piece of scrap decorative paper in a harmonious color. Fold it lengthwise, apply glue to the back and use it to cover the fore edge of the card.

Trace the large arrow onto a piece of decorative paper and cut it out. Glue it in place on the front of the card.

Take a bright, lighter piece of paper and tape it to your work surface.  Tape your stencil over the paper so that the paper shows through the word “awesome”. Outline the “awesome” arrow and lettering with a black Sharpie pen, then lift the stencil and finish filling in the arrow with the fine tip of a Sharpie double-sided black marker.

awesome

Glue the star and small arrow to the front of the card. Accent the lower and rightmost edges of the star and small arrow with the thick tip of the double-tipped Sharpie marker.

Make an envelope for your card by tracing Envelope template for Rectangular Card onto the back of a piece of decorative paper, then folding it and taping it together. Your’e done!

Low Tech Faux Postage: Part 2

Art, Mixed Media, Paper Crafts, Rubber Stamping, Tutorials, , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Finished sheet of faux postage stamps made to put on my 2019 Christmas cards.
Finished sheet of faux postage stamps made to put on my 2019 Christmas cards.

1. Download and print out the two-page PDF file Low Tech Faux Postage. You’ll use the second page for Part 2. (Part 1 is located here: Low Tech Faux Postage: Part 1)

2. With some light colored markers or colored pencils, color around the outside edge of the faux stamp sheet and inside some of the open areas inside the stamps.

Faux postage printouts colored with pencil and markers.
In the image on the left, I’ve colored on the printout with colored pencils. On the right, I used markers and gel pens with stencils.

3. If you own any rubber stamps with postal type words or sayings on them, get them out and stamp them on some white or light colored paper to make parts to collage onto your stamp designs.

rubber stamping words on paper then gluing them down
Stamp out and glue on postal-related words. Then add border stamps in black ink to frame the composition.

4. Tear or cut the words out and glue one onto each rectangle.

5. Take some border stamps and stamp them in black ink around the composition to make a border. I used some fairly bold stamps because the black rectangles in the original printout are pretty bold and dark so a strong border will help balance the whole composition.

6. Add some color with other rubber stamps from your collection.  I’m currently working on Christmas cards and party invitations so I used some rubber stamps that would fit into use on those kinds of items – either on the actual card or on the envelope.

Faux postage sheets with coloring, collage, stamping and stickers.
My husband Tom made the sheet on the left, and I made the one on the right. I decided after adding stamping that my design needed a lot more pizzazz so I got out some stickers and cut them into pieces to add to my composition.

7. When I make a stamp sheet like this that is designed to be viewed as a whole composition as well as single stamps, I take the original and get color copies made of it. Then I cut out individual stamps from the color copies to use on other projects and keep the original to display intact.

Low Tech Faux Postage: Part 1

Art, Mixed Media, Paper Crafts, Rubber Stamping, Tutorials, , , , , , , , , ,

stamp sheet collageFaux postage is a really fun mixed media project to make because it’s relatively non-threatening to create tiny works of art in a format that everyone is familiar with. There are lots of craft products you can buy that make it easier to make artwork that looks like postage stamps. A long time ago I designed some rubber stamps for this purpose and some of them are currently for sale in my Etsy shop. You can make this project with any other small stamps that you own also and a selection of paper crafting supplies. Enjoy!

1. Download and print out the two-page PDF file Low Tech Faux Postage. You’ll use the first page for Part 1.

2. Cut out some paper rectangles that are 1 3/4 inches tall and 1 3/8 inches wide from dark paper. You will need at least 16 rectangles.

Cutting rectangles from paper scraps to glue onto faux postage template.
Cutting rectangles from paper scraps to glue onto faux postage template.

3. Trim the edges with a paper edging scissors and arrange on your Low Tech Faux Postage sheet Page 1. You can think of your sheet as one composition made up of 16 tiny compositions if that helps you to get ideas. Glue down your trimmed paper rectangles.

4. Use a 1″ square paper punch and start by punching out one square for each rectangle from a selection of random scrap papers. Arrange until you are satisfied. If you have similar sized paper punches in other shapes such as circles, feel free to try them out. As you look through your scrap papers, you might get inspired to cut out other shapes. If you are moved to do so, go ahead and cut out whatever you like and glue down on your sheet without worrying about whether or not you’re “inside the lines”.

Paper collage on the template sheet
Paper collage on the template sheet. Mine is on the left, my husband Tom’s is on the right.

5. Take some tiny rubber stamps with words, phrases, numbers or symbols that have to do with philatelic stuff like stamps or cancellations. Stamp them in permanent black ink on light colored pieces of scrap paper. When the ink is dry enough to handle, cut or tear out what you have stamped.

6. Glue the torn or cut pieces to the collage work you’ve already done to help make each rectangle suggest a postal stamp design.

Stamped paper bits glued to collage
Stamped paper bits glued to collage.

7. Continue to add embellishments to your stamps until you think they look finished. Here are some suggestions for what you can add:

More cut collage papers, found or commercial
Stickers
Drawing – paint and gel markers are interesting choices to experiment with because you can write with them on slick surfaces and sometimes dark backgrounds as well
Stenciling
Image transfers
Design tape
Rubber stamping

8. When your stamp sheet is done, you can frame the whole thing to display it, cut apart your stamps to make tiny artworks, make color copies then cut apart the color copies, or put the whole thing in an art journal. Your imagination is the only limit and the most important thing is to have fun!