spontaneous stamping

After I finally started working on my wedding scrapbooks, it became painfully obvious that, despite all my shopping, I still have great need for more materials. There aren’t many crafts shops in India, most of them  only online, and their offer is well… iffy. They don’t have the best selection to begin with, and one third of products are out of stock. Plus there is waiting for delivery which can take ages… Not that I don’t enjoy getting this big, cardboard box filled with paper treasures! 

Anyway, I’ve been searching for few stamps all over the place. Sure, they have it in Europe or US, but guess what – they don’t deliver to India. I also wanted to experiment with stamp making, but again, getting materials is a pain. Last night I reached my limit and decided to take the matter in my own hands – so to speak. I grabbed paper knife and potato (yes, that’s right, its back to primary school for me!) and got to work. I ended up with 2 stamps I’m extremely happy with: one made with potato/hot glue, second with old school rubber.

 

Now, the rubber one was quite obvious: trace the pattern, cut it out and enjoy the effect.

 

 The potato one was kind of an experiment.  Again – I traced the pattern and cut it out.
Then, I covered it with thick layer of hot glue. (After it cools down, it peels right of) This way I got the reverse form. I brushed it with some oil and filled with hot glue again, waited for it to dry and peeled it off.
It needed a bit of sanding to get the proper image, but after few minutes I had my “&” stamp ready. 

It doesn’t give completely smooth print; there is this kind of vintage quality to it. I think it is the matter of filling the form with glue. You have to make sure it really gets into all the cracks. I actually like it a little rough, so didn’t make another copy. Now I just have to figure out what to mount it on…