Stamping Intervention

My name is Erin, and I have tons of unused stamps. We all have them, and most of us wish we used them more often. I'm not sure why there is such a reluctance by many to use stamps on scrapbook pages and cards. Maybe we forget we have them, are afraid of making a mistake, are uneasy with the permanence of ink, or just unsure of how to incorporate them. With ideas like these, there is no need to be afraid of your stamps any longer! I challenge you to pull some out this week and use them.

Practical Scrapper Cathy

Practical Scrapper Erin used Tim Holtz Distress Markers and a water pen to colour these stamps by KaiserCraft.

Practical Scrapper Mary Pat

Practical Scrapper Ann Jobes used this sweet stamp set from Your Next Stamp, a style typically used for a card, to create this birthday page. 

Practical Scrapper Jayma used flower stamps to create her own patterned paper.

Practical Scrapper Caz used a Studio Calico stamp set to create the background

Practical Scrapper Leila

Amy stamped on pattern paper.

Fresh Face Aimee Kidd 

Practical Scrapper Donna stamped on patterned paper

Practical Scrappers wants to help! Tell us your favorite way to use stamps on your projects, or what keeps you from using yours.

**Designer projects are not always linked in our posts, but you can always find their blogs in our sidebar or in the staff tab**

Cards With Stamping

This topic of stamping covers such a wide range of possibilities, and today's projects do just that; cover a variety of techniques, tools to stamp with, and materials to stamp on. One thing is for sure, you are definitely going to be grabbing those ink pads and stamps when you are done looking at our top ten from this call!

Practical Scrapper Fern's stamped image and coloring stand out on this card from her choice of colors and pattern paper.

Check out this adorable You are my Sunshine card that Kristie Maynard created.  She stamped her image on a dryer sheet and colored with water color crayons--how original!!

Friday Stamp Projects

Erika used as many font stamps as possible on her layout.

Crystal used a watermark and some paint-themed stamps on the bottom border, some various tool stamps for the accents, and a calendar stamp for the date that we did this renovation.

Sarah’s layout uses stamped journaling boxes, title, and shapes.

Jessica’s card includes a stamped bunny and sentiment. In addition, the taffeta ribbon is stamped with flowers in coordinating colors to bring the final touches to life on this card.

Deanne’s main image is stamped but she also made her own paper. She stamped and heat embossed all the background paper.

Fern stamped "Christmas" with VersaMark onto some red glitter paper and then embossed it using black embossing powder. (Make sure you let the paper completely cool before you start working with it.) She also used a large flower stamp. First she stamped 2 flowers on the back side of the red crushed velvet paper and cut them out. Then she turned them over to the velvet side and rolled the edges. She stacked them and put a big black brad in the center!

Thursday Stamp Projects

Erin stamped the background shape with a texture stamp and star stamp, using a diecut negative (star) as a stencil. She used a stamp and her copic markers to make the boy and stars embellishments. Finally she cut out her title, then stamped overtop of it, and coloured it with her copics.

Catherine’s blue card uses the "kissing technique". This technique is perfect for adding texture to your solid image stamps. For this technique she chose a solid coloured stamped (medallion) and inked it with light blue ink. Then she took a script writing background, and stamped and inked that with navy blue ink. She then pressed the script stamp onto the medallion stamp and then pressed the medallion stamp to the paper. Two toned textured image!

Catherine’s purple flower card uses the "popping pastels" technique. To achieve this look she stamped her image with versamark ink on white cardstock then rubbed chalk over the image. The chalk sticks to the versamark but not the cardstock giving a soft muted effect.

On Jennifer’s layout, she masked the area around the photo, then stamped the numerous hearts to create a border. She stamped the white hearts and embossed them. Then she cut them out and raised them up using dimensionals.

Jennifer’s stamped the image on her card using Stazon ink and then colored it with watercolor crayons and a blender pen.

Robin decided to stamp her layout background you see on the upper left. Then she stamped the butterfly with a glue pad and then sprinkled with glitter.

Robin’s card uses the same butterfly stamp on the card, but a different approach. First she sprayed the cardstock with water until saturated. Then she scrunched the cardstock, opened it out and continued to scrunch until she got the desired look. She ironed the cardstock dry, and stamped the butterfly and the sentiment. She created 2 butterflies in this way, glued the bottom one down, and then lifted the top one up with foam glue dots.

Wednesday Stamp Projects

Kerri’s card allows her to share a new technique. I’ll let her explain:

Creating a chalkboard effect with stamps...it's very simple. Stamp with white ink ( I used a pigment ink-- don't use the the white stazon) on a piece of black cardstock. Then use chalks to color over the image. Wipe off the excess powder with microfiber towel (lint free) until all that's left is just the chalked image. You will see the haze like you do when you erase on a chalk board.. I did this on both the front of the card and the inside greeting. I can see this being perfect for end of the year teacher cards and back to school cards as well.

On this card, Kerri did a paper casting technique with toilet paper. It's very cool and very practical-- who doesn't have toilet paper lying around!!

Sherri used a little "bee" digi-stamp: colored it with watercolors pencils, markers, glitter glaze, and cut it out.

Nadya made her own printed background papers for both projects, something she loves to do on her projects. Nadya’s card has a stamped gray/blue cardstock with lots of different swirls. Then she cut lots of different shapes out of it using the cricut and several different cartridges. She then used those die cuts on the card.

After making patterned paper with stamps, and cutting out shapes with the cricut, Nadya uses them on the layout too. She stamped her own background paper for the layout, as well as the title. Which means her embellishments, background paper, and title were all done using stamps!

Jamie used The Stamping Boutique's Rainy Cynthia and her copic markers!

Amy used a pumpkin stamp and added some stickles to it. She stamped it onto a yellow circle so it would be better seen, then glued that to the black scalloped circle.

Barb painted her stamps, then embossed the images with a mixture of Perfect Pearls and water to get a shiny look. She then popped each matted square on 3D dots, alternating with leftover gold coin confetti squares of green and black for a fun border.

Tuesday Stamp Projects

Tanya’s project showcases Two-Step Stamping. This involves using stamps that are made to layer one another. She chose the background flower and inked it up, and stamped it on a spare sheet of paper to lighten the ink. Then she took the outline stamp and inked it up, only to stamp over the previous image. The nice thing about this is that you don't have to be precise. Each image will be different, unless you use a stamp-a-ma-jig, which allows you to position the two stamps directly over one another.

The little Japanese dolls on Dianne’s layout were stamped in black and then colored in with a blender pen and chalk pastels. She then cut them out and added them to the tag.

Dianne’s card features a stamped title colored in with a blender pen and markers. She also stamped a flower on the card base in Versamark ink. The delicate flowers are made from tissue paper that she ran through her die-cutter and glued together bit by bit.

Marjorie stamped her images and texts on pattern paper to liven up the circle elements on the page. She also used a coordinating green to stamp out her journaling lines instead of plain black, to keep the journaling block from looking too heavy.

Wanda used a large flower stamp colored with pencils and added a button. Her title ‘Celebrate Spring’ is also stamped.

Corinna used a Unity Stamp Co. circle stamp but instead of putting the circle "around" something, she decided to use it with all the colors of the Easter eggs in the photo to make a colorful background for her page.

Monday Stamp Projects

Kim’s flower is made from Bazzill textured cardstock and Easter Egg stamps, topped off with stickles (of course!).

Joni dug out her beloved foam stamps. She used various circle ones and used White Kraft Ink. She filled in the circles with rub-ons and then added some foam shapes.

Julie’s layout uses stamps in her title.

Heidi stamped her flower image with a gluepad and then added pink and green glitter. She embellished the flower with a blingy brad.

Amanda’s project used Pollycraft digital stamps. She colored them with chalk pencils and markers, used an x-acto knife to cut them out, then placed them on a stair-step card.

Jayma randomly stamped her card base with several stamps in different sizes and colors to make her own patterned paper. The cake is also a stamp and is colored in with a blending pen using ink from the stamp pads. She added glitter to the candle flames, and liquid glass to the polka dots for some added texture.

Focus: Stamps

I love to create. But my scrapping budget has always been pretty limited. So when I was first introduced to stamps for scrapping, I loved the idea that I could use them over and over again in a variety of ways – limited only by my own imagination. This week’s challenge insisted I look at my stamps with fresh eyes. I’m not a CTMH consultant or a Stampin’ Up demonstrator, so I don’t have countless sets at my disposal. But I still want to use what I have, and I want to use it creatively. I’m so glad I was challenged this way, because I tried things I wouldn’t usually try and I loved my results.

So what did we do? Well, there’s the obvious stuff – that stamps are really good at. I love me a stamped flourish, a sweet saying, or some big fat letters for my title. Stamps are great for keeping our handwritten journaling looking straight and neat.

Then there’s the not-as-obvious stuff. Heidi used a journaling stamp and then in the midst of her handwritting, added colorful stamped characters and words to complete her message. What a great use for those tiny stamps I have! Tiny stamps can create a set of ideal embellishments too, as Tinalyn’s Halloween page beautifully illustrates. A punch + patterned paper + a small stamp = embellishment; used in combination with other tiny embellishments you create yourself = your own set of embellishments ideal for the layout in front of you!

Stamps make me the designer. Christine and Lynn make their own patterned paper with stamps. This way, Christine can color her cupcakes to perfectly match the birthday photos. ;) And I love how Kim uses stamps with other materials to create her flowers. Using only part of my stamped image on my circles made me feel pretty creative.

I love to create. I think you do too. But it has occurred to me this week, that we’ve all taken different paths to get to this point in our scrapping. For many of us, stamps have been with us most of the way. Because of this, I think our experiences with stamps may be more varied than they are with vellum or all of the tiny scraps of paper that we save. But one thing we have in common - we can all try something fresh with our stamps. The design team did. Enjoy your supplies!

p.s. The cricut and cuttlebug layouts - Wow!

Jamie