Mail-themed handcarved stamps

i have been working on some new hand carved stamps. they are mail-themed and were inspired by C, who is learning to write friendly letters and enjoying the anticipation of receiving a letter in return. this all came to be because my sister-in-law, who is a very good friend, recently moved to a different state with my niece. we both agreed to try to encourage our daughters, who are only four months apart, to write to each other. they are very close, so they will miss each other very much. i thought it would be nice for the girls to keep in touch and practice their writing by sending letters.

the stamps, of which there are six, are designed by me and would add charm to letters, envelopes, packages, etc. they can also be used to make fake mail so kids could play post office and mail carrier. the stamp set includes:

• 'to:'
  
• 'from:'
• postage mark
• stamp
• envelope
• snail (to be used with the envelope to say, 'snail mail'. cute, huh!?)

i'm almost done with them and i think they look really cute! as soon as i get some good pics of the stamps, i'll put them in my shop.

J's Birthday Present-Completed!

so, here are some more pics of my completed present to my niece, J. this is the bunny pillow i made for her, using missy balance's free pattern.

and this is the back, with the stamped letters that spell, "SOMEBUNNY LOVES YOU". you might have to click on the image to get a better view. sorry, my photography sucks! but luckily i had this really cute volunteer to model for me!


and here is a picture of the wrapped gift. i wanted to show my wrapping because i am especially proud of the finger knitted yarn that my oldest, C, made. she made it with rainbow colored yarn and i thought it looked really nice with the tissue flower i made to top off the gift.

i didn't get any pics of my niece opening her gifts as my camera had run out of batteries and i didn't have time to recharge them. but i can tell you that it was one of the first gifts that she opened. and when she saw the pillow, she stopped opening the rest of her gifts and just took off to her room to take a nap. she was so happy to have a small pillow and she loved the little rabbit! it took her a while before she finally let go of her bunny pillow and agreed to open the rest of her gifts. it made me so happy to see that my handmade gift was enough for her to make her happy! of course, she also liked her other presents, but mine was the only handmade present and i'm glad that it stood up to the competition!

WIP: J's Birthday Present

i've been working on my niece's birthday present. she'll be turning 3 and will soon become a big sister, so i thought i would make her something to make her feel special.

it's a freezer paper stenciled shirt made using more than two fabric paints. it was really tricky to do this! and if i had started making this earlier, i probably would have had more time to allow the colors to dry before i went on to the next color. i tried to dry the paints with my blow dryer, but it didn't work too well. so if you zoom into the picture you can see all the imperfections. still, i like it and it's wonkiness. it definately has a handmade look to it and i think it makes it that more special. besides, i'm sure the birthday girl will like it, and won't notice those imperfections.


here is another freezer paper stenciled shirt. i hadn't thought out how i would embellish this shirt and since i already had all my materials for stencilling, i decided to look for a stencil online. i found this stencil design at stencilry. it's a website that offers free stencil designs and they have tons of cool ones that i would like to try out in the future! surprisingly, it took me less time to do this one, considering that i didn't have a stencil to begin with. i was able to quickly cut out my stencil and since i was only using one color, the application process was really easy. i thought this design was a good idea because she could use it for valentine's day and and anytime throughout the year.


and last but certainly not least, i'm making her a bunny pillow using missy balance's pattern from her blog crafty carnival. i'm still not done with it, which explains the lack of pictures. the picture above is of the back of the pillow. i wanted to embroider those words onto it, but again, because of lack of time, i decided to stamp the words using my letter stamps and the left over fabric paint from the stenciled shirt above.

she's a sweet little girl and i hope she likes what i made for her. her birthday is this sunday, so i'll try to post pics of the completed pillow and of the birthday girl with her presents, if i can remember!

Neice's Birthday Present Complete!

this is the front of the tote bag. i also decorated the gift bag with my own hand carved stamps. C made the birthday card.

this is the back of the tote bag. you can also see the hand carved stamp i made for my niece, outside of the little white envelope i packed it in.

here is a close up of the stamp i made for the birthday girl and the gift bag i decorated using my own stamps. note: C also made some mini brownies, shaped like hearts, with m&m's inside. we packed them up in a little box with printed wax paper (from the martha stewart craft line) and i wrote "to:" and "from:" on the front of the box and used the stamp i made for my niece and a new stamp i made that morning of C with her name on it. i didn't get a picture of it because C made them right before we had to leave to the party so i forgot. i also didn't get a picture of C's stamp, but i'll try to remember to post it along with any new stamps i may finish. right now all i want to do is carve my own stamps!

Latest Craft Hobby

i've been wanting to try out stamp carving. so a few weeks ago my husband was kind enough to indulge me in buying some supplies to get started. i've read many tutorials and with the clear information they gave i was able to get my first two stamps done with what i think are very good results.

these are the stamps that i carved. it took a little while to get the hang of it. i had to get used to keeping my hand steady and make sure not to cut too deep or cut too far into parts that i didn't want to cut out. i realize now that i could have tried an easier approach of just carving out the drawn lines and leaving the blank spaces solid, so that i could get a negative image. it would have been much easier, but still i think i did pretty good for my first try at stamp carving. i'm really excited about all the ideas i have sketched out and i can't wait to carve some more!

here are the supplies i got to start with. the most important, i think, is the speedball carving tool. it comes with several different cutting nibs that can be easily stored in the handle. that's important to me because i always have to worry about my girls getting into my craft supplies. i also bought a staedtler carving block, but i haven't used it, yet, so i don't know how well it handles my carving. instead, i used some cheap white erasers i bought in your typical office or school supply aisle in many stores. i thought i could use these erasers for practice because i don't want to spend too much money on my crafts. it might discourage my husband from giving me these kinds of indulgences! and last but not least, i got the tsukineko versa magic dew drop stamp pads. i got these mainly cause i liked the variety of colors. i really wanted to get the versa craft ink pads because i like the idea of being able to stamp on fabric so that i can make my own personalized labels on either fabric or twill tape. i also think a cute stamp on fabric would add a nice detail on plain looking sewn projects. i will post my progress as i continue to make stamps and experiment with using my stamps in combination with my other projects. i can't wait to see what i come up with!