I've been carving my own stamps for a little while now to put on my tags, notes, and packaging. I've decided to start putting them on my business cards too, since I'm venturing to the buggy side of things, and not monsters so much anymore. It was quite fun coloring each card by hand with sharpies, but it does get in the way of homework time.
So here goes! A tutorial for making your very own stamps! Here is what you'll need to start: Speedycut Speedball rubber, a Speedball carving set, a pencil, and of course an ink pad and paper. You can check out the speedball website
here.
First step is to sketch out your design (for this I chose a beetle). Make sure to do this very lightly, you don't want to make indentations in the rubber. Then cut out the area you'll be using.
Take the tiniest carving tool, and cut out around your lines. It goes very smoothly, so make sure to keep control over your tool, it's very easy to cut too much.
Should look like this!
Then start digging out the areas around the details. You want to do this very carefully, so you don't accidentally cut off any important pieces.
You can see here the beetle is starting to take shape. I added some lines for decoration, it shall be a colorado potato beetle.
Then take a larger tool to take out the rubber around the edges. You want your design to be the only raised area.
At this point, you're almost done. Clean up some of the scraggly lines with the tool with a smoother curve, and run it under some water to wash away the little bits and pieces. Pat dry.
And there you have it! If you use the stamp and discover that your design is a bit off, you can always go back and fix it until you get it right. You can mount your stamp onto a block of wood with glue, but for now I keep mine the way they are.
Now for the fun part - making business cards and tags! Here's what you'll need:
For my business cards, I simply cut up cardboard (the type used for cereal boxes, cracker boxes, etc) into rectangles. I try to make them roughly the same size, but don't worry about being exact. I then simply write my website, and stamp away!
If you get your hands on a tag punch and a hole puncher, you can make some awesome little tags for your items. The tag punch will actually punch through the thin boxes!
And there you go, cute little tags that are uniquely yours.
Some of the other stamps I've made so far:
Hope you've enjoyed this little tutorial! I think it's a great way to give your business a more personal touch, while being eco friendly (by using recyclable materials). You can of course create any design you wish, simple or complex. Words are a little tricky, as you can see in the last picture I just cut them out (backwards!) as opposed to making them raised.
If anyone makes their own stamps after reading this, I'd love to see them!
Comments will be moderated so you can't see the other guesses. Please leave either your etsy name or email address so I may contact you if you win. Everyone with a correct answer will be put into a drawing, with a name picked at random. The baby monster will also be chosen at random.
Love love love love love!!!!!!! AHHHHH!!! They're so perfect! Skyler is on the left, with the stripes and pretty face. Sherman is the pouty one that resembles a russian blue. They're brother and sister, I picked them out from a neighbor's litter of kittens when I was three years old. They are at home while I'm here at college, and I miss them like crazy.
I changed my avy to the caterpillar, I think he's less evil looking than the mosquito.
Mealybugs are nasty, fuzzy, hairy little pests that congregate on plants to suck the juices out. This makes them abhorred crop pests, but they're also kind of cute. They are a type of scale insect (order Hemiptera, the true bugs), though unlike the other scales, they retain their legs and can move around. The females have very reduced body parts and lack wings. They secrete a waxy substance all over their bodies, making them look powdery and furry.
He's the latest addition to my collection of gigantic insect soft sculptures, for sale in my etsy shop. Hand sewing his stripes and spiracles was tedious work, but well worth it. He's so cuddly and squishy!
Caterpillars may look like they have a lot of legs, but like all other insects, they only have six. The rest are prolegs, fleshy extensions with tiny hooks at the ends to aid in gripping and movement.
First step is to sketch out your design (for this I chose a beetle). Make sure to do this very lightly, you don't want to make indentations in the rubber. Then cut out the area you'll be using.
Take the tiniest carving tool, and cut out around your lines. It goes very smoothly, so make sure to keep control over your tool, it's very easy to cut too much.
Should look like this!
Then start digging out the areas around the details. You want to do this very carefully, so you don't accidentally cut off any important pieces.
You can see here the beetle is starting to take shape. I added some lines for decoration, it shall be a colorado potato beetle.
Then take a larger tool to take out the rubber around the edges. You want your design to be the only raised area.
At this point, you're almost done. Clean up some of the scraggly lines with the tool with a smoother curve, and run it under some water to wash away the little bits and pieces. Pat dry.
And there you have it! If you use the stamp and discover that your design is a bit off, you can always go back and fix it until you get it right. You can mount your stamp onto a block of wood with glue, but for now I keep mine the way they are.
Now for the fun part - making business cards and tags! Here's what you'll need:
For my business cards, I simply cut up cardboard (the type used for cereal boxes, cracker boxes, etc) into rectangles. I try to make them roughly the same size, but don't worry about being exact. I then simply write my website, and stamp away!
If you get your hands on a tag punch and a hole puncher, you can make some awesome little tags for your items. The tag punch will actually punch through the thin boxes!
And there you go, cute little tags that are uniquely yours.
Some of the other stamps I've made so far:
Caddisflies are in the order Trichoptera, closely related to Lepidoptera (butterflies and moths). In fact, the adults slightly resemble moths, holding their hairy wings tent-like over the body. They are most well known for the interesting, case building habits of their larvae. They live on the bottoms of fresh water streams. The larvae have three main strategies: build nets/retreats to capture food, build a portable protective case, or to be free living (though all types build a case to pupate in). Candice here is based off of a case-building caddisfly. They use a special silk to put materials together, such as rocks, twigs, and leaves. Each species uses a different type of material in a different way. An example of some cases (picture from this website) 
They are amazingly important little critters, along with the vast array of insects that act as the clean up crew of the world. Bacteria and microbes do most of the work of turning organic matter back into basic materials, but the insects are needed to break things down into manageable bits, or to bury them in the earth. Dung beetles eat dung, or roll it up into balls to bury in the soil. These serve as either stored food sources, or as brooding chambers for their young.
Names will be written on slips of paper, placed in a bowl, and chosen at random by my roomate. The baby monster will be chosen at random by me.
