Now I know that one of the things that many people love about Stampin' Up! is how easy it is to make amazing looking projects with minimal artistic skill. I have always been one of those people. I don't consider myself to be a great artist and I am the first to admit that most of my projects are, at best, modified from other people's Pinterest boards!
So when we were given the chance to try the Undefined Stamp Carving Kit at the last European Convention I was a little apprehensive. It took me a little time to decide what to carve, I settled on a little family of stick-men to represent my own family. It was quite stressful carving in a huge hall with hundreds of people hurrying around you but I was quite impressed with my results and found the carving far easier than I had expected.
When I returned from convention, I bought one of the kits, and it has been sat on my desk ever since! Not because I didn't want to use it, I was just trying to decide what to carve and didn't want to waste my rubber! Well, inspiration struck last week and now that I have finally cleaned up the shredded rubber scraps from all over the house, my stamps are ready to share with the world.
The inspiration for my stamps had been right under my nose the whole time, well on my arm to be exact. I have quite a large tattoo on my upper arm and it features a couple of swallows just above my elbow. I really love Americana style tattoos, especially the work of Norman Keith Collins, aka 'Sailor Jerry', and as I don't have many masculine stamp sets I decided to merge the two and create my own tattoo-inspired stamp set. I drew my designs onto vellum with pencil and transferred them onto the rubber by rubbing the back of the vellum with the carving tool. Then I just got stuck in with my tools (I watched the Stampin' Up! Youtube video first!)
A single Undefined Stamp Carving Kit contained enough material to carve my lovely pin-up, swallow, anchor and nautical star and I even have a little rubber spare. Altogether I only spent a couple of hours making the whole set and I am really pleased with the results.
My choice of stamps might seem a bit random, but that is the beauty of the product, you can make something that is just for you. The logo of a favourite sporting team, school or club emblem, a unique celebration or occassion - anything you can imagine. To buy your kit, visit my online store today.
Stampin᾿ Up! Supplies
