40 "Found" Objects to Use for Printing and Stamping

Purchased stamps and rubber printing blocks are readily available in stores, but dozens of items that can be used for stamping and printing are lurking right in your own home. Many of these make very interesting patterns and designs, and they're free! Look in your junk drawer, bathroom, kitchen, garage, craft stash, tool shed and back yard for:

1- Bottle caps

2 - Jar lids

3 - Wine corks (both synthetic and real)

4 - Feathers

5 - Potato mashers

6 - Lace

7 - Trim from a fabric store (flat profile cotton trims that can be glued to matboard)

8 - Paper doilies (use as stencil, then incorporate the doily itself into your collage)

9 - Household sponges

10 - Foam packaging materials

11 - Styrofoam packaging materials

12 - Buttons with a flat profile (glue onto the end of a wine cork to use)

13 - String

14 - Rope

15 - Cording

16 - Dental floss containers with flat bottoms

17 - Tennis shoes and flip flops with patterns on the soles

18 - Wallpaper with flocked or embossed designs (not plastic coated)

19 - Caps from cosmetic products (often have unusual or interesting shapes)

20 - Open weave fabrics such as burlap

21 - Heavy weight upholstery fabric with raised designs (Glue to matboard scrap to use as a stamp)

22 - Foam hair curlers

23 - Insulated pipe wrap from home improvement stores (can be incised with patterns or left plain)

24 - Drywall tape

25 - Cardboard scraps (peel off outer layer(s) to get an interesting stamp)

26 - Matboard scraps (use the edges to stamp straight lines)

27 - Pencil erasers

28 - Leaves from plants such as ferns

29 - Keys

30 - Foam meat trays (Cut into desired shapes, incise details with a ballpoint pen)

31 - Foam garden kneelers (Cut into pieces, use woodburning tool to make surface designs)

32 - Bubble wrap

33 - Carpet liner

34 - Rubber shelf liner

35 - Plastic or rubber placemats with raised or openwork designs

36 - Window screening

37 - Mesh

38 - Foam paint rollers

39 - Corn and callus pads (Affix to matboard scraps and stamp circles and ovals with them)

40 - Cookie cutters and biscuit cutters

Do you use any found objects for stamping or printing that are not listed here? Please share them with us. Let's see how many items we can add to this list!

©2015 Lynn Edwards

A Super Fast, Super Easy Last Minute Gift Idea

Who doesn't need a quick and easy way to whip up a last minute holiday gift? Here's a great present you can make in minutes and spare yourself a trip to the mall:

These are original Artist Trading Cards which, when matted, will delight anyone on your gift list. Make some up for your childrens' teachers, your neighbors, your boss, your dog walker...or that impossible-to-buy-for person who has everything. They're suitable for everyone, and creating them is easy! Here's how:

Supplies needed:

Blank Artist Trading Cards

Found papers such as sheet music or dictionary pages

Color pencils

Acrylic matte medium or acrylic soft gel medium

Stamp pad with permanent archival ink in black or dark brown (black is shown here)

Rubber stamps with leaf designs

Iridescent gold acrylic paint

Stencil brush

8x10" mats  with openings sized for Artist Trading Cards

Step 1: 

Trim the found papers to the same size as the blank Artist Trading Cards.

Step 2: 

Using the matte medium or soft gel, adhere the found papers to the blank Artist Trading Cards. The found paper will be your background.

Step 3:

Apply ink to one of the rubber stamps and stamp the image onto one of the found paper backgrounds. Repeat, using the other stamp on the other background. Let the ink dry before proceeding.

Step 4:

Add colors to the leaves using the color pencils.

Step 5:

Load the stencil brush with a small amount of the iridescent gold paint. Dab off all but a tiny amount on a paper towel. Apply the remaining gold paint to the area surrounding the leaf images in a dabbing or pouncing motion using a very light touch. Allow to dry.

Step 6:

Insert each card into a mat (I buy mine from Jerry's Artarama) and you have a fine gift all ready to give!

Text and images © 2014 Lynn Edwards

Super Fast and Easy Paper Beads

Here's a way to make embellished paper beads very quickly without going to the trouble of getting out your paints and brushes: use paper that's already printed and dress it up with some fast, simple techniques..

Text weight scrapbook papers are good candidates for this method, as are non-glossy old book pages, magazine photos, even junk mail brochures. With this method you can create many different beads in a short period of time.

Start by making a cylindrical base bead. (See my post on 3/19/14 for instructions.)

Next, embellish a piece of scrapbook paper or other paper that has been printed with designs, images or text. Two speedy ways for adding embellishment to printed papers are:

1. You can use a stamp and permanent ink in the color(s) of your choice

2. You can use permanent markers such as Sharpie permanent markers in different colors.

Stamping:

Here's where the fun begins. Printed materials take on a whole different look when lines, patterns, geometric shapes, etc. are superimposed over them. A page of plain text, such as a page from an old textbook, turns into a fine candidate for bead making when you stamp a small floral pattern over it in a contrasting ink color.

A piece of scrapbook paper with a floral design, say, becomes more intriguing when you use a text stamp to superimpose a "handwritten letter" in cursive writing over it. (Picture scrapbook paper printed with pink and yellow roses overstamped with flowing "handwriting" in crisp black ink. Much more interesting than roses alone.)

Trim the embellished paper to fit the base bead then glue, seal and varnish to complete it.

A few tips on stamping:

Whatever design you choose to overstamp with, make sure it's small in scale. Large patterns or designs don't work well for beads.

Use only permanent inks. Let them dry thoroughly before attempting to glue the stamped paper onto the base bead.

Using permanent markers:

These are a lot of fun to use. Here are some ideas to get you started:

Look for small black and white illustrations and color them in with the markers. Pick out the more interesting parts to use for the beads.

Cover printed pieces with small geometric designs in a variety of colors.

Apply scribble patterns or doodles to photos cut from magazines or advertising circulars.

Use fine tip markers to make Zentangle-like patterns.

Use different colors of markers to "color between the lines" on pages of plain text, creating stripes. Or use various colors of  markers to shade the lines of text, and use an altogether different color to fill the spaces in between the lines.

When you've made enough embellished papers, following the directions posted earlier on 3/19/14, cut them into small pieces to fit the base beads. To finish the beads, glue on your embellished papers, seal and varnish, and allow to dry. Now your beads are ready to become a new bracelet or necklace.

©2014 Lynn Edwards

How to Make "Stained Glass" Mosaic Cards

Last week I decided to play with some old magazine pages, using them to make note cards that ended up looking like stained glass mosaics. The combination of patterns and colors on these cards somehow reminds me of the glass seen in cathedral windows.

I started by tearing color photos out of some old magazines, then stamped designs over the photos using  rubber stamps and permanent ink. After the ink was completely dry I cut the photos into pieces of varying sizes to create "tiles.". Then I measured a piece of colored cardstock to fit the front of a blank Strathmore note card, available at most arts and crafts stores. I trimmed the cardstock so that it was slightly smaller than the face of the note card so there would be some visual contrast at the card's edges.

One of several designs I created, prior to being adhered to the blank note cards

Next, I arranged the "tiles" on the cardstock. When I found a composition I liked, I used an Elmer's glue stick to glue them into place. (I prefer the Elmer's brand because it glides on very smoothly, making it easy to get good, even coverage with the glue.) Once all the pieces were stuck down on the cardstock, I placed a clean sheet of wax paper over it and rolled a rubber brayer over the wax paper. Then I removed the wax paper and adhered the cardstock to the front of the note card. The result: a colorful handmade card perfect for sending to that special friend or relative!

All text and images on this page ©2013 Lynn Edwards