An Irish Friendship Wish
"May there always be work
For your hands to do;
May your purse always hold
A coin or two;
May the sun always shine
On your window pane;
May a rainbow be certain
To follow each rain;
May the hand of a friend
Always be near you;
May God fill your heart
With gladness to cheer you."
RUBBER STAMPING
Today I thought we could explore the wonderful world of rubber stamping together. I am still amazed when someone says to me "Rubber stamping? What is that?". I have been rubber stamping since 1983 or so, starting out self-taught as there really wasn't that much information out there about it. I have been teaching rubber stamping classes for a couple of decades! Wow.
In the back of a craft magazine I found an ad for a company named "Bizarro", that had rubber stamps. I saved up my money and sent off for the catalog. I think I may even still have it! The pages became very dog-eared and worn what with me reading and re-reading every page of quirky images.
To illustrate how much rubber stamping can be economical, I still have that original bottle of copper embossing powder I purchased for my first batch of home-made-rubber-stamped Christmas cards. I also still have the stamp I used. Both are still quite usable!
To illustrate how much rubber stamping can be outrageously expensive, I now have an entire room dedicated to my hundreds of stamps, thousands of sheets of paper and cardstock, and dozens of bottles of embossing powders, fun flocking, pearl ex, embellishments....well, the list could go on for quite a while!
How sweet it is!
hand stamped and colored domino magnet by inkspired
"The person born with a talent they are meant to use
will find the greatest happiness in using it."
- Goethe
Let's start with a fun rubber stamping project for any level stamper!
St. Patrick's Day Party Cupcakes
The fun baking part-
To do ahead:
Make a batch of cupcakes, let cool.
Frost with green frosting. If you can't find any pre-made, simply use a can of prepared white frosting, and drop in JUST A COUPLE OF DROPS of green food coloring. Really, just a couple. Mix well. You can always add more food coloring a drop at a time.
Sprinkle frosting with green tinted coconut to simulate grass.
How to tint coconut:
Add a few drops of food color to coconut in a jar; shake until evenly tinted.
The fun rubber stamping part-
Find a simple rubber stamp with an Irish theme - shamrocks are great. The image should be no larger than 1 1/2".
Purchase a good ink pad. Go ahead and invest $7 and get a green one. I like Stayz-on, Brilliance or Marvy Matchables.
You will need a pack or so of lollipop sticks. You can find these anywhere they sell Wilton cake decorating supplies (I get mine at JoAnn's Fabrics).
Now you want circles or squares or ovals of plain cardstock.
You will also need the same amount of green cardstock cut into shapes.
There are many hand held punches in these shapes.
For more addicted stampers, there are the cuttlebug or cricut machines, etc.
Or you could do the old fashioned but really cheap way, and trace around a bottle or jar for a round circle, and cut out.
Ink your stamp lightly. No grinding, pounding or smacking.
Stamp your simple image onto scratch paper first to practice, then stamp onto the shaped plain cardstock.
Pretty!
Let dry or help it along with an embossing gun to set ink.
No, a hair dryer won't work.
Now make a sandwich:
Shaped and stamped plain cardstock circle face down +
blob o' glue, with lollipop stick in the center +
shaped green cardstock.
Press to secure lollipop stick. Let dry.
alternate - you can tape the lollipop stick in place and then glue the green card onto the back.
Or, you can put a dab of frosting on back side of stamped circle, and push lollipop stick into that, then a dab more frosting and squish the green cardstock in place on top.
Go clean your stamp. Using an old washcloth or tube sock, dampen the cloth. Dab your stamp repeatedly onto it and slightly scrub until no more green comes off. Then stamp several times onto scratch paper to make sure there is no more ink leftover. Your stamp should not be wet.
For extra pretty, tie a thin ribbon bow at the base of each stamped circle, around the lollipop stick.
Push one decorated lollipop stick into each cupcake.
Ready to go!
Fun extra - if this is for a school party, you can write the name of each student on the back, plain green cardstock side to personalize!
"If you're lucky enough to be Irish,
then you're lucky enough."
inkspired
