It was a dark and stormy October night…The lightening flashed outside of the living room windows and thunder shook the panes of glass like a phantom seeking refuge within. Two women sat in front of a roaring fire, sharing glasses of wine and their newest hobby-rubber stamping. One of them was experienced; the other was just as confused and scared as she could be. Her attempts at stamped images either looked like The Invisible Man or had the appearance of the Creature from the Black Lagoon. The embossing she’d tried was a different nightmare! Giving up, the newbie stamper sighed and slowly made her way to bed. That night she dreamt of ink pads with legs and an embossing gun with teeth!

Sound familiar? Newbie stampers often have feelings of doubt but with a good handle on the basics of ink, paper, and embossing, their stamping journey can become less scary.

Let’s go over some of the basics together!

Paper: Practice on text weight or typing paper until you’re comfortable; it is best not to spend money on expensive cardstock until you feel that your images look good. Purchased pre-made card and envelope sets are a good bet for future stamping projects. Patterned papers make good layering materials. If you scrapbook, you will find a second use for your papers here. As you gain experience, you’ll discover the joy of making your own backgrounds using stamps and blank sheets of paper. The samples shown below were made this way.

Ink: There are two basic ink types made for stamping. The first type is dye ink. Dye inks are available in many colors and brands. The ink pad looks like fabric or felt. These inks are often archival, making them suitable for stamping and scrapping alike! Dye inks dry quickly on paper and do not need to be heat set. This card was made entirely with dye inks.

Pigment inks are wetter, and the ink pad looks like a foam sponge. These inks also come in a wide variety of colors and metallic looks. They are the inks that you’ll use for heat embossing. The moisture of pigment ink allows it to stay wet once stamped on to paper. This allows you to coat your images with embossing powder and to heat them for the look of raised images or script. Embossed images are especially nice for coloring; the raised lines give a boundary to work within when you are using paints or markers. One of the samples below uses heat embossing for the saying, and the other uses it for the image.

Embossing: This technique is one that involves the use of pigment ink, embossing powder, and a heat tool. In order to achieve a well embossed image, a stamper must remember a few basic steps. Your rubber stamp needs to be fully and evenly covered with ink. Stamps that are not inked thoroughly or over inked will appear blotchy or have halos around them once stamped onto paper.

Try placing your cardstock on top of an old mouse pad or magazine for extra cushion.

Applying the proper pressure evenly around a stamp also helps you to achieve a crisp image. Don’t rock your stamp! Save the rock for the radio, ok?

Once you have a crisp image, sprinkle the embossing powder over the inked area. Shake the embossing powder back into the jar, and then heat the image until the lines are raised.

Problem Solving Tips: Stray bits of embossing powder may often find their way around and within your image. Try dusting the cardstock with an anti-static bag before stamping an image. The bag eliminates this, and the powder will only stick to the areas that are inked. Flat embossed images are caused by over heating. Only heat emboss until you see the lines rise otherwise the powder will melt into the cardstock and your image will be flat.

Under heating causes the reverse problem; you will see powder floating from the stamped lines instead of the sharp lines you’d hoped for!

These are two of the most common problems experienced by new stampers. With practice, you’ll get the hang of inking and embossing and be on your way to making some nice projects. Moving On: New stampers, there is so much information available to you! Whether you seek inspiration within the pages of a book or magazine, or you surf the internet, there are places to help you learn about stamping. Internet mailing lists for stampers are a great place to meet with others and talk about rubber. Many stamp companies offer websites with ideas for card making. I often seek out new ideas to inspire me when my muse is dried up. This card was inspired by one I’d seen on the internet. I used the basic ideas and made the card my own. Practice your skills within a group setting such as a club. Children and adults alike will appreciate having you share what you’ve learned. The following project is one that could easily adapt to this kind of a setting. Don’t be afraid to expand your repertoire to more advanced projects! Tag art is something that can be simple or advanced, and there is no reason not to try it on your own.

Enjoy your new hobby, practice, and learn all that you can.
Remember the newbie stamper from the beginning of this article? That was me!
I’m living proof that a newbie doesn’t have to stay that way…