carving

Las chiquitas and I did our first stamp/block carving yesterday. I bought some for-real linoleum blocks, but decided to start with a grayish sheet I bought from Dick Blick that is easier to carve. We each tried out our technique on the fancy erasers I bought at KMart first, then I tucked into my olive branch print. The carving was easier than I anticipated, but going back and trying to smooth out edges, especially on the tighter rounds of the olives, didn't work as well as I would have liked. The material "gave" too much as I pressed into it. I think the stiffer linoleum material will be nicer for that. But long curves were like butta' :). This particular material is supposed to be thick enough to carve stamps on both sides, but since the image I carved is so big, I mounted it on wood to give the stamp stability. I used a stamp pad to mark the pretty aspen, and the image was fairly clear, but the ink absorbed into the carving material almost too fast to use, and didn't wash off, either. I do have some lovely screenprinting inks to try when this transforms my new cloth napkins...I think these might be inspiration for our next set of kid carvings. I think my ladies would love a bunch of stamps that can be used together in a scene (from the most recent angry chicken post).