HOW-TO INK A RUBBERSTAMP (PROPERLY)

Many of my clients for Besotted Brand are fairly novice to the art of hand stamping.  Maybe they have done it in passing in middle school or had an eccentric aunt whom was a rubberstamp hoarder/craft maven that had no interest in sharing her 'secrets', but they really haven't played much with the idea of using a rubberstamp in their d.i.y. life since.  My stamps are on the diminutive side which also means that the traditional stamp pad would engulf the design and perhaps be more messy than one would like.  I found the best way to ink the stamps is to take the ink to the stamp.  This is good practice two fold 1) I can make sure my entire stamp design is inked and 2) I can control the amount of ink on my stamp.  You want to have a nice even layer, not too thick, not too thin. I will do a whole post on ink types another time as that seems to be another can of crafting worms but for now let me concentrate on the inking.

Pressure is everything in hand stamping and that includes the inking of the stamp, you need a light hand but not so light as to not transfer any ink. I just go around my stamp with the ink pad making little taps--lifting + inking until I have the entire design covered.  This may seem more tedious than just plonking your stamp on a stamp pad, but the results outweigh the inconvenience. You can achieve truly professional printing results by taking the extra time.  With any new skill don't expect to be the greatest hand printer on your first try.  It takes practice, lot's of practice. With any printing method your results will vary with each ink (even color) and the substrate you are printing on, not to mention the surface.  Don't expect awesome results if you are stamping your blank cards on top of carpet, but I didn't need to tell you that, right?  I like to think of my stamps as miniature printing presses, it's as labor intensive as letterpress, with a smaller footprint + less of a learning curve. You can achieve beautiful results and you are only limited to your imagination.  So go out there and get to printing! If you have any questions feel free to send me an electronic mail, I always love hearing from you!