Block print festive gifts

1. About this class: My name is Julie, and in this skillshare class, I'd like to share with you how I carve my own stamps. We will then use these stamps to block print our own beautiful handmade gifts. I'll share with you how to carve your stamps. Tips for making our lines easier to see, and my process for printing on fabric. And at the end of it, we will create some beautiful festive gifts, like a tote bag, some fabric for wrapping our gifts, gift tags and greeting card. I'm Julie Saunders. I'm an artist, a printmaker, and a surface patent designer from New Zealand. I've been printmaking and creating art for as long as I can remember. My favorite medium is printmaking. I love the results you get. My favorite place to be and to be inspired is out in nature. I love going for a walk, getting into the forest, gardening and flowers. I'm also passionate about printing on fabric, and my work sells here in local galleries. I really hope that you enjoy taking this class and that you are inspired to create some beautiful handmade festive gifts for family and friends, and of course, for yourself. 2. Class project: Your project for this class is to create your own set of festive themed stamps. We'll carve those stamps and then we'll use them to print a range of festive gifts, such as a greeting card, gift tags, a tote bag, some wrapping paper. The possibilities are endless for your project, you need to print just one. I can't wait to see what you're going to create. Let's get to printing. 3. Class supplies: Let's take a look at what you'll need to create your own gifts. Today, I'm going to be using the speedball fabric ink, and you can also use this on paper. It's perfect for this class. Everything washes up in water. In terms of cleaning up, it makes it a lot easier as well fabric, this doesn't need to be heat set. You can print your fabric or whatever that might be for you today. It'll dry in around ten to 12 days. For my paper images or my cards that I'm going to print up, I'm going to use just a basic student grade red ink. You'll need a pencil, a Sharpie, some scissors, a print making roller, or a Brayer, they call it. You'll need your carving tools. You'll need a U shaped tool. You'll need a V shaped tool. If you pick up one of these sets that you see in art and craft stores, they come with all of the tips you should get both of those. That set, you'll need some wet wipes. It gets very messy, and you don't want to be transferring ink onto your already printed images. I'm going to use an archival ink pad today. Any color that's darker than your printing block, you'll need some paper towels. You'll need your template, which is available in the class resource section. Feel free to download that, use these images, or you may decide that you want to draw and create your own stamps using your own images. That would be amazing. You'll need your carving material today. I'm going to be using the Speedy Carve by Speedball. I find that it prints really, really well on fabric and on paper and I can get some really good results with it. You'll need some greeting cards. If you're going to create greeting cards, I'm going to be making Christmas tags. I've got some craft type paper. I've got some heavier weight card stock here which I'll use to create my art prints and frame them up later. You'll need a cutting mat, a craft knife to cut apart your steps. You'll also need some scrap paper. Lots of scrap paper. We'll use this a lot to test our stamps and to put behind something so that we don't get ink on the table. You'll also need whatever it is that you want to print out today. I'm going to print a bag. I've just picked up a checked little type bag from my craft store. Then I'm going to print my paper products. I just thought I'd mention about this barn, you don't have to have this particularly for the fabric, you don't need it. You could use a clean roller and you would get the same effect. Or often I will just use my fingers if I'm using the speedy curve, it's so spongy and so flexible, you can get quite good pressure with just your fingers. Barns come, they can look like this or they can look like that. Or you could even use a smooth paper weight. If you've got one of those glass paper weights you could press down using that. They're optional. You don't need them for this class. 4. Transferring your images to the block: I've cut out each of my shapes and to transfer them to my blocks, all I'm going to do is to grab my pencil. It's just an ordinary HB pencil. I'm going to draw the edge of my shape and then over all of the other black lines you're pressing firmly. But I'm not taking too much care with it. I just want an indication of where my where I want to carve. And you can decorate these shapes anyway you like. You don't have to use these lines, which I've drawn. You might like to have one window or two windows or a door, which is clearly missing from my house. I've got a side door just around all of your lines. I'm not going to worry about these smaller lines, but I'll use those as reference when I come time to carving. All you're doing now is grabbing one of your blocks, turning your motif over, making sure it fits onto your block. And you need a bit of room around your block as well. It's a matter of you fitting. You might have a different size block to me, you can buy them bigger. I struggle to find them in New Zealand. All I'm doing is rubbing the back of my pitcher with the same pencil. I'm not pressing too firmly. You can use a piece of tape to hold it down if that's easier. And I should have I transferred him. I'll carry on doing the rest of my motives and I'll see you back here when we're done. 5. Making your lines easier to see: The next step is to go over our pencil lines once more. I'm just going to use a Sharpie. 6. Cutting apart your stamps: It's time to separate our stamps ready for caving. Sometimes when you're trying to fit all of your pieces onto the block, it can be a little bit tricky. Try and leave a bit more space than I have here. You don't want to be cutting into any of your designs. Take your time and go slow. 7. Tip - staining your stamps: When it comes time to carving, I find this is my little trick that I picked up somewhere, is if you stay in your block with one of your archival ink pads before you carve, it actually makes it easier to see. Come time to carve, you can see the contrast of where you've carved. It allows me to see my lines a little bit better when I'm carving. I'm going to do that now. You don't have to do that. This is just something that is optional for me. The screen that I've already got here makes it easier to see. That's what it would look like if you didn't do that. I'm going to do that now. For all of my stamps, you are just taking your ink pad. You can either rub it or pat it is actually better for the ink pad. It doesn't have to be perfect, it doesn't have to be even. We're just changing the color and then we're rubbing it on our paper. You'll see that some of the Sharpie is coming off. That's a good thing as well. The Sharpie will show up on your images or about maybe 234 times before it no longer shows up, which is good and then you don't have to worry about it. That's that's all we're going to do for the rest of my stamps. It helps me to see my eyes aren't that great. This is really useful for me, but again, you don't have to do it totally optional. It's just a little tip. I'll do all of mine now and I'll see you once I'm done. 8. Get to know your carving tools : Now that we've stained our stamps, I want to practice using my tools. We've got some shapes here for these designs. There's some very distinct patterns on it. They are replicated through many of the motifs. I really want to practice those so that I know how to use my tool. I've got my Sharpie and I've got my scrap piece. I'm just going to practice a line then this little crescent shape here. I know that I want to practice that. I'm just going to draw that onto my block. Really important that we get to know how we need to tune it. We've also got some of these ones. Practice, we've snowflake type line, that's a line. Then we've got some of these. I really want to practice those as well. And I want to practice some smaller ones because we've got some smaller ones here, we've got a few corner shapes. I'm going to start with this one. I'm holding the tool like this finger on the end and it works with any of those tools. You're holding it like that and your finger is controlling that. Point to the end of my line. I'm going up a little bit to engage it and you'll feel that it's right and it should be nice and smooth. You can see how having that black Sharpie line really, really helps. I'm going to do these ones along here as well. Pushing then lifting up slightly. When you get to the end of the line, lifting up slightly, I'm going to practice these curly bits. I've got the straight line there. What I'm aiming for is to get that point there. The bottom point of that, into the line that I've already carved. And you can feel it feels like it's stuck in there. Then for these ones, you're turning the block and then lifting up. When you get to that line, try that again into the line that you've already carved. Turning the block, do it slowly, lifting up. Do as many of these as you want to so that you get used to how your tool behaves. So your tool is doing the cutting work and your tuning is helping it. And you're always cutting away from your self. And that's our lines. Same for these smaller lines here that we're going to use for the cuff of our mitten. You're aiming for that into the line that you've already carved. And you really should practice these ones just to see how you go so small. If you are having trouble, maybe you could do a different design for your mitten. You could just have plain lines. You don't need these, but if you wanted to add them, practice them. As you get down the line, you'll find that you get better and better. It's weird, your body goes, okay, I can do this and it does it. Let's try this one. It's just a line lifting up to finish again. We're going to start at that point into the line that you've already carved and pushing out and lifting up. When you get to the end of it, it's a reminder. Put that little point into that first line. These ones you're going to go engage the tool, it push a little bit and then flick up straight away as well. And I'm going to use my other hand for tuning the block. 9. Carving your stamps: Now it's time to carve for this initial carving stage. We are only going to use the V shaped till grab that out, make sure you've got your cutting mat. I always go for my easiest motif first. That way, by the time I get to the more difficult ones, I'm feeling a lot more confident. I'm going to start with my house and it's okay to carve over the outside of your motif, because we're going to carve that off later anyway, like that. And here I can go right across and then put the chimney on later. That pushing off from that line, getting the point of that tool into the line that you've carved. And I think I might do this one and now we've practiced these. So we'll get those ago member tuning the block. They look hard but they're actually not the windows. When you get to the end of your line lifting off in a pop, you can see how that sharpe makes it so much easier to see where you're carving that. And the staining, it can get pretty tricky on your eyes. After a while from my windows, I'm wanting to get that point right into the very end of that line that we first, and I want to meet up with the other side. There we go. 10. Trimming and carving around your stamps: We've carved all of our stamps out. The next step is to carve off any of this excess. To do that, you'll need your crescent shaped tool that we spoke about earlier. All you're going to do is get this point here into the line that you've already carved with slight pressure, your carving and you'll know it's right because you can see the edge of your tool popping up through that line that you've already carved. And we're going to stop just like that. I'll go round, I'll do this house shape, you'll feel it. It's so smooth and easy to do and you can see that it's right. It is pres into that line that you've already carved. This is where staining the stamp comes in useful because you can really see the pink against the color that you stained it. I normally just go around again, taking off a little bit more. All of this is going to be trimmed off anyway, but I just want to give myself a bit more space so that I don't accidentally cut through my stamp. So you're trimming it down. Getting rid, giving yourself a bit of room to grab your carving knife, your craft knife starting to look like a stamp. Now, once you're at that stage, you will then take your craft knife that we used earlier and you're just going to trim your stamp. Don't trim it too close to your stamp. You want somewhere to be able to hold it so that you don't get ink on your finger. A little bit close there. My knife is blunt. If you try and keep the shape of your stamp as well, that's always useful because when you turn it over, you can get an idea of where it's going to be on your paper. I'll carry on and do all of my stamps and I'll see you back here after that. 11. Testing and checking your stamps: Welcome back. Before we start printing, it's always a good idea to test out the stamps that we've just carved. I've got my archival ink pad here, and I've got all of my stamps that we've carved. And I just want to check to make sure that there's no lines or anything on them that I don't want to do that. The quickest way for me is to get my archival ink pad, and I've got my scrap paper here. I'm just pressing my ink pad onto my step. I'm not too worried if it's not that even I'm just wanting to see if I've got any unwanted lines on my stamp so that I can remove them before I start printing on my products. Let's have it go. I'm just using my fingers, making sure I'm pressing around the edges. Normally, the unwanted marks show up around the edges. You can see from there, I do have some down here you may choose to keep them, call it noise or chatter. Some people like that, some people like a cleaner stamp. My personal preference for myself is that I want that removed. I'm going to do that now. All you need to do have you cutting that near you. Take your gauge that we spoke about earlier because we've used the ink pad, you can actually see where those marks are. I'm just going to go round the same as what you did before and remove that. They will show up on feed brick a lot more than they will on paper. Let's try that again. You can also see that I've still got some Sharpie coming off after three or four uses using this stem that will disappear. It's not permanent, it's a bit better. I've still got to mark there, and that's coming from there. When you're looking at it, you're looking in reverse. If it's on this side, it's on that side on your stem. Let's do that. Again, pressing quite firmly, it's much better. Nice, neat and tidy. I'll go through and do all of my stamps and test them just to make sure that there's no unwanted lines. And I'll see you in the next video. I've tested all of my stands and I'm really happy with them. Now it's time to start printing. 12. Printing your gift tags: Welcome back. I'm going to start printing my gift tags first. This is a great place to start if you're new to block print making, because when we stamp, it doesn't matter if they're not quite perfect, because we're going to cut them out and make them into gift tags. It's cool. I have my stamps, I have my craft. I have my I have got a barn here. I may or may not use it. I've got my piece of purse, my basic paper ink. I a whole lot of wet wipes because we're about to get really messy. Apply a little bit of ink. You're taking your roller just starting and you're working it. You can hear a stick leave that beginning bit there and work on what you've got on here. I just want you to watch how it's behaving and you'll hear that the hassle stick changes. That's what we started with. This is the stage that we want it. Just check your roller, make sure your roller has got a beautiful coverage and I think that's ready. You must work your ink before you and cup your steps. I'm going to grab one of my scrap pieces of paper that we used earlier, and I'll just put that under there. You are looking for a nice, smooth consistency on your stamp. Have a play with it. And it might take you a few goes until you get the consistency right, and the inking right, and also the pressing right. But that's the fun of making these gift cards. I love that they are a little bit imperfect. It adds to the handmade charm of them. Always remember to give these a wipe if you've finished using them, so that you might want to change colors. Normally, at the end of a big printing session, I will fill up my laundry tub with some water and give them all a wash. Just remember, once you put it down, you cannot move it. You can't move it. If you move it, you'll get a double line. I've got a bit of ink there on the edge. Sometimes you can get rid of it by taking your wet wipe. You can see how inch you get it, but it's fun and just wiping off that. I had too much ink on my roller or I wasn't paying attention. You get inky and messy. Make sure when it comes time to printing that you've got some old clothes on as well and you can't answer your phone. There you go. Prime example of inky fingers, nice even coverage. All these little mistakes that you make are really forgiving on the gift tags, so they actually add quite a bit of charm and character to it. So that's why I've started with the gift tags. I'm gonna have so much fun cutting those out and creating some gift cards to adorn my presents. Or I might even make a garland with some of the 13. Greeting cards: For this one, let's try the speedball fabric and paper rink and just see how they react to the paper. I have cleaned my Brayer from last time. I have my purse specs and I have some script paper. The script paper I'm just going to spread onto my work surface so that I don't get all K got my greeting cards here. These are just from my craft store. Nothing special about them. Just a heavier card stock for my cards. I want to keep them pretty simple. I think that bird would look quite cute on its own. I'm just going to do that, just taking a little bit on our roller and bringing it down and inking that bit. You're waiting for that stick? I'll just do a little bit more. I think we're waiting for that, that beautiful hissing noise. And you'll be able to hear the change and see it starting to sound hissy. This particular ink smells has got a stronger chemically smell to it. Make sure you open some windows. I think that's perfect. If you look at that, Brayer, maybe you're not pressing hard. When you're inching up, you're just getting even coverage. Let's try it. I got my card. Make sure it's opening the right way. And I might go off the page for the No, wait, I will pressing. Oh, that's really nice. Inc. I love that ink. Get your Brayer if you need to. And I got a inky green finger on there. Never mind. This is all about the handmade look. 14. Printing your tote: Top bags are super useful and they're relatively inexpensive to buy the blanks. I think this one was about $3 or thereabout. My process for printing on fabric is to make sure that you have a blanket or something soft underneath it. If it was hard, it just makes it a lot more difficult. I've also grabbed some masking tape for my toe bag. I actually want to just print my motifs inside a border. So I'm going to masking tape around my toked bag. So I'm happy with that layout. I think that looks quite nice for me. So I want to make sure that I keep them all in that center. So I think I might like my tight bag blue. So I'm going to pour out some of the fabric ink. And then I might do my complimentary or my maybe with the green that we used earlier. I'm going to use my bigger Brayer for this because I've changed color again. You remember you're just taking a little bit and you're working it until you hear that beautiful hiss. I'm going to take my stamp, pop it onto my piece of paper and prayer on the ink, making sure I get a good even coverage. Then you can hear that hiss. I have my stamp, it looks like good coverage. I'm checking it to make sure I've got all the edges and checking that my fingers are clean and checking my placement, once you've popped it on there, you cannot move it. Otherwise the impression might be good because you've got your blanket underneath. This will feel completely different to you using your fingers than it did on the paper is really spongy and you can get a really great impression just using your fingers. It's so much easier. Make sure you still get all of the edges though. And the trick is going to be not to drop the stamp onto your fabric when you're lifting it off. There we have it. Let's lift him up. Hey, he looks cool. I've removed all of the masking tape, and honestly, I just think this is gorgeous. I can't wait to give this to some of my family and friends. I'm going to make lots more. So $103 type bag and some investment into your time and your creativity. 15. Printing a pattern on fabric: Welcome back for my next gift. I'm going to print out a piece of fabric and use this to create some, either wrapping paper or some other gifts. I might like to create a P type with it or a kitchen towel or something like that. It's just a quilting weight piece of fabric. And cotton is best for this process. I'll take my stamps and put them all over the piece of fabric. I'll turn them and rotate them so that it adds a little bit of interest to the final piece. I always place a piece of paper towel around the edges of my fabric. I like to go off the edge of my fabric, it always works out better for me. I'll re use that same piece around the edges. This particular ink, the speed ball fabric ink is amazing on anything printed. The fabric still remains soft and again, you don't need to heat set it, you just need to give it time to dry. It does have a smell, as I said in the tote bag video. So make sure you open your windows and give it time to dry, and then that smell that's associated with the ink will disappear. You're just following the same process that you did for your tote bags. I love it. It's awesome. I can't wait to see what you're going to create. 16. Thank you: Thank you so much for taking my skillshare class. I hope that you've enjoyed creating your own hand carved festive stamps and that you've used these stamps to create some beautiful gifts. I can't wait to see what you've created. Please upload your project into the project section so that I can be inspired by your creativity. You'll have these stamps to create, anything that you can imagine like this art print. In the meantime, take care and happy printing.