38) Make Your Own Stamps

We have had a large tub of sticky back foam shapes left over from the Beans birthday party. The other day we pulled them out and used them to make our own stamps. I cut up an old cardboard box into smaller squares and rectangles. Then the Bee and I both chose some foam shapes and put them onto the cardboard pieces. I used mine to make patterns and the Bee did some cool overlapping with hers. After we were done the Bee selected a few colors of paint which I poured into a plate for her. Then using a foam roller she rolled the paint onto her stamp, pressed it onto the paper and ta-da she had an awesome print! We only made 4 stamps the other day, so I am hoping we get a chance to make some more this week and do some more stamping.

35) Apple Print Wrapping Paper

We got this huge piece of brown paper in our last box from Amazon and it just seemed perfect for making into wrapping paper. I have been wanting to do some Fall apple printing so these two just seemed like a perfect match. The other afternoon, I took the paper out back and stretched it out in our backyard, pinning down each end so it didn't blow away. I then took a large apple from our kitchen and cut it in half. I let the girls select the colors, the Bee selected white and the Bean picked red. After pouring the paint onto plastic plates, I showed the girls how to dip the apples into the paint and press it down to create a print.
The Bee took off stamping all up and down the long paper. The Bean did a little stamping but mostly just enjoyed getting messy! Our finished paper looks awesome and I can't wait to wrap our first present with it.

29) Texture Printing

On Monday we explored textures with printmaking! We created three different textures, the first using pennies. I got a handful of pennies out of our change jar and hot glued them down to a piece of cardboard to create a coin printing plate. The second texture we created was by taking a piece of leftover Styrofoam from some fish we bought. After washing well, I cut the Styrofoam into two pieces and gave one each to the Bee and Bean. Using plastic forks they poked the Styrofoam however they wanted to create a interesting texture. Our last texture plate came from some bubble wrap we had left over from a package. After all three of our different texture plates were ready, we selected 3 paint color and I put the colors onto plastic plates. Using a foam roller the Bee rolled the paint out onto the roller and then onto the texture plates. After putting the paint onto the different textures she then took a piece of paper and placed it on top of the texture rubbing the back of the paper a little with her hand. Then my favorite part of printmaking, she pulled the paper off of the plate to see the texture she had printed. revealing the print is always like magic! After she got the hang of how it worked she spent a long time experimenting with printing the different plates and layering her prints onto the same paper. The finished prints were really neat and would be fun to use as a card or wrapping paper.