We love to make stamps out of simple shapes – you can see our first go at making geo stamps in this post here. Recently we made another set with the idea of making silly faces out of them. And we’ve been having a whole lot of fun with them ever since!
To make these we used the same technique as we did with our first set of geo stamps, of cutting out shapes from craft foam and gluing them onto wooden blocks. You can get a refresher of this technique in this post here. You can also download a template of the shapes we used here.
I also made a few sheets of stamping suggestions for the kids to refer to as I find that some guidelines often help to get the child started and then creativity begins flowing. And for my mathematically inclined son, he’s in heaven following patterns he sees, then he can take it from there. I made a few sheets showing face ideas as well as other random characters and patterns a child could make from these. We ended up laminating ours so that it can be used over an over again. We now store the sheets with the stamps so you can use them whenever getting the stamps out.
If you’re interested in doing the same, you can download all the idea sheets here:
DOWNLOAD SILLY FACE STAMPS IDEAS SHEET 1
DOWNLOAD SILLY FACE STAMPS IDEAS SHEET 2
DOWNLOAD SILLY FACE STAMPS IDEAS SHEET 3
DOWNLOAD SILLY FACE STAMPS IDEAS SHEET 4
Ed Emberley’s Picture Pie workbook is also a great reference for something like this. I really need to get that book. These also would be really cute used with Wee Gallery’s Dress up Animals. We had made our own quick version inspired by these but the original is always so much better and we highly recommend theirs!
These stamps actually came about and were used for a Twig Creative kids crafting event where they launched their amazing new product line, including their Pixie camera with movable view finder (genius!). I’ll have to share a few pics from the event soon.
The kids had a whole lot of MESSY fun with these.
Kids loooove getting messy and crafting is always a great way to do just that. And like many moms, when the creative fun is done, I love to get everything picked up and clean as easily and quickly as possible. Mrs Meyer’s Clean Day is having a super fun messy contest where one lucky winner receives a custom craft center (I want this!!). I also love the idea of getting kids involved with cleaning up after their projects and I think it breeds not only responsibility but pride and confidence in being able to clean up after themselves. Because of this I can honestly say that AJ loves cleaning up (most of the time) especially when a spray is involved.
Mrs. Meyers Clean Day Get Messy Arts & Crafts contest runs from March 10-March 28th. You can find more info about how to enter the contest here. Looks like so much fun (I’m loving the bubble prints art activity – going to have to do that that one)! Good luck!
(Oh and if you don’t want to make this version I found that Muji has a really cute set of face stamps you can just buy and stamp away!).
*this post is sponsored by Mrs. Meyers Clean Day
Love it! Also.. how fast kids grow! Big boy AJ ^^
Love these stamps. So much creative play to be had!
thanks! we’ve really been going a bit nuts with them. xo Mer
amazzzzzzing Thank you sooooo super much for sharing all of these super cool creations, links, resources and contest! you are simply the greatest! TY
This is brilliant! I’ve been looking on etsy & online all day for stamps that are open ended! I want to purchase them for my daughters easter basket. I think I’ll make a bit smaller ones out of this pattern and put in her eggs! What a great resource!!! p.s. your son looks so grown up in these pictures!!
great idea of making them smaller and putting into eggs. So cute! And yes, my son is growing up!! I can hardly stand it!
One, reminds me a lot of Ed Emberley’s Picture Pie (Ed Emberley Drawing Books) made with fraction pieces. (http://www.amazon.com/Emberleys-Picture-Emberley-Drawing-Books/dp/0316789828/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1395009467&sr=1-1&keywords=picture+pie)
Two, if you don’t have ink pads, one can use water-based markers, instead.
Three, craft stores sell foam stamps, which also work quite well. For instance, how about making faces using insects? Caterpillar eyebrows, roach nose, etc… 🙂
Four, I don’t have the wooden blocks, but I have had students make their own stamps using sticky foam sheets and pieces of cardboard. We hot glue a 2-liter bottle cap onto the cardboard for easier handling. Or, apply the sticky foam shape directly to the bottle cap.
Just some more stuff to add to the mix. 🙂
great ideas Chris. Thanks! xo mer
Ur kid haircut is cool !
These are so pretty I featured them on my creative moodboard of the month (http://skyforged.fr/moodboard-juin/). I think I’m going to make them this week-end for my kids. And for me 😉
thank you very much for these! perfect gift for my niece and nephew! i was carving out of rubber erasers, but cutting foam sheets will be much easier! whew!