Stamp Carving~The Real Deal

Before coming to Arizona, I stocked up on a bunch of stamp carving supplies, wanting to finally get started on 'real' stamp carving. Yes, we've placed 4 letterboxes in New Mexico already, but two of those held store-bought stamps, one a very simple line carved stamp, and the other a carving on a simple pink eraser with an exacto knife.

Also, we've been using five individual store-bought stamps to log into letterbox logbooks, and we know that it will be quicker and much more special to have our own unique hand-carved Personal Stamp.

After finding close to 75 letterboxes already, and enjoying the amazing creativity and uniqueness of the letterboxes holding hand-carved stamps, I felt it was finally time to get started carving some real stamps with 'the-real-deal' art materials.

So, I gathered up my Speedball carving tools, the MasterCarve, a computer-designed and printed image, acetone, and some cottonballs. And started creating a hand-carved stamp that we are planning on placing in Glenwood, NM near the CatWalk, on our way home from AZ.

We chose our slinky 'Cat Woman' because of the song "I'm too Sexy" and it's mention of 'shaking their little tush on the cat walk'. We considered using an actual cat image, but it just didn't seem fitting.

Here are some photos of my efforts at carving "The CatWalk" Stamp.

I transferred the image onto the MasterCarve using acetone and cottonballs.

After first carving. Still some more 'tweaking' to do.
It's so exciting seeing a block of white 'butter' become something creative and useful. Still a little more careful carving to do, to get a clearer stamp image.
Almost done! I did one more carve to sharpen the details and clear out some of the extra lines around the image. Now, just to complete the log book, First Finder Certificate, and place it at the CatWalk in New Mexico!!
I'm very pleased with my first real attempt at stamp carving. I hope others who find this enjoy this Catwalk stamp, too!