Working Ahead....

I've been trying to work ahead on some of my projects.  The last several years I have had some kind of hand made "goodie" to give out to my senior adult ladies at church on Mother's Day.  I came across this idea on the "Organize and Decorate Everything" blog. I love that it is simple to make, inexpensive and useful!  I started out using a stamp set that I already owned.  Individual letters, one at a time was taking too long. 

SO!  I used a coupon at Michael's and purchased a set of clear alphabet stamps. 

With these stamps you can use an acrylic base and create a whole word.  Makes the stamping go much faster.  I used (the recommended) Staz-On ink pad.  It is designed to be used on non-porous surfaces that you usually couldn't stamp on because the ink wouldn't dry.  I'm not sure it was necessary on wooden clothespins. 

At my local grocery store they had clothespins that were bamboo.  In retrospect, I think they would have been an excellent choice for this project and the Staz-On would have worked well on bamboo.

I had a hard time keeping the ink from soaking in and having a smeary look.  As I worked, I discovered that a light touch with the stamp was the key.  You want to push the stamp hard enough to get a good imprint but not stay long enough to put too much ink on the clothespin. 

Of course I can never do small quantities of anything.  :-)  I made 100 sets of 6 clothespins.  It really didn't take all that long using the new letter stamps. A couple of evenings at the kitchen table.

Here is my finished product.  You can see they are not perfect.  :)  However, I think they will be a fun to hand out on Mother's Day.