Print your own

Swept along in a current of pro-activeness, I'm looking with astonishment at a ticked-off xmas list and (small) heap of things to wrap. It's not even December! And thanks to a leisurely look around the Kensington High St shops, rather than our usual cultural outing on a Sunday morning, Tony has his list complete too. (This is so unusual ... and we'll no doubt both be rushing around for "something else" at the last moment...)

Over coffee we hatched a plan to have a "print your own wrapping paper" tea party, with seasonal cookies and cake, and immediately on getting home had a trial run. Out came the potatoes and carrots, and a roll of lining paper and scalpels, paintbrushes, and tubes of acrylic paint (all the stamp pads had dried up).

The simpler the shape the better, when it comes to cutting - and the bigger the potato the better when it comes to printing, not so much for the surface area as for being able to grasp it easily. 

We used a large-ish paintbrush to apply paint to the surface, and found that the cut surface could be somewhat wobbly and rough. I like that "hand made" look, but some people will be happier with the regularity of rubber stamps, so the hunt is on through drawers and boxes for all those stamps I've bought over the years.

Simplicity and spacing seem to be the key ingredients. It's an activity kids can do, but that doesn't mean adults won't have fun with it too!