Embossing in inkscape is a little tricky. It takes several layers of images to produce the emboss effect. I had a little look around the net and found this guy had made a video stream of how. If you are having trouble getting the emboss effect this video is worth looking at. He also shows you how to insert patterns into the image you have drawn. Nice effect

http://screencasters.heathenx.org/wp-content/videos/ep046/ep046.html 

This is the type of effect you can get. Quite easy, once you have done it a few times.