And Now For Something Completely Different

Nope, it's not knitting, or photography, or even cooking. Not tonight. Tonight was rubber stamping. Yep, that thing I used to do constantly from the time I was about 14 years old but that I haven't done for about 5 or 6 years. 

I was SO rusty and it took forever to come up with something I liked and could actually handle. I stamped no fewer than twenty-five 1x2 inch white rectangles (on BOTH sides) with the words "thank you" before I remembered how to properly line up a stamp, and still the words are off center in every single one. So I distressed those little rectangles, and no one will ever know. 

I like distressing. It means to wreck something on purpose for artistic effect. I know! It's sounds great, right? You should try it. 

Distressing aside, I used techniques that are old and simple; nothing innovative or fashionable here, and please don't zoom in and look closely. There is little of the clean perfection that graces the pages of stamping catalogs. Actually, we probably should call it Wabi Sabi rubber stamping, so put away your rulers. I'm pretty sure Stampin' UP! does not have a Wabi Sabi section in their catalog, but I'm okay with that. 

I never was perfect, but tonight I remembered that I used to be pretty good at this and had some fun. I figured out a design I could mass-produce to send to Sara. It's good for missionaries to have cards and notes on hand, and I still have gobs of supplies, so now I have a cute little set of 10 thank-you notes to send to New Mexico for her to use to share the Love of God with others around her. 

I'm kinda proud of myself, because it really has been years and years...and years!  Every so often I get rid of a few more stamps and sometimes I think it's time to get rid of all of the paper-crafting stuff. Then I go and have a nice, productive evening like this. Sigh. 

Now that I've crashed through the walls of the past to the forgotten crafts, you never know. It might be quilting next. 

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Finally, A New Assignment for Art

I really like this one. It was fun to do and I love how it turned out. It is scrapbooking paper, torn, cut and glued down on illustration board. The image is 10x16.  At my instructor's request, it is based on this assignment. and it was fun to reinterpret the same image. The requirements were to use at least 3 cool colors and at least 3 warm colors to add depth and complexity to a repeating image. My repeating image is the wave shape. Plus, there is a repeat of the triangle. She gave me dispensation to use some license on the placement of the colors. It was actually supposed to be a completely cool background with a warm foreground. I did mostly the opposite. I swear on my knitting needles that I never knew I had this sort of thing in me. That's why we should never give up learning.  This makes me happy and if I hadn't taken the leap to take the class, I would never have tried it.

Where to go from here has become a mystery because HCC did away with the photography certificate. A certificate is 30 hours of just the fun classes, intended for those going into the workplace rather than transferring to another university. Now they only have a 60 hour Associate Degree in photography. That mean's I'd have to take all the core classes-English 121, Math for People Who Wish They Didn't Have to Take Math and all that. It seems a bit silly to see if I could transfer my 60 or so core credits from two different 4-year universities down to a community college, just so I can get an AA. So, now I have to decide whether to start from scratch, get my online Bachelor of General Studies from BYU because they'll still honor all my credits from 25 years ago, or just keep taking the fun classes and not worry about the credentials.  In the meantime, I'll look at my pretty picture and smile.

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