Our Middle

Suzi gave me a couple of books yesterday for inspiration and one of them is a book that the lady has all these questions that are supposed to make you "think" about stuff. For me, thinking is a simple process. I would MUCH RATHER think about something that has an answer. A problem with a solution - I might not know what the solution IS, but it's there and I can find it.

One of the questions reads: What is in between our inside and our outside? The answer comes to me instantly: our middle. Done. Now, if this person was before me, asking me this question, here is where she would start backpedaling. "No, ok, but - " or "All right, but - " or "That's not really what I meant" or on and on and on. People make up these things and inside their own head they sound so complicated. Then they put them out there in the world and they're like "Look how complicated I am. Look at the type of stuff I think up. Aren't I inspiring?"

And my own friends agree and think these people are inspiring. And they expect me to find this inspirational and "get me thinking" about what is between my inside and my outside. Well, I know the answer. My middle.

But I have something for you all to debate amongst yourselves. In New York, that little ball of fried dough that comes out of the middle of the donut, we call a "munchkin". That's what they are a Dunkin' Donuts. For us, it's like when you call a copy a "xerox" or a tissue a "kleenex". Here and in Florida, they call it a donut hole. Now, before you go talking smack about New Yorkers, I want you to think about this: holes are not balls. You can have a ball-shaped hole. But a hole, by definition, is an empty space. A hollowed place in something solid. An empty pit. Look it up.

On that note, here is a stamp I carved for our Soul Garden chatters yesterday:

Notecards

Today on Soul Garden chat, we talked about notecards and how we're using them in our planners. Here are some that I made today. I carved this little owl and the talk bubble stamps for this one:

Nothing but paid for stamps for this one!

I really like the gold and brown here:

And this is just a chunk of scrapbook paper with some embossed flowers:

Great, Goog, but what the heck is Soul Garden? Suzi's newest class, of course! It's fantastic so far :)

Hell is...

So, here is a girl...I might have posted her before. The shading is better in person, of course. 

And I really wanted to stamp "hell is other people" on her, my new favorite quote. I was using the alphabet stamps that I carved myself, and I thought were going to take up more space so I thought I'd put two words at the top and two at the bottom, but the first two didn't take up very much space. I was a little torn then, because leaving a HUGE space between the words - two all the way at the top and two way down at the bottom - seemed silly.

But I just went with it! I'm happy. She rocks my socks. 

An owl and a cloud

Sounds like a Dr. Seuss book! Nope, it's just some stamps I carved. The owl is Kelly's design, I just did the carving. The cloud, I just like the idea of the raindrops being inside it for some reason.

Here's the rubber:

Carved:

And here's how they stamp!

A Day of Crazy Stamp Carving

Owl:

Hippo:

Rhino:

Thought bubble:

Cupcake:

Talk bubble:

More to come!

Ink test

Did you know that you're not supposed to use Stazon ink with Copic markers? My friend and Copic marker expert, Kelly, told me this - a YEAR after I've been using Stazon for ALL my Copic stuff!!  I just figured permanent was permanent, and that meant Copic-proof. It never even occurred to me that permanent doesn't actually mean permanent. So, I've been using Stazon Timber Brown and it's always worked totally fine, but I really wanted gray and when I told Kelly what it was for, she told me I can't use Stazon with Copics. Then I had to confess that I have been...

Anyway, I couldn't find gray, so I got black and even though I wasn't supposed to, I decided to put it to the test. Here are my results:

The Stazon smeared - for the first time EVER. I've used the brown a zillion times with no problem.

So, the memento made the darkest, cleanest impression and made me the happiest. I let them sit for a couple of days, so it's not like the Stazon wasn't dry. And the paper is Neenah Classic Crest Solar White - my favorite for Copics. Not the best coloring jobs ever, but I was really just trying to see if the inks smudged. The black Stazon does, maybe only with certain colors, since different chemicals are used to create different colors. 

Stamps!

I have a friend (OK, three friends) who are constantly encouraging me to teach classes. But here is my class teaching issue: I don't feel like I have anything to teach people. Other than drawing (which I learned from Suzi Blu), most of the stuff I do is just stuff I've figured out. Last night when I was carving stamps, I thought about this in depth. The process for stamp carving is so EASY. Buy rubber, buy carving tool, draw something on the rubber, use tool to carve. What is there to TEACH someone? Kelly is so funny when I'm carving she says I'm working my magic. But seriously it's EASY. Why would you need me to teach you something so easy??

This is the pencil I use - it's the same one I use for drawing, shading, math class. I LOVE this pencil. It fits perfectly in my hand. Unfortunately it costs more than I like to pay for pencils. $6 for two at Target.

This is the tool I use. It's a Speedball, but Blick also makes one and it costs about $3 less than this one.

This is the rubber I use. It's Blick's brand and it comes just like this - no wrapper, no tags, no price stickers.

Then I do one of two things. Either I draw or print out what I'm going to carve on a piece of plain old printer paper, then trace it with a pencil and burnish it onto the rubber - usually with my phone - OR I draw right onto the rubber with a ball point pen. Perfection is NOT something I strive for. Ever. This one is for Kelly :)

I didn't stamp with Kelly's stamp because that seemed wrong, but here's a finished and stamped one!

Is that teaching? What questions could there possibly be? Draw, carve, stamp. 

Stamp Face

Draw:

Transfer:

Carve:

 Ink:

Stamp!

My ink pad isn't juicy enough, but you get the idea! I LOVE carving stamps!!

Zombie bunnies!

And their human zombie, pretending to be a bunny! Look out world, the zombie bunnies are going out in an ATC swap for Easter.