The painting that I did a couple days ago is now in my portfolio. I’m quite happy that I’ve been able to add so much to it lately! Hopefully it’s dry enough to transport tomorrow.
So if anyone wants paintings or design, please let me know! (I am a starving med student after all)
Mike and I are hopefully getting a pair of kitties later this summer/early fall. I think that I just may need to make something like this when we actually get them. This is a cat adoption announcement (because everyone needs to know that you now have a kitten or two) by good old Martha.
via Modern Cat
Because I have been super busy with finishing up the school year and thesis and other projects as well as going home for Easter, I have no cool new photos to post. Instead I am going to do a long overdue shout out to EasilySuede on Etsy. For Christmas I commissioned a hand made leather messenger bag for Mike. I liked the style of the one pictured above but asked about getting it in a darker leather. She was so amazing to work with and the bag turned out great. I will post a photo of the finished bag when I return from Easter travels.
After quite the wait, I finally got around to photographing the invitations I letterpressed last week. I’m very happy with how they turned out! The paper I used was from a Strathmore “make your own cards” kit. After I was finished printing, I simply cut the paper down. Though it’s hard to tell in the photo, the ink is actually purple. This is because of Purple Day, an epilepsy awareness day. The purple ink turned out to be quite a hassle though, because the stuff I started out using was so very old that it was “tacky” (to put it lightly). So tacky that it was actually causing the rollers on the vandercook to stick and the whole machine to make awful noises. Luckily it did just turn out to be the ink and not a more serious problem and switching inks resolved everything.
Hopefully I’ll find more excuses for printing things, because I had a lot of fun making these (and they were a lot less paper cutting than the little books, which was an added bonus)
Sorry for the horrendous lack of posting the last couple days, it’s been a fairly stressful week waiting to hear back from schools. I thought that I would post a couple times today to make up for it. The first thing I would like to show off/plug are the finished flowers that Mike and I made for our Valentine’s Day fundraiser.
They look a lot more like irises than the first attempt. We’re selling them today as part of a fundraiser for the Neuroscience Charity Dinner later on in March. All of the proceeds are going to support Purple Day. Purple Day is a rather amazing awareness day because it was started by a little girl with epilepsy who wanted to help other children with epilepsy get past the perceived stigma as well as to create awareness about the disease in general.
Today I finished my letterpress workshop at Dawson Printshop. It was a fun-filled four days, though I must admit I should have chosen a more print heavy project instead of a book project (but that is my own fault). I definitely learned a lot (especially about paper cutting). My printing yesterday morning went very smoothly and the little pocket books look sharp with the silver ink on the red cardstock.
I wish I had photos right now to show off, but currently all of the books are in a book press so they will lie flat a little better. In total I made around 50 books, each one cut by hand, printed by hand, glued and then bound by hand.
I can’t wait to print more.
Though I probably would not like to admit that I even acknowledge Martha Stewart’s existence, I must admit that she does have some pretty cool projects. I’ve known of her crepe paper flowers for a while, but Mike and I decided that it would be an excellent Valentine’s Day fundraiser to sell irises for the Nova Scotia Epilepsy Association. They’re not too hard to make, and really have a neat look to them. I’m pretty darned pleased how the first one turned out.
And today has just been awesome in general…
I actually haven’t started printing my project yet, instead I spent the day on this:
I learned today that this machines were not made for people of my size. Especially when cutting very large sheets of paper. Luckily it got much easier once I was down to cutting strips into shorter strips. I’m going in Tuesday to print, so hopefully I’ll have some more images then. I really went a little overboard with this thing, considering I have never done any sort of book making before. I suppose we shall see how this turns out.
At least I’m done using the guillotine now…
Sorry for the lack of updates about the awesome letterpress workshop yesterday, it went late and I was tired. The workshop is going awesome though! There are seven of us and we each have our own unique project. The projects are all super cool too, I am definitely encouraging everyone to go to shop and buy some once we are done (I think I will). I really cannot praise Dawson Printshop enough, it’s a great resource, and if I end up moving away next year for school, I’ll definitely miss it.
I still think I’m going to get a press though.
So finally, I present the leg warmers that I was working on way back when. These ones aren’t actually the pair that I showed then, these are the other pair. I finally managed to snag a shot of them today.
I’m told that both have been well received and often worn. Leg warmers have been the most practical gift I have ever given, since we’re having an abnormally cold winter this year. Maybe I’ll need to knit myself a pair…
