Up close...

a beautiful sight:

"Even with the cold and overcast sky, I am still so pretty!", said Rose.

Just one of the blooms from Romy's rose bush continuing to surprise me every morning.

And then, when I was out in the back yard with Remy, this fallen aspen leaf caught my eye:

Cool, huh.

Not obsessed...

with carving stamps - perhaps mildly addicted!
I found a nice cigar box to keep them in:

Yes, I will need more storage :-)

Why all the fish? I was working on a monotype that needed a LOT of changes - color being the most critical:

Not liking the red...

So after I added more color to obscure the disconcerting red and yes, the muddy pink, I had something that reminded me of the sea. And then of course where were the fish and vegetation?...a nice opportunity to make some stamps for a specific piece:

Transformation!

Bummer :-(

I used a different material (Moo Carve) to carve a positive image. The results were not great, unfortunately.
Here he is:

O no-o-oh :-(

The intact stamped image is my test image. I washed the stamp and when I patted it dry the stamp looked like what you see in the photo. Ouch.
Moo Carve is really easy to carve - very pliable. Previous stamps I have done were carved from Speedball "Easy Carve"; it's a bit more dense and holds the carved line better.
So I tried a negative image with more success (yay!):

Negative image stamp using Moo Carve.

I am so new to stamp carving that every stamp is a chance to learn...something :-)

A bird in the hand...

which in this case is a bird critter:

Rubber stamps, yummy :-D

He's a pretty big stamp:

As a rookie stamp carver, I'm still experimenting material removal.

With Copic colors - hmmm, guess he has a crown now:

Perhaps he's an extremely tall duck???

I use my Copics more like watercolor - very little blending..

On a roll :-)

This is so much fun - creating rubber stamps using my own images. Something magical happens when a two-dimensional sketch takes on a three-dimensional form; my little sketch that I can hold in my hand. I thought I would be more intrigued with the ability to stamp multiple images, but really I am in love with the stamps themselves :-D
Here's my second rubber stamp:

I was thinking "Romy", dog spirit, when sketching this.

This little guy is about 1-3/4".

And now for something completely different...

I took a quick break from my current Gelli plate printing to do something I've always wanted to do - carve a stamp. Remy was watching me - and since he's a sweet dog he didn't comment on my "process" or eat any of the pink carving detritus.
So of course I drew a little image of a dog, no surprises there! and burnished it onto the carving block. I had some idea of what to do from reading Geninne Zlatkis's book, "Making an Impression: Designing and Creating Artful Stamps" - a great book.
I grabbed my tools and started.
Et voici, le chien:

Freshly carved, yay!

Here he is with a couple of impressions:

Woof, woof and woof!

I had a bit of a problem with carving the paws due to carving-tool-driver-error; I wandered over the line ;-)
I had a lot of fun and I will be making more.

New Gelli :-)

Monday was the first day of Gelli Plate Printmaking (online class from Carla Sonheim); I had never used one of these plates before so you know my curiosity knob was turned up to "eleven" :-)
I made the required eight prints... and then some.
Here's one I like:

The start of something....

This is the first layer - with more to come.