Happy Stamping

After getting the rest of our translation work done yesterday, I was able to spend most of today playing in my stamp room! I made up a bunch of cards, including the one you see above. Admittedly, my goal was to make as many as I could, and to use up some of the accumulation of patterned papers I've got cluttering up my stamping room. Can't say I made much of a dent, but it's a start!


I also worked some more on my altered book. Above you see one of the "layouts" or I guess you could say two-page spreads? Not completely familiar with the terminology, but I guess you can tell what you're looking at, right? On the right is a story called The Two Wolves which, along with the photo you see above the story, came in an e-mail from my absolutely wonderful friend Beverly. The story really resonated with me, so I included it in my a.b. On the left, I stamped a little scene (first in a very long time) representing a path with a fork in it, which is to remind me of my favorite poem, The Road Not Taken, by Robert Frost. I am very pleased with the way these pages turned out.


This afternoon I started on the next two pages, but as you can see, I haven't gotten very far. My modus operendi so far has been to glue a couple/few pages together, then paint a thin layer of gesso over the printed text in the book. In this yellow layout, I also cut out a circle to make a little window to the next layout. I am going to put some vellum in there, I think, rather than leave it open like it is now. I sponged some ink on the pages, then sponged some more with two different templates in place. I let a couple of phrases from the original text of the book show through; I think they are pretty apt. I know what message I want to include on these pages, now I'm figuring out how I want to do that.

It took me a long time to come to accept that it would be okay to actually paint, glue and cut up a book. For my first altered book, I chose a 1992 edition of Mystery Writer's Market (yes, I used to write mystery stories and even one book, and tried to get them published). At the very least, all of the contact information is out of date. Could be that some of the addresses are wrong, that some magazines have gone out of business, and others have started up. So I persuaded myself I wouldn't be struck by lightening if I "arted up" this book. It's a hardcover, and of a decent thickness without being overly tome-ish (is that a word?). I have cut out some pages entirely, because when you add paint, collaged images and what not, you add thickness to the book. I glue the pages together so they can stand up to their new duties.

I'm using this altered book as an art project plus journal, and so far I'm finding it remarkably therapeutic.