Wednesday, July 04, 2007

Impulse Purchase!


Stickers on purple lace
Originally uploaded by m.Lee
Happy 4th of July to all my American readers! Not that I am feeling all that patriotic myself, especially lately. And fireworks lost most of their appeal years ago. It certainly isn't worth braving crowds of people in Boston just too see them, especially with how my hips have been feeling. The thought of going out to the Charles to watch the display makes me shudder. Maybe we will have burgers or something tonight but sadly no beer for me.

Thanks to one of the many bloggers I read on a daily basis I ended up getting a cute little machine to make my own stickers last night. First I made some promo type stickers using printed out images of shrunk down art and when those turned out so nice I turned my attention to my real love. Making originals! And here is the first set I came up with. I don't have a ton of prints to work from so I don't think I will have many of these for awhile. Until then I will make what I can and probably do more for promo than for sale. The computer printed out ones are a nice little something to stick on packages. I'm always looking for different things to do with my art.

I also picked up some tools to try stamping again. I tried it around Christmas last year with not the best results using my woodcarving tools. From what I have learned the cheap Speedball tools with the thin blades are actually better for carving stamp material than my fancy wood tools. The blades on my woodcarving tools are just too thick. Getting used to the feel of the very different material will take a bit of time. I am used to wood not rubber. It might be interesting to make cards that are a mixture of gocco and stamping.

Jon is going to see the new Transformers movie today and I don't think I will be going. It really doesn't sound like my kind of a movie. Even though I had a couple of the transformers toys growing up I wouldn't say that I was all that into the series. I rarely watched the cartoon and I didn't see the original cartoon until Jon made me watch it a few years ago. It is terrible. But he is a boy from the 80's and he and his other boy from the 80's friends are all pumped to go see it no matter what the reviews say. Suddenly his standards are totally thrown out the window. It's cute. But I will be lonely while he is at the movie.

8 comments:

Amity said...

A sticker machine! *gasp* I may have to try that. How cool.

The Bookish Life said...

awesome!! those look great! did you get the xyron? i actually eyed these sticker machines at the craft store yesterday but I'm waiting for a good coupon - I'm cheap!
I also checked out some of the carving tools and stamp making stuff you recommended. i don't have a dick blick near me so i might wait until I'm chicago next weekend to see if I can find more than michael's has to offer.

VERY COOL! i love the way the stickers turned out!! yay for impulse purchases!!

gilfling said...

Hey! Just discovered your blog via the etsy forum - it looks great! I love those stickers and your plan to use them for originals. Yep my boy will be going to see that movie too - another child of the 80's with no regard for reviews - never mind - one of the reasons I love him!

looking forward to visiting again!

narchi said...

those stickers would make neat promos. I don't think i'd ever want to use them though. I'm a sticker hoarder.

Anonymous said...

Happy 4th of July! The stickers looks wonderful! Great post! :)
*HUGS*

Marissa L. Swinghammer said...

Yeah I got the Xyron that looks like an X in purple. It was $10 and works great. I found that the sticky part didn't alway attach as well as I would like using the "rub and peel" method that they suggested. But I solved that by running them through my printing press instead!

But for those of you without printing presses I would just press very hard or maybe even burnish it with a spoon.

We saw the Transformers movie and it wasn't bad. Actually it was bad but it reveled in it so it was enjoyable. But man the robots were better actors than the humans! It was kinda sad.

artandghosts said...

they do look fantastic...and i am mightly glad to have located your blog!

:))

Marissa L. Swinghammer said...

Same goes for finding our blog too my dear!