Art supplies

Another Sunday where my goal was to get certain things done (just 2 more Pointless Sister blocks!) ... and I haven't even started them yet.

But I've been busy. Cleaned the bedroom. Washed, folded, and put away 3 loads of laundry. Went out to the garage to get something, and got sidetracked with rubber stamps.

Yes, that's right. Rubber stamps. I've collected rubber stamps since I was in college, which was (ahem) over 20 years ago. My first stamp was a bolt of fabric! But I became more and more obsessed with stamps, which led me to paper arts and book making, which led me to making and selling and exhibiting artist books, which led me to teach book arts... Somewhere in there, the process of making books to be class samples, to be student tools, and working on books to make money took all the fun out of it for me. I slid back into fabric and haven't looked back.

And meanwhile, all my stamps are out in the garage, unused but not unloved. I've tried to weed out more and more of them to sell them. I hate to think of them not being used, but let's face it, I'm not going to use most of them again. I'd rather they were in the hands of avid stampers who'll appreciate them. I've sold some on Ebay ... and although that was actually pretty lucrative, the listing and keeping track and mailing out was hugely time consuming.

So, my friend Elaine is going to take a batch up to her (and my former) book arts guild, to see if they'll sell up there. That way, I'll get a bit of money for them, they'll get great stamps for cheap, and I'll know that people who'll use them have them. That's the idea, anyway. I spent about 90 minutes sorting stamps, into "sell" and "keep." I have a hard time parting with things that conjure up my past so vividly...where I was when I bought it, who I was with, what I made with it, the studio in my New Hampshire apartment where I made all those books and did so much stamping... I'm getting ruthless about parting with them, but still, there are quite a few I must keep.