Saturday, April 30, 2011

Ta- Da (relief printing in action!)


For those of you who are unfamiliar with relief printing... here it is (at least the poor (wo)man's version of it)! I bought to pieces of unmounted linoleum then mounted them to a wood board. The wood has registration lines on it so I know just where I want to put the paper when I'm ready for it. I've been working on carving the image out over the last week and a half or so. The process of printing the print you see in the video took just over 10 minutes. This was the very first print made from this block so it's a "proof". I went back in and fixed a few areas that didn't show up very well. As you can see I'm not using a machine or press to print this but am doing it by hand so each print varies more than if press printed. And, if you were wondering, the floor is not an ideal place to print especially when you live with a dog that sheds like a fiend year round, BUT it was the only area I had big enough to accommodate this.

This will be on sale soon in my Esty shop :-)

Friday, April 29, 2011

Thursday, April 28, 2011

Saturday, April 23, 2011

A new print

I've been itching to do some relief printing so I put my other projects aside and started carving. So far so good but I still have a ways to go.

Wednesday, April 6, 2011

Are bruises and bandages sexy yet???

So it was back to back gym climbing last night and then again this morning! Fun stuff, unless you ask my knees but what do they know!

I muted this one so you don't really get the full experience with me swearing as I make my way up the rock. I'm following a particular route (green). This is a fun 5.8.


This one I like to call the "Chipmunk Convention". I did edit it a little bit by cutting out a little slip I had and, of course, speeding it up. Towards the end of the video Steve, the person holding the camera, says "I forgot my gold sticker" which was a reference to a conversation we'd had the previous night in which I had told him that I was surprised he didn't carry star stickers with him to give to us after each climb. He is Mr. Positivity when we're climbing. He is very helpful, encouraging, and great to climb with; I was just poking fun at him a bit :-) This climb was rated either a 5.7 or 5.8 I don't remember.


This climb is my favorite in the gym. It used to be just the red/gold route but a couple weeks ago they added the green route. I fudged a bit by accidentally stepping on a green hold and by grabbing a green to catch my balance, but other than that the climb went alright. I wish it were just the red/gold  route there (which is actually named "Kill Bill"). The green route is totally dead to me!


Also at the gym today: I have kind of developed an interest/crush on one of the worker dudes there and so I'm walking toward the front area and my belay gloves (because I'm a wussy and 1. don't like the way the ropes feel and 2. am trying to minimize the wear and tear on my hands) fell out of my pocket. A gal behind me tells me they have fallen out so I turn around to get them. While I'm fetching my gloves I hear "Are those your 'do-me' gloves?" from this guy I like. I say "Did you just ask if these were my 'do- me' gloves?!!??!". He says "Your dueling gloves". OOOOoooooohhhhh My hearing was just all messed up today!

My dueling/do-me gloves.

Also, today I got 4 people to smell my shoe! Hahahaha For some reason my climbing shoes smells like fresh hay and this is after wearing and climbing in them for many hours.

Saturday, April 2, 2011

Strange day today...

So it's 50 degrees and sunny here in Minneapolis today; I was all excited to go get some dog food and take my little Valen gal on a walk around the lake. We get to the car and WHAT!?!?!?! A flat?!!?!??! Dang it! I've never changed a tire before so there was initially a little bit of panic, but turns out, if you give me a solid set of instructions I'm pretty darn handy!!


So after I got the fabulous spare on the car I still had to make a run to pet store. When I got there I saw local musician Jeremy Messersmith! I was hoping he would look up at me so I could do like a thumbs up and point at him and, of course, tell him I just changed a flat tire all by myself... I'm sure he would have been impressed. He didn't look up though. I thought shouting out at him would have been irritating so I held back.
Then I get home and checked my email and had sold a print on etsy! Yay!
Now it's off to see the last bout of the season for the MN Rollergirls!