Field and Fen

 I needed to make a few cards yesterday, since I never replied to any Christmas mail, so I assembled the doings for embossing.

Took ages to find the burnishers, hiding among other art materials. I always forget how small they are.

So here's how you do it

Plain cardstock over stencil held to window, just run the burnishers steadily around the edges of the cutouts. 

Card and matching envelope flap. Done. No artistic skill required. But it's very pleasing.

You can use a light box too, but I find the window in daytime easier. Also I've taught groups of kids, easy to have them spread out around classroom windows.

And they don't need fancy burnishers. A blunt knitting needle, even a pencil, if you don't mind pencil markings on the back. Kids usually don't, they're so excited about the embossing. Maybe this is one to show Kira, little nextdoor visiting grandchild, come to think of it.

Speaking of fun, here's a medieval scribe with a sense of humor

 Happy day everyone! Enjoy making something, or thinking about it if that's your speed. I started my day with this

As promised, I hauled out the tools for hand embossing, glad yet again of the Winnowing that made this a couple of minutes' search rather than a frenzied marathon of pawing through crates. 

You need a light source, stencils, as Becki astutely remembered, and an embossing tool. 

On the left here, that blue thing is a corner punch, a nice touch for handmade cards and books, gives a rounded corner, very posh.

The advantage of having them is that each end is a different size, so you can choose according to the size of the openings you're drawing around.  But other substitutes are fine, as long as they slide on the surface and don't stick.

The process can be as simple as taping to a window, creating your own stencils or just using commercial ones, and if you don't have a burnisher, a blunt knitting needle or even pencil will work. Kids like to use a pencil so they can see where they've been.

You can make this as original and elaborate as you want -- I've done embossing into large watercolors as part of the composition, using purpose cut cardboard stencils -- or you can do what I did here, and had a nice time doing, a couple of greeting cards.

The procedure: tape your stencil to a light source, window, lightbox, whatever you're up for.

Then hold or tape your card/painting/paper/ envelope, whatever you're embossing, over the stencil. 

Now firmly run your embossing tool all around the inside of the openings. You need to apply enough pressure to make the image sink into the opening in the stencil. You only need to work on the edges. The center will follow without your touching it.

You need to remember that you're working from the back, and right to left for lettering, if you're embossing to get a raised image. If you really want an engraved, sunken, image, work from the front, lettering the usual left to right.

Here are both

This one's embossed, raised

The back of each is the other. You can have an embossed front to a card, open it and on the left is the engraved image. And you can make use of this to make mixed images using both embossed and engraved in one composition.

So that's pretty much it. 

It was good that this subject came up, because I had a sudden surprise visit yesterday afternoon from a friend I hadn't seen for years. 

She threw my 80th birthday party, lovely person, the sister of the friend I helped care for with her in her final days at home. She, sister, Gary, all friends.

Anyway she came bearing home-dipped chocolates

Intended for Christmas, and finally got here. 

So that requires a little thank you card, why not an embossed one. Timely. Plain unlined 8x5 cards are good for this.

While I was looking for the burnishers, I came across these pens. I'm digressing here, as I tend to

I used to cut these from the wild grapevines growing behind the building I lived in, diagonal cuts to make two ends, dry them, and use them for drawing with ink I made from black walnuts, also growing out back.

This is what van Gogh used in his early drawings. I used to give them to my drawing students, with samples of the ink. So they had an authentic experience.

These are what Blake called rural pens in his Songs of Innocence, except his was a hollow reed. Same idea, also making his own ink, in the narrative.  This whole background was very interesting to adult students, seeing the connections across arts and cultures and history.

Anyway, enjoy your embossing/engraving adventures if you give it a try. 

Long ago, while I was doing printmaking, I saw some wonderful blind embossed work -- pressed without ink-- and fancied trying it. 

I didn't have access to a printing press, so I tried a number of techniques, standing on the assembled paper and materials, rolling them, various things, none of which worked.

I ended up getting a little simple pasta rolling machine, thinking maybe I could get that to exert enough pressure to emboss. The small width was okay because my prints were small, so I tried it, on the closest setting.

And it didn't work either. Just didn't have the required heft. So I moved on in  printmaking to other techniques. Including hand embossing done with a burnisher. I taught this to a few classes who were thrilled at how simple the technique is. I'll blog about this if there's interest.

Meanwhile I had a pasta maker clean as a whistle, only touched by clean paper, other materials sandwiched in, not touching the roller. It was not returning to the studio. One of the few times the kitchen has received from,  instead of giving to, the studio.

So I thought self, learn to make your own pasta. You've had marvellous pasta in Trenton restaurants, where there's an old Nonna in the kitchen making it old style. 

It totally beats even the best commercial pasta, which is made from a harder grain, and dried to be shelf stable. Your own pasta is cooked in a couple of minutes, very tender. So I did and loved it and then life intervened for a few years.

But yesterday I thought, I'll be giving handsome Son the monthly dinner soon, why not a from-scratch lasagna, noodles made to fit the dish.

And here's why I completely overlooked yesterday's knitting group, despite having decided after all to Zoom it. I got engrossed.

After mixing the pasta, added in a drop of water as I mixed, it needed resting for half an hour.

Then fun with rolling, starting at setting 9 then working down to setting 3.

Several layers. They're on parchment paper, and now they're bagged flat and in the freezer. 

I'm wondering if I need even to cook them before assembling the doings. They're much more tender than the boxed kind. I'll see.

Last night I only wanted a small meal, so here's a nice idea that really worked. 

Sweet potato, microwaved for a couple of minutes so I could make it into fries, then salted, chunks of fresh ginger I had in the freezer, harvested from my own pot, 400°f about 20 minutes. 

Enough for two helpings. I never roasted ginger before that I remember, but I'm going to do it again.

The weather's been bright but cold recently, in the teens Fledermaus, and suddenly there are birds at the suet feeder. I can't get good pix, take my word for it. 

Yesterday, first time in two years, woodpeckers showed up. Several visits from a red bellied, or maybe it was more than one, one from a downy. And the usual crowd of house finches, Carolina wrens, bluejays,  juncoes, and a new visitor, a white-crowned sparrow. It was great.

I finally gave up on the other feeder out front after several months of no traffic, and all this action was on the patio at the back. It's more protected, easy hiding places and shelter. 

Also I can bird from the sofa on freezing days, always a good thing.

Let me know if you wanted to see the embossing technique, and I'll set up pictures as s step by step. Maybe Valentine cards.