chuck's fine lines

chuck did a fun piece of mail for an exchange and kindly sent me a scan. i forgot which computer has my blurring tool, so i used virtual can of spray paint. i like his use of red dots between the words in the address. that's an idea worth remembering.

chuck's mail

i thought maybe i would stick in a couple non-halloween envelopes. chuck kindly sent a couple scans. this one looks like a folded pen was used on the name and then the shadow was done with a brush marker. i must try this kind of shadowing. the colors are wonderful with the stamp. they have some very pretty stamps in canada.
below are some i downloaded, but i have no idea how to move them around on the page.

brad's halloween

after i did all the letters on the halloween exemplar, i went looking on google images for more halloween images. this one caught my eye. i added the lettering. brad usually does a fun halloween print every year. i have not seen one for this year, but i did mail him a thank you for the previous ones. and his last name is ball, hence the baseball.

it is the same as ribbon writing or air hose writing from the green series

evans halloween

don't you all agree that this is the best stamp to go with this series. the only other one i like was the thoreau stamp.

i have a few more letters in the alphabet that i have not done...not sure i will get them done. the ones i left to the end are my least favorite, so, it is hard to motivate myself to do them...and yet, there is a rule in jeanland that often times the things that you originally did not like end up being favorites. so, i really should make myself do all of them.

the yang part of that rule, is that i turn on things that i liked right off the bat. bad news for my kids, eh? i'm kidding. i am sure none of them read this blog. or are they lurkers? the quote my daughter chose for her wedding photos...loved you yesterday, love you still, always have, always will.

the real lesson is to not even think in terms of like and dislike. as one of my favorite quotes goes.... i have learned silence from the talkative, tolerance from the intolerant, and kindness from the unkind; yet strangely, i am ungrateful to these teachers. kahlil gibran. so, i guess halloween will drag on into november as i finish up every letter in this alphabet.

my mail

chuck sent me a fun envelope. the pumpkins reflect the kumquats. the envelope is hand made out of a really nice rustic paper/card stock. thanks chuck. :-)

chuck update

chuck sent me a scan of his envelope after it arrived and it shows the coloring.

nancy's halloween

nancy only has two cats. and neither of them look like this. i just tried to do every letter of the alphabet off the exemplar that elizabeth sent to me. and i had not done an N yet. although the cat letter in the exemplar is a W, so...i'm not sure i have covered every letter as it appeared on the exemplar.

the stamp is a color copy off the p.o. website. i don't have time to go buy stamps or even order them online. classes start (me teaching) so, i need to get ready for the students. plus, i am trying to curb my stamp addiction.

chuck's halloween

i like the variation in size of little pictures, but i do not like that they start big, decrease to the middle, which is smallest and then increase to the end. it makes an ugly overall shape. the gator should have been larger and the bones smaller and the K larger. the scan was done before i colored it in. coloring in the figures improved the whole envelope and i apologize for not rescanning, but....that's the way it goes sometimes.... it is on a different type of paper. the rest are on an antique fake parchment. someone gave me a box of 200 antique parchment envelopes which is normally a paper that i find revolting, but it is perfect for halloween. so, don't ever look down your nose at 200 free ugly envelopes...you never know when they will be perfect. i should rewrite the story of the ugly duckling....only call it the ugly envelope.

marji's halloween

this was the first time i tried the J and it's a nice J. it is right off the exemplar. i had pondered trying to make an entire alphabet out of each letter.  i came close to not sharing this with the universe because it has problems and i really want to do it over...but...i don't have a *thing* for ghosts. or maybe i need to spend more time on ghosts. i am firm in my belief that if you want to be good at drawing, it is just a matter of time. you need to take time to discover how best to draw anything. so, i know i *could* draw ghosts that please me. but, realistically....is it worth taking the time to draw a pleasing ghost. not at this time. that is marji on the end, waving. she's been an inspiration to me over the years. everything i know about a variety of things i learned from marji.

sally's halloween

i added another 13-cent stamp in the lower right corner and added her  address in black. this is pretty close to the S on the exemplar. the rest is a variation on the ribbon writing or air hose writing. i need to research the leaves on pumpkin vines. i followed the exemplar and i sometimes do better when i research the actual leaves from botanical drawings.

color copy

i found a color copy i made of jeri's envelope. it isn't very good quality, but it gives a better idea of what the scarecrows look like with a little colored pencil

jeri's halloween

i regret that i did not get a second scan of this one after i colored it in with colored pencils. it was probably my favorite in the whole halloween series. the sculls were white and the little shirts were a dark barn red. and, i hope i added a 5-cent stamp. thoreau would have looked great.

the donald

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DrFFVpRnOqY&feature=related

nice video of the donald  (donald jackson)
a must watch for scribes and penmanshippers

gloria's halloween

this is the G on the exemplar and i figured out the loria on  my own. it is a lot like ribbon writing or the air hose writing that was on the envelope that went with the stamp reminding you to keep the air pressure up in your tires. 39-cents is not enough to mail this. my math was a little sloppy on the day i did this. and a few days ago, i probably said "the next twenty days would be all halloween" and then the montreal and big-zip envelopes popped up and now, i am obviously writing on oct 21st, which is contrary to what i keep saying about how i schedule all these postings a week or two in advance. today, this envelope popped up with no words over here, so, i am writing the blurb in real time. and it is close to a run-on sentence, which is why is should not do my writing in the morning. and i think i went back and colored in a bit with colored pencils.

big zip

oops, should have scanned with a background. only allowing myself 10 minutes for a new idea. below is the first post of the day. i set it up a while ago to remind myself to make a really big zip envelope. this one is not big enough. i will do another one, but not today. my halloween series is back tomorrow and those will take us through halloween and beyond. and i am not liking the city and state inside the 9 and 6. for people who want to learn the real words, the inside of a letter or number is called a counter. i don't like to use that term because it is already used for many other purposes. like the kitchen counter and the counter who counts people as they enter the places where people are counted. and the opposite position in an argument (point, counter-point)...i think we should call things what they are. those white spaces are innards. let's hire some hillbillies to rewrite the dictionary. better yet, let's not hire them, let's just tell them they get to be in charge and the honor of being in charge will be reward enough. and if there are any hillbillies reading this blog and you are offended...please do not be. i have the utmost respect for hillbillies. your art is called outsider art and i am fond of outsider art. and really...if you are an authentic hillbilly and you are reading a blog...i question your commitment to the hillbilly lifestyle. yesterday i went to the library and, oh-my-gosh....they weren't hillbillies, but they were talking to the computers as they were looking up things as though they thought the computer was going to respond to the remarks, which i am sure is coming someday. there are a couple librarians who read the blog...honestly...you should write down your stories...i was only there for about 20 minutes...and oh-my-gosh...ok...off to find the secret society of librarians who blog their stories on a website. i'll post it tomorrow. see what happens when i post on the same day i write the blog. this is outrageous. luckily, i have the power to delete it. and have you heard that rumor about how we might run out of coffee. i guarantee, if i lose my coffee, that's the end of the blog.

montreal no. 2

as i am addressing an envelope, i frequently think, i need to do an envelope where the zip code is the main event. this envelope has inspired me to actually do it. i wish i had some of those stamps. i'd love to have the snowscape on the bottom.

montreal envelopes

chuck sent this link which has a bunch of examples of envelopes.

http://societedescalligraphes.org/?page_id=1006&lang=en

this one reminded me of how much i used to enjoy confetti and how i hardly ever do it any more.

i don't think i would ever write at an angle like that, but it is fun to show things that i would never do for some variety.

skip's halloween

the P in this alphabet was one of my favorites. i really enjoyed making more little goblins and love the thoreau stamp with this lettering. i have some tiny little 13-cent stamps that have an indianhead penny pictured on them, i will use those to make up enough postage to actually mail this one.

elizabeth's halloween

this shows the L that elizabeth sent and my interpretation of additional letters in that style. although, i lost interest after the L and did not follow through. while elizabeth is one of my favorite names to write...when it is style that is as time consuming as this one...i lose interest. after i scanned it, i went back and did a lot more work in fine lines to mimic the engraving of the stamp.

kathy's halloween

this should have been the first in the series as it shows how each letter is a different little picture. i was fine with the K and A and T. however, the H was not something i felt like drawing, so i started doing my own thing, which led me to the jackie idea that appeared yesterday. i have not decided what hemingway will be thinking. i am open for suggestions.

jackie's halloween

there will be 4 envelopes based on a fun alphabet set to me by elizabeth. i worked on these during our informal gathering of people who like to letter so i was yakking whilst writing. these letters are drawn. i should have penciled a base line. although the unevenness of this one does not really bother me that much.

the sample elizabeth sent had 26 different ideas. if i have time, i will take each letter and do an entire name just based on one letter. the  lower case L was a bone which inspired this name. i dug into my stash of stamps to find some colors that i thought would go with the lettering. i used white colored pencil over the drawing. don't be sending fan mail to jackie at that address. it is a fake address. if you want to send her some fan mail, send it to me and i will forward it to her.

leftovers 4

my attention span for envelopes is three (the past three days). this was the fourth thank you that i needed to write and i decided to forgo the pencil lines and just gonzo it. mixing it up with a couple random l.c. letters. i should have chosen a better orange. i was also too lazy to go get anything other than black markers...but black shouldn't be uninspired. black is classic.

this has been an uninspired week. might be the falling leaves and mind-numbing amount of things that should get done before the snowflakes fly. or maybe after years of being a neuland-head, neuland just doesn't bring out my best work any more.

at least i am a reformed alphabet-head. those are people who only care to work with one letter at a time. i went through a phase like that. i believe i had two teenagers at the time. nuf said. and the really humiliating thing was that our pitiful newspaper is always so desperate for articles that at least once every 2 or 3 years, they trick me into being featured in some ridiculous article. one time (during my alphabet-head phase) they interviewed me and I mentioned that some people are alphabet-heads and admitted that i was currently among the ranks... and for the next couple weeks, when people who know me, would see me out in public, they would yell, and wave...."Hey ALph-A-Bet-Head." humiliating.

leftovers 3

liking the portrait orientation, i tried it again. also liked the gold borders. i will write the street/city/state in one line under the names, using the gold gel pen.

leftovers 2

on this one, i added some gold along the edges the way the stamp has gold on two edges. i like the stamp in a portrait orientation. as usual, the numbers could be better.

there are 4 envelopes in the leftover set. on all of them, i did not do a quick practice on scrap paper, and looking at this one, i wish i would  have.  i'm adding this comment today. it's good to see the envelopes on the screen instead of the actual envelopes if one wishes to critique the design. i think i would have liked the stamp either closer to the lettering or touching the top edge of the envelope.

leftovers

i had quite a few of the kumquat stamps left so i decided to try the elongated neuland that elizabeth sent. this one was fine until i put the zip code on . i had already spent too much time outlining the letters, so, it's going to have to go out as it is.

and i wasn't paying attention when i wrote timberline. i should have made it extend further so that i did not have to elongate r-o-a-d

...and the benes script is not graceful. i didn't warm up. and..it would have been better to put something in the envelopes. i ran into bumps which makes some of the letters unpleasant.

my mail

this is from elizabeth and she included some fun neuland variations. i can't wait to try them out. and check out the curled tails on the outlines. very nice. it looks to me like she used masking fluid for the name and then did colorful things over the top. maybe she will leave a comment with details... or maybe they are trade secrets....either way....i am inspired.

the trip

i was gone for ten days. i took my mom to see my son in lake tahoe, the prettiest place ever. and then we went to montana to visit relatives. a pretty place, too, but rather dusty. anyhoo, about ten minutes into the trip, i realized that my mom did not bring enough to do, so i gave her paper and pen and told her to write about all the funny things that were happening. i worked on the envelope.

when we got to tahoe, i was excited to go to the post office. there is no mail delivery around tahoe. everyone has to go to the post office. when i walked up to the counter to purchase one stamp, the postal worker exclaimed, "Wow, we need to find a really good stamp to go with THAT envelope." He pulled out some of the cartoon stamps and the pixar stamps. and we decided this one was the best fit. i was so happy to have a postal employee taking such an interest in stamp selection.

the addressees are all people who work at the des moines art center. sorry diane or diana, i never remember if you are e or a.

i like the idea of doing word jumbles for families...  that would be a good idea for a holiday card and envelope.

triangle letters

http://riowang.blogspot.com/2011/09/triangular-letters.html


more photos and the story behind triangular letters at the blog above. thanks to chuck, who sends me the most interesting links.

thank you

here is a real envelope for today.

it is the thank you that came from my niece. a while back i posted the invitation envelope. i knew she had ordered plenty of truck stamps, so i thought it would be fun to give her a set of thank yous already addressed. the little wheeled letter is heading home. i'm not sure the idea of coming and going really comes across. if i had it to do over, i would have had some little street signs that said something like...this way to the party.

technically not an envelope

this would be a spectacular envelope. i flipped it to the landscape orientation. it is by jackie and i found it in my download file. i am still housekeeping today and trying to figure out the new blogger system.

at least i have more storage. before, i was at 94%. now, after investing $5 with Google, i am at 4%. so...i have LOTS of space.

i am feeling a little guilty about not having an actual envelope today. I assure you, if i can make progress with the scanner as well as the new blogger system, there will be an envelope added today.

if not, please cut me some slack. this is better art than you will ever see out of me, so, be inspired by the beauty of the alphabet.

letter writers (not writters) alliance

i have some links that might cause all of you to ditch my blog and follow some others. it started with finding

http://16sparrows.typepad.com/letterwritersalliance/

they are intent on getting more people to write more letters. they are also interested in decorated envelopes. i'm not sure what they would think of those of us who like the envelope and don't bother with the letter.

i surfed back to their aug 17 post and found this. if you follow the link to an article in the guardian, you will find more envelopes like this one.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/childrens-books-site/gallery/2011/apr/21/illustrated-envelopes-posy-simmonds-axel-scheffler-tony-ross-david-mckee#/?picture=373125727&index=9

yes, dear brudder, i am not able to reduce that link to a tiny-ulr because the $5 i sent to Google to increase my space for storing photos did not include any extra space between my ears to store valuable technological information.

if you all are not able to link to these places, it is a blessing in disguise, at it would eat up valuable time.

btw, i found the letter writers alliance by clicking on [next blog] at the top of my own page and this popped up
http://apenchantforpaper.blogspot.com/?expref=next-blog
she has a lot of links
including this one
http://penandpaperhoarder.blogspot.com/

.4 anniversary

 the envelope is the fourth in the ten part series that i mail to my daughter and her husband everytime they hit another tenth of a year in their first year of marriage. this was going to be a birthday envelope for him, but it has been lost in a stack of stuff. i added mr and mrs and put a little note inside.






below is a card that came from....a penpal in ny, long island, to be exact...and i cant remember her name.
it is not with the envelope. so, i am sticking it in here. it was in with the holiday cards. obviously, it would work for any holiday. on the inside of the card is a little rectangle of paper that is printed with
INSPECTED
by no.17

joan gordon

i am pretty sure that joan started with a little eraser carving. it is printed 4 times, rotated...on the envelope and on the front of the card. then, there is a little star with three pieces of paper folded and it is printed several more times on the paper. i'll try to take a photo of it.

mary ann koch

 i am going public with my conflict with my scanner. that will probably cause it to retaliate. but, i want you to see what i am up against. i push the same buttons every time
and sometimes it does the black posterization. other times it does a color JPG. other times it does a TIFF and if it does a TIFF, then blogger refuses to upload it
and i have to go into the file and open it and resave it as a JPEG or JPG.......aaaarrrggghhh.

mary ann sent a pretty velum envelope. the red lettering is on a card. this was an exchange that featured the illustrator stamps.

edward gorey

i don't know what the protocol is for reposting things from other blogs. below is an excerpt from a blog. if you want to see it all, here is the link. i'm guessing they would appreciate it if you went out and bought the book. edward gorey's great simple theory about art (see below) is everything i have ever thought but couldn't put into words. i would have just said, *yin-yang.*

http://www.brainpickings.org/index.php/2011/09/15/floating-world-edward-gorey-letters/

 <>
Today, Neumeyer is opening the treasure trove of this fascinating, never-before-published correspondence in Floating Worlds: The Letters of Edward Gorey and Peter F. Neumeyer — a magnificent collection of 75 typewriter-transcribed letters, 38 stunningly illustrated envelopes, and more than 60 postcards and illustrations exchanged between two collaborators-turned-close-friends, featuring Gorey’s his witty, wise meditations on such eclectic topics as insect life, the writings of Jorge Luis Borges, and Japanese art.Equally fascinating is the unlikely story of how Gorey and Neumeyer met in the first place — a story involving a hospital waiting room, a watercolor of a housefly, and a one-and-a-half-inch scrap of paper with a dot — and the affectionate friendship into which it unfolded.
There’s a remarkable hue to Gorey’s writing, a kind of thinking-big-thoughts-without-taking-oneself-too-seriously quality. In September of 1968, in what he jokingly termed “E. Gorey’s Great Simple Theory About Art,” Gorey wrote these Yodaesque words:

This is the theory… that anything that is art… is presumably about some certain thing, but is really always about something else, and it’s no good having one without the other, because if you just have the something it is boring and if you just have the something else it’s irritating.”

save the post office

http://www.savethepostoffice.com/

mr. scanner is having issues today. so here is a link to a website addressing the closing of post offices. my mom has been worried that if the post office goes out of business, i will not have a job. but, it might be easier to not have the option to actually mail anything. or we could hand deliver things. she likes to go on trips.

the art below the photo is a button on the site.
if you click the button, you can see photos and stories about post offices that are in danger of closing. i wish they would just switch postal delivery to fewer days. and see if that would work. seems like an easy enough thing to try.

because jackie and i were strictly penpals for a couple years, before we ever met in person...i'm wondering if we should post our story. we probably won't. but, i should get around to writing it down for my own blog. i'll stick a label of note to self on here. i wonder if i already have this note, noted....

video

video that shows some amazing lettering


http://www.blautann -film.de/ dokumentarfilme/ weitere-dokument arfilme/a- brush-with- silence.html