Snowflakes (3) - Dec Exchange

One of our newer exchangers who found the exchange through a class I co-taught last fall sent an envelope with snowflakes. It is good for students to participate in group critique and we learn a lot by critiquing all the mail that comes in from exchangers. Nobody hears what we say, so we don't have to worry about hurting any feelings.

Two students in the class had joined the exchange, and they were very good sports about hearing our comments. My first question about her snowflakes was, "Did you turn the paper as you drew the details?" One of my best tips for flowers, snowflakes, or any symmetrical design is to turn the page so that your hand is making the exact same motion - in all six directions. At first, it seems tedious - but as you see the lovely symmetrical image appear you usually enjoy the look and appreciate that it might have taken an extra 60 seconds - but it was worth it.

I work really fast and am not too careful with the strokes. You can see a lot of asymmetry.  The minor differences don't really bother me. I'm pretty emphatic that the gestural portion of the image is what matters. Just my opinion.

Here are a couple more. I think the lavender envelope above is my favorite. But I only had one. The ones below are those truly nasty shimmer envelopes. I have literally hundreds of them left over from a job and will spend the next few months trying to make friends with them. Paint pens are nice. But I struggle with finding something tiny that will stick. Even permanent markers rub right off. I learned that the hard way. Grrrrrr. You may be able to see that I had to resort to strips of clear tape on these to protect the addresses. Grrrrrrrr.