Evergreen State Fair

Last week we went to the annual Evergreen State Fair. When we left the house in the morning, it was absolutely pouring down rain! So we donned rain coats and rain boots and brought the umbrellas. As soon as we got to the fair, the rain subsided, and didn't appear again until we got in the car to drive home that evening!

Here are a few (very few!) highlights:

Kade and one of his cousins got to go on rides together this year. They had a blast!!!


Best buddies :)


This was probably Kade's favorite part of the fair this year. We spent a lot of time looking at all these wood carved creatures. We got to watch a man create Kade's favorite animal, a turtle! Kade wanted his picture taken by every single carving that he thought was cool. I have about 25 pictures like these:


The tallest guy at the fair:


When Kade spotted this HippoCampus on the carousel, he was entranced. As soon as the gates opened, he made a beeline straight for it. He grinned so happily during the whole ride:


I was showing these photos to a friend of mine, and she liked the HippoCampus so much that she hand carved a stamp of it!! Here is is:


Isn't that amazing?! It looks JUST like the picture!

Anyways, I always feel like the Fair is a sign of the end of summer. Leaves have started to turn, it's getting dark earlier, Kade's starting Kindergarten on Monday. Summer went by too quickly! But, Fall is my favorite season, and I can't wait to see what it brings this year :)

Hand Carving stamps!

I have been creating lots of hand carved stamps lately! They are for use in letterboxing. A friend and I hosted a letterboxing event a few weeks ago (I'll have to share some pictures soon!) and it kind of re-lit my fire for carving stamps. Here are some examples of what I've done recently!

This was an "event box"- a letterbox made especially for the event. I decoupaged the "Treasure Island" photo onto a large (12"x14") old book about cats. Then, I turned it into a Secret Hollow Book!


This is the inside of the book. I glued all the pages together, and used an exacto knife to carve out two openings to house the stamp and the logbook.


This is a closeup of the logbook I made. It's completely hand bound! I used a great tutorial, it only took about 45 minutes total, and was pretty easy!


Here is a closeup of what the stamped image looks like! Click on the photo if you want to see it larger. This stamp is about 4"x5".


Here are the three letterboxes I carved to be "one day only boxes" - available only for the day of the event.

This is what is inside my letterboxes: a nice logbook, for you to stamp your own signature stamp into, a fun little prize for the first finder to keep, and the stamp, in it's own little felt pouch.




This is my "signature stamp"- what I use to stamp into the logbooks found inside letterboxes.


I also carved a signature stamp for Jeremy (this one one especially challenging!):


This is a new stamp for a letterbox that has not been planted yet. I have always loved the Claddagh symbol!


This celtic knot-work shamrock will be a bonus stamp for the above letterbox. It's small, only about 1.5" across:


And lastly, my Seattle Mariners stamp:


There you have it! My favorite place to buy the carving material is currently out of stock or something. So, you could say I'm going through carving withdrawals! Jeremy even got into the spirit and carved some stamps himself. It's addicting! And, anyone can do it- really! You do not have to be artistic and know how to draw! You basically just have to be able to trace lines. With a little practice, you can carve anything! You can carve onto erasers using an exacto knife, you don't need to go out and buy anything special. Here are some tutorials, if you'd like to try it out:

~ Geninne's tutorial (start at the bottom)
~ The Monkey Basket tutorial (shows the transfer method I use)
~ Two Cheese Please tutorial (using erasers and chisel tools)
~ Atlas Quest tutorial (one more...for good measure!)