My inspriation for 2017 is based on two events. The first was my breaking of my left wrist in a fall on October 18. This led to surgery (and a wicked-looking plate) on October 25 and occupational therapy from the first week of November through January 6, 2017. This event meant that there were numerous things I could not do, or not do without major innovation --- including papercrafting --- for several weeks (you'd be surprised at how much not beaing able to use your non-dominant hand affects how you pursue any life activity, from dressing and bathing one-self to cooking, cleaning, driving, even keeping one's balance!).
The second event was a visit to the surgeon yesterday where he told me that the "mushy bone" in my radius was solidifying nicely, that the break was healed, and that I could go forward without having to visit the therapists three times a week! The hand might never regain it's "symmetry" with the right hand (it does look a little off at an agle) but I should be able tot get the dexterity (I blame the reduced dexterity for an increase in the number of typos!) and the strength back to nearly 100% IF I follow the exercise regime religiously!
So I am inspired to continue the exercises prescribed by the therapists to stengthen my grip and stretch the tendons of my left hand (so that I can make a fist!) and get back to "normal."
When Tim Holtz previewed his new stamps to 2017, there was one that really rang a bell with me: it was a motivation stamp (sadly, not availablel until later this month) that said "I may not be there yet but I'm closer than yesterday". I decided to use that quote as the enterpiece of my card.
I started with a background: a "pine board" pattern stamped in Archival "Watering Can" on a scrap of light grey card. I mounted the image on dark aqua card, then on blue-grey metallic paper, and then onto a white notecard. I die cut some "wildflowers" from metallic light aqua card (I wanted to stamp them in Archival "Aquamarine" before die cutting but the wildflower die is the REVERSE of the stamps in the stamp set. How did THAT happen? Did I miss a stamp set somewhere?) and tinted them with "Peacock Feathers" and "Mermaid Lagoon" Dstress Inks (it's really hard to make out any effect from that tinting). I also tinted some word stickers from three different collections of Idea-ology chitchat stickers to paraphrase that quote (I couldn't find a sticker fro the word "closer" so I went with "stronger" instead. It seemed appropriate). I glued the flowers and the stickers down and added a drop shadow around the stickers with a "Pumice Stone" Distress Marker.
- Stamps: Stampers Anonymous "Birch & Pine" (CMS280)
- Inks: Archival Ink"Watering Can"; Distress Inks "Mermaid Lagoon" and "Peacock Feathers"; Distress Marker "Pumice Stone"
- Dies: Sizzix Thinlits "Wildflowers" (661190)
- Papers: Paper Studio Value Pack Notecards "white"; scraps of metallic aqua card, metallic blue-grey paper, dark aqua card and light grey card
- Embellishemnts: Idea-ology chit-chat stickers "Small Talk" (TH93193), "ChitChat" (TH 92998) and
- Big Chat" (TH93192)
- Adhesives: Viva Las Vegas "Miracle Tape"; Ranger Multi Medium Matte