Away from daily life

We went 2 days camping canoe trip to Namekagon River in Wisconsin last week. Namekagon River runs through Wisconsin countryside and we hardly saw human life along the first half of the river. We saw, heard and felt plenty of nature and enjoyed wild life to the full.
We started from County K Landing.
Encountered deer right after the departure. The first day was cloudy but wind was calm and warm. Landing on a campsite along the river. !!!!! Sunset view from our campsite. Early morning view from the campsite. Leaving for second day trip at 7 am. Turned out to be a beautiful second day.
Snack break. Beautiful flowers. Riverside Landing, the end of our 33 miles canoe trip.
I cannot wait making an album of the trip!

Summer stamp part 1, Lobster

We’ve, somehow, always wanted to make a stamp with lobster design but haven’t had a chance to begin on. We don’t remember exactly why we want lobster stamp although there is no ocean here in Minnesota. It is probably because we both were raised in a city nearby ocean and love seafood.
We have finally finished custom framing of cross stitch samplers that a friend of ours had asked us to do. Maybe it’s time to start working on stamps again.
The new design is off course LOBSTER, a taste of summer!

Stamped with red ink, the lobster is now cooked and looks delicious.

Recycled USPS box organizer

I can’t throw small pieces of paper left over after each project. When my scrap box is getting full, it is time to make an organizer! Organizers are always useful around my work table but I don’t like the plastic one sold in stores (Because they are not cute at all!). I have been making organizers by myself using recycled USPS boxes.

This is how I make recycled USPS box organizer.

First, close and glue the flap of the box with “Glue-All”. (Do not use tape)
Then cut the box half with a knife and glue them together like this.

Glue pieces of craft paper to all edges of the box.
Square the pieces of paper leftover with a square punch. (This is my favorite part of the process. Each piece of paper leftover reminds me of the projects I have done.)
Glue these punched paper to the box.
Embellish the box with stamps and rub on and distress the edges with ink pad.
After dry it well, cover all surface of the box with “Mod Podge”.
Then I add 3D embellishments, such as a label holder and metal charms.Some might say I am crazy to spend more than a half day to make such a small thing. But I just love being surrounded by stuff I made.

Handcarved Stamp, Flower and Humming Birds

We recently had an order of a personalized stamp from Shannon. She requested to add one more name to our original “Flower and Humming bird” design, but the original design can fit only one name. So, we re-designed to make one more name fit. We added another humming bird to balance the size of the design and the names.
Copied the design to a carving rubber.
On the middle of the carving process.
My shoulders are tight.
Mounted the stamp on finished wood.
We hope she likes the stamp and enjoys using it.

TC Witchcraft Factory congratulate Shannon and Daniel on their Wedding!

Handcarved Stamps

It all started from an idea that “we want to have a small shop stamp” we can use on our products. We searched on Etsy to look for a store we could custom-order our stamp. There were stores making cute handcarved stamps but none of them had a taste of our shop name, Witchcraft. So, we said “why don’t we make it by ourselves”. But the idea was put aside for a while just because we thought it would not be easy to hand carve the size of stamp we wanted.
One day, we found a curving rubber and reasonable carving tools at a local art supply and decided to give it a try. This is the stamp we carved for the first time.
It does not look nice but the stamped image has the taste we wanted.
Since then we have become addicted to stamp carving.

The project is in progress….slowly

We had one week vacation last month and have been to St. Louis, MO to see our old friends. We had such a great time there and took a lot of photos that I decided to make a scrapbook about visiting St. Louis. Since we came back from vacation, however, I haven’t made enough time for scrapbooking. I have a mixed feeling about working on this project. One side of me want to finish the project as soon as possible, but another myself want to take time and enjoy the process more. It is complicated.
Anyway, the scrapbooking project is in progress….slowly.

Finally finished one layout

Front cover was finished but...