Rewind to December: Magic Moments

I have meant to write this post for a long time.

At the Holiday Market in Eugene, I had a magical moment with some friends there. To explain how amazing and well timed it was, I kind of have to remind you where I was at the time…

I was finishing up a show season and heading into my slow time. I knew that I would have no more income until Spring but that I wanted to really focus on printmaking during this time in order to get that craft into shows in the next couple of years. To that end, I bought a tiny press. I put it on a credit card, hoping that I would make enough at my holiday shows to pay that card off before my income went away. Things were tight.

North and Lori are really sweet artists who make jewelry and fiber art. I see them every weekend at the Holiday Market and several times we’ve had booths next to each other. They are gentle and friendly neighbors who stay calm and help me to keep some perspective on the whole scene. You can see some of their work online stores through their website: http://northbynorthwestdesigns.com.

And this year, just as we were about to tear down at the end of the entire run of weekends, they each came over and told me that they wanted to support my new printmaking venture by buying cloaks for themselves. They’d been looking at them for years and decided that, since I might not be weaving them for much longer, they would get one now. It was a perfect ending to the market run.

The magical part came when I rang them up and subtracted their “friends and family” discount. It was, to the dollar, exactly the amount that I had just spent on the baby press. When I saw the number I laughed out loud! So, this is how the muse would have it. These two sweet artists supported my new venture by paying for a little press to get me started.

Now it’s a whole season later and that baby press has served me well, allowing me to print hundreds of wood block tests and color experiment cards. I even pulled an entire edition of lunar calendars on it. At 11″x14″, they are the absolute maximum print size. Now, the little press will be used for small projects like greeting cards,  workshops, and on-location marketing events for the arts co-op that gets a little more real every day. And I’ll never forget the sweet women who paid for my first press. Thanks!