Papel Picado, Invitation Stamps & Art Love

Being an artist and planning a wedding is fun, because I'm able to envision and create a lot of the decorations quite easily.  To the left are the papel picado flags that I made for our centerpieces, to stick in amongst the flowers.  It is a cut paper craft, a traditional Mexican folk art that is abundant here in San Antonio.  I used card stock instead of tissue paper so that my designs would be sturdy.  First, I made a little template on gridded paper, then transferred it to the paper & cut around the pattern with an exacto blade.  Each one is wrapped around a little barbecue skewer, painted white.  My friend Claudia had the scarf in the background specially made for the bridesmaids in our friend Ann's wedding this past July, based on colors from Mrs. Gosser's art.

Our wedding invitations have all been made...the paper measured & cut, folded, glued, stamped & addressed.  Now that the RSVPs are starting to come in, my daily trip to our mailbox is so much more exciting.  Since I'm a printmaker, of course I wanted to print the invites for our wedding.  I had custom stamps made by the ladies at Antiquaria-they turned out beautifully and gave me the look of letterpress without having to hand over the project to another studio.  It took a long time, two ink pads, a lot of paper, and even more patience.  Steven and I had a little assembly line set up in our dining room for about two months while I printed and we put everything together, together.  Pictured are the RSVP cards, the last step in our invitation suite.  I am happy to report that our dining room is now available for dining again!  

            

The other bit of good news is, with most of the planning and big wedding craft projects finished, I am back in the studio, ready for a new year of art!  I've made a handful of new mixed media watercolor paintings for Valentine's Day that are now listed in my Etsy shop.  I've been working on two pieces at once to keep myself from getting stuck. So, rather than sitting in my red chair and staring at my art, pondering how to finish it, I'll just work on a second piece for awhile & go back to the first with fresh eyes.  So far it's been working great, and keeping me very productive!   I'm lucky to have time to be creative and do what I love.  

My job as a painting instructor at a local art studio here in the city has been amazing-my work is to make art and my colleagues are talented and amazing!  I am inspired every time I'm in Jennifer's painting studio.  Two weekends ago, she and I went to an art opening at the Bright Shawl Gallery to see Rikkianne's  art (another artist and friend from work) for the Junior Art League! We even got our picture in the paper (bottom, middle).  Famous!