Hitchhikers

The saying "If you love something, let it go..." is a bit melodramatic for letterboxing Hitchhikers, but it does apply. When you release a HH into the wild, you have no control over that stamp and no guarantees. I've only created a handful of them, but I've had pretty good luck, I think. Probably because I plant them and then promptly forget about them. When a find report pops into my mailbox, it is always a pleasant surprise.
"Butterflight" was my very first HH. The girls and I created it when we were raising Monarch caterpillars the first year we started boxing. The butterfly is a two part stamp; one piece for black and one for orange. It was hacked out of a piece of mastercarve and sent on it's way with the hopeful instruction that it should migrate to the west coast. Somewhere along the way, the stamp broke and some beautiful person mounted it to a wood block. I received scattered reports of it's movements and awhile back was completely surprised when it and it's full logbook arrived home in my mailbox--all the way from the west coast. After a successful run, it was retired.
"Al Capone's Getaway Car" was created for the Great Atlas Quest HH exchange (or something like that) where I exchanged with mokeymiddle from Portland. She sent me her "Stumptown HH" which I have run across several times since then.
Last I knew, Al's car had been found in Jay's Toolbox.
"Global HH" started out in the International Triple postal ring, where it traveled around the US, UK and Canada. It currently resides in my craft cabinet, but with a new logbook it will be ready to travel once more.
"Hardanger HH" was a special creation. After DH had his surgery in the Twin Cities, he was trying to rest and recover and I was bouncing around the hotel room like a pinball. He made the mistake of asking if I didn't have any clues with me. I didn't return until after dark.
I drove up along the gorgeous St Croix river to Scandia, where I found a whole slug of fantastic Scandinavian themed letterboxes by She Who Plants. One of them was the "It's Been a Quiet Week in My Hometown HHH." After such a great day, I wanted to send a thank you. Since controversy seems to surround inflicting a poor, hapless hitchhiker with what some consider a prison sentence, I decided to make a HH that could happily stay in the Scandia hostel for the rest of it's natural life. Hardanger is a Norwegian needlepoint and I carved the stamp from one of my pattern books. It could have turned out better. I mailed it up to Art Gekko (I think) and it was added to the HHH. It has long since moved on though.
Last and certainly least is the "Hydrant HH". This one is neither success of failure. Yet. I created a box for a letterboxer in the Sacramento area a couple of years ago and it has yet to be planted. The stamp was of a Dalmatian dog. The hitchhiker went with the box and included instructions to try to keep it in Dog themed boxes. Eh.

I do have one other release, Bedtime Buddy, that went into the Bear themed boxes in Troy Grove. It was a recycled stamp.

A Puzzle for the 4th

Last night I stumbled upon the perfect LTC to share today, and since it looks like it is going to rain on our parade, I have time.
Quite some time ago, I made a number of LTC puzzles (and here are two more). Well, one of them didn't get quite finished. They are still sitting in a box and only need some minor assembly and they would be ready for trade (hint, hint).
When I get this one listed it will be Jigsaw Puzzles: I Love America, or something like that. It is difficult to tell, but the pocket has fireworks embossed in an iridescent, sparkly ink on it.
This LTC uses all recycled stamps. The USA stamp was from the International Triple postal project, Global Housewarming. It made it's way around the US, Canada, and the UK before coming home. The fireworks were part of one of my Periodic Table trading cards; Phosphorus, to be exact.

I wish everyone a happy, safe Independence Day!

Summer Fun

Last post until next week, I promise. There are bugs that I refuse to carve, like ticks and mosquitoes, for instance. But when I found these images, they looked like such fun. There are nine separate tiny stamps and I am having such fun coming up with possibilities for LTCs, greeting cards, wrapping paper, etc. If I can keep the 7 yo from swiping them first.

Springbok

It all began with the discovery of some of my Dad's keepsakes in the attic. Shortly after finding his yearbooks and being stunned at learning that he had dated other girls before Mom, I came across a small box. It contained a Springbok Mini titled "Romance of the Square", and thus my love of puzzles began. That puzzle is long gone, but here is the stamp I carved this morning:
SHH, you will be proud of me. This is the first 100% gouge carving I have ever done. Of course, I'm not sure it could have been done any other way. The stamp is 1 3/4 inches.
Gyro (above) and Bilbao (below) are two other Springbok designs that I carved awhile ago for one of the Just an Inch challenges.
One of my favorite puzzle memories is of the 10,000 piece puzzle of the Chicago skyline at night that I took with me to college eons ago. I'm pretty sure the entire girls dorm (of about 200--small college) worked on that puzzle at one time or another.
Puzzles with only one color...puzzles with only one shape piece (an Escher tesselation!)...puzzles of crayons and cats and bears and outhouses...

Now, I have to put them together alone because my family has no tolerance for focus on detail. But I am patiently waiting on the youngest, who does show some promise.

End of a Dry Spell

The Doctor Who Challenge card must have sucked my creative pool dry, because I haven't carved since. Just to get things moving again, I asked my peeps on Facebook what I should carve. One answer was "a volleyball". I have no idea what I'm going to do with it, other than give the stamp to the person who suggested it, but here it is:
The idea must have worked. I now have a stack of about 16 pictures printed to carve. Of course, getting a new order of PZ Kut from Webfoot helps too!