The new year

   So in usual fashion nothing ever slows down for me.  It is just layers and layers of being crazy busy.  Unfortunately, over the break my father fell very ill and has been hospitalized.  It is unclear what will happen but for now he is where he needs to be with around the clock attention until he is better and can go home.  It has put me in a funk of sorts which is a bad place to be when you are busy and have deadlines. 

     With the semester looming and multiple commitments to workshops, lectures and everything else life is throwing at me right now I was actually given an incredible gift by a colleague.  He actually forced me to slow down and make something just for fun. It has been a long time since I had just gone into the studio without having to make a piece for a show or crank out 100 little doo dads.  Sadly, as I grow older I actually use the word "fun" less and less.

   I don't think it is a secret that I have found myself doing exactly what I want and I am still not happy.  I can't quite put my finger on it.  I have always thought that when the passion is gone it is time to move on.  This gift that was given to me to just play in the studio is exactly what I needed at exactly the right time.   I really had a blast, and it has given me some hope that I will be able to actually start this year on the good foot.  

   My new years resolution is to remain positive.  I am going to make the fun things more important than the not so fun things.  I am going to take more time for myself and my family.   



  So....for some reason I have been saving the spoil boards from the CNC.  The CNC had a table top that I level using a leveling bit.  Normally you don't want to cut into the table top.  So we lay down a spoil board to cut on.  I have collected about a dozen of them.  One day a fellow technician Dylan MCmanus who happens to be a printmaker said  "We should print those."  I kind of brushed it off at the time.  For some reason I like them as objects and couldn't visualize them "on paper".  Until now.  Here are a few photos documenting what we are doing.  There is much more to come but for now we are starting with two layer then three, then four..  The sky is the limit.