52 Down, 30 To Go!

Hi friends! I'm finally posting another update, and I am including pictures of one thing I've been working on to prove that I've actually been quite busy this summer. Enjoy :)

Cards for Curtis! A week before he left, I started imagining what I'd do for writing letters to him every night. I pictured fun little doodles and quotes on notecards. The day he left, I went and got a few art supplies - watercolors, colored pencils, and sharpies, then went crazy. Since then, I've made an original card for every day. That's 80ish cards...yeah, it's taken up a little time, but proven to be therapeutic and a great way to encourage both of us. I can't promise that I can do this every deployment, but for now, I still have plenty of ideas. :)

Not going to lie, a lot of ideas came from Pinterest, and I've tweaked some a little to make my own. It's been a long time since I've done so much artsy stuff, and it feels so good to get back into it!

Well, somehow we have made it almost 8 weeks through this time of separation! I am so excited for September to get here, but I have to say I feel guilty wishing for it. I've always loved summer, and while I love fall too it's always a little sad when school/obligations/routines kick back into gear. This year, seeing back to school things on the shelves and the words "pumpkin spice latte" appearing in ads is making me grossly excited. I'm all about relishing life and that each day is a gift, but there's nothing wrong with some eager anticipation for the next time I see my love. :)

By the way, I've never even had anything pumpkin spice. Last year, Curtis and I went out to get BOGO pumpkin spice lattes, and ended up falling in love with a puppy. Who we brought home 2 days later. That "cheap date" idea ended up to be our most expensive. Love ya, Charlotte. ;)

Last I wrote was on our anniversary. The day was as good as any day could be while we're apart. We talked on the phone the day before, we emailed back and forth all day, I received letters in the mail, and I saw pictures of him posted online! All these things have been my favorite things to look forward to this summer! Then I also had my family keeping me company and showering me with love, my grandparents stopped by for a visit, and received many happy wishes from friends. It was a great day, and I felt strengthened and refreshed and ready to take on the next 6 weeks.

Reaching the halfway point was both a relief, yet the end still felt (and feels) so far away. I compare it to swimming across the ocean. When you reach the halfway point, you can celebrate all you want, but I realize we still have to go through the same amount of time that we already endured, and you have to keep swimming. Just keep swimming, just keep swimming... The only time that having 6 weeks left so much less was when we had no idea where we'd be living at the end of them. We weren't even sure which state we'd be in. That feeling was stressful for someone like me who likes to have life planned out, yet I kept reminding myself at least we'll be together!! And I knew that's all that matters.

But last week, we finally got the exciting news of where we go next...Drum roll please! We're going back to Arizona for a few more months! We are SO excited about it! Last May when we left, we were both thinking and kind of hoping that they would move us right along to the next thing after training. We just wanted to keep going and knock it all out, one thing at a time. But after being apart, we both realized that every week we had in between is a week we get to spend together, and it delays the next inevitable time of separation. We will have about 4 months in between now, and we both think that's a perfect amount of time to relax, get caught up, and have some more adventures before moving and beginning the next thing. So come this December, we get to make another cross country move, from one warm and gorgeous climate to another! Until then, we'll be relishing another few months in a state we love and know so well. :)

I'm very thankful for all the ways we've grown together through this time. There have been bad days for both of us, ones where we just want to throw in the towel and be done with this, but God has given us both strength and hope to press on and live day-to-day. I have loved getting to know Curtis better through his written letters and emails. I love all the reflecting we've been able to do on our love and life together. I love how we've grown stronger in our faith and closer to God as we experience the trial, and continue to learn from each other's discoveries. Even though we aren't experiencing life side-by-side right now, we are both still very involved and invested in each other's lives. In distance, we are far apart, but in our hearts and minds, we've never been closer. We're still counting down the days when we can close the gap and be together again.

It's so hard to believe that at one time, my countdown said 82. I can't imagine or even remember how we managed that, but now that we're here, the excitement is building and it'll be so worth it the moment we see each other again! I know that there will be many other times through this that we'll have to be apart. This is kind of just the preparation for what is to come. I know that we'll face this a lot and we'll both learn how to function without having each other there all the time. I know one thing for sure though, is that I don't want to get used to it. I don't want this to ever be something that is normal or just happens - "oh yeah, my husband and I are separated half a year, no biggie!" I want it to be a big deal, and I want to miss him and think of him and long for him every day that he's gone. I believe it's normal and healthy and that all that comes from God. Every deployment will be a trial for us, and I pray that we will always see it as that and that we will "consider it pure joy" and learn something new from each one - learn something more in our faith, and in our marriage.

That's all for now! Ok, so I really do still enjoy writing little updates, but I have to say I'm REALLY looking forward to the ones I'll publish in a month. But that's just me. ;)

Today, I had another Military Wife milestone - I mailed my very first care package! Come back later next week for the details - Curtis is able to access my blog sometimes, so I can't give away any spoilers! (Love you babe. ;))

Preparing to Plant

As I mentioned a few months back, one of my projects this summer was carving a letterbox stamp series in honor of my favorite movie. Well, after holding on to my precious stamps for a little too long, it was finally time to let them go into the wild where other people can enjoy them! We hid them this past weekend, but here's a peek at the work we put in to making sure they'd be safe out there in the big world. This may not be super interesting to some, but this is just giving you an idea of the work we go into to plant letterboxes, and maybe if you're a boxer, it could give you some new ideas. :)

My sewing machine! I found it at an estate sale - besides a few character flaws it works great!

I used some scrap material I had to make little pouches for the stamps. I guess it may seem over the top to some, but I really like these stamps and hope they will be around for a long time. It was hard enough for me to have to part with them! Another thing I tried doing for the first time was gluing a thick foam layer to the back of the stamps to make them easier to use.

  

With 9 boxes to plant, we got creative with the containers we used - it's not easy to find a good, sturdy, waterproof container! It made it easier that for 8 of the 9 boxes, I was only hiding a stamp and no logbook. We usually use Nutella or peanut butter containers, but we didn't have any on hand and we were not about to start eating entire jars of Nutella! ;) Thanks to Mr. Garlic Powder and Ms. Ibuprofen for giving up their homes for this very worthy cause.

We've seen stamps hidden in camouflage covered, water-proofed bags around the country, but not many (if any!) in Tucson. Hopefully they will last well - but again, they're only holding stamps, so I don't have to worry about a logbook here.

The final stamp is hidden in a good ol' Lock 'n' Lock container. 

Tada! Plenty of space for hitchhikers. :)

The logbook, all ready to be filled with finders!

Oh, and there's a little prize waiting for the first to find my treasure. ;)

This part may be the most complicated part of planting a box. The carving is fun - especially when it turns out well - the planting can be a challenge, and clue writing may need many revisions before I get it right, but there's so many details to think about between the carving and the planting. How am I going to make this series last as long as it possibly can? Hopefully all this hard work will pay off!

A Letterboxing Post: Stamp Carving 101

As I mentioned yesterday, this past week I've been busy carving stamps. When I first started letterboxing a year ago, Curtis told me to think about stamps I'd like to carve and plant. The very first thing that came to mind was an "Emperor's New Groove" series. (If you have never seen that movie, please stop reading and go watch it. It's on Netflix. It's not necessary to see it to understand this post, but it'll make your life much better.) After a year of thinking through how each stamp would look, how many stamps to carve, where to plant, and how to write the clues, I finally got to work on the first step - designing the stamps, and finally carving them!

Now I'd imagine that if you're reading this, you're either a letterboxer who knows how to carve already, or a "noxer" (non-letterboxer) who doesn't really care. But I still wanted to share how I went through the process of carving one stamp, and give any letterboxers a sneak peek at one stamp in the series of 9. :)

Every stamp starts as a doodle. I'll draw several images and decide which I like the best.  Size is always a factor, I'm all about conserving the carving material. In this series, I had a wide range of sizes - this is one of the bigger ones. After I've chosen which image to carve, I use a pencil to thicken and darken the lines. Thicker lines make it ultimately easier to carve. 

Next, I prepare my carving material - sometimes that means a new piece, other times I can use a scrap from an older piece. (We prefer the pink stuff over other materials for carving, it can be found at Michael's - make sure you have a 40% off coupon!) I find a piece big enough for my carve, then take the paper with the drawing and press it on the rubber, rubbing it so that the led leaves a mark. This is why you want to make the lines so thick with led on the drawing! It rarely turns out perfect for me, like in the above picture, but it's relatively easy to fill in the parts where it didn't work out.

After darkening the lines again, I'm ready to start carving! This is my handy-dandy carving tool. I always begin with the smallest bit (#1). I begin by outlining the entire stamp, carving around all the lines. Ultimately, I want the lines to be all that's left for the stamp. As you can see, that means I'll have lots of thin lines to work around, as well as small spaces around the lettering. Letters are hard, if you're just starting out I'd advise you to avoid those for now. Wait until you know your carving tool really well. :)

This stamp in particular literally took 5 hours to carve. It can be a long and tedious process, which takes a toll on your neck & shoulders. Make sure you have a husband as great as mine to massage them for you. ;)

Here's a closer look at what it looks like after a lot has been carved out. After I outline the entire thing, I use bit #2 to carve out bigger sections. It goes much faster and deeper than #1. I do not use it on more detailed areas though.

After I think I've carved out all that needs to go, I ink it up and stamp it! Sometimes I make stamps intended to have lots of color which requires using markers instead of ink pads, but this entire series is just outlines that can be colored in if one wants to. 

What do you think - it looks done, right? Wrong!

See those tiny black specks between the lettering? That will show up every time it is inked. I always spend extra time cleaning it up to avoid blemishes like this.

Readable? Yes, but why not go the extra mile and clean it up?

Tada! A year of planning, a dozen doodles, and 5 hours of carving later, I have my stamp! 

I'm extremely happy with how all 9 stamps came out. Now it's time to get them ready to plant, but I feel like I'm going to have a hard time parting with these guys. Once you plant a letterbox, it's out in the wild, available to anyone who has the clues or randomly comes across it. It could be destroyed or lost. Of course, where I choose to hide it plays a huge roll in how long it will last, but you never know what goes on in the wild. All I know is, wherever I hide them will always hold a piece of my heart. ;)

Arizona letterboxers: be looking for this series, coming soon to a trail near-or not so near- to you! You won't be disappointed! 

Here are a sampling of other stamps Curtis & I have done:

Father Tucson - an event box that Curtis carved. Pretty impressing, right?!

I carved this heart stamp just for card making purposes.

A personal traveler that I carved. 

As you can see, we've had a lot of practice, and a lot of fun with this. I hope people enjoy getting our stamps as much as we love making them!

A little room make over!

I redid my bedroom for $30!

1 can of paint: $30

...that was it :) I borrowed a comforter/pillow cases from my sister, and just made everything else fit in!

It does great things for my productivity!

Top pic: My bookshelf, Wizard of Oz pic (yes I realize it's backwards!) and the stuffed animals that made the cut :)

Bottom: Bed, desk, window...pretty self explanatory! I love this place!! I've never felt more organized in my life!