WWBFD - Part 5: My Thanksgiving Day Feast of Printing!

Yep, it was a long day, but I am done with the printing. Woo hooo!! At 9:30 am I start carving the 3 blocks I have left. I am blessed by the stars and they carve well and I like how they look. I have never carved 3 blocks at once, and somehow I do it in less than 2 hours. This is amazing. The hardest part is little girl in "Make New Friends." (Little Debbie? Could be.) So of course I do that block last . That's usually how I do it - easy first to build up my nerve or something.

I'm at the IPRC at noon, and print two of the 3 blocks before I leave for Thanksgiving dinner. I call my parents in NC while I am printing and talk on speaker phone. I know they won't mind, as they are gearing up for a 3 day craft show they do every Thanksgiving weekend. I helped them last year - it was CRAZY! It's nice knowing they are doing their craft thing too today - even though they are thousands of miles away, I feel connected by that. 

I am extra grateful to have someplace fun to go today. And it's a nice bike ride there on the Springwater corridor trail and through Oaks Bottom Wildlife Refuge. It's nice to see the trees and the river, and wouldn't it be great if I see a Bigfoot as I am biking down the trail? 

Dinner is great, good company and food, and I don't have to do the cooking or cleaning - the perfect holiday meal!  (I did make a pumpkin pie this morning while carving the blocks.) After a few hours I am back on the trail, biking back quickly through the Refuge in the dark. It's peaceful and foggy, perfect. (Note to worriers - I weighed the safety factor of biking quickly through the woods to the bike path, versus trying to cross Powell Blvd at 17th. The woods feel  WAY safer.) 

I'm back at the IPRC at 6, and print the last block image in a half hour. Then the fun begins - I finish setting the type, which is harder because I change my mind about a few things I set the other day. Darn revisions! But it's better now. And I am still figuring out what I am actually trying to say. What does Bigfoot mean to us as a species? What do the stories about bigfoot tell us? I stop and do yoga, meditate, eat a piece of leftover pumpkin pie, and think about it. What is the highest possibility of Bigfoot? Then I know - to help us evolve as a species. 

The text is shorter than what I originally wrote (THANK GOD) and fits on one page. Fine with me. It's the most text I have printed at once and it takes a while to get it to print right - switching out letters that are damaged (hell type), and packing in spacing so it fits in the press without letters falling out. The actual printing is easy once everything is set up and ready to go. I print 110 of the text pages, whew! 

Around 10:30 I set the type for the last page - about the project, and the special thanks. Thank goodness it's a lot shorter, as I am getting tired and hopefully am not misspelling anyone's name. It sets up to print pretty easily, and I print them, finishing at 12:15 am. Woo Hooo!!!! I clean up and go home - biking in the quiet, misty night. It was a long day, but I'm SOOO glad it's printed!! I get home at 1:11 am. 

I am still not done yet - I have to let it dry, then fold, staple and trim it. But I'm close - and VERY grateful for that!! I will finish it up in a few days - believe it or not, this is actually not the only creative project I want to do this weekend! I have craft shows the next 2 weeks, so it's a little crazy... just like my Mom taught me! 

So Happy Thanksgiving! And thanks for your supportive comments and emails! It helped today knowing people were rooting for me!!