time on my hands?

I think not!
But I do have some 'space' to try out a few new ideas. Some ideas are productively creative for upcoming craft fairs (check out What's New? in the sidebar for info) starting next weekend with Got Craft? on Mother's Day (join me at the Legion Hall on Commerical Drive!).

And some ideas are to keep me 'up to speed' with what I was studying at college last semester. OK, so I haven't been packing in volumes of technical writing, and I don't have access to Adobe InDesign on my pc but I have been exploring digital design. The initial 'a" above was created using Microsoft Publisher, playing around with opacity of filled objects, and the dotty heart below was 'drawn' on my smartphone using Autodesk's Sketchbook Mobile Express.

Each project presented a different technique to master. The Publisher project was constructed from three different sizes of dots, filled with three different semi-transparent colours, which were inserted into an outline. Once I was satisfied with the layout, the outline was deleted. The Sketchbook project was 'drawn' freehand on my android phone (I use a Targa stylus though I'm waiting to get my hands on the Bamboo version) using a second layer over my initial outline. Again, once satisfied with the overall look I deleted the layer with the outline.

OK - there's nothing earth-shatteringly artistic about them but they are my first forays into digital art. With a little more time I should get my Bamboo tablet re-installed to see what results I can get with a stylus/touch pad combo (my tiny android screen is too small for sketching). I do have Corel Draw and, after seeing the amazing Masha Levene's presentation at the last PechaKucha night and the incredible digital art of Joyelle Brandt at the same event, am considering trying out both Art Rage and some Photoshop/Illustrator techniques as a summer vacation project while I'm travelling.

Oh yes ... I haven't told you yet about the travel!