Finally! A Decision!

Some of you probably know that I'm working on a Masters in Library and Information Science. It's a field that interests and excites me and I love it!

However, long story short, some issues have come up with the program I'm currently in. I'm not going to go into all the frustrating details, but it's something that's been stressing me out since February. It's been a lot of "wait-and-see-what-happens" and worrying. A month or two ago, I started to seriously look at transferring schools and UW-Milwaukee topped my list. Turns out that the school I'm currently at decided to partner with UWM and make it easy for those interested students to transfer to UWM's online program while still keeping a lot of credits. I went to an informational meeting on Wednesday about the deal the two schools came up with and finally came to a decision-I'm transferring.

I filled out the applications this weekend and just have to drop off one of them at my current school so they can forward all my application information and transcripts to UWM. I'll be giving up the face-to-face interaction and since I have 21 credits and they'll only take up to 18, I'll lose a class, but I think it will be a better fit with me personally and I won't run the risk of not receiving an ALA accredited degree and won't have to wait years until I'm finished.

It's amazing how much better I feel now that a decision has finally been made and I've taken action. Granted, I'm still stressed since I'm not technically accepted as a UWM student and it'll be hard turning in the application at my current school and saying "I don't want to go here anymore", but at least something is being done.

My Favorites, Card 2

"The Raven" was made for one of my Quickie swaps, in which the participants have a week to make a card and send it in the mail. You can only use stamps that are already carved and materials that you have lying around the house.

This stamp is kind of a spoiler. I originally carved the image for a box in North Carolina (it's missing last I heard), but I loved the image so much that I carved a smaller version and made it into a hidden in plain sight box. My cat broke the "in plain sight" part, so it might be retired unless I can fix it.

The background is just black cardstock with handpainted swirls in a metallic green paint. Each card is (obviously) a little different. I love that paint. I can't use it often because I'll start looking around for things to paint. Very dangerous.

Blah

I've been feeling very uninspired and, well, blah lately. I haven't been happy with most of the cards I've been making and I've been feeling that they aren't "good enough" (for lack of a better phrase).

So I'm going to go through cards that I've made and point out a few of my favorites. Maybe that'll get me going again.

The one in this entry is my favorite of my cards. It's "Eilwynn" from an Amy Brown swap. I love carving fairies and I absolutely adore carving Amy Brown fairies (I have one of hers sitting in my "Images I really want to carve" file that I really want to do this summer. It's kind of dark, but it fits my mood right now).

Anyway, this is Eilwynn. The scan doesn't do her justice. I saw this image and just fell in love and I'm very glad that my stamp is pretty close to the original. The colors are gorgeous-shades of brown and a beautiful light blue. It took forever to color all of the cards, but it was worth it. The ribbon is a sheer, irridescent blue held on with brass brads. The main part of the card is just cardstock (I think the name of the color is "mink"). This card is different than what I usually do in that it actually has some embellishment. It's still simple. I usually don't have the patience to deal with fiddly-bits, but sometimes I suck it up.