I've always loved book plates. I love finding old ones in second hand books. I bought a ton of them in middle and high school for my most treasured books, including an Arthur Rackham drawing. When I got my first press I thought I'd do some, and I went looking for that lick on the back paper and couldn't find any, and then I just got distracted. But recently I was looking at my small blocks I've done for cards, and I've been sorting my type, and it just seemed like a great thing to circle back around to. I've laid out three different ones so far and printed a smattering of each. I think I'll keep playing. Maybe even make myself an owl. Owls more and more feel like a sacred presence in my life. There was one just now calling from a tree in my front yard as Henry and I walked home from an evening stroll and a porch visit with neighbors.

It's also been nice to have some small scale projects I can do in the print shop – ease my way back into more standing work. So my first batch of bookplates is already in some of my books. I'm using thin Stonehenge printing paper and acrylic medium to paste them down with a paint brush. It's super satisfying. And I like that someday someone will buy my art books second hand and find a small bit of history and a little extra art in them.

I've been in the print shop a lot this week, which is such joy after a long layoff. I'm working to get back into more serious landscapes, but the first one I carved lately was this fun one. My friend Chrissie uses the phrase “On the struggle bus,” and it always makes me smile even when the road is rough. I decided more people might like to have that in their mental vocabulary as well. I conceived of it in three colors. It's two blocks (yellow and black) printed separately with a small red stamp for the stop sign. I added in the red lights with just a brush. Then I wondered if I like the white of the paper highlighing those spaces better than I like the darker red in those holes.

But while I was proofing I pulled just a black and white image, and I liked that too. I've tried it with the red sign and with and without red lights. I've got one drying that has a black stop sign instead of red. I figure there are no real wrong answers here, and people may like different versions, so this one will be a varied edition, which means there will be a total set number of prints, but the prints won't be identical. I also use that method when I'm trying different colors of paper for the same print or different shades of color. Really this is just for fun, so coming up with one identical edition didn't seem to be the main priority.

It’s Revive a Troubled Print day here in the studio. I started this one last year as a three block print (the third image), and it clearly has registration issues where Henry's outlines don't line up. I thought it would be fine with just one background block instead of two and tested that out today.  I spitballed the sun placement but will do better once I get serious about printing it, and I tried two different greens. I can maybe raise the black key block a little to line up the Henrys, or I might need to recarve the base layer, but since it’s almost all solid that won’t be a huge chore.

Here are the two bottom layers and my print shop door. The door is a handy place to tape up in process works and stare at them from across the way, and also as I pass through regularly on the way to my kitchen. Getting back away from them and letting them settle a little while both help me see them more clearly.