Newsletter

Latest e-mail letter

The Old Island Stamp Company

September 26, 2003

STAMP DRAW WINNER: We are pleased to announce the latest winner in our stamp draw is Trish Hoeksema from Hamilton, Ontario. Congratulations to Trish! The new stamp draw is ready to go. This month's prize is three Christmas stamps, including a new snowflake that is so small we had to create a new price code AAA! As usual, if you are the winner you can pick any stamp, including UM's of an equivalent value. Good Luck!

	AROUND THE STUDIO: I have identified 32 species of birds on our property in the 10 years we have been here. There have also been many more I have not been able to definitely identify. I have found that extremes in weather bring different birds in towards the house. When we had a very heavy snow fall several years ago the varied thrush from very deep in the woods came to forge for food near our house. This summer we had extreme draught conditions with the lowest rainfall for June, July and August for nearly 100 years. One morning in the pre-dawn light I awoke to scratching outside our bedroom window. I thought it was a raccoon on a tree trunk, but I could not see any. So, I got up and went out to investigate. Something was making a bit of a commotion in the salal bushes. I thought it must be a small raccoon, until a birds head poke out from the leaves to investigate who was stalking it. The bird was brown and about the size of a chicken. I soon counted six of them forging in the underbrush. I identified them as Ruffed Grouse. They stayed with us for a week. We would see them each day. Then one day there was only one immature one, who was seemingly left behind. She was around for about another week, and then with the rain she was finally gone too. Hopefully, we will see them again some day. It would be nice to share our little piece of paradise with them again, but also, if I am not mistaken it would mean a gorgeous streak of dry sunny weather, again!
	UNMOUNTED SAMPLE: I recently had an e-mail asking if we gave out free samples of our unmounted system. Unfortunately, we cannot afford to do that. However, a couple of years ago we offered to send out your choice of an "AA" unmounted stamp, cushion, cling vinyl, a small acrylic block and written instructions for $5 including postage and handling. It was very popular, and it gave a lot of people an opportunity to experience the system for a nominal fee. I decided to do it again for a limited time. So, until the next newsletter you can send a five dollar bill, cheque or call with your Visa or MasterCard and we will send you or a friend or a number of friends the system. If you do call with your credit card, I would ask that you e-mail your mailing address to us first. It just makes it easier for us, and is definitely more accurate. It is $5(US) for a US mailing address, and $5 Canadian for a Canadian address. We will also send the UM samples internationally for $5(US). Our website is not secure, so if you are paying by credit card, we suggest you send your credit card number in a series of e-mails. You do not have to identify what it is that you are e-mailing...we will know. If you would like, you can hide the numbers in text. For example, an expiry date could be, "we are hoping to make a trip to Canada 04/06".
	CHALK INK PROBLEM: Last month I warned people about the problem of chalk ink drying on acrylic blocks. No one came up with any difinititive solution. I spoke with the people at Cleasnap (the makers of ColorBox) and their advise was "don't let it dry on the blocks". They also suggested that we might try using their Ancient Page Cleaning Pad, because Ancient Page is permanant ink. I have not had a chance to get hold of an Ancient Page cleaning pad to try it out. If anyone can try a little experiment with it, we would love to know the results, and I would gladly pass them along to our readers.
	MARGARET'S MUSINGS: If you have had an opportunity to see our display at anytime over the past few years, you would have seen sample cards by our friend Margaret Appleton. Margaret is always trying something new, and comes up with some great effects with our stamps. She has agreed to write a short piece for each newsletter on stamping in general and on techniques slightly beyond the basics. I love the rich colours of pearlescent powders. At this time of the year they are especially wonderful to use with autumn stamps of leaves, etc. if you choose the reds, golds and greens. Those powder colours also work with Christmas stamps and I have had some fun lately working with that season in mind. The pearlescent powders that I have need something to bind them or to stick to, so I began my trials by covering a small rectangle of white cardstock with watermark ink all over (I later tried clear embossing ink and that works, too). I tapped a small amount of each colour off the end of a brush that had been dipped into the jar of powder….red, gold, green. With a soft brush I rubbed gently and "swirled" the powder until the whole paper was covered with colour…areas of red, areas of gold and areas of green. These colours overlapped and blended a little and I liked that. I chose a stamp of a Christmas tree. I inked it in dark green and stamped several times onto my multi-coloured paper. I was pleased with the look and intended to frame it with gold and then green. I won’t explain how this next bit happened but I found that if I stamped with a clean stamp it removed the pearly powder and then I had a white tree image on the multi-coloured paper. I stamped a combination of some green trees and some "white" trees. I realized that the pearly powder was now on my stamp and when I misted it very lightly, I could then stamp the powder-coloured image on to black paper. From there I tried the whole thing again starting with black cardstock. The look is different but also nice….the lines of the image where the stamp removes the powder will be black instead of white. You will still get powder on the stamp so be ready to recycle it by misting the stamp and then stamping onto another piece of black paper. When you apply the watermark or embossing ink to your piece of black paper, try leaving a space between "padmarks". When you eventually apply the powder there will be a solid black line where there is no ink and, after you stamp with a few different clean stamps, you end up with a collage look. This looks great surrounded by a stark crisp white frame. The powders WILL rub off onto fingers so you may have to spray with a sealer if the card is going to be handled a lot. Have fun and be early for Christmas! Happy Stamping!

	STEVE'S PICK OF THE MONTH: I have decided to feature one of our "Old Island Classics" as a 'stamp of the month' each month. The stamp will be available to you at half price with a minimum order between Stamp Draw dates. This month's stamp is the Small Heart 395-AA. This very popular image was drawn by a young girl here on Salt Spring several years ago. A customer at the Saturday Market once described her style as "Hippie/Celtic".
	E-MAIL ORDERS/SPAM: Our internet service provider has begun using a spam filter to get rid of junk e-mails. It would appear to be working wonderfully. The spam is almost completely gone. My concern is that it might occasionally weed out a genuine e-mail from one of our customers. So, if you e-mail us, first be aware that we reply to all of our mail. Secondly, we priorize request for quotes, and you should hear back from us within 24 hours during the week. We process orders and ship on Mondays, Tuesdays, Thursdays and Fridays. If you send an order early on one of those days and have not heard back from us that day, something is wrong. If you feel you are not getting through you can call on our toll-free line to check and see if we have sent your quote (877-653-9091). One more thing about orders; we really do prefer that you e-mail us a list of what you would like, and e-mail your mailing address when you confirm your order. It is the most accurate way of doing it. We are not set-up to do orders over the phone. I have bought things on 800 numbers where they take your order and mailing information, and give you a total while you are on the phone. We are not set-up to do that. We are most likely up to our elbows in rubber when you call, or in the studio helping a customer. So, we really want to take your credit card info on the toll-free line for security, but please put the rest in writing.
	THE WEBSITE: I have added six new stamps to the Latest Images page. They are all Emily Hull images, including "Buds" from the last Drawing Board. If the shorter days and the coming of winter is beginning to weigh on you, there are lots of light flowers to give you a lift. They are great for colouring in! (I have come to the conclusion that I must not have gotten enough colouring time when I was younger. So few things in life do you get a second chance to make up for. That is what is so great about entering your second childhood...you can colour your little heart out...making up for lost time. It makes me feel great to be a little part of making it possible!) I have put a recent sketch of Jodene Kilner's on the Drawing Board for feedback. It is a nest of sorts. I am thinking...Easter? The "Where to Find Us" is up-to-date, including the Christmas shows, except Fulford. We are not sure of the dates on that one yet. The changes for this year are that we are not going to be at Kris Kringle in Qualicum Beach, and we will make it back to Calgary this year. The Qualicum show conflicted with the Calgary date this year. Hopefully, that will not be the case next year, because we would love to do both. We have updated the downloadable Catalogue for printing with all our new images. We have broken it into two parts, so it is easier to download. Part one is pages 1-18. Part Two is pages 18-36. If you have already downloaded the new 34 page catalogue, all you need to do is download the Update, which is the new pages 35 & 36. We have also added some other downloads in the PDF format. You need the Adobe Reader to download and print these files. If you do not have it on your computer you can download it free from Adobe. The new download documents include embossing directions, cling mount system instructions and mail order form for ordering by snail mail. Happy Stamping! Steve Mueller If your catalogue is up to date it should have 36 pages. The catalogue is of course FREE! Please, note there is one catalogue for printing and one catalogue for viewing on-line. The printing catalogue is no good for viewing (way, way too slow), and the viewing catalogue is no good for printing (the images will not print in their actual size or clarity). So, make sure you use the right one for your purposes.