On Wednesday night Arlene saved my butt for meeting a deadline. I had signed up for a swap of Chinese New Year art made with hand-carved eraser stamps. I’ve been carving stamps for something over twenty years, but not much for the past two years, when I’ve been more likely to spend my time knitting. The deadline for the swap hostess to get participants’ pages for the swap was Feb. 1. I figured that I was pretty much OK if I had them in the mail on Feb. 1 — there would still be time to bind the whole thing and get it in the mail to arrive before Chinese New Year on Feb. 18 — but that not having it in the mail the day it was supposed to get there would not be acceptable. At any rate, we worked pretty steadily from suppertime until 10 PM (Arlene wanted to watch _Medium_) stamping, embossing, trimming paper, and glueing parts together. There was still one more stamp to add to each page in the morning, and the pages needed to be signed, but enough was done that there wasn’t any problem getting them in the mail before work.
I have one extra page still. I can’t scan it and show you yet. It’s strictly forbidden to publish pictures of these swap things until all the swap participants have received a copy. Around Feb. 19 or 20 it’ll be in the clear.