Shealynn's Faerie Shoppe: calligraphy

, by Shaylynn

I finished this calligraphy piece several months ago but forgot to blog it-- it's J.R.R. Tolkien's beautiful poem Namárië from The Lord of the Rings. It is written in Quenya (the High Elvish language). On the left, the poem is written in our alphabet, and on the write, it is written in the Tengwar (Elvish) script.

The poem is a beautiful piece which the Lady Galadriel sings to Frodo when the Fellowship leaves Lothlorien to destroy the Ring.

I didn't have space to fit the entire poem on my little sheet of paper board, so I just used the first stanza and stuck the final two lines (about farewells and finding Valinor) on at the end.

The border was done entirely freehand using india ink and watercolors. I am pretty proud of it-- this was my first time making an Art Nouveau border, and I'm getting better at making celtic knots with decorative tips.

The heraldic device at the top is the symbol for Feanor, as designed by Tolkien himself. I thought this device would be fitting because not only is Feanor Galadriel's anscestor (if I have my genealogy straight), but it was mostly because of his family that the Elves were banished from Valinor-- and this poem is all about Galadriel's longing for Valinor when she thought she could not return, but nonetheless wished that Frodo may make it there one day. (Valinor is sort of like an Elvish heaven-- sort of, not really, but it's the best description I can come up with off the top of my head).

Here's the English version of the poem:

Ah! like gold fall the leaves in the wind,
long years numberless as the wings of trees!
The years have passed like swift draughts
of the sweet mead in lofty halls beyond the West,
beneath the blue vaults of Varda
wherein the stars tremble in the song of her voice, holy and queenly.

Who now shall refill the cup for me?

For now the Kindler, Varda, the Queen of the Stars,
from Mount Everwhite has uplifted her hands like clouds,
and all paths are drowned deep in shadow;
and out of a grey country darkness lies on the foaming waves between us,
and mist covers the jewels of Calacirya for ever.
Now lost, lost to those from the East is Valimar!
Farewell! Maybe thou shalt find Valimar.
Maybe even thou shalt find it. Farewell!

______________
For those of you complete Tolkienites, the title of this blog post ("Farewell") is not about me saying farewell to blogging or anything. I have one more crazy busy week of school left, and after that I will be taking a couple of days to just do nothing and not feel guilty about it (in other words, I will curl up on the hammock for two days and do nothing but devour some novels and drink lots of iced tea and catch up on TV shows before bed). After that, however, I will be working on some of the hundreds of creative projects that have been clanking around in my brain. :)

It's so incredibly strange to think that I am almost done with high school. It's been a beautiful four years and I've learned and grown so much! For all of you still in school, when does your summer vacation begin?

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, by Shaylynn

calligraphy

DIY Sealing Wax Stamp

Today I stepped out of my comfort zone and made a video tutorial! I just snapped a few pictures as I worked, so the video is probably more illuminating.

I've always loved writing letters and have dreamed of the days of yore when people sent letters calligraphied on parchment, sealed with wax... there's something so romantic about it. Then, after I made the blog post about glass nib pens and several of you oh-so-lovely readers teased me about having sealing wax kits while I didn't... I just had to get or make one! :)

I bought some sealing wax but didn't want to spend $20 or more on a stamp that I would only use when sending those long, rare, handwritten letters, so I decided to make my own! I tried using buttons as a stamp but we didn't have any pretty ones that worked, and I wanted to make my own cool design. Several months ago I saw this pin and memorized the steps from the photos. I just spent a couple of minutes searching, and it looked like this idea originated from this post on a design blog called RageHaus.

Anyway, here's my spin on the DIY wooden sealing wax stamps!

You will need:
A wooden dowel or block
A woodburner / pyrography wand
A dremel tool
Oil
Sealing wax
Approximately 45 minutes

Above you can see my first attempt at making a wax stamp (the red stamp with the monogram "S). I was really pleased with how it turned out, especially considering the complexity of the design! For this tutorial I made a very basic heart stamp. It's a lot easier than it looks!

To begin, you'll need a circular wood dowel. I used a block from one of those ubiquitos toy block sets.

Draw the design that you want on the dowel. Remember, your image will be reversed when stamping. For the heart it doesn't matter, but for the monogram I freehanded a mirror image. If you don't like mirroring or drawing things without a reference, you can print out a reverse image and transfer the picture onto the wood.

Next, use the pyrography tool to burn the wood! Begin by simply using the smallest tip to slowly, slowly trace the design. After the initial burn, press down the the tool (it's best if you do this using the side of the tool, not just the tip) to deepen the valleys. It needs to be deep enough for the wax design to stand out clearly. Do your best to not just push a bunch of dots into the wood, as this will make the final design very bumpy.

Protip: If your design starts getting really bumpy, use a small flathead screwdriver to push the bumpy wood down flat. You want everything to be level-- unless you want a design with varying heights, such as my monogram, where I carved the main letter deeply but made the swirlies much lighter.

Also, if your wooden block is covered with paint like mine, and it smells really foul while burning it, you can always put on a mask. I wound up doing that because the smell made me queasy, so just watch out.

You're not done yet! The design needs to be sanded to make it flat and even. If you sand it well enough, the wax will not stick to the wood. Use a fine nib dremel tool to do this!

Ta-da! The design is finished, and all that remains is to dip the tip in oil and wipe off the excess (to discourage the wax from sticking to your stamp). Then it's time to test out your new toy!

I just wanted to send a little shout-out to GreenCraftStore, where I bought the wax. Their pieces were reasonably priced and just lookit that beautiful packaging!

I'm not really an expert on stamping with wax, as the first time I did it was when I made the monogram stamp, but here's a couple of tips:

1. Don't catch the paper on fire if you are using a wax stick with a wick. Do, however, get really excited that you are holding a flame and dripping really really really hot wax on paper. It's cool.

2. Let the wax dry for just a couple of seconds before imprinting it with the stamp.

3. Let the wax dry with the stamp ontop of it, then wiggle the stamp off.

4. If you are going to mail this, use modern plastic waxes that won't break in the mail. I used beeswax, which is great for historical accuracy. However, historically seals were used not only as a sort of signature but also to keep prying eyes off of letters. If a seal was fiddled with, it would crack. I think that beeswax probably won't survive modern mail machines. I've yet to test it out, though!

Ahhh! It WORKED.

Ignore the cheesy "To: You"-- I needed something to quickly write on the sheet of paper and "To: You Lovely Blog Readers and YouTube Followers and The Random Person Who Just Stumbled Upon This Video and/or Blog Post" would have taken too long to write.

Here's a shot of my "S" stamp. And an envelope which I marbled. That will hopefully be another tutorial someday, just as soon as I perfect my marbling technique...