Favorite stamp class

[XrayAmy]

I thought it would be interesting to talk about your favorite class. What kind of class was it, what did you learn, how long was the class, was it taught well, did you finish your project in class...etc?

[Nancy]

Oh there are so many...

Tim Holtz - he supplies everything you need, very organized and he's fun. Every class I've taken I've left with a completed project! It's a bit pricey - but everything is included plus extras to go home with. Classes average about 2 hours.

Mary Jo McGraw - the woman has a tremendous amount of knowledge and shares it freely! Many of her classes that I've taken are technique based and so you don't have a project per say, but tons of examples.

Quick Collage Class - taught by DeAnn Musiel where she showed the class samples but then put them away so we couldn't look and copy them exactly! At first it seemed strange because you're used to doing it exactly like the sample - but this was better because we had to use our own imagination!
She gave great ideas and suggestions as we worked on our cards. And yes - we each had about 5 completed cards at the end!

When I first started stamping they had some stamping classes at the Community Center. Each session was 4 weeks and each class was 2 hours. We came home with great cards - but the neat thing was we learned something new each week in a very easy way and as a new stamper it was wonderful because you felt sucessful! This was basics like embossing - where I learned about heat guns... to think I was trying it at home with a lightbulb :confusion:

Nancy

[StamPoor]

As a new stamper, I was lucky enough to spend an all day session with a representative of a company called Mostly Animals (I miss their designs). I think her name was Cheryl. What I think I learned most from her was to look at stamps beyond the obvious. Could I use just part of the stamp for something else (ostrich tail feathers make good ferns!). Can parts of stamp be combined to create a new image. Slowly view the stamp from each of the four sides to see if a different perspective might generate a new idea. It's advice I've used a lot in choosing new stamps to buy.

Maybe my most fun experience was a two-hour class when a very talented and well organized local teacher showed us how to make 50 cards using the same stamp. We only made a few of the cards, but we went home with a color print out of all 50 cards and instructions on how to make them. Wheee!

[stampin stacy]

I've never taken a class. When I was working I never had time to take a class. Now that I'm not working I don't have the money to take a class. I watched everything I could on tv, read magazines & books, and have watched lots of make and takes at conventions.

I have listened to Mary Jo McGraw and Joyce Hazen at Imprints after conventions also. Those aren't really classes as we aren't making anything just watching and listening to them, but boy do you learn a lot. If I had pick a favorite between the two it would probably be Mary Jo because she taught me its okay to experiment and talked about the differences between craft and artist quality materials.

[ctinyjoy]

My favorite class was probably my first class. It was 2 hours long at one of my LSS. Everything was included for us to make 5 cards for $20. It was just the basics, and I was so awed by everything. We used markers, water brushes, diamond glaze, stickles, eyelets and brads, ribbons, corner punches, mulberry paper...it seems like technique overload but it was great. It hooked me completely. I still pull out those first 5 cards and will use them as inspiration for a design.
cheri

[CatStamper]

I thought it would be interesting to talk about your favorite class. What kind of class was it, what did you learn, how long was the class, was it taught well, did you finish your project in class...etc?

My favorite was an Alextamping class taken at the Akron stamp convention last spring. It was my first hands on introduction to scenic stamping. The instructor Karen Canto was great. She started with a 15-20 minute demo of some basic techniques - stuff like stippling in areas of color, masking with straight or torn paper to make a horizon line or hillside, and some tips for using her particular stamps, all while creating a few quick scenes from scratch before our eyes. Then she set the class loose to do as many scenic cards as we could for the rest of the class.

There were 20+ trays of stamps and inks with instruction sheets, each tray gave you the tools to make a different scene. You could pick a forest scene, or seaside, or cityscape, etc. The sheets showed you step by step how to make the scenes (e.g. ink color and placement of each stamp), and Karen and her hubby Carlos circulated to help us with any questions. It was very well organized and really neat to be working at your own pace but without feeling left alone to work.

Her stamps were neat to work with since they are mostly solid stamps instead of outlines - so for instance you stamp the sky in blue, the trees in green, the deer in brown, etc, and then your scene is completed without needing to do a lot of coloring. A super quick and easy intro to scenic stamping. I left with 4-5 completed scenes (some of which are posted in my gallery I think), but others finished more than that.

I also really enjoyed the relaxed, supportive atmosphere - they helped you figure out how to turn an "oops" into a nice card (maybe different than your original plan, but still nice!) and encouraged us to PLAY. It felt very un-fussy, and lots of fun.

I felt like I went from wanting to try scenic stamping to being a scenic stamper in just two hours. Lots of fun! :D

Would love to more from others about their favorite classes!

Kate

[j3annin3]

Like you Stampin Stacy, i have never taken a stamping class. Money is an issue for lots of us. But, some years ago, as a gift; my sisters signed me up for a 6 week evening class. They said they chose the most offbeat seeming class offered that period. They laughed themselves silly when they gave me only the time, location, and taped closed shoe box of 'class supplies' for my first class. If only for that, it would be my favorite class; but really the things i learned in Sister Martin Bernadettes' Practical Origami class were amazing and wonderful.

She taught her class in the dinning room of the Sister House, dressed a very formal habit (with a wimple even.) Sister Martin was 78 then. She said she would wear a casual habit but that she had a neck like a rubber chicken. It was a whole evening of surprises! She started learning the art of origami while she was part of an overseas mission, and that while she was there she really had to learn to make something needed, out of what was there, because the available resources were "unbelieveably meager." That was the focus of the class, to learn to be more resorcefull and creative "by using what WE all have and underappreciate."

I openned my shoe box and insider were pages and bits of paper. All kinds of paper, newsprint, glossy magazine pages, waxpaper,foil,printerpaper....ect; with a craft knife and ruler. Those were the only supplies we ever used. By the end of the 6 week/12 class course we had all learned to make a couple dozen truly useful, nearly magical things, like a drinking cup, boxes, bags, envelopes, bowls, folders and of course party hats. During every class, Sister Martin would regal us with stories of life in a sister-house, her experiences as a nun, and how to get through life with humor and tolerance and respect.

I still make alot of those models, and i use them as a base for stamping. The boxes and envelopes especially. And still, everytime i make a container of some kind for some child (or adult, or myself) out of what is just lying around, there is a small kind of real awe for the everyday magic of paper.

Sister Martin and i kept in touch until she died about 2 years ago. With every letter we exchanged we always mailed a model or 2, and while she didn't have 'any intention of teaching you [the class] how to make cranes and butterflies, and such,' i have a whole zoo of Sister Martin's "fripperies" made out of weekly circulars and newsprint.....including a paper rubber chicken, her personal totem.