A funny thing happened at the rubber stamp store.......

  Besides 6'3" 300lb. me wondering ,ok lumbering, around a Stamping and Scrapbooking store. ( Stamplistic in Amherst, Ohio )


   So anyway, here is the story. We had just helped Stamplistic move form their previous location to a new one, just thirty feet away form the old one. A newer and bigger space. Thursday was their first day open after the move and we decided to go see how it looked. So, while the Mrs. was looking at scrapbooking stuff I was looking at flower stamps in the stamp section ( I know very Manly right? ) While checking out the rubber flora I spotted a brochure that had a card with a eagle stamped on it on the cover.

   Now, when you design and illustrate things for various companies you never know when something you worked on might turn up. A sign here, a salesman waving a flyer at you there, the back of the guys shirt ahead of you in line for the bathroom at the county fair. Etc. Regardless of where you see some of your work being used it is still cool. Because usually after you finish something you rarely ever see it again.

   Imagine my surprise when I realized that the eagle on this card was one that I had done for Stacy Rich of Stacy Stamps ,TEN years ago and it was one of the first illustrations I had drawn for Stacy. Who by the way was standing about ten feet away from me at the time waiting on a customer. Stacy works part time at Stamplistic teaching classes and selling cool stuff, when she is not running her stamp business. (or pimping me out to customers to draw a cruise ship template for a high school prom, but that is another story).

   Needless to say the brochure came home with me. After I had read it over I decided to go on line and check out this Operation Write Home thing. It made my day. You see when I am drawing these stamp designs I always wonder what people are going to make with them. Where they are going to end up. What thoughts and feelings they might be used to convey from one person to another. I could not have been prouder of where that little eagle had ended up. Helping people and families thousand of miles part stay in touch with one an other. From places and times that the connection to Home is one of the only things that keeps you going.

   I decided to email OWH to tell them how happy I was to see the eagle stamp was being put to good use. I had no idea who would receive that email, or when, or if I would get a reply. In just a few minutes I had a reply. It was from Sandy Allnock the president of OWH. She told me it was the first card she had made when starting OWH...or, rather, a replica of it since she had sent the original out. She had received a dozen stamped images of that design as a gift from someone. She never actually had the stamp and always wished she could find one so she could make more of these cards.

   Soon Sandy will have a eagle stamp of her very own. And I have great story to share with all of you. By the way the name of that stamp is "Freedom".

   Sandy asked me to participate in her bloghop today by telling you this story. And I gladly accepted. So if you are here for the bloghop here is your next stop, http://www.winkwinkink.com/ .

Sandy's Card

A photo of the original artwork( yep I still have it )

 If you would like to buy a Stacy Stamps eagle stamp go to Stamplistc's website and order one or call them at
440-989-2622.