Feature Artist - Rachael

~Happy Tuesday all,
~Sorry again for the late post today, but better late that never right??? Todays interview comes from the ever lovely Rachael, who is one of my bestest bloggy friends (love you hun). Here is her interview.......
My name is Rachael Wood. I've been scrapping since I was pregnant with my daughter, almost 10 years ago. My husband was in the Navy and on deployment so I started a really rough scrapbook of my pregnancy for him. I'm living in Kauai right now with my 2 kids, but I have lived all over the country over the past decade. I'm a little crazy, a whole lot of random, and pretty ADD when it comes to style and medium. Right now, I'm mostly focusing on making pictures again. Getting back to my roots, so to speak. When I was in high school, my first job was for the local newspaper working in the darkroom. I ended up with a gig free-lancing by the end of my senior year. That's my claim to fame!

Who is your biggest inspiration??? Oh, I have many. I think top three would have to be

#1 Frank Lloyd Wright. He was an AMAZING architect. And not just an architect, but a furniture designer, he even designed dresses for his wife! He was brilliant.

#2 Pablo Picasso. I have been in love with him since high school at least. His use of color, the emotion his painting evoke, and obviously his cubist innovation.. WOW. He was truely a womanizing slimeball, but you can't deny he was a fantastic artist. I could stare at his work all day. When I get stuck for color combinations, I turn to him.

#3 Jason Mraz. I listen to him when I scrap. Something about the flow of his music, his lyrics just does it for me. When I am blocked, I crank him up and try to use his lyrics as inspiration.

Yep, not a scrapbooker among them. Know why? Cause my mood is never the same. I have a list of blogs/galleries I check when I am looking for something, but it's almost never the same person twice. Some of my favorites scrappers are Beth Perry, Tanisha Long, and my friend Jamie Dougherty (www.jaylynnscraps.blogspot.com).

Why did you start creating? To create a record of my pregnancy for my husband who was deployed. So he didn't feel like he missed out on so much.

What is your favourite thing to create? Right now, just photographs. I love altering anything that will stand still too. But if I am scrapping, I LOVE creating no-photo pages. Yep, sort of an art journal. for me, the photos can get in the way of the art. And vice versa. I don't want to feel obligated to take photos that will scrap well or with the intention of scrapping them.

What are your favourite manufacturers? That's an easy one! Top 3- Prima, Basic Grey, and Sassafrass. Man do I love me some Sass!

What was the inspiration behind your Etsy shop?
Ummmm, how did you know I had an etsy shop! Lol! I got the crochet bug BAD this last winter. So I just sat and crocheted neck warmer, which are one of my favorite things ever. I ended up with tons, so I decided to sell them. I sold a few, will work on them again this winter. Not quite the season now. Same thing with jewlery. Just made myself some, had tons of stuff left over, decided to make soemthing and sell it.

What is it you like so much about photography?

Everything. The ability to let someone else see what I see, in my frame of reference. To hopefully make them feel something. Images can be very powerful, very comforting, very disturbing. The challenge is to make someone else feel/see what you want them to. It's a way of being very honest or, by manipulating the image or the scene, very dishonest. Not many mediums have that power.

Do you create with music? If so what is your favourite creative song?

I cannot create without music. Just doesn't happen. Right now, my "scraptime" playlist on my Ipod classic has Jason Mraz, the Fratelli's, Dave Matthews Band, Pendulum, Dynamite Hack, Kepa Kruse, and Panic at the disco, to name some. I have VERY ecletic taste so i listen to a little bit of everything. As far as favorite song on that list, has to be Honey girl, by Kepa Cruise. If you aren't listening to him, you're missing out. (www.kepakruse.com)

What are your 3 must-have creative items? Besides the obvious adhesive, trimmer, etc. i would say flowers, ink of any kind, and thickers. when I first saw thickers, I thought "really? are we really going to get into another fad like eyelets??" I now have probably 40 or 50 packs! Funny how that happens.

Have you ever created anything you've hated? Oh heck yes! Many things. From a photographic standpoint, I have deleted entire shoots. We're talking a hundred frames or better. I'm crazy like that. There is this one scrapbook page I made of my daughter at Halloween in like 2005. I did it, took half of it apart, redid it, took 3/4 of it apart... I still hate it, it's in pieces. and I started decopauging this pig at christmas time. spent like 4 or 5 hours tearing and pasting and placing. Hated it. painted the stupid thing white! It's still on my shelf, blank.

~Rachael is also doing a fabby giveaway, she doesn't have a picture but here are the details:

I don't have a photo, but since I am living in Hawaii, thought it only fitting that I send you a little Aloha. There is this cool tiny little beach here where sea glass washes up. So I will be giving away a little bit of Kauai in the form of some seaglass. It is great for making jewlery out of and using on scrappy pages.

~Make sure you leave Rachael some blog love, and you have until Sunday night to enter her giveaway!!!
~love, Vicki xxx