Owning your deck part 4: Glitter

Glitter is the little extra thing that makes life amazing

 Don't you love glitter? I know I do!

Glitter is amazing, which is why I had a new, fancy, glittery idea for customizing my decks.

Glitter! On the Romantic Tarot

The Romantic Tarot is not only one of my absolute favorites. It is also the most customized deck I own!

Custom Romantic Tarot a la Peachess

Lo Scarabeo's Romantic Tarot (Art by Giulia Massaglia - gorgeous!) is my second Tarot deck ever (after the Deviant Moon deck which I had a hard time working with) and I LOVE it.

That is, I love a lot about it, and I absolutely hated the borders. They really kept me from appreciating the BEAUTIFUL ART. They had to go, of course. After that, I changed a number of other things, as well.

1. Borders off - no more titles or borders! Pure art!

The beautiful twin eagles and the gorgeous roses used to be framed by a hideous border, 

but I freed them!

2. Edges - they are red.

3. Custom bag

and finally ...

 Key 3: Empress

 Key 21: Judgment

Key 0: The Fool

4. You guessed it, glitter!

As you can see, I only added tiny details, such as the wings of doves, or a dress.

I used a very thin brush to add these little details, and a tiny bit of acryllic metallic gold color:

Key 1: Magician

In the magician card, this really gives the card a more magical feel to it. Also, painting on my cards feels like seeing them again for the very first time. 

For now, I only put glitter on the Majors. But maybe the Minors will also get the glitter treatment when I have time. I will probably also use this newly found technique on other decks.

Some tips:

1. Use a tiny, thin, brush. Size 0 is best.

2. Use a microscopic amount of paint.

3. If something looks bad, let the paint dry, then slowly and carefully scratch it off (with a toothpick or your nails)

4. Do not put glitter everywhere. Unless you want to. In which case, go ahead and try it!

Have you tried something similar before?

Blessings and balance ~

Peachess

 

Owning your deck part 3: Custom bags

Love the deck, hate the box

I've been at war with cheap standard boxes of Tarot decks ever since I got my very first deck. Lo Scarabeo and U.S. Games standard boxes are too tight, not at all sturdy and often already ripped or bruised upon arrival.

Not seldom do boxes arrive with blunted corners because of shipping. This would not be happening if the boxes were sturdier.

Also, getting the cards out and be a total nightmare. When the boxes are still new and unopened, getting the lid out of the tight box can be a hard. Often, the lid is clutched tightly by the folds underneath. If you try to open the lid by force, you could rip either the lid of the folds. Both are extremely annoying and again don't happen with sturdy two piece boxes.

Of course I understand that financial reasons lead to these nasty boxes. Thankfully, one does not have to keep them!

All of my favorite decks have their own speshul bag. The only exceptions to this rule are the Morgan Greer deck  (which came in a tin and is protected already) and the Deviant Moon Borderless, for which I haven't found a fitting bag or pattern yet.

Some decks, particularly indie decks, come with a matching back.

Alice Tarot (the bag cost extra):

 A very nice bag lined with vintage silk

Pouch used as tarot bag for the Twin Peaks Tarot:

I believe this was intended as a make up pouch. I used it first as a bag for coins and now with the Twin Peaks tarot. A number of charms are attached to the bag, which has no relation whatsoever to the deck inside but remain there because I used the bag in Japan.

I also have a number of bags I bought separately on etsy.com.

My custom bag for my Arthur Rackham Oracle deck

I got all of my bags from WyldeChilde creations, because I like the fact that you can get the bags padded (meaning, they have an extra layer inside that makes them a little sturdier and protects the decks). I really want to get more bags for my other decks that are still hidden away in their boxes.

My bag for the Romantic Tarot:

I absolutely love the Romantic Tarot. And I love the back design. And I just couldn't find a bag that matched that design. So I did the only thing I thought of, which was to get a file of the back design online and got the fabric custom made on fabricsondemand.com. The result is this beautiful bag that matches one of my favorite decks of all time to a T (also made by WyldeChilde creations)!

I also have a matching reading cloth with the same design which I should use more often and currently don't know where it is.

Personally, I prefer having my decks wrapped in cloth. I love Tarot bags and if I were rich, all my decks would have one. The decks (particularly those that had flimsy boxes) are really freed from the pain of obstruction. Plus, it's the best kind of add-on for your one favorite deck. Some people even create their own bags! I really want to try that at some point, too.

Blessings and balance ~

Peachess

Owning your deck part 2: Edging

Some decks profit a lot when edged

Many decks are great the way they are, but just need a little something that will give them a lot more atmosphere. This little something is edging.

I often edge my decks

After cutting borders (which I do all the time), edging is my second-to-top most common way of customizing my decks. Right now, I edged 4 or 5 decks using inks.

Some of my decks are already gilded, which looks like this:

Obviously this level of edging cannot be achieved with the simple technique I use.

Unlike cutting off borders, edging a deck will give the edges a little stickiness to the texture. This is not only true for self-made edged decks but also those that are gilded in the printing press. Decks with edging or gilding tend to stick together just a slight bit more than normal decks. So if you are a riffle shuffler or overly concerned about the integrity of your deck, this technique might not be for you.

The inks I use

Memento Dew Drop and Distress Ink

I use a numner of different inks for edging, but if you are cheap like me I recommend Memento Dew Drops. You do not need a huge ink pad to edge your deck. These small ones will do and they are available in many colors. BUT!! The Memente Dew Drop Brilliance bleeds a LOT so I do NOT recommend it for edging. It's just on the pic because I bought it for edging and then thought better of it.

My tips from experience:

1. Edge your cards one by one by pulling the edges along the inkpad

2. Watch your hand!! The ink will definitely leave a mark on your hands and fingers. Be cautious and work slowly to avoid splotching ink on your cards.

3. Keep a towel or paper tissues at hand to wipe your hands clean regularly.

4. If you notice "bleed" on the edges of your cards, don't panic. As long as the ink hasn't dried, you can still wipe the extra color off using a clean tissue!

5. Do NOT stack your cards right after edging them. Put them on paper to dry first for at least 10-15 minutes.

6. Because of no.5, it is advisible to work in groups of 20-25 cards each. Do 25 cards, lay them out individually to dry, wait, then stack them and move on to the next group of cards.

7. Do not use metallic inks (like Memente Dew Drop Brilliance). For some reason, they bleed a lot and will smudge over the cards.

8. Work lightly. Instead of pushing the cards into the inkpad, work the card across the pad multiple times.

9. Try it on Memo cards, paper or the "extra" advertisement card that comes with the deck. Or, if you intend to take off the border but haven't yet, try edging the border before taking the border off.

10. Do it slowly. I've said this before, but the slower you do this, the less likely you will be to ruin your cards.

This is how it should look:

Arthur Rackham Oracle, edges

This is how it shouldn't look:

Obviously this was done hastily and only once. Because of this, the edges don't look boldly aged but rather just smeared with color. I will repeat the procedure with this deck once more in order to get a good coloring to the edges!

 If these cards from the Rackham Oracle look a bit dirty or smudged on the borders, it's because I haven't been doing a very good job keeping the ink off the cards. I just stacked them on top of each other without letting them dry one by one on a paper first.



Now the bleed and smudges are okay on the Rackham Oracle because obviously with the borders you hardly notice. But it really bugs me that I didn't use more time and brains to edge his deck (it was my first!)


If you follow these tips you should be fine edging decks.

The difference between debordering and edging

I dislike borders to the point were most borders make it impossible for me to work with a deck at all, so debordering is a no-brainer. Also, cutting of borders with scissors or the paper guillotine feels meditative to me and I really enjoy doing it. And I love the result. Cards that had been useless are transformed into a lovely deck of cards.

Edging is different.

First, I do not enjoy edging cards. It's a task that is about concentration and precision. The waiting time inbetween groups of cards anmoys me. I often mess up and have to wipe bleed off the cards. It's a task that goes on forever and you have to repeat the edging process on each individual card in order to get nice coloring. The end result is also less of a revelation than the debordering: a new edging is just a cute and nice extra. It doesn't transform your deck. From the front, you can't even see the result.

So while debordering is a requirement for me, edging is something I often put off because it feels like cleaning and polishing shoes. Repititive and annoying. However, I really like the result so it's worth it. Ink is rather cheap to come by, so even if you end up edging only one deck it's still worth it, while investing in a paper guillotine might be too pricey for you.

If you are a card purist and prefer the deck the way it is, that's fine. I personally like to think of my cards as a canvas for my personal worldview.

What do you think? Do you edge your decks, and if so, which ones?

Blessings and balance ~

Peachess

Studying the Tarot: The Drawing Approach

Because Keywords are lame!!

Have you read a book on Tarot? And has the book suggested that you sit down and jot down the keywords that come to mind? The answer is probably yes and yes. It was like that for me. As a novice to Tarot, I sat down, I read a gazillion books, only one of which was ever useful, and never wrote a single keyword down at all. I got where all those authors are coming from, but writing down keywords and really getting the meaning of a card really seemed far removed to me. So I skipped that part.

But you have to ingest the card meanings somehow

The trouble is, once you've gone around and studied the cards, and feel like you've understood them, you finally come back full circle to keywords. Nowadays, when my friends ask me what certain cards mean, I just list my internal list of keywords.

Different approaches

You can of course list keywords. You can upgrade those lists all the time. That's fine. I would have done that, too, if I weren't so terribly lazy. But I am. Listing stuff is tedious work and I hate that. So I don't do it.
Instead, I draw the cards. I take one card, and I sit down, and I just copy everything. Every single detail. This is tedious work too, but I can simultaneouly improve my art and style and see all the tiny details of the card that I missed before.

Key II: The High Priestess from Lo Scarabeo's Romantic Tarot and my rendition

When you describe a card, you can be as detailled or as non-chalant as you like. If you list keywords, you can just overlook the stuff you don't understand. But if you copy a card, you have to really look hard at what you're doing, because otherwise it will look nothing like the card.

Twin Peaks Tarot: 3 of Pentacles

Even if you're not really gifted at drawing or painting, recreating the cards isn't about pretty or ugly. It's about a deep meditation of the cards and their meanings. It is a way of connecting to the cards in a personal manner. For instance, I decided to rename the High Priestess in this deck "The Reader".
But that's a personal choice. The bottom line is, drawing or tracing a Tarot card (you could get the RWS cards online in black and white and just trace them and color them) will make you see everything, while keywords reduce the card to very little.

Romantic Tarot Key 0: The Fool

 

Think about it. Maybe drawing a card or two will help you get a better understanding of the cards you failed to connect with until now.

Blessings and balance ~

Peachess

Owning your deck: Cutting Borders

Are you afraid to damage your precious deck?

Fear not, everyone probably felt a little squeezy at the idea of cutting off borders with a pair of scissors (or more elaborate mschinery!).
At first, I just looked at youtube videos where people cut their decks to pieces and draw on the cards with edding and other nasty things.

I hate borders.

I always hated borders with a passion. Borders are the enemy. I can#t stand borders, especially white, thick borders. Those can ruin the entire deck for me.

Patrick Valenza's Deviant Moon Tarot Original and Borderless Edition. 

Picture credit: Patrick Valenza.

The first tarot deck I ever got for myself was Patrick Valenza's Deviant Moon Tarot. The Original Edition. Back then, I wasn't even aware of the borderless edition and I also wasn't aware of the fact that you could buy a borderless edition of any kind of deck and if you had asked me, I probably wouldn't have known what could possibly be hideous in the bordered edition.

If you take a look at those two cards, you can see that the bordered edition's imagery is greatly diminished by the green and white borders. The images don't really pop, like they do in the borderless edition (in which the titles are black, which is much more fitting than yellow). If in comparison, the original really bothers you and you don't think you could work with it while the borderless version really appeals to you, you're like me.

Making yourself cut up your precious deck

While cutting borders is a hard step to take (if the deck was expensive or has some meaning to you, of course you don't want to damage the cards like that and risk cutting in the wrong place etc.), it's often the first one people take when customizing their decks. Why? Because borders are the enemy, that's why. If something really bothers you during a reading, at one point you are going to have to realize that Tarot is a useless tool if you can't work with it unless the borders are gone.

I realized this very soon, but it took me a long time to see that I wouldn't be able to click with those decks unless the borders were gone.

The perfect materials

You *can* cut your deck up with a pair of scissors. If you have good control over your hands and do it slowly, this is maybe even the most accurate method. But it really depends on how good you are at following a line on a paper with a pair of scissors. So I suggest you try this out on a pair of paper: just draw a black line across and try cutting it up.

Two of my decks were made borderless with scissors:

 The first deck I ever did: as you can see, the edges are a little rough still. The cardstock was pretty thick, so that made it harder for me to be accurate.

 The second deck: Much smoother and more accurate. The edges are nearly perfect.

As you can see, it worked out quite nicely. Obviously you can't expect your decks to be completely aligned at the edges (like they would be if this had been done by a machine), but it's close enough. I found that while cutting edges with scissors is pretty accurate, it's also extremely time-consuming. You sit and sit and sit and cut and cut and cut. And once you're finsihed cutting, the edges still need to be rounded!

Buy a corner-cutter

My number one piece of advice for people who want their borders gone: get a tool to round the edges for you. Cutting in a straight line is simple enough, but rounding the edges with a pair of chunky scissors will probably leave you with a very uneven result. Don't do that! Just get something like this:

This is the Sunstar Kadomaru Corner Cutter (available through retailers like amazon)

A corner cutter works like a stapler. You insert the corner of the card, you push down the lever, and ta-da! You're corners are rounded. The Kadomaru has the added bonus of offering 3 different sizes. S, for tiny rounded corners, M for normal, and L for a very smooth curve. You can try this with a regular paper first, to see which size is perfect for you.

Additional material

If you want to cut borders like a pro, or like me, have too many decks that need to be liberated from nasty borders to cut them up with simple scissors, get yourself a paper-guillotine.

I have no idea what brand I got here, but this paper guillotine cost around $15, so it's not that much. Basically you just put in the card and pull down the lever and the border is gone. It's very simple and efficient compared to the scissors-method. I definetely recommend getting a guillotine if you have many decks to deborder, because doing it by hand will make your wrists ache and takes ages.

Don't be afraid of hurting your deck! Tarot or Lenormand or Oracle is your tool! If you don't use the cards, they are literally useless. If the borders really bother you, get rid of them. Once you've cut borders on one deck, you'll stop being afraid of the process and instead enjoy creating and owning a unique piece.

Blessings and balance ~

Peachess

Newest Family Member: The Dark Days Tarot by Wren McMurdo

It arrived today!!!

The newest member od my growing family of Tarot decks. The Dark Days Tarot is on  of the decks I got back in December before my big Deck Buying Hiatus that began in January because I'm too broke to get new decks T-T

Anyway I ordered this deck before it was even finished on Kickstarter (a dumb habit of mine I know and I stoped now I swear) back in December 2016. So now, 6 months later, the deck finally arrived at my home (yey!).

I had to pay loads of import duties but I felt elated when I got the parcel anyway. The deck came in a bubblewrap envelope, and the box is sort of banged up (boo).
But it's really pretty and the size I expected!

The box has two pieces, and is slightly too large for the deck. There are no extra cards, just the usual cards which did not come in order but had the Major Arcana in between the pip cards, which was weird. I'll have to sort through all the cards chronologically later.

The cards are black for all the minors and white for the majors. There are no colors, just black and white and greys. The illustrations are very thin and flimsy and detailled. Some people like that, some don't. Whether you like it or not, I'll have to warn you that the minors are hard to take in in one look when lighting in the room isn't very good. That means you'll really have to scrutinize those cards if you want to connect to them and understand the meanings. this could be a major annoyance depending on your eyesight. If you like having a quick look and taking everything in at once, that probably won't work because of the thin lines of the artwork and also because of the fact that these cards have 4 sides.

North, East, South and West all have their own meanings and interpretations which are thankfully all keyworded in the book. This foursidedness was my main reason for getting this deck, because it intrigued me to have two more ways to read the cards. That being said, I'm not sure how this will work out in practice.
I tried a quick one card draw and immediately got Key XIV, Temperance, in the upright position. I don't know why, but ever since I started this blog, Temperance has been haunting me. Maybe it's the Tarot's way of telling me that I should stay focussed on my journey?

Quick first look review:

The box is stable but came with a few bumps, which is irritating. The box itself is a little too large for the cards and the book, which means that the cards could postentially get damaged if you plan on taking this deck wherever you go. The book has pretty good binding and is looks quite thick at a first glance. However the information in the book is quite scarce, because 50%+ is taken up by large pictures of the cards and other illustrations. That makes it only useful for advanced Tarotists. The images are equally unsuitable for beginners, as the concepts are often hard to grasp directly, and the flimsiness of the illustrations and lack of color-suit relation makes it harder to identify patterns.

As for the cards themselves, the illustrations are cute and I like them. However, the cardstock isn't very good. It's very thin and some cards, even though they were wrapped in plastic, already have a bump or two.

This deck has a very unique concept and feel to it. If you are and advanced reader and feel drawn to this deck, by all means check it out for yourself. If you are a complete novice, maybe consider getting another deck first. For collectors, this might be a good addition to your Tarot decks, but its also the type of deck that might remain in your closet forever. I myself am not positive this deck will be with me for long.

If I do keep this deck, I think some things need to be changed. The cards could use some edging and maybe colorful additions. And glitter.

Blessings and balance ~

Peachess

Me Being the Mock Turtle: sharing my spreads

Th  other day I introduced a spread that I created myself and which I like a lot because it stresses duality and openendedness as opposed to direct answers and easy solutions (which are both so rare in my life).

I used the Alice Tarot, because to me it fits the image of the Mock-Turtle best (for obvious reasons), but I want to try this spread with a number of different decks as well.

The cards I drew are:

1. the Head/Face: Temperance. Featuring Alice with a long neck. Trying to keep the balance.

2. The Heart (part one) the Mock-Turtle. Eight of Cups. Alice flees the duchesses' house with a little pig in hand. Leaving a bad situation behind, new beginning. Burdens.

3. The Heart (part two) thr Turtle. Six of Coins. Alice hands out the prizes, carefully not giving anyone too much or too little. Taking care of others, difficult charity.

4. The Filter/Bridge Seven of Cups/reversed Alice asks the flowers for guidance but can't choose who is correct. Difficult choices, choices that all seem bad.

5. The Way (part one) the vice. eight of wands, reversed. Alice  nd the Red Queen rush to a new place. You want things too fast or rush through tasks too quickly.

6. The Way (middle ground) the truth. Hierophant, reversed. The blue smoker teaches Alice a strange lesson that might not be helpful at all. Being unhappy with the current level of knowledge/ no mentor or authority to help in sight.

7. The Way (finale) the desire. Four of Swords. Featuring a sleeping mouse on a table. The rest might be temporary but the break is a welcome one. Dreams.

Bottom line of this reading for me? My neck has grown too long trying to balance out all the stuff that's going on. Even others can see how burdened I am. Inside, I am torn apart: both the 8 of Cups and the 6 of Coins in the Alice Tarot show Alice taking care of others. In the Mock-Turtle, this is seen as a burden, a difficult and hard thing to do, while the Turtle refers to this as an honor. Both are there at the same time. The Bridge or Filter between me and the outside world is the 7 of Cups, showing too many choices, or an overload in information. Since the card is reversed, I have a hard time communicating with others. I give out too many signals that might mislead. Also, I want too many things at once, which the next card also suggests. 

The final three cards in the spread show My Vice, my Truth, and my Desire. I believe that vices and desires lead our lives, while we often overlook the truth of our situation.

My Vice being the 8 of Wands reversed. On the card, we see Alice running like hell with the Red Queen, while not even quite knowing where they are going. This is a classic hint that I am going too fast, without even a goal in sight. This wanting of things should be stopped. Instead, I should reflect. Temperance, the Head card, also suggests this. 

The Truth is given in form of the Hierophant in reverse: The blue, smoking Hierophant teaches Alice the way, but really teaches nothing at all. This card, in reverse, suggests that I could actually use some guidance (which may or may not be helpful), but that I cannot expect to get any. Instead of having an authority next to me, I'm on my own. This doesn't have to be a bad thing, though.

The Desire, finally, is in the form of the 4 of Swords. On the card, we see a little mouse taking a nap in the midst of a tea party.  She has her own little seat, so she must be a guest at the party. However, this repose is definetely going to end. I might want a break right now, but seriously: is a temporary break really what I need? Should I not rather, given the other cards, consider making my every day life less stressful by burdening myself with too many things at once?

The Piece of Advice: Do not burden yourself any more than necessary and choose active meditation and relaxation instead of fitfull, temporary sleep.

What would you add to this interpretation?

Blessings and balance ~

Peachess