 Well hello there! Welcome to my new site dedicated to all things cartomancy. From card reading to the history of these various card decks, and so on to helpful tips for designing and publishing your own decks to my experiences with my own extensive collection of created decks. There will be a little bit of everything so long as it has something to do with these wonderful little things known as cards.
First things first: My name is Bethalynne and it is good to meet you. On this site you’ll notice my entries marked as Miss Blue as this is one of my longest running nicknames. Blue, Bethie, Beebs, but my personal favorite is Miss Blue. I’ve been a professional graphic artist since the mid 90s and self published my personal portfolio online since 1996. Somewhere mid 2006 I began work on my first tarot deck and since then I’ve published eight different collectable card decks that include the tarot, the petite lenormand, an oracle deck, and a standard deck of playing cards. Each one has furthered my experience in understanding these decks and their histories, what they mean to people, and the instructional side of creating and publishing them. I’ve learned a lot over the years. That brings me back to my blog introduction. Every now and then I sit down with my gent and bemoan my desire to be an expert in something to which he often points out I am: Cards. I realized this is quite true. I started out collecting tarot decks in my teens after my aunt gave me her Gypsy Witch Fortune Telling Playing Cards. I was fascinated by the idea of them but rather self conscious in the idea of using them to read from. As an artist I greatly enjoyed the artistry of them more. It seemed like a no-brainer when I decided to create my own deck, but it only came after I’d already included two tarot decks within a graphic novel of mine. I wanted to hold them. I wanted that piece of my fiction made real. I didn’t even know if I’d seek to sell them. It all led to selling that first deck though and the very complicated process I went through to get to that point. After that I began to study the history of these decks more deeply and started to research a better method of creation and publication. I’ve been doing this for the past ten years. I might not be an expert, but I honestly know quite a bit and I thought a blog sharing some of my experience would help fill that wee mentoring spot in my heart. 😉 I’ve been making notes about this site over the summer, but I have spent my autumn trying to decide how best to organize all of these notes so I’m offering them in a cohesive manner. I will be posting regular card of the day posts because these are how I’ve been learning to become more confident in my own readings. I’d like to share the process behind my decks and how & why they came into being. I have a wonderful circle of friends who will be contributing some interesting things as their schedules permit. And perhaps what I find the most important; I’ll be offering tips and tutorials for creating and publishing your own deck. This last thing I’ve already written quite a few articles about but I realize I’m writing them as they come to mind so there is a need to better organize them. So my first post is here the first of October, but the site itself won’t officially go online until October 31st. This gives me a month to work some of that fuss out in real time. So thank you for stopping by and reading this far. I hope you’ll become a regular visitor and there will be something here I offer you find useful. This site is a sub-site for my main shoppe: The Attic Shoppe Trading Company – where you can order my decks as well as a few other interesting and related things. I’m always open to chatting or questions so please feel free to contact me of follow me online. My links are all up and to the right. And with that, this little cartomancer is going to get back to mancing the cart… er card? 🙂 |
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