What do you want to know?

Hello there! Agnieszka wanted to do an interview with me concerning the workshops in Warsaw. You can find the whole interview in English and Polish here (link), but I thought to blog a few anwers here, too. If you are interested in the workshops, you have until the 10th to enroll to info@rekodzielnik.com.pl. More details here (link).

I also thought that this would be a perfect time to ask if you have any questions I could answer. Please either leave them here, in this post or then mail them to me. I'll do another "interview" post with them later this month!

Heippa! Agnieszka halusi tehdä pienen haastattelun kanssani Varsovan kurssien takia. Koko haastattelu löytyy täältä englanniksi ja puolaksi (linkki) ja alta löytyy osa kysymyksistä ja vastauksistani englanniksi. Googlen kääntäjä (linkki) näytti tekevän suhteellisen järkevää käännöstä ainakin ensimmäisestä kysymyksestä.

Ajattelin, että tämä olisi myös hyvä aika kysyä, josko teillä on jotain kysymyksiä, joihin voisin vastata. Voit jättää kysymyksesi joko tähän kommentteihin taikka lähettää sen sähköpostilla. Kokoan näistä kysymyksistä toisen "haastattelun", jonka julkaisen myöhemmin tässä kuussa täällä blogissani!

"Hello Riikka

A: In March you are supposed to teach in Poland during Rękodzielnik vol.7 and I would like that people who so far had no opportunity to meet you or get to know you, could read a little bit about you. So I have couple of questions to you :) I would like to thank you very much, that you accepted our invitation and you will come to Poland. Do you know our country? Have you ever been here? What are your associations with Poland?

R: Thank you for inviting me! It's a dream come true, really! 

I haven't visited Poland earlier, but the country has been on my mind for long now. So it's a great to have the opportunity to both teach the workshops and to visit Poland at the same time. Poland seems to have something special in the water as it's home to so many amazing artists. I feel really enthusiastic about learning more about the country and its people! I associate Poland with art, Copernicus and white/red flag.

A:You live in Finland - could you tell us a little more about your daily life, your job, family...?

R: I live in Helsinki, the capital of Finland with my husband and our two girls. My older one turns five during the spring and my younger one just turned three. I have a full time job as a sales person, but as I work in shifts I tend to have a little bit of creative time every week. I love the creating part, but I could really use a secretary to do all the writing bits. It's not that I don't enjoy it, but it steels time away from the most fun part, creating!

A: Scrapbooking is your passion, isn't it? When it came into your life? How long do you scrapbook?

R: You have that right, scrapbooking is my passion! I've done all sorts of crafts my whole life, but scrapbooking really hit me like a ton of bricks. I started doing pages about four years ago, even though I've made sort of minialbums from all of my vacations. My first pages were about my first born and then after my younger girl was born I of course started doing pages about her, too. Nowadays I try to scrap about my husband and myself also.

My style has evolved much since the beginning and I think I really starting to find my style two years ago when I suddenly realized the base of the layout is "just paper" meaning that if I didn't like how adding different mediums to the background looked like, I just could throw the paper away and start again. The photo could be reprinted and the memories would be safe in my mind regardless what happened to the paper.

A: On your website there are information about companies, you worked for and where you were published. So many of them! But I feel that you are very modest. Such cooperation must be a great opportunity for meeting new people and your artistic development. Could you tell us some more?

R: I've been really fortunate to get published and to get to work with a number of different companies. I treasure every opportunity I've been given. I'm always jumping up and down with joy when I get accepted to a DT or when a page gets published!

I love meeting people who share the same passion! I also love how every assignment gives me a challenge whether it being a page for a publication or for a design team. Every team gives so much - inspiration, friends and guidance. One can only feel blessed!

I've dreamt about being in a manufacturer team and during 2013 my dreams became reality. It still feels a bit unreal! So at the moment my design teams include manufacturers 7 Dots Studio and 3rd Eye, online shop Mixed Media Place, publications paperHaus, Craft Stamper and Scrap365 together with challenge sites CSI, Scrap Around The Word.

A: What are your challenges and goals for 2014?

R: I got back to work last autumn after being a home mom for over four years. So I guess the challenge continues to be combining my artistic goals and aspirations to work and family life. As I said the shift work allows me to create on weekly basis but on the other hand the evening shifts are time away from my family. It's a tight rope walking every mother knows.

Interview: Agnieszka Arnold and Riikka Kovasin, translation: Patrycja Lech"