These are the 3 current designs I am trying to finish carving.
Actually I HAVE finished carving 2 of these. You can see some images of these linoblocks below – I only have to trim the edges on them.
What you will notice is the 2 different types of lino I have used.
The reddy brown one is some lino I had bought in a really large piece and this is the 2nd last one I am carving using this particular brand. the last one is the one I am still working on – I find it easy to carve and great for larger areas but a bit ‘crumbly’ in the very fine sections of my carving and therefore a little annoying.
The other is grey which is the Silkcut Lino – as I have said before SOOO glad they went back to the ‘older’ style of grey lino recipe rather than the one that was a very light brown that I found difficult to work with.
So these are essentially ready to print. But I do like to print a few blocks at a time as it means I have to only set up and clean up once and sometimes it helps with getting a good flow when you are printing. You have more time to get into a rhythm and get some nice printing happening.
The final block is of Australian Rainforest Flowers. It is quite a complicated and intricate design. So my method of working with carving this block is to eseentially carve around the outlines of the sections I wish to carve out with a fine blade and then come back with a larger blade and scoop out the broader sections. I finally finish by coming back over the design again with the very fine blade and set up nice sharp clean edges so that I can get nice clean edges over the whole design for printing. It is time consuming but I get the print that I want at the end of the day!
So here is the inital ‘outlining of the design completed – now about to start with the wide blade and scoop out the larger areas I want to be white/colour.
Wildflowerings - Art Studio Diary 
They’re looking good! I was going to ask whether you were reserving the crumbly lino for designs with broader lines, but I can see from your photos that you’re not. You must be holding your breath with every cut!
Well it was necessity really I used the last lot of Silkcut for the Banksias and I couldn’t get the Silkcut lino in the larger pieces locally at the time – they said a 2month wait so I was less than impressed! So I just go carefully and where it is a bit crumby I adjust the carving. Also a bit of super glue comes in handy sometimes!! LOL
Perhaps thinking of it as a challenge might be appropriate!!