the differences from her East Coast origins. While she and her husband sat at a Lincoln stoplight, a pedestrian looked into their car, and waved at them. Vinci comically commented that the pedestrian might have been giving a totally different and not quite as friendly gesture back home, she said, laughingly.

In 2002, Vinci came upon brightly colored polymer clay-and she loved it. Vinci finds working with polymer clay "therapeutic." To date, the artist estimates that she has created over 1,000 pieces of this artwork. Vinci sells nearly every art piece she makes, mostly via the Internet, but she also shows her work at local art shows like the annual event at the Cathedral of the Risen Christ.

Creating polymer clay vases like Vinci's is a time consuming process where intricate designs and infinite color and texture possibilities necessitate some fundamental creative choices. First, taking a glass vase or receptacle, the clay is placed over the vase in the selected design or pattern and can be smoothed or textured, just like more conventional clay pottery. Unlike regular clay, polymer clay remains pliable until baked. This non-drying characteristic allows the artist to constantly work and rework the design until she is satisfied with it, Vinci said.

Many of Vinci's pieces are bold, two toned and textured, some with swirls and others with layered lines. A bright neon green piece shows off an intricate daisy-like pattern. Once Vinci finishes a desired pattern, she then bakes them in her oven -- in her kitchen! "I'm not a good cook, so the kids used to say the only thing I can bake is clay," she laughed. She also related that, at times, the horrific odor of burning polymer clay engulfed the kitchen. Apparently this scent is far from a burned pot roast dinner. This is an obnoxious chemical smell the family members did not enjoy, to say the least.

Vinci's youngest child, a 17-year-old daughter, is the only one left at home, and she will soon be off to college. Vinci, 52, sees this stage in her life as an opportunity to expand the time she spends on her art and to develop new techniques -- "branching out" in new directions.

The artist has experienced success trusting her instincts when "branching out" before. Vinci's shift from polymer clay to the decidedly different medium of digital and altered digital photographs happened on an ordinary day, because of a very ordinary event -- her sister-in-law handed her a digital camera. Vinci wanted to use the camera to take photos of her polymer clay work for a Web site. She has not made a polymer clay piece since. Smiling whenever she discusses digital photography and the program she uses to alter the mood, and the entire look of her photos, one can tell Vinci has found a new infatuation, a new passion and a new love to pursue with all her creativity. So enthusiastic is she that thousands of untouched photographs are stored and waiting until she finds the time to play with them on her computer. Using her computer as her artist's "brush" allows Vinci to make one photo look countless ways. Sometimes she makes subtle lighting or color changes. In other prints, the image becomes unrecognizable as a photo, and instead, looks like a painting or a drawing.

Though Vinci's comfort level with computer technology is high, this artist thinks she still has plenty to learn. The complex program she uses can only truly be mastered over years of practice and experimentation, though she has already taken a number of courses to learn some of the techniques she uses.

Moving to Lincoln and living in Nebraska has definitely influenced her photographic work, Vinci said. She enjoys taking pictures of wide open spaces and other Nebraska photographic opportunities like barns, which her husband enjoys helping her scout, as well as "lone trees" on wide expanses of land. Vinci draws from history of the Great Plains, as well. Fort Robinson in Nebraska is one of Vinci's favorite places to take photos.

Many of the artist's subjects are closer to home: a Monet-like Sunken Gardens pond with lilies, a unique pillar at Antelope Park and charming hidden neighborhood fences. Although she loves photographing Lincoln and the larger state of Nebraska, Vinci takes advantage of her travels. She captures some of her best photos in other locales like Charleston, South Carolina; Cape Cod, Massachusetts and Saint Louis, Missouri. Now, Vinci said she hopes to make it to New Mexico to get a more Southwest feel to some of her work.

While her photos show a wide array of subject matter, overall, her body of work is heavy on florals and architecture. Some photos search out simplicity: a blade of grass, a black and white building facade or a single, lonely sailboat. Vinci strives for this in part, because she draws inspiration from Nebraska born photographer Wright Morris's black and white photographs that often display a stark but powerful simplicity.

Vinci's love is clearly architecture, but she creates "florals" often because of the ease in taking them, she said. Her own living room walls now display two close-ups of fresh white and green flowers, with an almost ethereal soft glow. Looking at Vinci's prints and the variety of digital techniques applied to certain photos to create different looks for the same image, one can see that this is the work of an evolving artist, having fun exploring a new medium.

A perfect illustration of her differing style and substance are what Vinci calls her two "signature pieces". These two images starkly contrast one another. "Abandoned Window" shows a lonesome, vine-bedecked window on an old Cape Cod house. Vinci sells different versions of the photo, digitally altered for different effects. In each of her Abandoned Window prints, subtle changes to the photo still allow the original image to shine through, but "Late Saturday Afternoon", Vinci's tribute to her favorite artist Edward Hopper's work called "Early Sunday Morning," looks more like a brightly colored painting than a photograph of buildings lining 48th Street near the Nebraskan Wesleyan campus.

Vinci likes to take and alter photos to bring a sense of time to her audience. She wants them to look at her images, and get a sense of déjà vu. She wants them to seem like a memory or remind them of the past. She wants her pictures to be simple, old fashioned and peaceful. She executes these ideas in an art-deco inspired photo, of signage over a theater subtly infused with pastel color that evokes a dreamy sort of emotion, and in a gold tinted, twilight lit photo of the Union Station in Omaha that harkens to another time. In keeping with her overarching goals and themes, Vinci's next series will be black and white or sepia photos, she said.

This artist knows where she has come from, and she has come to this point with all her creativity intact, trust for her own creative instincts sharp and a healthy willingness to evolve when life's little things have led her down a different artistic road. Lincoln can continue to expect good things from Debbie Vinci's evolving artistic path.

To check out Debbie Vinci's art and photography please visit www.davincidesigns.com.