Craft books, tools, makers, craft travel and craft inspiration. That will be the focus of this webpage. It’s about the doing of it has always been my personal mantra and I am still “doing it”. Weaving, spinning, felting, some torch work to keep my hand in the glass but I am also interested now in writing about it as well as learning about and introducing the makers of today. I hope to find some in my backyard but traveling to find new makers to introduce will be my reason to say, I have to go! Come with me as we look for craft inspiration wherever we go.
During these winter snowstorms, I always think that I will go though all of my drawers, closets, nooks and multiple crannies, where things get stashed and forgotten. It has been a particularly brutal winter, so it seems like a good time to start. I thought an easy starting place would be my magazines. I would clean up some piles and pass along any that I didn’t need, to fiber friends who might enjoy them. I started with my Spin Off Magazines. I have stacks of them going back 20 years. Some I hadn’t looked at in those same 20 years; since the day I first read them. This should be easy. Spread out in front of the wood stove. Sit on the floor with the dog and be ruthless. I would just keep the ones that had really good stuff in them: articles with technical information, history and travel. I could dream of places I haven’t been to see fiber I haven’t spun. I didn’t need the beginner articles or the project/pattern heavy issues. We all know we don’t need new projects! Needless to say, this didn’t go as planned. The first issue I picked up was Summer 2001, which contained “Learn How To Spin Silk with Sara Lamb”. I don’t need a silk refresher so this can go. I should not have opened the cover. Her article was “Spinning Silk for Weaving” and the jackets that were made from the spun and woven silk were amazing. NO! No new projects, especially …
Look what I found growing in the woods. I wonder if you can use it for dyeing?
This is what it takes to make me work on the computer. Inches and inches of snow, brutal wind chill and a warm fire to type by. This is the time of year to get organized before the busy days of spring. When the sunshine is calling and the garden needs planted. I always say, when it is snowing I will get my website going. Well, it is snowing!