Cloud Mobiles, Classes, and Crafting.

 
Hello friends,

The studio is abuzz with all sorts of wonderful projects right now. I am teaching a section on soft sculpture over at our online course, INTERWOVEN. It's wonderful to research sculptors, fiber artists, textile artists, and to amass the lists into "art" and "craft" categories and giggle as the lines between the two categories look more like a spider's web and less like a spreadsheet. Of course, they do!

I am teaching the students to make a cloud mobile this week--a very simple introduction to soft sculpture and working 3-dimensionally with fabric. It's exciting to talk about all the different types of fiberfill, the details of a blanket stitch, and my techniques for making patterns. (You can still join us for the last three of four sections--crochet was last week but soft sculpture, embroidery, and quilting are still to come. And you can use the code JOINUS for a 10% discount at checkout, my treat.)

It's good to work on such a small sculpture after twisting my brain around the set design and its many abstract parts. It's rewarding to sit down, sketch, cut, stitch, stuff, and assemble a small mobile in just a few hours. I like straddling this line--the large-scale installation work and the small-scale craft work--and then reconnecting with the parts of me that once worked as a teacher and a writer too. (Hello, various parts.) It feels right to work on both sides of the "art" and "craft" divides as I sew and stitch my way through each project.

And I am super (duper, duper) excited to say that the Country Living article featuring the 2012 Blue Ribbon Bloggers is now out in the world! (I blushed when I typed that line. Really.) So to those of you visiting for the very first time-- by way of Country Living's new March issue-- welcome. I'm so glad to have you here and look forward to getting to know you in the months to come.

Now then, Happy Valentine's Day, dear sweethearts! Eat chocolate. Drink wine. Draw pink chalk hearts all over the sidewalks. I hope Cupid aims his crooked little arrow straight at your big complicated heart.

xoxo,
k