These are the sweet handmade ornaments I received in this year’s Craft Club swap and I love them. Elizabeth crocheted the adorable apron, Debbie (who is super talented and totally needs to start a blog to show off her work) knitted the cute little cupcake and Catherine made the stocking complete with an “I love [...]

It seems I’m always on some kind of deadline. Today I’m on a column deadline and a self-imposed art quilt deadline. While it seems ridiculous to suggest I have to finish a small quilt this month in the midst of everything else, that’s exactly what I’m doing. I spent the evening working on my quilt [...]

This is the apron I made today to wear to Renegade. (Who makes an apron to wear to Renegade?! “Hi, my name is Jennifer and it all makes perfect sense to me.) I really like it, but I’m bummed that I ran out of steam before I could complete the custom, CraftSanity embroidered pocket. So [...]

I’ve had three boxes of fabric piled up in my dining room for weeks now. It’s been sitting there urging me to do something with it, reminding me daily of the commitment I made to do my best to transform it into something wonderful. I accepted the fabric on behalf of the Craft Club I [...]

We made fabric pendants today at the Y Craft Club meeting. This one could use more embellishment, but I’ll add that another day. These pendants would make great gift tags and interesting adornments for handmade cards and scrapbook pages. Podcast update: We’re working on it. Really we are. We’ll post it as soon as s [...]

When local calligrapher Jennifer Buck and I cooked up a plan to throw together an impromptu calligraphy workshop, I expected to fill a small room at the Y with about 25 people or so. Wow, did I underestimate my reading public. I’ve been OVERWHELMED with sign-ups and had to request a larger room and plan [...]

Feast your eyes on these beauties. (Scroll down to see more.) Aren’t these ATCs great? They are the result of the artist trading card workshop, our resident expert, Diane Moser, led us through last month. Tuesday about a dozen workshop participants returned to the YMCA to swap their cards. Like a proud mama, Diane led [...]

Okay, so I haven’t tasted it yet, but I’m already smitten. This week’s CSA farm share included this beautiful, bright swiss chard. I love the way the stalks look in the recycled pear jar I like to keep around and use as a vase. Nutritious eye candy. Perfect. Now I just have to figure out [...]

Tuesday night’s birdhouse workshop at the YMCA in Grand Rapids was a loud success. We had some craft club regulars and several first timers join us to learn some great woodworking tips from Dan Boy, the master woodworker I featured in Sunday’s craft column. I ended up bending more than my share of nails, but [...]

Hey, West Michigan readers! I’d like to invite you to the David D. Hunting YMCA in Grand Rapids Tuesday night to make a birdhouse with the Grand Rapids Craft Club. We will be hosting a workshop led by Dan Boy, the master woodworker I featured in today’s Grand Rapids Press craft column. The workshop is [...]

I taped the quilt to the dining room floor and basted it with pins. Now for the quilting… I’m going to stitch around all the embroidered panels first, working from the center out. Then I’m going to fill the spaces in between with free-motion quilting. We’ll see how it goes… In unrelated news, I invite [...]

Every Tuesday night I go to CRAFT CLUB at the Y and hang out with kindred spirits. Since I’m the chatty founder of the group, I’m finding that I don’t get much work done during the meetings and still end up making a bulk of my projects at home way after midnight. Nevertheless, I’m having [...]