I’ve lost count of how many times I’ve ripped my pants. If there’s a way to get stuck on a fence by the rear of my pants, by golly, I seem to find a way to do it. I’ve ripped my pants running by fences, guard rails on the side of the road and during [...]

I couldn’t sleep last night. I’m not sure what my deal was but it made for a challenging morning when I had to pull myself together and do an interview across town. Thankfully, the subject was art and craft and I was fully engaged. With that said, I headed straight back up to bed as [...]

If you’re looking for some fun new books to inspire your summer craft sessions, I invite you to read my column in today’s edition of The Grand Rapids Press. I reviewed eight books worth checking out. Enjoy!

I’m not a royal watcher and can live without reading the latest details about the upcoming nuptials of Prince William and Kate Middleton, but when you tie it all to crafting I’m suddenly very interested. A review copy of “Knit Your Own Royal Wedding” (Andrews McMeel Publishing, $17.99, 64 pages) by Fiona Goble arrived in [...]

I’m taking a quick break from spiffing up my house for the holidays to let you that I reviewed a whole stack of books in my weekly art and craft column that was published in today’s issue of The Grand Rapids Press. And I reviewed more books in the first issue of CraftSanity Magazine. I [...]

I finally finished quilting the beast that was panel three of my charity ArtPrize quilt project. I had some thread tension issues in the wee hours of the morning that cost me some valuable time and sleep, but I’m back on track and a little more in tune with my machine. If I’ve learned anything [...]

My Artprize deadline is less than two weeks away, so I’m in continuous work mode and really looking forward to taking a serious break in a couple weeks. I worked until 2:30 a.m. this morning free-motion quilting the first quilt panel. I thought I was done when I went to bed only to wake up [...]

Hello! I’m back from a short and lovely vacation with the family and excited to catch up with all of you. I’ve been working on lots of creative projects and will be sharing those is posts sprinkled out over the course of the next several days. A new podcast is in the works, too. I [...]

Baking gingerbread cookies is a big part of our holiday routine here at the CraftSanity headquarters. And the book, “Cookie Craft Christmas: Dozens of Decorating Ideas for a Sweet Holiday” by Valerie Peterson and Janice Fryer is packed with inspiration to up your game this year when it comes to cookie embellishment. (To bad the [...]

Crochet played a key role in my development as a young crafter. I got “hooked” around age 5 at Great Grandma Case’s Sunday night craft table where I learned to stitch granny squares with the crafty women in my family. I still LOVE to whip up projects with my old set of aluminum needles. (My [...]

When I sit quietly with an empty page in front of me, pausing for a moment before picking up my paint brush, I’m often surprised by what comes out on paper. I get answers on almost every page. Art journals are great that way, even for those of us who don’t consider ourselves great painters [...]

This week my Grand Rapids Press craft column is a review of some inspiring new craft books. You can read the column on my newspaper blog. And be sure to read it all the way to the end to find out how to enter to win a copy of “Weekend Sewing” by Heather Ross. I [...]

I’ve been distracted ever since I got my hands on a copy of “Weekend Sewing” by Heather Ross. It’s a beautiful book (STC Craft, $27.50) featuring illustrations by Heather and great photography by John Gruen. According to the subtitle, the book is loaded with “more than 40 projects and ideas for inspirational sewing.” And I’m [...]

A fun sample box from Jessie over at Phat Fiber arrived in the mail the other day, and, WOW, what a treat. I love, love, love yarn, so it was a very fun to go through this box of goodies that included several mini skeins of yarn, roving, stitch markers, note cards, a bar of [...]

Franklin Habit’s book, “It Itches: A Stash of Knitting Cartoon” (Interweave, $12.95), landed on my welcome mat last week and, wow, what a treat! I’ve heard Franklin read his knitting related essays on the podcast circuit, so I was well aware of his skill in the humor department. But I had yet to realize his [...]