I’ve been earning my living as a designer,  fiber artist, writer, workshop presenter, and other wild and wonderful ways (professional puppeteer included) for more than 35 years.  Over those decades, I have come up with some handy  ways of organizing my work.
When I am working on a new book,
(like I am right now)
I have dozens of projects in the works all at once,
and each of the projects has heaps of iterations.
I make a project over
and over and over,
refining and honing it.
Lots of the versions will simply
get frogged as soon as I recognize
a problem and note what I
have to do to …read more

Yesterday, I reviewed Jane Patrick’s wonderful book: Time To Weave.
In ‘Time To Weave’, she has a project (with variations) that uses a peg or stick loom.
She made her weaving sticks by cutting lengths of aluminum tubing.
I was pleased to see that she had included the stick loom in the book, as it’s a small loom that has lots of creative potential.
Seeing her version of the stick loom reminded me that it was something that I had been exploring about a year or so ago.
So, I went and dug out my version of the stick loom.
(Well, to be perfectly honest, I …read more

When my daughter and her husband moved into their new house, they trimmed a branch that was hanging over the sidewalk.
I brought the branch home and let it dry out for a few months.
I trimmed the small stickie outie bits off….
And carefully sliced pieces off the branch. The pine wood smelled wonderful!
Then drilled holes
Voila! Handmade wooden buttons- they need to be waxed or varnished…
perhaps embellished with a little woodburning or paint first?
Hmmmm….. my son trimmed the apple trees…. perhaps I should make some apple wood buttons…..

Do you have a million notes to yourself – with brilliant little flashes of inspiration, or more mundane, ‘Remember to…..’ floating around your work space?
Well…. here’s a fun and funky ‘green living’ alternative to all those scraps of paper.
Make yourself a Chalkboard Dolly to  write all those little notes to yourself instead of having a mountain of little notes.
On the one hand, those little slips of paper can get lost so easily.
On the other… they have a way of stacking up and turning into clutter.
With a few simple tools, you can make yourself a very neat Chalkboard Mamma, who will …read more

In these challenging and  stressful times, people are finding relief by reaching back in time to embrace and re-interpret vintage crafts.  Yarn is one of the greatest sources of comfort imaginable, so it is natural for yarn lovers to find ways of soothing themselves, AND other people with their yarnworks. I have been mulling over some yarnie comforts lately…..
Yesterday,  we had a very stressful day. We went to visit an old friend who is terribly ill in the hospital.
As we were leaving the hospital, talking quietly together about our friend, a young woman dashed into the elevator with us.  We …read more

For the longest time, I have been planning a scarf on the Butterfly Loom.  I have  handspun 2 shades of  yarn for the scarf .
I have been spool knitting variegated handspun for the edging, so I posted a tutorial about how to spool knit a sturdy cord on 2 pegs with thin yarn.  Tutorial
Here’s a pic of the 2 shades of yarn that I spun for it, as well as the Butterfly loom, a spool knitter, my Nostepinne, and a flower loom (I think I will add flowers soon….)
The instructions that come with the loom show how to stitch …read more

The Lily Speed-O-Weave is a wonderful vintage loom that is no longer produced. Luckily, they still show up in garage and yard sales, second hand stores and on eBay.
I am in the process of making a series of ‘how to work with the Lily Speed-O-Weave’ loom video tutorials.
The first one is an introduction, showing how to wrap the loom with the warp strand layers.
The yarn in the video is Lily Sugar’n Cream in Black and Lily Sugar’n Cream in white. I hold 2 strands of yarn together as one strand throughout the whole project.
In the video, I  wrap the pegs …read more

Crocheted pocket dolls are wonderful gifts. They are quick and easy to make, and because they are small, they are wonderfully portable.
Crocheted Pocket Dolls are excellent as comfort dolls.
If you have a friend or family member who is in need of comfort or a little extra love, why not crochet a  little pocket doll for them?
Add wings and it’s an angel….
I am going to share my design for a super simple crocheted pocket doll that you can make as plain as you would like, or you can embellish and make it as wild as you can imagine.
You can stitch a …read more

I’ve been posting all kinds of tutorials on weaving with yarn on the potholder loom, but haven’t put the links to  the basic ‘how to’ tutes up on Hankering for Yarn.
This is kind of inconvenient for some readers, who like to have things organized all together, so I’ll post the tutes to Hankering for Yarn.
The potholder loom is a wonderfully simple loom that has been under estimated for it’s creative potential.
I suspect that is because most people associate them with loops, which have -ahem- severe limitations (to say the least).
Yarn is so wonderful and colorful and textural and ubiquitous and …read more

Last night, I was working on a crocheted and woven sculpture.  I worked a motif for it in bullion stitch.
I thought about how much I love working the bullion stitch, but how sometimes, the bullion stitch can be challenging for people.
So, of course, I thought…. time to make a video!
And, here is a little video that shows how easy it can be to crochet the bullion stitch, which is a lovely decorative stitch.
It’s fun to do the bullion stitch, once you’ve got the secret to it!
Remember to relax your grip somewhat when you are doing the bullion stitch, as a …read more