Tag Archives: crafting

#WIPWednesday

creativity, Making,

WIP is short for “work in progress,” and is, surprise to me, a supply chain and accounting term. I encounter it in my crochet threads, and today someone referenced #wipwednesday on Instagram. The hashtag takes you to a lovely page of all sorts of WIP from crocheted blankets to hand painted miniatures. There are Lego structures and lots of visual art, all partially completed. Some people post videos as they work, describing the process and offering tips. While it is always fun to see final products, watching the process unfold is far more interesting to me as it is often hidden from view, as though seeing something being created takes away some of the magic. This hashtags celebrates creating, encouraging others to join in and experience the joy of making.

#WIPWednesday is also reassuring for crafters like me. While I tend to read one book at a time, I usually have at least three crochet projects in various stages. Right now, I am trying to finish up the second snow person in a pair before winter ends. There is also a green wool cardigan and a soft purple coverlet waiting their turns.

The snow people came in a kit that sat for a year before coming to the top of the pile. There are more kits in the closet plus more coming as I am part of a monthly crochet club. Kits, of course, do not count as WIP because they have not been started. I can always, as I did this year, gift them to someone who is not yet hooked on crocheting. (See what I did there?) And, kits are a hedge against the future when, presumably, I will finish all my WIP and existing kits and need something new to work on and no longer have access to the outside world. (Zombie apocalypse perhaps?)

I wish for you a WIP in 2024. Give yourself permission to just work on something without worrying too much about the final product. Take your time, sink into the creating, make it a a meditative act, connect with a still place beyond the frenzy of the world. And, yes, I might be talking about crocheting a dishcloth.

Happy #WIPWednesday!

Thinking About Crafting

art, creativity, learning

I have been binge watching the PBS series Craft in America. It features American handcrafters and is the creation of a nonprofit in Los Angeles. Many of the artisans who are featured were doing the work as a hobby but eventually found ways to make it the focus of their lives. The series features a wide variety of crafters from sculptors to violin makers. Individual programs are organized around themes such as memory and community.

As I pursue my own crafting more deeply, listening to these artists talk about their process and progress has helped strengthen my commitment. I was initially a little frustrated with the box making instructor as she seemed to take a long time to get to the box making. But, I realized, as I settled in to listen, that she was discussing her creative process in developing the box, showing the iterations that led to the current product. She was inviting us into that process. We were doing more than just following directions.

Check out the holiday version of the series:

Creating Time for Creativity

creativity

Making, creating, crafting…increasingly, the virtual world is the place to share your analog creations. While the maker movement tends to focus on electronic making, there is a huge homemade crafting movement going on. Just as educators are trying to find time for creativity in schools, so grown ups are trying to find time to create as well. In my younger days, I was a cross stitcher and made complicated samplers. I look at them now and wonder when I found the time. Perhaps it is telling that they were all made pre-Internet days when I had a “regular” job and did not live on a farm. I could spend a Saturday afternoon listening to a book or watching a movie and stitching. Now, I spend much of my time with a laptop on my lap.

But, I still try to find time to craft. For now, it’s mostly crocheting. It’s easy to pick it up for a few minutes while dinner is cooking or as I watch the news. It takes a different part of my brain but it isn’t mindless. Crocheting requires pretty sturdy math skills and just general concentration.

So, I was excited to discover that March is National Craft Month. And a new organization called cre8time is doing what they can to encourage people to make time for crafting. The goal is just 8 minutes twice a day which leads to 8 hours a month. The video may be a bit dramatic (I think it’s the music) but it reminds us that in the busy-ness of life, we need to find time to create.