The journey of an itinerant crafter
Recovering at the moment from, what seems to me, a long illness, I am discovering the benefits of creativity. It has taken me some time to realise it, but designing, crafting and making things are having tangible and positive effects on my health.
Epiphanies
My recent situation has made me think about starting a blog. Oh boy, have I been thinking… REALLY thinking. You know, the kind of thinking you do when spending serious hours, nay days, in Pinterestland and other Youtubelicious places. However, these online adventures have gradually led to epiphany #1: I need a blog AND a website.
Great idea’, said the husband.
‘Definitely a good idea’, said the doctor.
Yaaasssss’ and ‘👏🏼🔥💪🏼✅’, said both the children (technically now actual adults, but that’s another story).
So that did it.
And here we are.
Easy….
actually far from it!
Truthfully the only reason I have got this far is that I am almost certain this post is not going anywhere near viral.
Second truth: I don’t really have a clear idea of where this is going. Narrowing down website topic and focus has been pretty challenging. Not only has my ill-health put me off kilter, but my eclectic approach to crafting doesn’t lend itself easily to writing anything highly specific. I have always loved designing and making things, largely magpie-ing my way through creative childhood hobbies, having a go at anything and everything.
So thinking about this bloomin’ blog has hardly been therapeutic up to now; more like a surge of self-doubt and creative identity crisis… Illustration or card / jewellery-making? Collage, print-making or painting? Sewing, felting, quilting or crochet? Up-cycling with furniture and fabrics or even floral design, as a bit of a wildcard thrown into the mix? Crafting chaos…? Maybe.
Anyway… having been told that doing this would be good for me, I’ve become an avid reader of many wonderful blogs by artisans, artists, quilters and craftspeople who share their art and practice online. How can I possibly pack all my various artistic endeavours into a manageable -sized suitcase to be carried into the blogosphere?
And then it started to dawn on me… taking a heavy suitcase on this kind of journey might just slow me down and be awfully tiring. So, like a piece of raggedy-old, half-finished embroidery with loose threads all over the place, I am launching this blog precisely because things are unfinished. My two significant discoveries:
- that my creativity does in fact have a common thread to it (ha ha) and that textile art is at the heart of it
- that the journey of learning, reflecting and developing artistically could be the thing that helps link these threads… AND be the focus of the blog.
Therefore I am going to try and document how my textile and fibre arts develop …. Perhaps I will be able to gain greater insight through pushing myself to practise more intensely and reflect more thoughtfully, knowing I have made a commitment to record the process?
I might even find that I become a little bit more like one of the inspiring crafters I so admire?
But, if I don’t, writing this post has led to the best epiphany of all …. it doesn’t matter one little bit. One way or the other I will have managed to start getting my threads together.
credits
title photo by Emma Louise Comerford on Unsplash suitcase photo by Erwan Hesry on Unsplash
