craftygal scraps - Born to Craft

Welcome

Some years back, I was sitting at my boyfriend’s band practice, stitching away on an elaborate cross-stitch rendering of a medieval tapestry. When the band took a break, their drummer eyed my work and turned to his girlfriend with a worried look in his eye. "You don’t do anything like that, do you, babe?" he asked. She assured him she did not. And while I continued to stitch away, I wondered if I might be the only person my age interested in the craft. Certainly the bulk of available patterns indicated that the average cross-stitch fanatic was happy to work up corny sayings and folksy animals. And none of my friends showed any interest in my hobby. Aside from occasionally marveling at how I found the time and patience to do this work, they seemed to think that such a hobby was destined to leave me a crazy old woman living in a house full of cats, stitching maniacally into the night.

Years later, I met Taryn and Christy, and was delighted to learn that they too were closet crafters. They had cross-stitch projects in the work, and introduced me to the world of rubber-stamping. We had crafting nights together and encouraged each other in our pursuits. One day the three of us were eating lunch when we were joined by a friend who told us of her evening filled with mishaps. "And then," she said, "I had bought this cross-stitch kit, so I thought I’d get started on that, but I couldn’t figure it out at all." We immediately started offering advice and told her she was welcome to come stitch with us. She was completely taken by surprise. "I totally thought you guys would mock me out for doing cross-stitch!" she exclaimed. We were glad to assure her that she was not alone in her crafting interests.

It was in moments like these that we realized that there were other crafters who were actually in need of encouragement, and that there were still other folks out there making a living with their crafts. Why not create a place where we could all share ideas, inspiring stories, and our overall interest in creating a crafty life? It was then that the craftygal idea was born.

Amie joined Taryn, Christy, and I in a writers’ circle. When she caught wind of craftygal, her journalistic instincts kicked into high gear and she began plotting articles she could write on craftygal outings.

And so it was that we found ourselves on our first official outing at a local bingo hall decked out in our "Ladies Sewing Circle and Terrorist Society" t-shirts (get yours here). We were all thirsty and decided to walk over to a nearby gas station to buy some beverages. As we were paying for our drinks, a fellow behind the counter asked, "You guys are a sewing circle?" When we confirmed our status as a sewing circle AND terrorist society, he confided, "I made my hat." We all applauded his sewing efforts, and when we recounted the story later, we realized that we were already living out craftygal’s mission to encourage fellow crafters everywhere.

Welcome

Craftygal's Top 8 Crafty Songs

Craftygal's
Top 8 Crafty Songs