blogging tips

me, at work, blogging as if my life depended on it

A quick post to bring your attention to some great hints and tips from AliciaMae on the Blogfire, the Bloggers Guild of ArtFire bloggers blog (phew!). She's running a series of articles on how to set up your blog.

Check out the latest on tagging your blog entries and see the previous article on how to alter the layout of your page (which the more astute of you will notice that I have followed!)

Thanks Alicia

Handmade Nation coming to Vancouver BC

Yes, Faith Levine's documentary Handmade Nation, is coming to Vancouver. The amazing duo behind Got Craft, Rob and Andrea, have arranged the premier screening of the film with Ms Levine in attendance. It's taking place at the Rio Theatre on Broadway at Commercial on Thursday, 9th July. Doors open at 7pm for the craft showcase and the film starts at around 8pm.

Full details and tickets are available on the website.

See you there!

PS: and if you miss the artisan showcase chock full of incredible local talent then check out the next Got Craft bite size fair at Little Mountain studio on Sunday, July 12th!

what can you do out and about?

portable crafting projects completed

Maybe some inspiration for what can be created with just wire, a crochet hook and some pliers?

design-a-day

crafted portably of course - glass and copper wire crochet

 

Yesterday was Canada Day - my tent blew away but I did make some good sales (rather than the great sail that my tent was making!).

Before my tent went aerial I managed to set up my smaller table to put on an "artisan at work" demo (since I was in an artisan showcase). The wire crochet drew lots of attention and I had some lovely chats with some fascinating onlookers. Hopefully I'll see some of them when I resume teaching classes in the Fall.

I've got another couple of craft fairs coming up over the next two weeks then it's summer holidays for me. For inspiration I've set up a design-a-day challenge for myself. It will run until the end of July and document my crafty endeavours thru the first half of The Wee Guy's school holiday. Check out the flickr set of work done so far.

Currently it's running at 2 out of the 6 listed projects being portably crafted, including the sumptuous copper wire crochet cuff shown below. This was completed during my first stint in the Blackberry Artist's Cooperative shop in Port Moody Art Centre on Sunday.

Faberge: copper wire crochet with freshwater pearls

similar for sale here

please take my child to work day - yabloodyhoo

portable crafting kit - ready to go

Today is "(Please) Take My Children To Work" day - but I am unlikely to benefit from this (just like all the other SAHMs round here especially since school has ended for the summer).
This is a glimpse of how I routinely take my work to my child (since that is how things are done around here right now) - a tray of handcrafterly goodness with projects to complete. If I have something set up like this it means I can indeed go watch Spiceworld with The Wee Guy for the umpteenth time and manage to be productive too (and even retain a little sanity and brain power perhaps).

follower friday (it's a new thang)

IMG_2997, originally uploaded by ritasmeeta.

It's Follower Friday (bear with me, it's a new tradition I'm throwing in here to try make my blogging a little more productive). Portable Crafting now has seven amazing followers so I wanted to introduce you, gentle reader, to them one by one.
First up is ritasmeeta who makes astoundingly cute stuff as shown above, gorgeous bags and purses, and is also an active member of the Vancouver BC Etsy street team.
You can buy her work on Artfire too and read all about it here.
Thanks for following, ritasmeeta!

pattern play

simple shell stitch pattern in 28G copper

I've been itching to try this for some time but as usual time itself has been conspiring against me! Finally I tucked a crochet hook, the 28G copper wire and the pattern details into my portable crafting pouch and set off for the great outdoors.
Feeling slightly rebellious, I left my crochet hook safely hidden as I knitted alongside other local knitters at the Rocky Point Knit in Public session held on Saturday. Yes, I knew they would be OK with me crocheting .... but with wire?
I held off with the wire until most had departed then built a foundation chain and started the pattern. It's really a simple trebles and DC shell pattern built up over a multiple of 3 chains (similar to the pattern rows here). I had tried this pattern earlier on some 'proper' fibre - the 28G copper was perfect to work with though I'm not sure how well the shell pattern comes thru.