I'm excited to kick off 2013 by recognizing a wonderful crafty artist and all around awesome human,
Jillybeans!! Jilly has contributed a long list of projects to our Miscellaneous corner of Craftster and every single one of them has brought a smile to my face. Her art and spirit are both so happy - and I would know because I've been lucky enough to meet her in person!!
Jilly recently took some time to tell us a little more about her crafty self. I hope you enjoy reading this interview as much as I did!
How long have you been crafting? What's the first thing you remember crafting? Honestly, I can't remember a time in my life that I haven't been crafting. My mom was, and still is, very support of my crafting love. Though she was very crafty herself. She made most of my clothing, and she cross stitched, painted pottery, and was practically a jack of all trades. Even if we were tight on money, she always seemed to find the money to buy me new craft supplies. One of my earliest crafts was a rubber band man that I made my mom and dad. I was probably 3 or 4, and I grabbed some rubber bands, made a head and torso and then cut out really tiny arms and legs out of paper with tiny pieces of tape to hold it all together. That thing lived on our basement door for the longest time. Besides that, I did a lot of jewelry making and card making as a kid. Most of my rubber stamp collection are ones I've had since I was a kid. Probably some of my beads, too.
What's your favorite media to work with?Currently my loves are watercolors and paper, as well as working with felt. Though I go through phases of loving certain media. Sometimes I will be all about making jewelry, or knitting on my knifty knitter, or cross stitching. Both working with felt and watercolors are both newer mediums for me.
What inspires you?Craftster! I finally joined in 2011, excitedly awaited my month waiting period and started swapping! Since then, my crafting has intensified ten fold! I honestly can say I didn't craft as much as I do now. It was always part of my life, but now it is a HUGE part of my life. There are so many awesome swaps and each fills me up with so many new ideas. My husband is also a huge inspiration to me. He is always supporting me and helps me come up with new ideas when I'm stuck. He is an amazing sounding board.
Do you have a crafty/creative philosophy?If I had to think of one, it would probably be just have fun, or TRY ALL THE THINGS! Since crafting should be fun and freeing and I eventually want to know it all! I hope to soon learn how to crochet! I've always wanted to learn, and I think this is the year for it!
On what other boards can Craftster members find your work? Well, lets see:
Bath and Beauty
Cooking
Home Sweet Home
Image Reproduction Techniques
Jewelry and Trinkets
Knitting
More Art, Less Craft
Needlework
Occasions and Holidays
Paper Crafts, Scrapbooking & ATCs
Pottery, Ceramics, Polymer Clay
Purses, Bags, Wallets
Quilting
Toys, Dolls and Playthings
LOTS AND LOTS in the Swap Galleries, though I try to give project I make in the swaps its own posting on the boards.
I do A LOT of ATCs, since I've been running the Ongoing ATC Swap for over a year now. I also make a lot of freezer paper stenciled t-shirts. My husband, dad and BIL love them, so they get quite a few. I love to dabble in new things. Last fall I took my very first pottery class, which I thoroughly enjoyed and was told that I excelled at. Throwing was an incredible experience. I hope to return to a new set of pottery classes soon. Or, hey, maybe even a glass fusing class! That would be fun!
What's your favorite creation that you've posted on Craftster?Aw man, that's a hard question. I love a lot of stuff I've made. Being in so many swaps, my husband sees a lot of things made by me that leaves our place to its new home, and it makes him sad. ^_^ He ends up wanting to keep a lot of it. Well, I can't pick one, so I think my favorites are the Teesha Moore style Harry Potter Tote that I made for my SIL for her birthday or the Elmer's Sponsered Zentangle High Heels I made for my sister's birthday. I had seen so many wonderful TM stuff that sheepBlue was making. I immediately fell in love with the style of it. I knew it was within my realm of abilities to try it, since it had almost no machine sewing to it, since I'm not great with a sewing machine. Though, of course, to make it I would need to learn how to embroider. ^_^ It was hard to give away, since it took over a month of work to complete, with my new embroidery skills. I'm much quicker now. My fingers developed some new callouses from that project. The heels are something I dreamed up. I always wanted to do some zentangles, and realized around the time I was doing projects for Elmers that it would make a great project for that. They were so easy and so much fun. I've made a few different pairs now, and I love each equally. I know I'm not done making them, since I haven't even made a pair for myself yet.
http://www.craftster.org/forum/index.php?topic=405039.0http://www.craftster.org/forum/index.php?topic=407228.0
What's your favorite item on Craftster created by someone else?Not a surprise to anyone, but I'm completely enamored by everything Knickertwist does. Her "A Little House of Everyday Wonders" that she made for a swap partner is amazing!
http://www.craftster.org/forum/index.php?topic=353043.0I also love the work of sheepblue, as I mentioned, LimeRiot, cackle, rackycoo, and my crafty bff, gozer.
Thank you for sharing this with us, Jilly and for sharing so many inspiring and helpful projects with the entire Craftster community. You ROCK!
