Weaving Our Words: Links from the THREADSTACK Community

First report from Quiltropolis, embroidery capturing a gone-extinct animal, choosing process over perfection, and more ...

Jul 01, 2024

Welcome to THREADSTACK’s weekly roundup of writing about the world of fiber/yarn arts/crafts. I am excited about this week’s contributions. I am also super excited about the rich conversation that’s still going in the THREADSTACK community question thread that we started last week. We’ll definitely be doing more of those.

Have an old or new article related to thread/yarn that you want to share in next week’s roundup? Submit a link using this Google Form. More details here.

Gratitude to
Marianne Fons
of
Reporting from Quiltropolis

for sharing insights from having “spent three decades deep in the quilting industry.” And for sharing this beautiful quilt that has me in awe:

"Reporting from Quiltropolis" is Marianne Fons' inaugural essay in her Substack column by the same name. Fons is known to millions of quilters who watched her cohost "Fons & Porter's Love of Quilting" on public television. She writers from her small town of Winterset, Iowa, which she has nicknamed Quiltropolis, because so many quilty things happen there.

And Marianne reminds us: “It takes a long time to finish a quilt (or any other thing you're making) if you're not working on it.”

Which makes me think of the Julia Cameron quote:

“But do you know how old I will be by the time I learn to really play the piano / act / paint / write a decent play?"
Yes . . . the same age you will be if you don't.”

Reporting from Quiltropolis

If you think quiltmaking is a quaint hobby pursued by a few old ladies just trying to kill time, you are wrong. Today, more Americans (around ten million) are quilting than ever before. Quilters tend to be women, but there are talented men among us. Money-wise, quilters spend around $3.76 billion per year on cotton fabric, patterns, thread, and computer…

6 months ago · 11 likes · 7 comments · Marianne Fons

Gratitude to
Melissa Wiley
of
Catalog of Enthusiasms
for sharing

“A short piece about a now-extinct rat I stitched for my Endlings project” … It’s so adorable!!!!!!!

and for sharing this message to the community which I feel so much myself:

“What a joy to find my feed filled with color, thanks to Threadstack!”

Catalog of Enthusiasms

An embroidered ode to a rat who has left the planet

This little fellow is a Bramble Cay melomys, also known as the Bramble Cay mosiac-tailed rat. I first made his acquaintance when I began researching “endlings”—the last individuals of a species before it goes extinct. I planned to design and stitch a series of pieces to ho…

5 months ago · 17 likes · 4 comments · Melissa Wiley

And gratitude to
Caroline Osella
of
Rewilded Anthropologist

for sharing the story of how

“A craft newbie longs for perfection - before realising that *the process* is what's important for them. It's OK to be (very) less than perfect.”

Echoing that for sure. I am very much a process crafter. End products are nice but they’re rarely the point for me.

Rewilded Anthropologist

Shitty Crafts

I thought I’d do a quick share of something I got into over lockdown, which began as something of a time-pass and then turned into both a kind of mindfulness practice and also a soapbox to yell about: shitty crafts. You know how at primary school, they get you to try everything…

10 months ago · 4 likes · 7 comments · Caroline Osella

One of the things you’re invited to include if you submit a link to this roundup is a shoutout to another THREADSTACKER we might all like to know and I’m grateful to Caro for shouting out:

I love
Ana Torradinhas
of
Unfinished Object
for her deep understandings of the philosophy of hand-craft, for her extraordinary multi-modal creativity - and for her inspiring designs.

YES YES YES.