The Creating Place Blg

Hello Creating Placers!

Hi there, I am the newest addition to the Creating Place crew. My name is Jenyfer and I am crafty. I am new to paper art, and very excited to learn! My craft of choice depends on the day. I have a bachelor of fine arts with a specialty in stained glass, however, I paint, sew, knit, experiment with graphic art, and I am a photographer. I am very excited to be a Creative Consultant here at the Creating Place and look forward to meeting you, the Creating Placers. Keep visiting our calendar; starting in March I will be hosting several photography classes to help you understand your camera and give you basic guidelines for taking creative images.

Check out my website! It is always under construction.
http://web.mac.com/jenyferlewis

The week of February 3rd - 9th:

On Thursday Anji taught a fantastic Bauble Heart class over lunch. We had a great time shaking it up and making a beautiful mess. Don't worry you have a chance to take this colorful class next Tuesday, February 12th from 12:15 -1:00. Bobble hearts make a great handmade gift for that special person in your life!

The week of Feruary 10th - 16th: Coming Up!

Want to get out of the house tomorrow (Feb. 9th) but it's to cold to be outside? There will be a fun Valentine Gift box class here at the Creating Place from 10:00 - 11:30. You will be able to use the techniques taught in this class to create inexpensive gift boxes all year long. I assure you it will be warm inside.

Those of you who understand Photoshop and want to use and create brushes for your digital scrapbooking pages, there is a class for you on Monday, February 11th from 6-8. These classes open a whole new world for scrapbooking creativity. You'll be hooked.

Do you love scrapbooking but just don't have the time? Think about attending Anji's Digital Scrapbooking class on Wednesday, February 13th from 6 -8. It will give you another creative scrapbooking option.

Cards for snow days??

So today has been the snowiest day we've had so far...I had a couple customers come in today and both joked about "hey, do you have cards for congradulations on the best (or most) snow yet?" and I thought--jeez, we should!!  I do love all the cards we have--they are all visually beautiful, from the technically stunning Nikki McClue to playful Shannon Cartwright to whimsical Evon Zerbitz to simple Bella Muse to our always entertaining Kids Quotes (and of course the Mina Lee always tickle the funny bones).  And I totally love the new ones we got for valentines da (see previous blog from Anji) and of course, I'd be remiss to not mention the handmade cards we get from Sue Clover (which are amazing and very well done!).  In a society that seems to thrive on email, instant messaging, it's comforting to see handwriten cards still take center stage with such magnificence!   amy

Love for All!! new Valentines Cards are in.

Ahhhh Valentines...you love someone, they love you, they give you stuff, you give them stuff. I call Valentines Day a hype holiday. Much like new years for me it doesn't quite live up to the hype. However, recently I have been finding Valentines Cards that fit the occasion, in my mind at least. You know when you see something and it just fits...there are no words..but somehow it just fits. That's how we feel about these cards from Kim Bagwill. They just fit. They're funny, but not corny, subtle, humorous. Perfect!!

                                                                        

Precious Metal Clay Class

It's a cold cold day, but it was really warm working with torches and PMC. Heidi taught us to layer, texturize and create with PMC. Here are some pics of our work.

 

Cinder Knits are Here

We are so excited to have these great hats in by fiber artist Lucinda Pannell. We love love love these great hats. In Alaska your hat is your most important fashion accessory and these are perfect. They come in sizes for kids and adults.

Most amazing hats

So we have the good fortune of having a very talented knitter as our bookkeeper and she has made us the most wonderful knitted hats. I am really excited to post them here tommorrow after I get some good pictures. Look for them soon!!!

Tonights Digital Scrapbooking class is on using templates both that you make yourself and that you can find on the web. I love the topic of this class because it pulls the whole idea of digital scrapbooking together, from sketch to finish. I will be posting the pics from our digi class here tommorrow as well.

I'm off to teach Digital Scrabooking...bye for now

Anji

Scrapbook Layouts w/ Amber Tingey

Amber's scrapbook layouts are simple and beautiful. She is able to completely convey a story through the use of her pictures in a simple and constructive way. Amber teaches for The Creating Place once a month. In her classes you have the opportunity to make three 2 page layouts using coordinating papers and embellishments. She gives you the fourth layout at the end of class to take home and complete.

If your having in hard time getting your pages completed this class is a perfect jump start!

Amber's Class: Saturday Jan 19th 5:30 - 7:30

This Week's Featured Artist: Nikki Mcclure

When I first saw Nikki Mcclure's cards I found them beautiful and peacefule. When I realized that each image had been cut from a single sheet of paper with an exacto knife, I gained an even greater appreciation of her work. The Creating Place just brought in the 2008 Nikki Mcclure calendars. We are also really excited to have the Collected Raindrops book in stock.

Nikki McClure of Olympia, Washington is known for her painstakingly intricate and beautiful paper cuts. Armed with an X-acto knife, she cuts out her images from a single sheet of paper and creates a bold language

that

translates the complex poetry of motherhood, nature, and activism into a simple and endearing picture.

Her work depicts the virtues of hard labor and patience, which is inherent in her process as well as in the images themselves: weathered hands washing dishes, people sweeping, mothers caring for their babies, and farmers working the land. But there is also a large element of celebration, of taking the time to roll around in the grass and get wet from the early morning dew. The need for all of us to lay down on the ground, grab hold of the earth, look at the stars and dream. She magnifies the importance of simple things, like the change of seasons, slowing down the world for a moment so we can actually taste it.

Nikki's images exude a positivity that revolves around community, sustenance, parenting, and appreciating both the urban and rural landscape, undoubtedly influenced by her home in the Northwest and specifically Olympia. As one of the more prominent visual artists involved with Olympia-based record labels K and Kill Rock Stars, as well as the Riot Grrrl movement in the early nineties, Nikki's work still embodies the fiercely independent fire that fueled the passion and creativity of that time period.

She regularly produces her own posters, books, cards, t-shirts and a beloved yearly calendar as well as designs covers for countless records and books, including illustrations for magazines the Progressive and Punk Planet. She is a self-taught artist who has been making paper-cuts since 1996.

-Cinders Gallery

Anji's new art

I finished some of my metal etch pieces...finally. I really like the way the copper takes the etch. i felt transformed when I discovered what I could do with copper.

New Site is up

I feel heroic. Is it possible that I actually managed to get our site updated and online? Thank you James for reading to the kids tonight so that I could get it done.