Making things

It’s high time I explained that one of the inspirations for these Scrips was a friend’s blog.

Here's the link:

Julia's creative year

In her introduction, Julia describes how she wanted to try a year of exploring “different ways of being creative.” She wanted to learn new skills, “and relax, and hopefully develop my creativity along the way.” After the year was up, she kept going, and from the start she chronicled her adventures in a blog, an illustrated conversation with her readers.

There’s a lovely openness, in Julia's posts, about the mistakes and successes of each project. She makes many different things, some for the first time—crocheted scarves, watercolour paintings, fabric bags and skirts, felted pictures, jewellery, and more. The blog sparkles with the excitement that comes from creating, especially when you start off doubtful that you can. And she doesn’t hide her struggle with perfectionism. On June 17th she writes about making a book (one of my favourite posts, of course!) using Coptic stitching to bind the pages. She didn’t start off with enough thread, so had to tie on more. Now, there is a knot where there shouldn’t be. But she laughs about it; she’ll just have to plan better next time, she says; and, " Oh well, it’s a good job I'm getting to be less of a perfectionist in my crafts!"

This honest dialogue with readers, this reminder that creativity is play, and that it’s fun to make things, as well as to enjoy what other people make, all of it prompted me to start writing these little scrips. I'm trying to be less of a perfectionist myself in them, and not to worry about any visible knots.