What Are You Working On? is for all things hand-made, home-made, and creative in a variety of mediums.
I feel I am still in my learning phase with quilting and embroidery. Probably will feel that all my life. As such, before COVID times, I’d usually attend a couple of “conferences” a year. I put conferences in quotes, because I could be a week long class at the Clearing in Wisconsin, or five days at John Campbell Folk school, or five days at the Applique Academy at Colonial Williamsburg. Not to mention occasional classes at quilt shows. I am a more visual learner.
Then came COVID times. Opportunities for in-person learning ended, as was reasonable. I still wanted to learn more though. So Zoom and UTube became my friends. I had used UTube to watch how specific embroidery and knitting stitches were done for years. But that was very focused to a single specific instance.
This spring, Embroiders Guild of America, the Great Lakes Region, held a virtual conference. OK. I decided to give it a try. The image on top, Memories of ***, is one of the results. Another project (I took 2 multiday classes) is not finished. It is below, called Partridge in a Pear Tree.
It needs more work obviously. This was the first time I had done padded embroidery. You can see the top right pear showing the padding before the top layer of embroidery covers it.
For quilting, I’ve done a few quilt alongs. Below is one square from a fall quilt along.
Pat Sloan also has multiple quilt alongs usually going on at Ilovetomakequilts.com. She had videos that go over how to do each square. I’ve done her Summer Soiree. A few of the blocks are below.
The point of this is, while I prefer in person-learning, I have found online / virtual learning works well. Particularly with a good teacher. What I miss most with the virtual learning is the lack of camaraderie of fellow enthusiasts. Still, it works. So even though meeting is person is limited, I feel I am still continuing my learning journey.
What are you thoughts on virtual learning in crafts?
And, of course, What Are You Working On?