Showing posts with label crafts. Show all posts
Showing posts with label crafts. Show all posts

Tuesday, April 23, 2013

Member Monday: What drives you to create?

Yesterday over at the Hippie Peaceniks facebook group, we decided to try something a little different for our Member Monday! We wanted you to meet more of our members, so we posed the question "What drives you to create? How do you find inspiration or motivation?" and boy did we get some great answers! I hope you get to enjoy a little taste of behind the minds of some of my favorite Etsy shop owners and artists. They truly are such an inspiring and wonderful bunch! 

 

 

 

 Sarah from StarJewels   

 

 

"Both my parents are/were artists so I think creativity is in my blood. I always have a need to create and do something artistic. Lately it has been jewelry but I also did ceramics for 16 years. I just love making jewelry and seem to have no shortage of inspiration and motivation. I am inspired by styles, by stones and beads and other materials, by techniques, and by nature...things like flowers, and the ocean. Selling on Etsy encourages me to make more because there is an outlet for it all and some profit, so that is motivation."



Jayne from TwiggyandOpal 



                                                                                                                                          "Color is my driving force! I love to experiment with color, which leads to unique and artistic designs. To me, bolder is better! My motivation is my daughter! She has been a huge influence in my designs. From critics, ideas to support!"





"Colors affect me on such a deep emotional level..as well as music also does. Sometimes texture begins the process however...I cannot keep my hands off of anything with interesting texture...we almost got thrown out of a museum once because I loved on-(just touched...lol) this wonderful piece of glass which had multiple textured worked into it! I feel so incomplete as a human if I cannot create whether it is jewelry, mosaics, or music...it has to happen...most of it just gets in my head and HAS to GET OUT. (It's scary in there sometimes;)"
  


Margalita from MosaicMargalita 



"I'm effected by colors and materials in my Mosaic works, Many times I have no idea what I'm going to do. and I just follow colors and textures, and materials and they "lead" me...till it feels right. I guess it's more intuition than knowledge that I follow." 



Terri from TerriJeansAdornments 




" I love to create. I have to be doing something creative. I too am effected by colors, textures and shapes. My love for animals, and nature is my inspiration in most all my designs. I like to be different and try new techniques in my designs. Although currently my focus is making jewelry and hair accessories, I use to sew a lot and work with ceramics and painting. There are so many areas I would love to try like felting and creating jewelry with clay, but for now I am so full of ideas when it comes to jewelry it feels like my head will explode. Getting these ideas made, and seeing the finished outcome inspires me to do more, especially when these pieces are purchased. It is such an amazing feeling knowing others love and want what I have made, especially since I know my creations are not necessarily trendy and are a bit different."





Lisa from ArtisticFunk 



" I am driven to create by sight. When I see bold color, patterns, textures, anything in a newspaper ad, magazine print ad, hospital hallway benches or artwork, a documentary about historic tribes showing their clothing and colors, the costumes on the show ‘Once Upon A Time’ and the landscape across my canal interspersed between the branches of the tree in my backyard that is yet to bud, or the shadows the tree casts on the ground, I am suddenly SEIZED by the need to create something. Generally that takes me to my studio where I look among all the pieces of materials, beads, leather, hemp cord, yarn strings, buttons, that I begin to drape together in an attempt to CAPTURE and re-create the FEEL from the combination of colors and juxtaposition of lines that just inspired me. I also take to computer where I search for that new thing I MUST add to my materials repertoire that seems to be taking me in a direction of color and design that is still finding it’s way towards it’s ultimate goal of “THE LOOK” “THE FEEL” “THE CLOTHING ITEM” “THE JEWELRY PIECE” “THE ARTWORK ON that piece of glass, or bottle, or tank top, or bag or canvas” and find where it goes and what and where and how it all fits together to form that final creative vision. And, then, when it comes together JUST right, there’s this BIG aaaaah!
But that aaaaah may take an hour or a week or a month or a year to get to! I LOVE my creative journey! It actually is helping me to find myself, who I am, a thing I never knew because I was SO busy surviving life that there never seemed to be time to ask the question who am I? what can I bring to the table? What do I want? How can I help others? What will I leave behind that will show I was here?"
 


Fiona from TheHappyMushroom 



"I am inspired by pattern, as the greatest part of my craft is making the patterned millefiori 'canes' to slice and apply and turn into my beads, pendants and little fairy houses. The patterns can be found in nature or on fabric prints or almost anywhere. I sometimes wonder where inspiration comes from. Sometimes it is like I am being bombarded by a thousand tiny ideas. Recently I have been making 'canes' inspired by patterns found in Native American beadwork." 



Thanks for stopping by, I hope everyone starts their week out feeling inspired and motivated by these gals, I know I did! Stop by next Monday for another look inside the minds of the Hippie Peaceniks family. 

Smile, and pass it on! 
 

Monday, March 11, 2013

Member Monday: Meet Mrs HippySticks!

 

Name:  Jennifer Traynor

 

Alias: Mrs. HippySticks

 

Find her here: Etsy Shop, Facebook

 

Things that make her smile: Cornfields, rain, summer breezes, campfires, sprouting seedlings

 

 

 

A little about Jennifer at home

My name is Jennifer. I live in a tiny little town in the frozen tundra of Maine with Mr. HippySticks, our three children, a dog, a cat and some tropical fish. I am an engineer in mind, body and spirit. One may not see art in metal or machines but I would differ. Regardless of artistic medium, creativity is a beautiful process to work through. A two member engineering house became unsustainable as our family grew and I got the lucky straw on that one.

From my intense desire to create and make something of nothing and my absolute love of a blank canvas, I have unabashedly embraced knitting, gardening and homeschooling. In a family of 5, it gets complicated but it's a good thing I have a knack for work flow management. There is more than one excel spreadsheet involved in running our household.

How HippySticks was born on Etsy

My shop may seem eclectic but I don't focus on any one product at a time as I expand my knitting horizons. I think after the 25th hat I knit for my family, it seemed that it might be a good idea to indulge my knitting and also get to share it with a larger ETSY "family". I had an overwhelming outpouring of support from friends and family to get involved with ETSY. When it was time to settle on a shop name, I spent a lot of time thinking of who I am, what I do, what inspires me and where my passions lie. A friend of mine would joke frequently about me knitting in seemingly inappropriate places like at the movie theater or the beach and he would call me the hippy chick with her bag of knits so I think HippySticks is an accurate description for me and my shop.


I am passionate about natural and organic fibers and cannot seem to pass up a chance to add to my ever growing stash. I love interacting with the local farmers from whom I purchase my wool. Just as I believe in “Know your farmer, Know your food” I can go visit the sheep, and learn how the wool is processed and dyed.

Advice for budding shop owners

All through college my grandfather, also a design engineer, repeatedly told me that engineers need tool boxes too. With every success and every failure he would say, and that is one more tool in your tool box. Same thing with networking and collecting business contacts, in the tool box he would say.  So for new shop owners I wouldn’t stress enough how important it is to stock your tool box.  I think one of the best things to do is join a great team. They personalize what might seem like a mammoth anonymous virtual undertaking. The right team can uplift your spirits, spark your creativity, applaud your success and help keep you motivated.

Future of Hippysticks

My shop is still in it’s infancy. HippySticks opened the last week of November and I remember being floored getting orders shortly there-after. That was a HUGE thing for me and me very fragile ego. As I look forward to the future, I am hoping to continue pushing my comfort zone. I have always found it difficult to “sell myself”. I have some fun things in the works going forward for partnership promotions this summer that I am really looking forward to.

In the mind of Mrs HippySticks

When I'm not creating, I think about creating! It’s a multi-partitioned jumble in my head. I can be knitting 4 projects at once and my head is already spooling eight more that are screaming at me to get made.  I am an all in kind of gal. Everything gets made with all of me all the time. It doesn’t matter if it’s dinner or knits or garden or what. My family raised me with a tremendous work ethic and a drive and focus to never attempt anything that you would not see through 100%. The motto I focus on with my children is to always give people more than they expect and leave things better than you found them.

"Knit"spiration

My “knit”spiration as I call it comes from my life and all the chaos that comes with from having a very full house. As I’ve watched our youngest son transition from baby to toddler I have had the pleasure of seeing how he likes to manipulate objects and what attracts him to certain things over others. I am chomping at the bit to start introducing felted manipulative toys and felted open ended playmates over the course of this year. It also comes from my desire to be sustainable. When I make something, I want it to be the type of thing that gets handed down through generations.

Favorite creations

  

My “favorite” listing is the one I am most proud of.  It is the item that really sparked me into delving into felted manipulatives and fidgit toys. I am passionate about creating non plastic alternatives,eco-friendly treasures, for the littles in our lives. The stacking teething ring was a fun thing to create for my son and to then be able to perfect to make it available on ETSY. I learned so much about the felting process through that project. I am very grateful when I get a thank you from a customer for providing plastic-free alternatives for toddlers.






I hope you enjoyed learning about Mrs HippySticks as much as I did! I just adore her amazing shop and spirit, don't forget to stop by next Monday for a peek at another awesome Hippie Peacenik Member!

Happy Monday, and remember to smile! 

Xo,

Lulu Divine of Divine Lulu Creations