Legitimizing crafts

A friend of mine, who is a fantastic fiber artist, posted a link recently to a really great blog post at Ask Harriete about the tendency of people to copy the work of crafters, sometimes blatantly! You can read the original article here. (Thanks for the link, Liz, I'll be reading this blog more often, it's really good!)

I rolled it around in my head. I've been guilty of the same thing, and I wondered why. it wasn't hard to make the leap to the conclusion. Here is my response:

I've done it. In my head I've said, " I can make that." Sometimes I can (because it's not that original or cool) sometimes I buy the artist's work (because it is cool and original). It seems to me, though the very reason that people feel that it is ok to copy it is how we the artists put our work out there. We call them crafts. as they are, but craft in our society implies something very different. Craft implies accessibility, a hobby, something anyone can do or teach. Think about it, we have craft stores, craft groups, craft shows. At each and every one we show "crafts". This very fact implies to our customers that this is something anyone can do. 

I was once in a fiber guild who met at an art studio. They referred to themselves as artists and their items as art. They may have worked in a craft, but their pieces were all art. I found that people changed their attitudes when they looked at the pieces. They stopped being something "anyone" could do and started being the individual and unique work of an artist. People are less willing to ask an artist their techniques than they are willing to ask a "crafter" about them. I remember when one member of that same guild had knitted eyelash scarves in a juried gallery! These were the stuff of craft shows, but because she presented them as art, that is what they became. 

Now I'm not trying to negate the author's points, I think they are fantastic, actually. I cringe each time I hear "Oh, I could make that!" even though I myself have said it in my head. It's just rude. My thought, though, is that if we begin treating our own work as art and calling ourselves artists or artisans, and our work as art, we may see less of that "craft" mentality. 

Imagine as a weaver that you have a booth at an arts (never crafts!) show where you introduce your pieces as "handwoven scarves". Your next door neighbor markets hers as "one of a kind wearable art pieces" and makes her artist's resume accessible. It will absolutely change the attitude of the people viewing the items. It won't fix the problem, but it's definitely something to consider when we market our work. I think it will go a long way towards legitimizing our work as well.  

Gigantism and walking

In an effort to improve my health and reduce the size of my jeans I've begun a campaign of walking/jogging. I love walking. Especially long distances. It's weird, but whatever. You like weird stuff too. Stuff like shrimp and footrubs and footrubs while eating shrimp. Even weirder, eating shrimp while receiving footrubs from shrimp. You sicko.

I digress. In the course of my recent walks I've happened upon a curious phenomenon. It seems that there is a rash of freakishly large things appearing in people's front yards. I'm not sure how this happens, or how one prevents it. No one wants to wake up one morning to a 15 foot tall replica of the Titanic in their yard, but these sorts of things may be unpreventable. As evidence, I offer these:

A ginormous Ikea deer

Massive Snow Knight

These things were found in entirely different neighborhoods, so clearly this can happen anywhere. Protect yourselves, Protect your families, Protect your yards, lest you wake up one morning to a giant, angry shrimp front and center in your front yard. (I told you all that weirdness would come back to haunt you.)

Rules for Knitting with Confidence

1.      Gauge swatches really are important. And not just to use as coasters later….. They also come in handy when you run out of yarn or need yarn for a repair later. Bonus: they are good for checking gauge too!

2.      Mistakes happen! It’s OK. Sometimes it’s good to step away from a project for a time, then go back and determine what the mistake was. Sometimes it’s the knitter, sometimes it’s the pattern, and sometimes it is evil anti-knitting fairies who come mess up your knitting in the night. Hint: it’s usually number 3.

3.      You may not find the mistake until you are wearing the garment. At this point it is always “A part of the design”. Besides…. NO ONE WILL EVER SEE IT. Especially if they are not knitters. Even if they are knitters, chances are they will never notice. If they do, they are your best knitting friend or a complete jerk for pointing it out. Just think about that horrible mohair thing they knit last year and laugh quietly to yourself.

4.      Knit what you love. It’s easy to get caught up in knitting fads and trends. When a particular lace knitting book came out a few years ago I was obsessed along with all of my other knitting friends at the thought of fluffy airy knitted confections to wear with every outfit I owned. I struggled at knitting them only to realize that I HATE KNITTING THEM. This is not fun. You know what is fun? Making color work items with bizarre patterns like skulls and ravens. This is what I like, so this is what I knit. It’s OK not to go along with the crowd. This is a hobby. You’re supposed to like it. If you hate it, it’s just not worth your time.

5.      In keeping with #4, it’s OK to frog a thing you hate! We all have that horrible project lurking in the depths of our stash. The Project Who Shall Not Be Named. It was a great pattern in bad yarn, or a bad pattern in fantastic yarn, or sometimes it’s just something that no one in their right mind would ever love. Like the puke green angora hat that makes you look like a chia pet. Let it go. Rip it out. If you still love the yarn, use it for something else. It’s OK to realize that a project is just not salvageable and it’s time to let go. Life is too short for bad knitting.

6.      It’s just sticks and string. We all have an inner perfectionist who wants us to whip out perfect knitwear with the greatest ease and a minimum of pattern reading. When we do make errors, we tend to be really hard on ourselves. We’ll tell ourselves that we are no good at it, it’s too hard for us, or the world is about to collapse on itself and become some sort of fiery black hole of doom.…   Relax. It’s just sticks and string. You’ll get there. Maybe on your own, maybe with help, maybe perfect, or maybe a little wonky, but you will get there. And won’t you feel smart when you do?

Finally, just a word of advice. I often hear people say, "Oh I'm not a very good knitter, I just knit *Insert item here*". This doesn't make you a bad knitter. It is exactly what MAKES you a knitter. You know who “bad knitters” are? People who don’t knit! Revel in your talent. You are a KNITTER

You may have noticed that I have been missing lately...

Here are some reasons why:

• The boy had to have an additional surgery to remove a pin in his leg in order to speed the healing process. I suggested amputation. I was told that we should at least try to look like we are encouraging healing before me maim the child for sport. Disappointing. His doctor has mentioned that his healing has picked up considerably and we will now have no good excuse for recreational amputations. Doubly disappointing. 

• The final weeks of school were a bit more intense than I recall them being. Really sad since there were no finals, just a great deal of papers due. Normally I can come up with many, many pages of BS without even thinking about it. This semester took all of the BS out of me. Hence no blog posts. I was just an empty, empty shell. 

• Directly after school ended, my family came for a visit. Three weeks of a visit. It was delightful, but at the same time, very long. I am currently suffering from a rare form of post-traumatic stress that involves me waking up in the morning and hoping that there will be someone on my kitchen to make me some raisin toast. This is what I find instead: 

This is a lonely toaster. Bereft of raisin toast. TOASTER!! MAKE ME RAISIN TOAST!!! Nope, still nothing. 

• During the third week of that visit my husband and daughter were also home. This means that there were a total of 6 adults in 1200 square feet of townhouse with only 2 toilets. Even worse, two of these adults were my husband and daughter who had not spent time together for a year. There was constant beating upon, farting upon and hollering at one another in the manner of toddlers. It's a wonder that I haven't developed some sort of drug problem. 

It's like a Christmas bomb exploded in my living room.

• Prior to all of the above trauma beginning, I was lazy. So there. What are you going to do about it?? Nothing, that's what. 

HOLY OBAMACARE, BATMAN!!! Part 1

In case anyone is interested, (and because I thought it might be interesting to document the process) we lost our health insurance in the recent job change. John prefers to work for small companies where the person he reports to is also the owner of the company. I don't blame him, it's nice that way. We avoid the BS of corporate jobs where you are expendable because someone had a bad day, or your hours get cut because someone needed a bigger bonus. (Yes, these things all happened with his previous employer. Funny thing is, that he is such a good employee that they called him back in less than a week, begging him to come back. He. Said. No. Good man.) Because his new job is at a small company, they do not offer health insurance. They don't have to. So I did something I have never before been able to do....  I went to the marketplace to find out about coverage. This is really important. I've shopped for health insurance before. When I did I had to make applications at each of the companies to get quotes. so if I was interested in five health plans, that meant five applications. This time, I only had to fill out one application.

Um, yeah. If you could just take a 25% pay cut so I can afford more hookers and cocaine, that would be great.

I think it is important to mention here that you can get a pre-application quote on the Kaiser Family Foundation site, but it comes with all sorts of caveats. Basically it tells you that this is a middle of the road plan, with no tax credits included and no information about your family included. So, it's inaccurate. The quotes given do seem kind of pricey, but then I compared it to what we were spending on health coverage with the previous employer.

According to the KFF website I can expect to pay between $4,433 and $6,090 per year for a health care plan. These are Bronze and Silver plans, respectively. According to my benefits enrollment from from the previous employer, we paid $5747 a year for benefits. I'm not certain if their plan is considered a silver or bronze plan. In my opinion it was an aluminum plan, but I digress. I'll keep the benefit info and compare it when I get more information. Either way, they KFF site tells me I'll pay approximately what we paid before.

You, sir, are well covered.

Plus we get a refund if we stay healthy and don't use our premiums. Considering that I went to the doctor twice last year, once for pink eye, and once for an annual exam. John went once, and Trystan's care is through a non-profit hospital, we stand a good chance of recovering a portion of our premiums at the end of the year. (And don't give me that crap about the companies losing money, I worked for a reptile who made healthy profits on a less than 10% profit margin, if these guys can't make it on a 20% profit margin, they're doing it wrong.)

So I decided to fill out an application. Yes, the website sucked and I could not create a login, so I did this crazy thing. I CALLED THEM.

Operator, connect me to the communists!

The voice response unit was good and I got to request a representative within two responses. (I've worked in call centers most of my adult life. Getting a rep withing two responses on a VRU is AMAZING.) There was no hold time before I was connected to a representative, but I was asked if I would participate in a survey. I declined. I then spent 20 minutes with a very pleasant young man who took my application over the phone AND tolerated my bad jokes. He even had the good grace to chuckle once or twice.

I don't get paid enough to deal with you, ma'am.

I realized today that I had given incorrect information about my husbands employer. John was on the road and unreachable, so I had taken a guess and looked up the company info on the DOT website. I picked the wrong company. (Lesson learned: don't take me to Vegas.) I called back to update my application. I spoke to another very pleasant representative who took the updated information. Again, I did not to wait to speak to anyone. I asked how long it would take for my app to be approved, and he informed me that it would be a couple of weeks, but as long as the plan was chosen by December 15th, my coverage would be in place on January 1.

I will keep you updated as the process continues.

You did what???

Some of you may have read my post about my husband buying a hat. Just a synopsis, he was apparently SO COLD that he could not wait even a couple of days for me to make him a PERFECT and LOVINGLY HANDCRAFTED hat for his giant horrible noggin that he bought a hat. 

After appropriate chastisement for his flaw in judgement regarding knitwear, I told him I would knit him a lovely hat, which I have, and only need to complete the matching cowl to keep his sweet head warm. Until this:

HEEEEEAD! Down in front!

Yes, he shaved his giant, horrible, huge, misshapen, not-conducive-to-being-hairless head. So his giant, horrible, huge, misshapen, not-conducive-to-being-hairless head is too cold to live without a hat, but not too cold to live without hair??? Not a well thought out plan, sir.

Even worse to include a photo of you in the hat with which your giant, horrible, huge, misshapen, not-conducive-to-being-hairless head has taken up an affair with.

Look, I'm made of something that squeaks and melts!

My sweet, sweet husband.... You have 7 weeks to grow back some hair on that giant, horrible, huge, misshapen, not-conducive-to-being-hairless-too-cold-to-go-2-minutes-without-a-commercially-knit-hat head. Get to it.

I should get an award for this

Actual text of conversation with my friend who is terrified of spiders

Her: There is a huge spider in my laundry room and I'm terrified.

Her: It is sitting there daring me to come closer

(Some time later)

Her: You'd be proud. I hit the wall next to it to scare it away behind the big freezer. Of course, now it will probably go all Power Rangers on me.

(Some time later because I'm a really lousy super good friend)

Me: No it won't. You are bigger and scarier. 

Her; Not after it grows to the size of a house. I was so terrified. Stood there just kind of shaking and terrified for about ten minutes (seemed much longer), was about to start crying that Hubby wasn't here to take care of it. Then I was overwhelmed by my own patheticness. 

Me: LOL. You aren't pathetic. You stood up to your fear and conquered it. I'm proud of you. 

Her: If you had texted back during that 10 minutes, I would have broken down and begged you to come over and take care of it. 

Me: So it's a good thing that I forgot my phone downstairs. I would have told you to suck it up though. 

Her: I know you wold have. Hell, you *were* telling me that - every time I thought of just calling you, I'd hear you say it. 

This is clear evidence of what an asshole a good friend I am.

Me: LMAO, you did it though. The spider won't take it's revenge. They have terrible short-term memory.

Her: Hmm. Have there been studies on that?

Me: I've conducted them myself after lengthy interviews with many spiders. It goes like this: 

"Mr. Spider, are you as scary as people think?"

"Who are you? Where am I? Is there a Starbucks around anywhere?"

*actual quotes from my highly scientific survey

Artist's Rendition of Suspect

Yeah. I should get the "Friend of the Year" award. I'll invite you to see my acceptance speech. There may be scary stuff there. Suck it up.