One thing was for sure, I was born with a pencil in one hand and a paintbrush in the other. When I wasn't drawing or painting, I was making something with whatever happened to be around. No craft shops back then. No craft TV shows either. When I started "crafting" we didn't even have a TV. I remember my mum and dad making crêpe paper flowers and buying supplies from a tiny room at the top of a flight of narrow rickety stairs, but that's pretty much it. Oil painting by number kits were coveted presents for Christmas and I remember making Christmas cards with stencils and red, green and yellow paint. As a teenager, I used to visit the art store at the university with my dad. I loved the vibrant colours of bottles of ink and infinite colours of pencils and would save my pocket money to buy one or two pencils and perhaps one additional colour of ink each time I visited. By this time I thought I wanted to be a fashion designer and filled pages and pages of dress designs, but then I decided it would be much more fun to see the world.
I was living in Germany when I discovered hobby shops and quickly started making all kinds of "things". Mobiles were pretty popular at the time and I remember small fairies with feathers for wings flying from the ceiling of my room. After I was married in the early 70's, Air Force wives introduced me to Dip'n Drape dolls, Paper Tole plaques and making my own decals from cards and gift wrapping paper. I'm grown up now, sort of, but I still don't know what I want to be. I guess I just am who I am - a crafter - there's no escape. I'm lucky that I get to do what I undoubtedly love for my job, but it does present a challenge sometimes. I am so busy drawing and creating projects to feature certain products and find new techniques, that I forget to do things that I like to do, and sometimes I even wonder what it is that I like to do.....
I posed a question to Scrapbook Soup viewers via Facebook about a week ago - "what is your favourite scrapbooking/crafting technique?" When I ask myself the same question, I have no answer. I like to do so many things - sewing, hand smocking, crocheting, knitting, decorative painting (not oils), all kinds of paper crafts, embroidery, silk ribbon embroidery, beading/jewelry making, shell crafts - I wrote a book on shell crafts that was published in the early 90's - Seaside Treasures - it was one of my favourite books and it was still on the shelves in Michaels until about 2 years ago. Design Originals updated it by adding some children's projects and changing the cover, but they kept all my original projects. I thought that was kinda cool. Shell crafting apparently isn't subject to fads and trends. This probably means I'm a "jack of all trades, but master of none".... I look at it as a way of keeping my creative options open. I'm pretty much pigeonholed as a "scrapbooker" since I host a scrapbook show, but "google" me and you'll find a lot of references to decorative painting. No worries - I love it all! Actually I love the CREATIVITY of it all..... Here's a few projects I made last year to feature sheer ribbon:
You may have seen them (and a lot more) featured on signage, but probably didn't associate these projects with something I would make. It's all about being a designer and a business that I love.
Well, time to get back to the drawing board. Yes, I still draw - with a pencil first, but then it has to end up in Photoshop and Illustrator - the world has definitely changed over the past 50+ years...... y'all come back now!
Yours truly,
Julie :)
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