Hello and welcome to Yarnsmith Studio, 

If this is your first visit let me introduce myself -  my name is Tracy and I am based near to Brighstone on the beautiful Isle of Wight, where I have lived since 2007. It truly is a magical place with inspiration and colour everywhere, provided you keep  your eyes open to all that nature provides. We all get caught up in the mundane, everyday things and sometimes forget to look around us, I am lucky in that my drive home from my day job provides some beautiful scenery and views.

Why Yarnsmith - it seems to capture all that I do perfectly. I take yarns and threads in the Old English definition of the word Smith I 'forge, fabricate and design' with yarns. 

Seagull study

I love nature and find great inspiration from all its shapes and forms, I am currently working on a series of nature pieces which have evolved from the Seagull Study, more on these to follow later in the year.

I also love to take the everyday objects and give them a little quirk - such as my cactus pincushions.

My day job is as owner of TAJ Crafts, which is a yarn and embroidery shop based at Holliers Farm, Branstone, near Sandown, it is on the same site as the House of Chilli. I am surrounded by beautiful colour all day, and get to meet some amazing and talented people every day. 

I teach crochet and knitting, covering a range of topics, more details to be found on the classes and workshops page above. 

Whatever you do, happy crafting I look forward to welcoming you into the studio again soon.

Tracy

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Crafting in Public

A good friend of mine, Su Douglas just blogged about crafting whilst commuting and it got me thinking about my crafting habits. I cannot craft on my daily commute from Brighstone to Shalfleet, mostly because it is me driving.
Those of you who know me personally know that I always carry at least one project with me - everywhere...
I have mindless knitting for hospital waiting rooms, complicated stuff to work on at the shop and projects for Jo and I at home, as not everyone appreciates the extra love that out 5 cats weave into whatever I make.
As Su mentions, it can give you an extra space next to you as no-one wants to sit next to the mad woman who is crafting in public. Although I have found it is almost as good as having an animal with you for starting conversations, mostly starting with a wistful 'I used to do that all the time, but no one wants it any more'. Or the perennial - 'you don't see people doing that anymore', I'm not sure we ever did see much of it public, but as a youngster growing up our house was always full of crafting. My mum taught me to knit when I was 9 and I taught myself to crochet around the same time, I cannot remember a time when I did not craft, what age did you start?
Where does the idea that all we create has to be for anyone else come from? Modern throw away fashions mass produced for pennies in some far flung places mean that it is never going to be economically viable to produce your own knitted/crocheted garments. But those items that you create with your own hands with time and love have so much more value than the cheap clothes available on the High Street.
I must confess to not making very much for myself or Jo recently, but that is due to making samples for the shop and also items for Open Studios.
Open Studios went very well, thank you to all who came along and supported us in the Church and hall at Shalfleet. It taught me a valuable lesson - don't make things that you think people will like to buy, make what is in your heart. I failed to do that at Shalfleet, so it is back to the ideas pad and sketch book for me, I have lots of ideas running around in my head, I just need to work out the practicalities of converting my visions into reality. More about this process to follow in future posts.
What are you working on at the moment?
Do you craft in public? If you do how do you find the reactions of the people around you?
Until next time, happy crafting
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