So Monday (April 21) was my birthday. I’m 29. And holding. Anyway, I was working on a different project and mentioned it to my partner in crime, Suzy. Today she sent me the most gorgeous doll she’s made yet, based upon my other project:

I was so delighted I squealed like the fangrrrl that I am.

So in case you’re wondering, yes, I’m going to chart it. No, I’m not going to offer it for sale. This one’s for me, but I will post WIP progress pictures.

Thank you, Suzy!

…was good for Effervescent Designs. It was fun and frightening all at the same time, seeing as how I’ve never done a trade show before. There are quite a few shops willing to take a chance on a new designer, and for that I’m grateful.

I think what will remain with me for the next little while is that yesterday, while filling orders, it occurred to me that this was the most fun I’d had working in a long, long while. I fell into bed last night exhausted and more satisfied with a day’s work than I have in a long time.

Why, no, I haven’t added anything new in almost a year. How could you tell?

I knew I’d be bad at this blogging stuff. I always mean to keep a journal, but then I don’t and, well, you know, content is King. This post on craft is something I’ve been working on for a long time, trying to gel my thoughts and sift through how I really feel about it.

My question:

What’s the difference between an artiste and a craftsman, and is one better than another? I ask myself this on a daily basis because I finally came to the conclusion that I am not, and I am never going to be, an artiste. I’m a craftsman and I must be happy with that.

My original premise was as follows:

Artistes come up with original ways to solve the same ol’ problem. Craftsmen implement existing ideas.

Not sure I believe this now. I’ve spent the better part of the last year writing something that’s been cooking in my head for 14 years. It’s a riff off Hamlet, which was, in itself, a riff off someone else’s work, so is what I did art or craft? I took someone else’s framework and decorated it with vines and flowers and thorn bushes and other more savory and unsavory things, but in the end, I didn’t create the framework.

In terms of needlework, I’ve taken a completely unrelated art (pixel dollz) and translated it into fabric and floss and beads. Is that art or craft? Suzy’s skill at creating the dollz gave me the original framework. I just dressed it up with fabric and floss and beads.

I don’t have an answer to this question anymore. Yes, I used to, but now I think there has to be a measure of both art and craft (skill) involved in each, most likely at different percentages along the spectrum.

Not just anyone can do what Suzy does. I can’t. Not just anyone can do what I do. Suzy can’t. Is that a difference between art and craft (skill)? Dunno, but I will say this: Without Suzy, there would be no needlework dollz at all. At least, not from me, and I depend on her art to give mine wings. Perhaps I’m more craftsman than artist after all.

So here’s what’s been happening over at my house:

I’d like to thank Kay Jones for stitching Water Goddess and Mlle Musketeer for me, and Melanie Johnson for stitching Yo Ho Ho. Fabulous jobs, ladies!

For the next little while, I’m planning to work exclusively on Suzy’s dollz to bring you a good selection of something new, different, and exciting (okay, at least to me) in needlework patterns. I may slip in a sampler a la Les Tuileries

here and there because I like geometrics, but really, the dollz are just too irresistible not to continue with them.

I’m going to tell you a story that is true. It happened in 1998 or 1999. I did someone wrong, and in trying to put it aright, I am now going to do something fairly daring.

Begin story:

In 1998 or thereabouts, I met a fantasy artist at the Kansas City Renaissance Festival. I was immediately taken with her art and asked her if she wanted to be “charted” for counted cross stitch, and I explained what that was. She said yes and gave me a print as prepayment (which is its own irony). I went home and promptly began to work on one of her pieces. However, the software I had at the time and my lack of skill/training to make a good chart made it nearly impossible.

I must have charted and re-charted that piece 20 times. I started stitching it 4 or 5 times and finally gave up in frustration because I could not create a good combination of “fun to stitch” and quality representation of her artwork. I emailed her and told her of this brick wall I had run into, but for whatever reason, I never heard back from her.

I have always felt that I was not as honorable as I could have been in following up with her and making sure that she understood where I was with it. All these years, the partially stitched canvases sat folded in my cabinet, reminding me of my inability to accomplish this task, and alas, I no longer have the print. This has always been a blemish on my conscience.

Two years ago, I finally realized a dream of mine that began with my asking her if she wanted to be charted. I bought good software and learned how to use it. I learned that I was supposed to pay the artist for the right to chart the art and have done so faithfully. I also charted my own designs and am selling them (as you all know).

Charting previously existing artwork is a very difficult, time-consuming, and painstaking task which I didn’t understand in 1998. I grossly underestimated the time and effort it would take. It isn’t as simple as running the art through the program. It requires making the chart fun to stitch and keeping the integrity of the artwork intact. Now that I know better, I spend hundreds of hours refining a chart before I even begin to stitch and then I (or another skilled stitcher) spend thousands of hours stitching to further refine (usually quite drastically) the final work and the chart.

So, with a few things under my belt, I felt emboldened to tackle this piece of hers again after so many years. I had kept the graphic file in the expectation I would return to it after I had learned what I needed to know, and I took an entirely different approach than I had before.

The art? Faery Ring.

The artist? Nene Thomas

The appropriate attribution and copyright link? Here. Scroll Down.

The finished piece? Voila:

Cheryl Flanders did the magnificent and painstaking work of stitching this piece.
Lori Armold of Enchanted Fabrics hand dyed the fabric it was stitched upon.

I hope that Ms. Thomas can forgive me for not following through on my end of our bargain.

Susanne Ohlsson did the art.

I did the chart.

She’ll be officially released for sale July 4. We both hope you like her as much as we do.

Yes, we’re jumping the gun on Christmas, but at least we gave you a good bit of time:

Click here to order.

Kay Jones stitched the lovely model, and I really want to thank her for doing such a wonderful job–and so quickly, too!

I got something done with my life:

Now available for sale in email, paper, or kit.

Every time I ask someone if they would be willing to stitch a model for me, the first thing they say is, “Well, I don’t know if I’m up to your [i.e., the designer's] standard. My backs aren’t very neat.” Click here to read more.. »

I’m stitching the Effervescent Designs logo in Needle Necessities overdyed cotton “Arctic Nights” and Kreinik high-luster “sapphire,” one strand of each over one on 20-count silver metallic lugana.

I’ve read on the boards that a lot of people don’t care for Kreinik’s fibers Click here to read more.. »