I'm Taking the Plunge!

That's me, jumping in. Which one are you?

I have been pretend-blogging for a couple years now. By "pretend-blogging" I mean that I've done it with no consistency and virtually no attempts at marketing it, or me. But now I'm taking the plunge and asking you to jump in with me!

Some of you know, and others may have suspected, that I fancy myself creative and quite crafty. I remember the exact day when I discovered Creativity (the capital "C" is intentional). It was soon after I quit my fulltime job to be a fulltime mom to my 5-year-old son. I had already been a weekend/late-into-the-night quilter for a decade. It was at my kitchen table that hot, August afternoon in 1991, with the sewing machine sitting in front of me and a project strewn everyplace else, that I was overcome with a sense of the importance of this thing known as making something.

More than 20 years later, my understanding of the importance of tapping into my creative side still drives me. As I say on my website homepage (itsthesimplethings.com); "Creating something...anything...brings a sense of purpose to my soul, forcing me to slow down, focus, and listen to myself. Genesis 1:27 says that God created man in His own image. Wow! If the Creator of all created us to be like Him, then the act of creating HAS to be hardwired in us! To go through life without taking materials and making something new of them is truly a denial of who we are meant to be!".

For the past couple years, a vision has been unfolding that brings me to this point in space and time. I love to make things, but what I love even more is to provide the opportunity for other people to make things...to give them the place and guidance to find the creative spark that I know is inside each of us, and watch that spark turn into a flame!

I am married to an amazing man who built us a beautiful house on 10 acres here in Colbert and, a couple of years ago, added a large, barn-shaped shop. After some mostly-kidding discussion of what my rent payment might be, he gave me the better part of one wing to use as a studio. He insulated it, sheet-rocked and painted the walls and ceiling, trimmed the windows, and traded some of his own labor with a friend who is a cabinet maker, giving me custom cabinets throughout the space.

Yes, I am spoiled, although I prefer to think of it as "well-loved".

My ducks aren't yet all in a row to open the studio to classes, but I'm getting closer. In these days of social networking, the integration of my website, blog and Facebook pages are a vital part of getting where I want to be. So I'm asking you to consider coming along for the ride by following my blog. You can access it from itsthesimplethings.com or by "liking" me on Facebook.

As best I can tell, getting folks to comment on your blog somehow magically makes it more appealing to folks who might just stumble across it. Those first "followers" are the hardest to get. If you feel moved to be one, God bless you!

If you like what you see/read, please, please feel free to share it with other folks who might be interested. I hope the blog will appeal to a wide range of people, but I'm especially interested in  reaching folks in the Spokane area who might, one day soon, like to come to the farm for a class.

Peace,
Chris