Category Archives: Interesting Web Sites

About.com Is Recruiting Contributing Writers for Crochet and Other Topics

Update: These positions are no longer available.

About.com is seeking contributing writers for a number of different craft topics; several of the available topics might be of interest to the creative people who frequent this blog:

  • Crochet
  • Digital scrapbooking
  • Machine quilting
  • There are plenty of other topics too, but these are the craft topics I know of that are currently open.

The crochet topic is especially near and dear to my heart, as the person selected will be working with me to create free crochet patterns for the About Crochet web site.

If any of these are topics where you have significant experience, and you’d like to share your knowledge and passion with others, please check out the links posted below for more information.

Thanks so much for your interest! Best wishes to all applicants. Please know that I sincerely appreciate each application!

Get Creative! Try a New Craft or Hobby

If you’d like to learn how to crochet, or try a different hobby — knitting, rubber stamping, drawing, cross stitch, or any number of others — these links lead to information that will help you get started.

Would You Like to Try a New Hobby?

Several About.com Guides on the hobbies channel have been working together to create an easy way for people to find beginner-level info on a variety of different hobbies and crafts. Throughout this week, we’re each blogging about our recommendations for how to get started in our particular areas of expertise.

Personally, I’ve enjoyed every craft I’ve ever tried, and I’ve tried most of them on the list below. Crochet was the first craft I ever got serious about. I don’t even remember how old I was when I got started with it — maybe 6 or 7 years old? So, I am now thirtysomething (haha) and have been crocheting for quite awhile.

Perhaps you’ve never given any thought to learning how to crochet. Has anyone ever explained to you how much fun it is? Or how relaxing it is? Or how easy it is? Or how affordable it is to get started with? Maybe not. Well, I recently wrote a new article: “Is Crochet the Right Craft for You?” The article provides basic considerations you should know about before getting started.

If you’ve ever wanted to learn how to crochet, this is a fantastic time to jump in and give it a try.

If you’ve been following this blog for awhile now, you already know that I like to crochet, knit, rubber stamp, make jewelry, and dance. If you think you’d like to get started with any of those hobbies, or others, I can highly recommend the tips and advice provided by my colleagues at About.com:

Crafts and Hobbies 101:

Hope you’ll make good use of the information! Happy “hobbying”! :)

CHA, Clear Scraps, Crafts News, New Knitting Web Site, ETC.

It’s been awhile since I last updated my blog, and I have quite a bit to post about…

CHA Winter 2009 Clear Scraps Booth: Janet Blair, Elisa Kammerdiener, Sally Lynn MacDonald, and Amy Solovay

First, I wanted to share some photos, links and memories from CHA (the Craft and Hobby Association trade show), which I attended in January of ’09. I spent most of the trade show working in the Clear Scraps booth, meeting Clear Scraps customers and demonstrating how Clear Scraps acrylics can be embossed in the Cuttlebug machine using Cuttlebug embossing folders. You can see one photo of the Clear Scraps booth above. From left to right in the photo are Janet Blair, Elisa Kammerdiener, Sally Lynn MacDonald, and me (Amy Solovay.)

During the CHA trade show, I embossed lots and lots of the new Clear Scraps mini keychain albums in the Cuttlebug machine. So, naturally, now that I am home, I have been working on projects that use embossed acrylics. I wrote a couple of new articles about embossing Clear Scraps acrylics. One of the articles has been published at clearalbums.com. The more detailed of the two articles will hopefully be published on associatedcontent.com in the next couple of weeks. Edited to add: Click here to read my article about Hot New Scrapbooking Trends: Tiny Mini Albums.

When I wasn’t working in the booth at Clear Scraps, I did get out and about a little bit to look at all the other booths and see what’s new and trendy in the world of crafting. I caught a little bit of the Fashion Show sponsored by Lion Brand Yarns, and I saw some of the gorgeous new yarns at Premier Yarns. I posted quite a few of these knitting photos at my new knitting web site, Knitting With Color.

Click here to see knitting trends and knitting photos from winter CHA 2009.

I also took lots of photos of the brand new scrapbooking supplies too, so you can look forward to seeing those in future posts here and also at clearalbums.com and paperlaces.com.
I have also been writing lots of new articles and posting new crafts projects for various web sites around the internet, and I have been submitting my projects to magazines for publication too.

I just updated the page about Martha Stewart punches at paperlaces.com: Martha Stewart Punches (along with some other brands of scalloped heart punches that make good alternatives to the hard to find Martha Stewart Scalloped Heart Punch.) I have also been working on updating my free paper lace idea book too. I updated the chapter about using punches to make paper lace, and I have also been working on expanding the other chapters with more detailed diagrams and information. I’m hoping to get even more updates posted in time for Valentine’s Day, but I’m not making any promises. Hope you guys are all enjoying your Valentine’s Day preparations! I know I am. It’s one of my favorite holidays.

Thanks so much for dropping by. I hope you are having a lovely and creative day!

“How To Make Paper Lace”: A Free Scrapbooking /Card Making / and Paper Crafting Idea Book Posted Online at Paperlaces.com

Purple and Orange Greeting Card With Flower, Paper Lace, and Supplies by American Crafts Including a Details Flower Center Layered Embellishment and House of Mirrors Patterned Paper

Handmade Greeting Card by Amy Solovay, With Simple Paper Lace Plus Supplies by American Crafts.One of my latest projects is a book called How To Make Paper Lace. This was a book that I originally planned to publish through a traditional book publisher. However, after much frustration attempting to do that, I decided to publish the book online, for free, instead. I am really excited about it because, as a crafter, I can see so many advantages to publishing the book online. Readers can easily click through the links I provide and see immediately where they can go to get the supplies they need. Readers can also immediately see what the supplies actually cost, and have an easier time deciding whether or not it is a project they want to try. Additionally, it is super-easy to comment on any entry from the book and ask questions, get help, give suggestions for alternate techniques or easier ways to do things, etc. And of course the best advantage for readers of all- the fact that all these projects are available for free! Hopefully having these scrapbooking and card making ideas available free of charge will allow you to take more of your money and spend it on supplies.

I have been working on this idea book for well over a year now, and I am excited to say that things are coming together nicely! The entire book has not been posted online yet, but there is plenty of material there to get you started. You can click here to see the introduction to the book. If you’d rather jump right in, feel free to start by reading Chapter 1: Materials and Supplies You Will Need To Make Paper Lace. The first part of Chapter 2: How To Make Basic Paper Lace is also available. At this point Chapter 2 is not complete yet and I plan to add some updates hopefully next week. However, there is enough information there to be helpful, assuming that you get through reading the introductory material that comes before it first. I have also begun posting the free project ideas that go along with chapter 2 of the book. The greeting cards shown here in this post are just a couple of the free project ideas. There will be more posted soon.

Keep in mind that these really aren’t the “laciest” of the paper laces I have designed; these are ultra-simple and very easy to create, sacrificing some frills for simplicity. This will hopefully be helpful for the sake of getting you started if you are a complete beginner to paper crafts in general and paper cutting / paper lace in specific. As we get farther into the book, you will be able to learn how to create more complicated designs that are much “lacier”.

Thanks so much for stopping by! I sincerely appreciate your interest in my work.

New Altered Book, Altered Art and Scrapbooking Web Site: Clearalbums.com!

I am so excited about the latest web site I have been designing and creating. The web site is all about Clear Albums! Clear albums are one of the newest hot trends in scrapbooking, altered books, and art journals.

If you’re not already familiar with clear albums, here are some informational web pages on the Clearalbums.com web site that I have put together so far. (More are coming soon.)

Some Manufacturers of Clear Albums:

I have been working on a few new mini books using clear albums that I will be revealing soon. Can’t wait to show them to you! Also, I am planning on organizing a design team for clearalbums.com too! So please stay tuned for details.

Thanks so much for dropping by! I really appreciate your interest in my blog and in my artwork. Hope you are having a fabulously interesting and creative Monday, and that your week is off to a good start!

Paper Laces, Antique Crochet, Blogging ETC.

I have been a bad blogger. :(

Well, actually I have been blogging my head off! But not at this blog. I’ve been working on my antique crochet web site and my paper lace web site. If either of those topics sounds interesting to you, I hope you’ll check them out. :) This blog has been sadly ignored at their expense. Sorry!

I have been working on sooo many new art projects too. I cannot wait to show them to you. Haven’t taken pics or uploaded them yet, but I have some new paintings and collages plus a stack of new layouts finished.

If you read the last post I wrote, maybe you remember that I was rambling on, and on, and on about a great deal I found on scrapbooking paper. WELL, I got all the paper and it is incredible! Just wonderful stuff. A lot of it is patterned paper that I totally wanted anyway, but even better, a lot of it is paper that I never in a million years would have picked out for myself. Well, guess which stack I am scrapping with? Haha! You just never know. I normally don’t do “surprise” lots or “mystery” lots because I am sooo picky. But this turned out even better than expected, and I had high expectations.

I also just got a whole bunch of KI Memories Lace Cardstock. It is such a beautiful paper! LOVE it. I cannot wait to show you all the fun things I have been making with it. Update! Click here to see free card making and scrapbooking ideas using KI Memories Lace Cardstock. I have been taking forever getting it all online because I am trying to write up instructions, and, well, that is just taking more time than I expected. Next on my list, I want to get a whole bunch of this paper ribbon. It looks like it would be perfect to use with all the Narratives die cut papers I just scored. :) I am one happy scrappy girl at the moment.

Well, if you happen to read this, please drop me a comment and say “hi”, and if you paint/ scrap/crochet/knit or do anything crafty I’d love to hear about what you’re working on these days. Hope to update again soon! :)

Flickr Explore!

OH WOW! :) :) :) I am so excited over some really really old news that I had no idea about until just now. I just found out that five of my photos on flickr have been featured on Flickr “Explore”. I am soooo thrilled! Flickr Explore is a daily showcase of 500 of the most interesting photos uploaded to Flickr. I didn’t really know much about it until I just read this Flickr Explore FAQ from Bighugelabs.com. This is a big deal to me because Flickr is one of my all time favorite web sites ~ it is just such an incredible place to go for inspiration ~ with soooooo many talented photographers and artists, from all over the world. According to my Flickr DNA, NINE of my photos have been in explore in the past. This is really exciting to me because all the photos that showed up there are photos of my paintings and artwork, so it means a lot to me that people liked them enough that they would be chosen for Explore. Yipppeeeeeeeee!!!!!

Free Shipping Coupon at Joann.com + Thoughts on Crop in Style XXL

Free shipping at Joann.com!  Code:  SEPFSA735

I just found this free shipping coupon for Jo-Ann.com .

It’s really a great deal if you are going to buy something heavy! Like, for example, I used one of these coupons when I bought my Crop In Style® XXL Tote (which Joann has on sale for only $90.99 right now!)

Crop In Style® XXL Totes

I LOVE MY XXL! I am going to write some articles about how to organize art and scrapbooking supplies, and the XXL is one of the main highlights of my organizing strategy. Not sure how I got along without it before! I’ll update again when I add the articles to my site…

(Edited to add, that when I got my XXL with the free shipping coupon, they didn’t add any additional shipping fees onto it. I think the additional fees only apply if you want express shipping. When I ordered mine it took about a week and a half to arrive, so I thought that was pretty reasonable.)