It's a puzzle! It's a toy! It's a fabulously fun object to sew! In this sweet little class, professional crafter Faith Hale shows how to design, sew, and construct a puzzle ball. Originally intended as a toy for her baby daughter, Faith became intrigued with the simple geometry of the form. While some puzzle balls are assembled with a solid core, this method relies on three interlocking rings to make the finished object. Once you make one, you'll be hooked.

If you’re a busy person looking for a quick crochet project, Tian Connaughton is the designer for you. Mentor and expert crochet designer Tian shows you how to design and crochet your own unique and cozy shawl. In this class she demonstrates three different shawl patterns and shapes, plus three different styles of borders so that you can mix and match them to create exciting combinations. All the motifs are easy to learn and simple to adapt to whatever sized shawl you’d like - from a small and cute pet bandana to a full-sized, gorgeous accessory for you.

Join illustrator and printmaker Mariko Jesse in committing to make a small sketch every day. You only need a few moments, and you can do it anywhere - from your living room to your local park to a vacation in a far-off location. Mariko shows you how she works in three different kinds of sketchbooks - "everyday," "work," and "observational" - depending on where she is and how much time she has to draw. Throughout the month, Mariko switches between pen, colored pencil, ink, and watercolor, and you’ll learn to adapt to using what you happen to have on hand or in your pockets at the time of your sketches. Consider sketching while you're watching TV at home, eating a snack at a cafe, or even chatting in a Zoom meeting for work. There’s no need to worry about style or getting it precisely right. Instead, Mariko encourages you to enjoy the process of drawing, looking at the world in different ways, honing your skills, sketching in public, and the importance of practice. Your sketchbooks are just for you, and will quickly contain sparks of inspiration for future great ideas. 

This class begins August 24, 2022.

The Rainbow Road Mini Quilt, based on a vintage quilt pattern, is graphic, bold, and makes an exciting visual impact. If you've been curious about trying paper-piecing in your quilting projects, this beauty is for you. Textile designer and modern quilter Annabel Wrigley demonstrates how to create this gorgeous quilt top one step at time, from cutting all your fabric, to incorporating curved paper-piecing into your block, to creating a paper-pieced sashing panel for a striking quilt border. If this sounds like a lot, fear not; Annabel's confident guidance will lead you to an extraordinary finished project you’ll be proud to display.

This class begins August 31, 2022.

The depth, texture, and whimsy of cut-paper illustration begins with one thing: beautiful papers.  Artist and children’s book illustrator Dawn M. Cardona demonstrates how to play with gouache on a Gelli plate to make uniquely textured papers to use in your crafts. You can apply these papers to other classes taught by Dawn, or use them to add interest to any collage or drawing projects. While this process is instantly gratifying, you’ll be rewarded by experimenting on papers with different weights, textures, and colors in order to make them uniquely yours.

Polymer clay is a surprisingly flexible material that you can mix up and manipulate to beautiful effect. Faheema Chaudhury of Unicorn Crafts expertly guides you through creating a gorgeous set of watercolor marbled hair clips. Faheema loves color, and you'll be using a lot of them to give your plain white polymer clay an ethereal watercolor design. You'll learn some clay basics like how to properly condition it, shape it, and bake it. You'll also have so much fun discovering the techniques for making a marbled watercolor slab. Plus, Faheema will even show you her secret tip for giving your hair clips a perfectly smooth finish.

Have you ever wondered how a professional artist begins a piece of work? For Rebecca Ringquist, expert visual artist and designer of Dropcloth Samplers, it begins in the sketchbook. Known for her samplers as well as her textured, stitched drawings on fabric, her sketchbooks serve as collecting tools - a place to write down ideas and gather pictures and patterns - as she nurtures the layers imagery to create abstract autobiographical artworks. In this class, Rebecca cracks open her sketchbooks to show us her process and walks us through three exercises to dive deep into thoughtfully layered and textured creativity.

If you're looking for a quick way to freshen up and brighten your living space, look no further than this dazzling color wheel pillow, which is also an amazing stash-buster. Expert sewist and quilter Leslie Schucker designed this pillow to feature the EZ Quilting Fat Cat template, which makes cutting your fabric shapes a breeze. She'll then guide you through piecing your color wheel together and lightly quilting your pillow top. You'll also learn a neat trick for transferring a quilting design from paper to fabric, and how to sew your own envelope pillowcase. By using various fabrics from your stash, all of your color wheel pillows can be just as unique as you.

Collagraphy is a printmaking process in which textured materials are collaged onto a rigid printing plate. When ink is applied to various textures, you'll see an array of interesting tones and shapes on your prints. You can make your own collagraphs out of items you find around the house. Book artist and printmaker Sarah Matthews shows you how to make different plates using cardboard, hot glue, craft foam, and string. Then you'll learn Sarah's monoprinting technique with a brayer and Gelli plate to create beautiful prints and unique papers with your handmade stamps. This class is great for beginners and kids, and you'll start looking at everything in your house as potential material for future collagraphs.

When asked whether Milwaukee-based artist and quilter Heidi Parks travels with her sewing machine, she answers “yes” and holds up a sewing needle.  Using simply a needle, scraps of fabric, and colorful thread, this daily practice in hand-stitching has something for artists of all mediums. Learn techniques and artistic concepts that relate to a story-telling quilt and sew a quilt top through stitching, appliqué, patchwork, and other hand-piecing methods. This is a wonderful way to use sentimental fabric scraps, work organically to keep creativity flowing, and find beauty in imperfection. The daily prompts of this quilt design are a bit of a scavenger hunt encouraging you to show up curious. And since our hands are our most valuable tool, Heidi - who is also a yoga therapist - shares some hand yoga stretches to give you the self-care your practice deserves.

To follow along on social media, please post your progress using the tag #DailyPracticeQAL 
 

Whether used to attribute your quilt or explain the circumstances of its production, a personalized quilt label is a thoughtful addition to a quilt. In this class, Milwaukee artist and quilter Heidi Parkes teaches how to embroider text in your own handwriting, both printing and cursive, using the back stitch so that you can leave yourself or someone else a special fabric note. The sentiment can be personal or practical, mundane or historical; this embroidered handwritten label can be added to a quilt, article of clothing, embroidered art piece or really anything that can hold stitching. Heidi walks you through the basics of hand-sewing, her easy tracing and transfer technique, and how appliqué the label using a neat trick using aluminum foil. Once you get the hang of it, you can transfer any sentiment onto an embroidered label.

Dyeing fabric with ice is like watching magic happen before your eyes. Lesley Ware, a maker and author of three books on sewing and fashion, takes you step-by-step through the fun and fascinating process of transforming a plain white T-shirt with dye. All you need are ice cubes and powdered dye to add a burst of color to your wardrobe and create interest with dynamic patterns.

In this beginner-friendly class, author, textile designer, and modern-quilter Annabel Wrigley teaches you how to make log cabin quilt blocks, then how to sew them together into a lap-sized log cabin quilt top. Begin with planning your design, choosing fabric colors, and cutting fabric, with several layout options provided in the class PDF. Then, Annabel will show you how to sew the log cabin block. Seaming your blocks together is a breeze, and by the end of the class you'll have the skills to create a log cabin quilt as small or as big as you wish. Once you start sewing one log cabin quilt block, you won't want to stop.

Professional artist and storyteller Christopher Clark's favorite subject to paint is the light itself, and in nowhere is it more important than the portrait. Inspired by 19th century art and the Impressionist Movement, this class formally guides you through all stages of developing a portrait in oil paint. Learn about light, shape, value, and anatomy sculpturally, as you push and pull with charcoal and add and subtract paint. Begin with a charcoal study, then move on to underpainting. Then follow with blocking out general shapes with paint and then adding a few more layers of detail and fine-tuning. While portraits can certainly be challenging, they are also immensely rewarding. 

Picasso said, "Learn the rules like a pro, so you can break them like an artist." This month, artist, author and educator, Cleo Papanikolas teachs the old-school tracing and transferring techniques used by designers before computers to create analog surface design patterns that can be used to print fabric, wallpaper, tiles, puzzles, and more. In the final three days, she shows us how to digitize the work with Photoshop and Procreate, and how to upload to Spoonflower to make all your artistic designs a reality.

The pamphlet is a deceptively simple bookbinding structure that’s easy to transform into something fabulous. Printmaker and book artist Sarah Matthews demonstrates three ways to bind a basic pamphlet book: a seven-hole pamphlet stitch, the link stitch, and her favorite - the dot dash stitch. Use these approachable techniques to make books, journals, zines, and more, and play with specialized tools like the bone folder, a Japanese screw punch, and waxed linen thread.

Handcrafted jewelry deserves to be beautifully presented, which is why Tracey-Renee Hubbard, designer behind the jewelry brand Scotchbonnet!, created this class. Whether you’re documenting your work to share with friends or marketing your products for sale, Tracey-Renee shows you how to choose props and consider placement, proportion, and composition to best highlight your pieces. Using her tested methods, you'll learn how to create gorgeous images - right on your cell phone - that you can use for social media, email newsletters, or your online store.