Little treasures

I have some beautiful little treasures to share today.
They were all made by my cute little students, 6-8 year old, during the last school year.

This little creature is known as a penguin, it was created by one of the sweetest, gifted and enthusiastic student I have ever taught.

One day, with a shy voice, she asked if she can show something to the class, then she took out of her bag this lovely pillow she had created during the weekend.
I asked her with whom did she make it, and she answered she did it by her own, since no one in her family knows how to stitch.

At the last month they have created sock dolls same as I had already taught dozens of times.

The girl who created this doll insisted to create a long curly hair for her doll, just the same she has.
I had no idea how can she make it and then she came up with the idea of cutting fabrics strips in zigzags that look like the curls she has.

This one is quite accessorized as you can see.

and this one has only one sock, the other one had been created till the last minute of the class.

Let's cloth it

I decided to begin a new design project for my etsy store - "Lets cloth it".
The purpose of it is to transform every day items made from different materials into textile ones, or everyday items we know as made by one kind of textile into another one.
The purposes is not only the transformation itself, but also looking for new meanings and utilities for each item.
The first Item is my cloth cups-
these cups are replications of the porcelain cups I inherited from my grandmother, who was my first needle craft teacher.
I already made some replication of them as part of my installation at the huismethethandje last May. In this project I want to create more functional design pieces.
I wouldn't recommend them for having your tea, but for putting some order on your desktop, organizing your crochet needles, brushes, buttons, pencils, pens etc.. they will be much more useful, but of course I would be glad to hear more ideas for other utilities.


These cups are now listed at my etsy store check them out here, or at my Dawanda store here.

Craft with kids

The kids at the age of six and seven at elementary school where I teach , made those funny cute heads.

At the next class they are going to be scraps dolls like these ones made by me.

The one on the left is my favorite, but I love all of them and how they look like together. I am always amazed by their ability to put so much character in their creations.

When I first considered teaching last year I thought about adults. I didn't think I will have patience for children neither I didn't imagine myself get along with noisy cheeky kids (in other words typical Israeli kids) and make them doing something with their hands. I already described here some of my difficulties to deal with them at the workshops I taught last year at the school vacations, but most of the times (for my surprise) it was great fun for me.
So I was quite glad when I was offered to teach twice a week at school. It is big difference from my daily work of creating dolls and accessories, which sometimes can drive me completely crazy by the preciseness and concentration it requires. Beside that, most of the day I am alone at home, it was what I dreamed about, but when a dream comes true, the disadvantages of it pop up. The disadvantages of this dream is the claustrophobic feeling of working all the day alone at home, I want to go out, I want to meet other people, I have so many things to do today, maybe later, then it becomes maybe tomorrow and so on... I better stay at home finish all the stuff I was planning to do today.
When I dreamed about working at home I saw myself working few hours then wondering around, sleeping few hours at noon, cycling along the seashore, visiting friends.
I am so slow at my work so each time when I do some of the above I have guilty feelings.
Teaching is great excuse for having some break which is also being paid for.
And one more advantage of working with the young kids, it forces me to think how to simplified things, it’s completely different from my regular way of thinking.