The CraftSanity Podcast

If you attend national quilt and craft trade shows, chances are good that you've run into Michele. She is a craft industry insider with a generous spirit who gets a real kick out of connecting other creatives with the people who can make big things happen.

Erin Beckloff, 31, of Ohio, recognizes that there is something very precious about the knowledge and skill letterpress printers accumulate during a lifetime of printing and she's on a mission to preserve it for future generations as co-director of "The Letterpress Film."

On the this episode of the podcast, you’ll meet Liz Reed, co-creator of the Cuddles and Rage comic featuring humorous hand drawn and clay characters.

In honor of National Stress Awareness Month, San Francisco-based crochet designer Twinkie Chan has teamed up with the Craft Yarn Council to help all of us reflect on the stress busting wonders of knit and crochet.

I wanted to help Mary Colucci, executive director of the Craft Yarn Council, spread the word about the organization's 30 Days of Creative Ways to #StitchAwayStress campaign that kicks off today and runs through the whole month of April.

A self-proclaimed cat lady who studied fashion design in London, Sara, 30 of Nashville, Tennessee started Scooter Knits, an Etsy shop featuring handknit hats for cats in 2009. The hats were a hit and six years later, Sara is still knitting like the wind for feline friends and their owners around the globe. This week is an exciting one for Sara, whose first book, "Cats in Hats: 30 Knit and Crochet Hat Patterns for Your Kitty", will be hitting local bookstores.

In her book, Rebecca Ringquist presents “embroidery as just a way of drawing” and instructs stitchers to “loosen up and try to disregard their idea of embroidery as a really uptight, precise sort of art form and introduce the idea that embroidery is easy and accessible.”

Abby Glassenberg shares her thoughts about blogging, launching her podcast, the future of publishing and her experience with self-publishing ebooks and patterns on her website.

The story behind Jennifer Ackerman-Haywood's last column for The Grand Rapids Press and MLive.

If you're sad about missing QuiltCon, cheer up because QuiltCon is coming to you during this episode featuring Sherri Lynn Wood, author of "The Improv Handbook for Modern Quilters: A Guide to Creating, Quilting & Living Courageously." I interviewed Sherri before she left for the convention where she is teaching and signing books.

Erica Lang has always known she is an artist at heart. But she was worried she would never find a job, so she pursed several other careers. "I actually purposely avoided (art classes in high school) and took math and science because I was so worried about not being able to get a job," Lang said. Check out the podcast to find out what convinced her to follow her heart and start a printmaking business called Woosah.

Born a day apart, Jacob Vroon and Elyse Marie Welcher crossed paths for the first time in the Butterworth Hospital nursery in June of 1988, completely oblivious to each other. It would be 23 years before the two Geminis would actually meet when they reported for their first day of work at the Buckle at Woodland Mall. He was the freight guy and she was the seamstress. And when they were introduced, the manager suggested they talk because they both made leather bags. They ended up inspiring each other to greatness, but not without a few twists in the story.

If inspiration to take your handmade business to the next level is what you seek, tune in for my conversation with Anne-Marie Faiola, CEO and founder of Bramble Berry, the Bellingham, Washington-based online soap-making supply company and creator of the new Handmade Beauty Box, a monthly DIY project subscription service.

As a screen printer and designer, Marcy Davy, of Ypsilanti, knows the joy of printmaking and repeats the process daily as a professional artist producing prints for her All Things Grow product line.

There is beauty all around us, but when we’re busy rushing from here to there and checking our phones we miss a lot. This is where Wei Shyuan Peng comes in. By day he’s a hydrogeologist who adopted the nickname “Stone” while enrolled as a graduate student at Western Michigan University, and when he’s off the clock he’s a photographer armed with the Nikon D300 he been using for years because “that is good enough for me.” Peng, 53, of Grand Rapids, likes to compose minimalist photos and is willing to spend hours waiting to capture just the right image.