Wednesday 1 January 2014

Top 5 of 2013: Inspirations

Top 5 Inspirations:  What books, people, blogs, trends etc. motivated you this year?

1.  Pinterest.  Yes, Pinterest.  I know that people poke fun, thinking it's all mason jars and fantasy weddings, but I've found some great inspiration from fellow sewists' pins.  

2.  Twitter:  Yes, Twitter.  I joined in 2009 during the Iranian spring, but then didn't have many friends on twitter, so I left it alone.  Then I went to Toronto for the GTA meetup in February 2013 and Gillian mentioned how many sewists were on twitter.  Back I went and found a great new way to talk fabric - literally, in the case of Friday #fabricchat!  

3.  Meeting blog friends IRL:  There's nothing like meeting the people behind your favourite blogs in person and realizing that you could talk for days.  

Feb: Toronto 

May: Montreal visit from Debbie....

...and a visit to Tampa where I got to meet Andrea and Myra.


May, August, & Sept: Montreal meetups!




August: 2 days in NYC for MPB day 


Oct: SF with Loran (not yet blogged!  coming soon!)

4.  My ever-evolving blog roll:  Take a look at my blog roll if you'd like to find some awesome new sewists, because that's where I get the bulk of my ideas.  I noticed that I've stopped keeping up with my blog reading since about March of this year, and wondered what caused that.  Then I realized that I started sharing my lab and office space with a couple of new people right at that time.  Oopsie.  Guess I had been doing more blog reading at work than I realized!

5.  Finally, one pat on my own back for starting Map the Sewintists.  I still haven't figured out how this will evolve, but if anyone has any suggestions for making it more user friendly, or switching to another format, please let me know.  It's helped me find people, and hopefully has helped some others connect.  

View Map the Sewintists in a larger map



11 comments:

  1. I adore Pinterest. Yes it is a lot of mason jars and furniture made from pallets (hanging head in shame-I have a board of each), but I really use it as a visual bookmark, I find I can find things much easier if I have a photo. I have almost no bookmarks on my browser anymore, I just don't use them since Pinterest.

    I agree, you do deserve a pat on the back for creating the map. It hasn't helped me at all, there is no one near me, although there must be some, as we do have a busy fabric store in town. Someone will turn up one day.

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    1. Yeah, I can't remember the last time I bookmarked something (besides academic papers). It didn't make sense when I first heard of it, but it's one of those ideas that everyone wanted, but no one had previously thought of.

      Actually, I was listening to a media expert (whatever that is) the other day on the radio, speaking about how the most revolutionary internet ideas of the last 10 years weren't about content, but about platforms for sharing content. Got me thinking....

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  2. Map the Sewintists was a stroke of genius! I've looked at it many times!
    Happy new year, and I hope we get to meet up again sometime soon!

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    1. Definitely. If there is another GTA meetup, I'd love the excuse to come down for a visit. Maybe even bring the family this time. :)

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  3. I love Map the Sewists! I'm just always so sad to see my lonely marker up in the Yukon. :( But I'm excited for my next trip down south, because I'm going to try to get in contact with some other sewists! Thanks for creating it, you smart woman you!

    Happy New Year!

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  4. Happy New Year! Thanks for setting up the Montreal Meet Up! See you very soon!

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    1. Will you be in Montreal this summer again? It's hard to think of summer today, when we are at -44C with the windchill.....

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  5. What a wonderful year you had Vicki! It was really nice meeting you while here in Tampa!

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    1. I just told Andrea today that if I'm back in Tampa this year, I'll make sure to call you both again!

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  6. Also, your map is so very creative! I can't imagine anyone creating anything more!

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