Brittany Stanton: Most makers have a pile of unfinished projects somewhere, and usually we think it's a problem of discipline. But the problem is something else entirely. We've never defined what a creative practice is.

Cheri: Welcome to the Creative Practice Series. Here is how today's episode is going to go. First, Brittany and I are gonna talk about what a creative practice is because that word gets thrown around a lot, but it's kind of vague. Then we'll share a resource that we are loving that pairs very nicely with your creative practice. And finally, Brittany is going to share one of the projects she's working on right now because seeing the creative practice in progress. is one of the best ways to learn what it looks like in real life.

Brittany Stanton: first let's dive into defining a creative practice is. And this is being involved in your creative practice so that you're not just focused on creating an outcome or a product, but you're in your creative practice to develop skills. to enjoy the flow, to build your creativity, it's a relationship with not project checklist.

Cheri: The idea of practice as related to making things is relatively new to me. I've always thought of this idea of a practice as related to yoga But when I started applying the idea to other hobbies that I in my life, it makes complete sense. The first one being language learning. People often say I'm learning language or I, learned a language, which is absolutely not true because we don't ever even finish learning our own native language, much less ⁓ a foreign language. And when you use the word practice, I am practicing French, I am practicing Portuguese, that fits perfectly and it makes complete sense. Brittany, you have been what would be considered a professional creative for most of your adult life. So if you can, you know, think back to maybe your high school self how would you have defined the idea of a creative practice when you just had the freedom to approach your work however you wanted?

Brittany Stanton: As a young creative, I was able to a lot of time building skills and making materials for things spinning the yarn, but I very rarely. did anything with it or ⁓ making the paper, but then, you know, kind of storing it away and tended to be more of a materials curator that I would make the materials and then curate my collection, then actually come up with some sort of end product. And as I've moved into more of a creative professionally, there's more of a push to have an end result or an end product I think then, practice was less heavy on the, ⁓ am I accomplishing here? It was more on either, am I learning? What skills am adding to my tool belt? ⁓ Or, Am I finding joy in this process it was a lot more to have a creative practice that was about process and being in the moment and getting into flow. And when you are a fiber artist, there are a lot of things that are repetitive. you knit, knitting tends to be very repetitive Spinning is very repetitive. And I don't say that in a negative way. It's just the rhythm or the movement motion that you're doing is the same which really lends itself to flow state, which is that state of kind of falling out of time and into your project. And I think that's one of the beauty, beautiful things about pursuing creative practice is tapping into that flow state, the mental space where you can kind of let go of the to-do list do things that don't have an agenda. You necessarily have to have a specific outcome. And a of our life does require those They do demand us to accomplish something or come up with an end result or a product. so building a creative where those rules don't apply, I think is ⁓ really fruitful. And that's that I've been able to take out of my up having that childlike perspective of time doesn't exist ⁓ and outcome doesn't really matter ⁓ is really, really valuable.

Cheri: So I have a couple of questions for you. First of all, when you release yourself from that idea of production or an end result, how does that relate to the amount of time that you need to develop a creative practice?

Brittany Stanton: I think it frees you up to have a shorter amount of time because to accomplish something you need a set amount of time to be able to finish the thing. But when you say, only have five minutes to set for myself, then that five minutes can go towards something as simple as sitting down ⁓ and writing first 10 words that come to your brain and just letting that kind of flow out of you or sitting down and spinning for that five minutes that you have. whatever happens in that timeframe, just embracing that and seeing where that takes you. Sometimes five minutes is all you're motivated to do at the beginning. And once you sit down and you start doing your thing for five minutes, then that ⁓ pulls you in for longer. If you're someone that maybe has been out of the practice of creativity for a while and is trying to get back into it, then setting that low bar of one minute to five minutes where you sit down and you do your thing, whatever that is, and you can establish that ahead of time, only require yourself to do that short amount of time to kind of get into the rhythm of it and then see if that leads into a longer session. But the kind of shorter timeframe means that you aren't going to accomplish a ton. And so really leaning into the, what else can I get out of this session rather than accomplishment or production? So things like, where can I go mentally during this five minutes of creative time? How can I work on my emotional state during this five minutes of creative time? How do I just let go of all of the rest of life and just be in this moment?

Cheri: made me think something. Right now I am learning a skill that is completely foreign and new to me and that is drawing, specifically botanical drawing. I have never put any time or effort into learning how to draw. It's pretty intimidating ⁓ and it feels like I don't any talent at it, in learning to do the botanical drawing, the unlock for me has been simply just making the first marks, doing a contour drawing of the plant, really just completely releasing myself from my drawing needing to look like the lavender plant that's sitting in front of me. And some of the creative activities and tactics that they give in the class really helps with that. So let's now layer on fiber arts because almost all of the creative projects that you partake in, knitting, weaving, spinning, crochet, basketry, you don't just sit down and do those things. There's quite a bit of a learning curve beforehand. So when we're talking about a creative practice, does a creative practice apply to the learning process for the very, very beginner? And if so, how ⁓ does that apply? How can get over the hump of putting a lot of shoulds on yourself when you're first learning something that is a complex skill.

Brittany Stanton: Yeah, yeah, I think creative practice actually applies to that situation. if you're learning a complex skill, breaking it down ⁓ into ⁓ smaller or pieces is take knitting, for example. When you first start knitting, the first thing you have to learn how cast on. And you might need to cast on a hundred times before you get the concept of what casting on looks like and get the sense of what it means to add stitches to a needle. If you're crocheting, that would be learning the chain stitch and learning how to create even chains. So creative practice that five minutes a day, which I think is probably my ideal shortest span of time, because you can actually pick something up and, make a few stitches or do a row or it is, you can accomplish something that feels tangible in five minutes, having kind the mindset of, me break this down to the smallest step that I can possible. ⁓ And you're ⁓ new a fiber or any craft, what is the first thing you need to learn? So for sketching, maybe it's just learning how to shadow and you crosshatch for hours. maybe it's learning how to weave the base of a you just do a short segment that piece. So it's not this whole, I have to learn how to do this entire thing and it's gonna take me 10 years. and 10,000 hours to become a master in it. Take that off the table and make it small and doable today think creative practice does work well for beginner, ⁓ the very beginner.

Cheri: if you've taken a class where you had to memorize a lot, and I'm just gonna use language learning as an example here again, because I'm familiar with it, there's something that we use that's called a spaced recognition. Meaning, ⁓ you learn a word one day, or it's to you one day, you review it again the next day. Then you review it again in a week, and then you review it again in a month. And as time goes on, the gap between when you review it ⁓ extends. And so that if, let's say you don't see that word for a year and you still remember it, then you own it. You know that you're not going to forget it. And in fiber arts, much of that is it's the same because it's a muscle memory. developing muscle memory and you might be able to follow the directions when they're sitting in front of you or you're watching a video. But if you came back to say cast on again in a week and it's gone, like you have to practice it over and over, I'm sure you don't even think twice about casting on at this point. It's just completely automatic, right?

Brittany Stanton: Right, yeah. But there are things that have to go look at my notes, like ⁓ bind-off ⁓ knitting is something that I do it just rarely enough that I have to go look at the tutorial to remember how to do it because, you know, it takes me so long to knit a sweater. It'll take me three to six months to knit a sweater. And by the time I get to the bind-off, it's like, ⁓ OK, how do I do it in Italian bind-off? just as a side Having those little like, cards, know, note cards with your notes or your ⁓ file online where you can have those notes in ⁓ reference or pull up a tutorial.

Cheri: Thank goodness for YouTube. So in the last two years, I've been working on learning embroidery and the same thing happened. You know, I'll sit down and watch a tutorial on making a French knot and you know, crank out 20 to 50 French knots on the project I'm working on. And then a month later, new project comes along and there's some French knots and it's gone. It's gone. And I have to find the YouTube tutorial, watch it again.

Brittany Stanton: Yeah.

Cheri: So when I first started doing this and the only stitches I seem to be able to remember were the back stitch and a running stitch because I was already a sewer, was so frustrating and I felt like I'm never gonna get this. But slowly and slowly over months, months of consistent practice, it does become a muscle memory. But then I had a big long gap and I came back and I needed to do a split back stitch and I couldn't remember I think the creative practice comes in because if you're practicing something for small amounts on a regular basis, maybe not every day, but on a regular basis, you that is a consistency you need to make something enjoyable. To make it so automatic that it actually becomes meditative. When I first learned to quilt the quilt teacher talked about how free motion quilting was just a meditation. was her favorite part because she could just you know, go with the flow. And the first time that I did machine quilting, it just felt like I put my foot on the gas pedal. nothing, nothing meditative about at mean, I needed a chiropractic appointment afterwards for my shoulders because so stressful. And I'm sure ⁓ every fiber art starts out that ⁓ It's not fun when usually when first learning something, it's frustrating.

Brittany Stanton: Yeah, yeah. Learning is hard because it puts us in a position of really not knowing a whole lot. ⁓ as adults, we're so used to knowing that ⁓ it's very humbling. my expectation is that thing looks like the teacher's. And then your hands feel very fumbly and uncoordinated ⁓ and like, ⁓ this actually isn't quite as easy as I thought it was going to be. get a lot of in basket classes specifically, a lot of folks that inherently this concept of, I gotta get a kit and do this basket again next week there are hooks in our brain that we need a history of information add new information to. And the more times you do something, the heftier that hook is ability to recall ⁓ and pull information. And I think that this is true when you're learning something new. If you have a tangential skill. That maybe it's like very, very tangential, like spinning and basket weaving don't have very much in common But I feel like my spinning helped me helps me as a basket weaver just because of the finger nimbleness, like knowing how to work with materials. and finesse things and the nuance of how reed works versus wool works. So I have kind of a sense of, I'm going to apply the skills that I have learned, so transferring that to another medium. really I think is useful because that hook might not be specific to the thing that you're doing, but you still have some creative skill. when you don't have those hooks to start with, when you've never done anything creative or consistently with your hands, it is gonna take time to develop and it is going to be kind of a discipline to sit down and put time into those things because it's uncomfortable and embracing the discomfort. is one of the very difficult parts of having a creative practice and learning something new.

Cheri: I think about brain health pretty much every day. It's a hot topic right now and it is very relevant to me. nothing is better for our brains than using your hands in two planes and pretty much all craft skills. You're doing two different things with your hands. You could also get this through music and other ways, but we're all makers here. It's actually better for you. The harder it is, the better it is for your brain because you're really having to rewire. You're having to say crank up those neurons. So if you need encouragement to be uncomfortable and bad at something, there you go. It's good for your brain health. And it also made me think of meta skills. You're learning how to learn. And that's really similar in all making because when you know how to read a pattern, the written word and translate that into a 3D object. No matter what skill you're doing, you're going to get better and better at being able to translate patterns into action. Tension. You were talking about spinning ⁓ and basket weaving knitting all all require you to just be consistent with a certain tension. Controlling tension would be a meta skill of fibercraft.

Brittany Stanton: Yeah, and it's something that you don't even consciously realize you're learning or even doing I I did a video for our basket weaving with textile into YouTube channel recently where I myself to weave a basket blindfolded because I wanted to see if my muscle memory could weave a basket and when knitting there's times where or a time when you feel confident enough that you're and you can watch a movie and not look down at your knitting the entire time. or just every once in a while and you haven't skipped any stitches, you haven't done a purl instead of a knit on accident just because your muscle memory is there and kind of has your back

Cheri: can you give us just couple of very practical takeaways for today?

Brittany Stanton: Yeah, think practical tip number one is pick a time during the day that you can set aside five minutes. Maybe that's in the morning before work, maybe that's in the evening after work. If you have kids, maybe that's after they go to bed, during nap time, something like that. Pick something that you can be consistent at and an amount of time that you can fit in as regularly as possible. Maybe you do this on your lunch break. There's been a period of time where ⁓ I would sit in my car on a lunch break, to have that little creative space for to... Yeah, be able to fit that five minutes of creativity in. choose a project or a skill to start with. So it can be hard to figure out where do I even ⁓ start? If you already have a project started, if you're knitting something, working on a basket, whatever it is, working on a botanical ⁓ drawing, then pick up. Get your materials and situated all together in one bag or basket or something and that project ready to go so that when you have your five minute time lock, you can actually sit down and work on it. then pick a space that you can be consistent with going to for that project, if it's possible. If you need to be able to take it with you, ⁓ you know, randomly wherever you're at throughout the week, then that's great too. just knowing where that space is, having the atmosphere ⁓ in your head of this where I be working, can be really helpful to visualize yourself doing the thing in that space. then a, I think a fourth one that's kind of a bonus is if you're working on ⁓ a defined like you're following a pattern and it's already defined for you, you're just going to chip away at that project, ⁓ learn how do that project, then your definition or your kind of timeline is already set up for you, But if it's something that's a little bit less tangible, like you're learning a skill, you're trying to develop more ease in a specific process or type of material that you're working with, then maybe defining out what would some steps be So of sitting there every time and thinking, what should I be working on? And then spend your five minutes trying to figure that out every day. Kind of have a running list of I want to practice chain stitch for five minutes a day for a week, then you'll know this is next thing that I'm going to work on, or is the thing I'm going to settle into.

Cheri: That is exactly what our free worksheet helps you with, putting language around how you're going to define your creative practice, the where, and why you're going to do it each day.

Brittany Stanton: There's even a reflection prompt in there to help you process and define what you want your creative practice to do for you. It can be suited to you specifically for your season of life. It doesn't have to look like mine or look like somebody else's. It can be tailored to what your creative needs are right now.

Cheri: Now let's move on to our favorite resource. So each month I publish a Links We Love post on the Textile Indie blog and we're going to pull one of our favorite resources from that monthly post to share with you here. And today's favorite resource is the Sheep Spot podcast.

Brittany Stanton: very passionate about rare breed sheep and using their fibers in your spinning projects and other fiber arts projects. So she has a wealth of knowledge and information in her podcast series that really deep dives into a lot of different sheep from all over the world, if you're interested in wool fibers.

Cheri: Now it's time for our show and tell. Brittany, what project did you bring to show and talk about today?

Brittany Stanton: Okay, today I have a Drea Renne Knits cardigan. the Stria pattern, if you're familiar. We'll put ⁓ to it in the show notes. So is a striped cardigan. It's got raglan sleeves. I've got the body done. There's the hem right here. And I'm on one sleeve right now. Got part of a sleeve and then I still have this second sleeve to do. And then the collar and front band will have a button placket down the front. ⁓ made of a worsted weight wool yarn, which is a little bit heavier than the pattern calls for. But I ⁓ I did size calculation and decided to go a little bit heavier. because my studio space tends to be colder last spring I did the Portland, Oregon Rose City crawl Cheri We explored all the local shops that were involved in that yarn crawl and I found the mint green, this color here, and then this kind of blush and orange color. by Salty Blonde which is a great indie dye shop that does lot of different types of wool yarn. And then these two here are two colors from Malabrigo's collection. And then I got the cream just as a background color. So this is all wool yarn. I really have a preference for Raglan sleeve sweaters because I like the construction. I like how they fit. I'm wearing another one here. the stria sweater, is in I believe it's half fisherman rib. So that was a new stitch for me. this is actually the knitting pattern that I was referencing earlier when I have to sit every time I take a break from this project and reorient and figure out what, how did you do this stitch? Where am I at? How many rows have I knit? How did I get the stripes in at the right order? because it's just a little bit more complicated than straight up stockinette stitch, which is kind of my comfort stitch. So, yeah, excited to see this coming along. I started this October, well, September. We were driving down to California to do some classes at Festival and at Fiber Circle Studio I started this ⁓ there on that trip. and just been chipping away at it ever since.

Cheri: So that brings up a good point that relates to creative practice and what we were talking about today. So Brittany and I are both infamously multi-project people, like an embarrassing amount of projects going at once. And I know that you do pump out a lot of projects.

Brittany Stanton: of the reasons I ⁓ start so many different is that there are lot of different scenarios that a project fits into. So if you're working on a project that doesn't really take a lot of thought and you can sit and watch TV and do the thing and it comes out great, there's a project that you have to sit down and you have to think about it and you have to learn the next step. and you have to really process and have focus For me, that's the projects where I even have music on in the background because I'm so like cognitively focused on figuring it out that I don't ⁓ want any other thing going on in background. ⁓ I have as much time for that kind of project where all of my can go to it. So I have some of those and those fit in a specific scenario, season of life or timeframe. then I have things kind of in between the projects that I have to do in my studio because I need more space, the projects that I can do in the car or on the road, the projects I can do when the family's together and we're sitting around talking. Each type of project fits a different scenario. So I like to keep... at least one project in each of those categories, if not multiple, so that I can kind of bounce around and work on the thing that fits the ⁓ environment that I'm in. And means that my forward is a little bit slower because I'm not ⁓ just focusing on one specific thing, I've found that I actually do ⁓ make more, learn more, if I just one project and it was a challenging project that I had to focus on, I probably would only have time to work on that once a week if that because I would need to be in my studio space with all the materials with no distractions. And yet I can spend five minutes to three hours on a project that I don't really need to be focusing on, that I can do while talking to people or spending an evening with my husband or my sister or mom having a variety of different projects, think I'm a big proponent of that. Cheri is a big proponent of that. If you are also a multi-project potentialite, then ⁓ are absolutely welcome here. And if you like to have one project going at a time and that's all you have bandwidth for it, you're also welcome

Cheri: If you want to take this deeper, you can grab today's free worksheet. It will walk you through defining your creative practice in a way that's actually doable and personal to you. Here is something to think about this week. What does creativity mean to you right now in the season of life that you're in?

Brittany Stanton: Let us know what your creative practice looks like right now.

Cheri: And we will see you next time for the topic, the power of starting small.

Brittany Stanton: Take care and happy making.

Cheri: Bye.