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Friday, September 18, 2009

Quilling Tool Lending Program/Quilling Teachers

Just in case you haven’t noticed . . . I love quilling. I am fascinated by “all things quilled”. I was so impressed with the “simple” designs quillers created for the Accord Calendar project a couple of years ago. Simple is in quotes because the projects were anything but. It took a great deal of creativity to create designs that used no more than 108” of quilling paper. I was blown away when I saw my first reliquary the year we had our quilling conference in Rochester, NY. My personal goals included creating my own quilling and helping to promote this little known art form. That’s why I worked towards organizing American quillers so many years ago helped in organizing what today has become the North American Quilling Guild. Of course, now I have Whimsiquills, the business that has taken over my home and a large portion of my life. I am still selling my work and of course selling supplies as well, but I find I don’t have much time left over. I don’t get to teach or demonstrate much anymore (unless we have a visiting quiller here at the studio). So how do I keep promoting the art?


We have come up with a program that I think is pretty unique, a lending program. When I talk to a scout leader or teacher who is planning to teach a group to quill . . . I tell them about our tool lending program. Most of these groups have a very limited budget (if any at all), so we send them the tools they need for their class at no charge, along with some other goodies (sometimes bookmarks or mat boards, whatever we have on hand). We also make sure they have links to our free patterns and instructional sheets which include things like a basic shapes chart and are all free and downloadable. We also encourage them to visit our blog http://www.quillingwithwhimsiquills.blogspot.com/ where we have all kinds of helpful info like teaching quilling. We have had an excellent response to this program.

4 comments:

Regina said...

Pat!!!

Your blog is inspiring a lot of people. Thanks a lot for sharing so many information about quilling. I´ll place a link to your blog on mine!! Hope you don´t mind.

Love and hugs
Regina

Pale Bear said...

This site is amazing! I started quilling about 3 years ago. It seems like then I couldn't find anything online about it and now it's all over the place (kind of like being country when country wasn't cool).

Can I get more information about the lending program? I'm in a card club and want to teach the ladies (there are 8 of us) how to quill. And I want them to really get it, not just see a few examples and think "Oh. That's nice."

Anonymous said...

Hi Pat,
Don't know if you remember me as a paper quiller from West Nyack a few years back?
I am the program director at a senior day program......I would be interested in your tool loaner program for my seniors. I have previously worked as an activity director for the same company in two of their assisted living communities and while we could afford the purchase of tools, I taught quilling on large round toothpicks....Amazing results for ladies up to 95 years old. Just laid out a few "samples" of shapes on the table, leaves, flower, stem, etc. taught them how to do individual items and let them assemble whichever way they chose. One woman's daughter even framed her Mom's piece it was so lovely....
Linda O'Donnell

droam said...

Hi Pat. Do you still do the lending tool program? I taught my neice now she moved away for college and she is doing a presentation and needs 12 tools. Please let me know or if you know where I could get these for her cheap.