Learning to Fly

Almost a year and a half ago, Beehive started offering classes. They wanted to have lots of different designers teaching workshops that focused on their particular medium and strengths. There was another children's designer there who was teaching classes in another part of town, and she pretty much had the market cornered on teaching sewing, but I offered to help if I could, and thought it might be fun.

I got a call from Petra, the founder, and she mentioned that they wanted to add some evening classes to the morning classes that were already being offered, and was I intersted in taking those on? Umm, heck, yeah! Evening worked better in my schedule, anyway, since our younger child was not quite one at the time, and as a SAHM, I didn't have child care arrangements. In the evenings, my Sweet Husband is home from the office and I can tag out to go teach.

At first, as with all new ventures, things got off to a slow start--we had a month or two where I waived the minimums and taught classes to a single student, just to get the ball rolling and word of mouth going. And then things began to grow. The other designer got a 40-hour-a-week freelance gig and offered me her morning classes, too--at exactly the same time that the little church in our neighborhood started offering Mother's Morning Out for JUST the hours I needed.

Since then, we've consistently taught classes morning and evening each month, and sewing has been the most popular of these (I have my own theories for why this might be, which I'll be happy to share in the future). I've been so proud to work with these students and see just how very much they can learn in four short weeks. Seriously--I can't even count how many register and feel they have to apologize that they've never ever ever sewn before, and then at the end of the month, they're making curtains and bedspreads and piped pillows for everyone they know. All handmade Christmas presents for their whole family. One woman started a small business making onesies. Two of them are sewing for me now, even!

So I'm thrilled to announce that we've started a Flickr group of photos from our classes. I hope it'll be fun to browse and see not just what we make as part of the class, but also what all these women are making after class hours are over. It makes me feel pretty warm and yummy inside. I'm adding images as quickly as I can (and learning about all the cool things Flickr can do at the same time), so keep checking back for updates.

Check out our images, and let us know what you think! I'm happy to pass along your compliments....