April Winchell

Yesterday I posted a picture of my first sewing project.

Hard to believe I'm self taught, isn't it?

Well, the strangest thing happened. People actually liked it. I mean I got email like you wouldn't believe.

Here's an excerpt from my favorite one:

"I just can't stop looking at your creation…..it has some form of magnetic attraction built into the design. As someone who uses his hands to make things everyday, I applaud anyone who takes it upon themselves to create something from their imagination and skills.

I send my best to you for creating something that wasn't in the world 24 hours earlier. Many people think up ideas, but few follow through with producing them.

I'm serious when I say I like your design. The reason I say this is because I have never seen anything else like it before, and too many of us just repeat past influences.

So press on April. Can't wait for more things."

Is that fantastic or what? And that's not even counting the offers I had to buy that thing. I probably got 12 people asking my price. Oh, I suspect it was a cruel joke at my expense, but I'm going to pretend it was a validation.

With love like this, what choice do I have? I must continue to create. It's bigger than me now.

So I made these guys.

Here's what I'm thinking.

I opened a store on etsy. I haven't put anything in it yet, but when I have an actual inventory of at least 30 things, I'm going to put them up for sale. I'll donate a portion of everything to Project Angel Food, which is a wonderful charity I have supported for many years.

I think that's a cool idea.

I'm going away to work on a project starting on Sunday. I'll be gone for two weeks, maybe even three. I'm going to take my sewing machine with me and see how much I can do at night when I get back to the hotel.

In other news, two very good things are poised to happen to me, and I will be able to tell you about them soon, I hope.

One of them involves a possible television appearance, and one of them involves a piece of mine being published somewhere.

But I don't know enough yet to blab about it. So I'll just be over here, making shit like this.