1000 Cranes Craft and Art

My guilty pleasure during this quarantine is crafting. I say ‘guilty’ because the pandemic is giving me an excuse for treasured time to create. The world has slowed down long enough that it’s actually okay to just be. And breathe. In some upside down and backwards way, I feel guilty for not feeling guilty for taking the time to do something that I love. Okay, that’s enough guilty.

I think I’ve been a bit like a kid in a candy store — “ooh, ooh, what shall I try first?” I’ve re-arranged the furniture. I’ve bought new furniture (well, new to me, and it was sight unseen off a consignment store website which is kind of bold, eh?). I’m painting the old furniture. I’ve re-hung pictures. I’ve made bread; and clafoutis; and matzah covered in toffee and chocolate. I’ve gardened. I’ve made more pom poms (of course)!

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I pulled out the sewing machine and made masks — from thrifted toile flannel pajama bottoms (really, I only wanted to wear the top).

I made bracelets from leftover fabric and ribbon and embroidery thread and mailed them off to my daughters. (It’s amazing what you can work on during a Skype call if the video is turned off!)

I’m working on my book folding skills. I’ve purchased several different kinds of patterns to understand the different techniques. The Book End guy, at the start of this post is one. That pattern is from SimplexBookFolding. (He’s got an inverse partner who’s up for folding next.) The abstract Yin Yang is another piece, from an excellent YouTube video by Johwey Redington (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PWXugfboYvE):

But always, it seems, there are cranes.

I started the quarantine with 289 cranes. I really wasn’t sure if I was going to try to fold 1000 cranes again this year. One month in to the quarantine and I am up to 500. I started folding cranes last year to build resilience. That need for resilience, that need for a sense of creating something concrete, and the zen of having something unobtrusive to do with my hands while my brain focuses on other, less pleasant but necessary, tasks — those needs haven’t gone away in 2020. This year, rather than being folded from panty liner backing, the cranes are folded from the pages of an old dictionary. Words in flight.