A Tea Party Challenge

One reason today's crafts magazines are so enjoyable is that they feature such a great variety of women (usually) and their work. One of my favorite magazines to turn to during "down time" from our own magazine is Cloth Paper Scissors. The new cover caught my eye, and when I saw that Cloth Paper Scissors is sponsoring a Tea Party Challenge, well, I'm always up for a good challenge!

And so are some of you. Turns out this is a call for tea party-themed art in mixed media (go here for the details), and I suspect a few of you creative tea-lover bloggers would be ideal participants. Go make us proud! We've got two months to e-mail them some photos of our projects, and I'm already sketching my ideas for what to make. What I have in mind is a fabric teacup (or maybe teapot) wall-hanging with dangling tea doodads and bead thingies. Even if you're not a crafter, I think you'd enjoy reading this issue, especially the editor's letter by Patricia Chatham Bolton. I always enjoy her editor's letters and think she would be a lot of fun to meet one day.


Quilting Arts, the sister publication of Cloth Paper Scissors, is another of the crafts magazines I read on occasion. I couldn't figure out quite why this cover spoke to me so, but it did. The cover is not pink, it's not especially frilly, but something about it was intriguing. I got home and read that this fascinating cover art, a mixed-media paper quilt by Judy Coates Perez, is titled "Tea & Entomology." Look closely beneath the letter "Q" in the logo and the bird's tailfeather. Recognize the vertical piece as the Tazo Tea label? And would you believe the artist has incorporated teabags into this piece? Between these two creativity-packed magazines, I have plenty of inspiration as I prepare to accept the Tea Party Challenge. I hope some of you will join in as well!