Sister Diane can be found at her podcast craftypod, she is joining the whipup team as an occasional contributer. Welcome Diane.

As much as I love my online crafting community, there are times when I really want to make stuff in the company of real, live crafters. Crafting, as we all know, is an amazing way to connect with people — through making, we can find common ground with just about anyone.

I’d love to see more crafters forming local groups. It’s one thing to invite your pals over for a crafternoon, but to create a regular opportunity for creative people in your community to meet each other and share their love of craft . . . now that’s satisfying.

Here are some tips for crafters who are looking to group up:

Set a specific time and date, and stick to it. I’ve seen more new craft-groups die before they ever got off the ground, because nobody involved can agree on when to meet. It’s far better to establish a specific, recurring time right up front, such as “second Friday of the month from 3pm - 7pm.” The people who are truly interested in coming will make time on their busy calendars. And the people who have to miss the meeting can always come another time. Which leads to . . . .

Be a reliable presence in your community. In other words, when you say your group is going to meet at a particular time and place, be sure that it does. People who are considering coming to your group are very often thinking, “That looks like fun. I’ll just wait and see if they really stick around before I go try it out.” So if you want to keep attracting new members, you have to demonstrate that your group is stable and reliable . . . for months on end. I’ve had people come to my Church of Craft meetings who were on the mailing list for two years before they ventured out to visit us.

Make it clear exactly what happens at your meetings. It’s pretty universal: most of us feel shy about going to a party where we don’t know what to expect. So when you’re organizing a craft group, it’s important to help new people feel comfortable about coming to your meetings. When people know what to expect at your meetings, they’ll be a lot more likely to attend. And so, whenever you tell anyone about your meetings, be as specific as possible about the activities that will take place.

For example, let’s say you’re thinking of going to a craft group meeting, and you don’t know anyone there. Which of these meetings sounds more comfortable to you?

“We’re going to just hang and craft.”

-or-

“Everyone will bring a project they’re working on, and usually, we have knitters, embroiderers, beaders, and weavers in the group. We’ll work on our projects together, and then have a little show-and-tell. Then later, we’ll have coffee and dessert.”

These things take time. When you form a new craft group, and everyone is fairly new to each other, it takes a few meetings for the initial awkwardness to dissolve, and friendships to form. So be prepared to hang in there for those first few meetings, even if they aren’t quite the warm, convivial experience you’d envisioned. That experience will come — just keep meeting. Which also leads to . . .

Be a good host. If you’re the group organizer, then it’s important that you make everyone who comes to your meetings feel welcome. That means greeting each person as they arrive. It means introducing people to each other, to help get conversations flowing. And it means thanking each person for coming, and saying goodbye to them as they leave. In other words, the more comfortable and appreciated people feel in your group, the more likely they’ll be to come back. However . . .

Be patient with the flake-factor. Every single time your craft group meets, at least one person who said they would come, won’t show up. Sometimes, almost everyone will no-show. Don’t sweat it. Just keep having meetings, and before long, you’ll build a loyal following. Everyone is busy, and everyone flakes out on something once in a while. It’s nothing personal.

All this is much easier to do than you might think, and the rewards of forming a craft group are huge — making good friends, learning new techniques, and enjoying that amazing crafty group-energy. Get out there and group up, everyone!

This entry was posted on Tuesday, January 30th, 2007 at 1:12 pm and is filed under creativity+community. You can subscribe via RSS 2.0 feed to this post's comments. You can comment below, or link to this permanent URL from your own site. Your comments will be moderated but will appear as soon as humanly possible.