I wanted to tell you all about my library’s Thrifty Gifter workshops all in one shot, but then I blew it last week when I got too excited to hold back any longer.

Last Tuesday and Thursday we had our third installment of crafty events: Metalworked Bookmarks!  This was the largest of any of the Thrifty Gifter workshops, with 40 total students sawing, punching and hammering all at the same time.  We made some serious noise.  Lessons learned?  My library’s auditorium is surprisingly soundproof.  Also?  Although the class worked well and most people wrote that they loved it, next time I would keep the size down to 25 or 30.

This was our most diverse group yet, with teenage twin sisters, fathers and sons, little old ladies who were best friends.  We worked with some cool tools, including this crazy hole punch contraption.  Don’t forget your goggles, ladies!

My favorite ever was sawing a little miniature cowboy hat out of copper.  I learned that I have an inner zen-metal-sawer!  I don’t, however, have any secret ink and gesso skills, unlike these two:

But our instructor, Mollie Blackburn, was very charitable and told me that my cowboy bookmark looked great, anyway.  She has a super supportive teaching style.  Here’s Mollie helping another student.  Don’t you love her goggles?

Once again, students had really lovely things to say.  One person wrote that they love the “doing” classes.  This reflects what one of my colleagues mentioned the other day — he commented that it’s unusual, and pretty cool, to see photos of adults “doing” stuff at the library, instead of just sitting around watching someone else talk.  I think that’s pretty cool, too!