I missed the Craft and DIY Bird of a Feather session at BlogHer '08, or I'd be highlighting the many people who came to share their passion during that session. Instead, let's look at what's been happening in the rest of the blogosphere:

Dyeabolical spent the week sewing pencil cases (can the start of school be far behind?).

ARTJuNK girl believes we should Do What You Love~

Nicole Lecht of freshly{blended} highlights the work of the block printers at Tugboat Print Shop.

Claire from Loobylu perfectly describes the brain fuzz I'm been feeling lately. :

Oh my goodness… do you ever get that frenzied, slightly panicked feeling that there is just so much you want / need to do in such a short period that. you can’t actually get focused on anything?

Click through to check out her brilliant solution.

Ulla-Maaria Mutanen, aka HobbyPrincess, reprinted her essay about "slow fashion" vs. disposable clothing in Big Returns.

When H&M announced that it would be using the classic Marimekko prints and models as a source of inspiration for their 2008 spring and summer collection,  Marimekko's customers predictably cried foul. Why is the McDonald's of fashion suddenly so interested in slow food? Because vintage is hip. In return for letting H&M reinterpret their products and image, Marimekko got its brand name and logo to be the central focus of H&M's global advertising campaign, sweeping over bus stops and billboards from Shanghai to San Francisco like graffiti written in disappearing ink. Former Marimekko CEO Kirsti Paakkanen (she has since stepped down) explained the partnership considerably increases Marimekko’s visibility among the young trend-conscious consumers. As a result, one of the world’s biggest marketing engines is currently promoting everlasting Marimekko as this summer’s trend.

Meanwhile, reacting to hearing Mutanin's Craft Manifesto, Caterina Fake wrote :

I see the rise of crafting, DIY (and their mouthpieces in magazines such as Readymade and Make) -- and, in the digital realm, people publishing their photos and blogs, as the expression of a powerful, almost demiurgic need to create one's own world. The need for uniqueness and singularity becomes really pressing in a world of endless reproduction, sameness, mediocrity and crap.

And Michael Nicoloff expands on the theme at I am yer grammar:

But what I'm really interested in here the fact that this manifesto casts craft culture as something that's trans-medium, as a philosophy that can lie beneath whatever work one happens to be doing. That was certainly the case with segments of DIY culture--I mean, riot grrl was something in music but also something in zines but also something in performance and film (hello Miranda July). There was a broad network of diverse social spaces one could enter--physically enter--where a similar philosophy was in the air regardless of the art form or activity that was going on. And with that came a sense that things frequently seen as "art" could now be democratized into "craft," into something that anyone could do, sometimes as a real "career," sometimes not. Instead of the "dumbness" that it tends to imply--and instead of implying a particular kind of content--"craft" becomes a mindset with which to approach your activity, instead of the forbidding "art," which frequently carries the silent "(high) art" along with it.

OK.  On to something lighter and more yellow: Bitter Betty Blogs that her life has been taken over by yellow lab puppy:

All major projects are slowed to a crawl. My life is divided into the short segments between naps, walks, training sessions, and clean up. I really want to be a good dog person with a really good dog, but I find the lack of sleep and concentration are really wearing me down,

In truth, it feels like my life is no longer my own.

I was able to make and un-make 14 potholders. (Yes.. I had to disassemble my potholders because Poly Batting is Not Good For Potholders. In fact, it almost conducts the heat. And I had hand quilted 7 of them.... ARRRGH!

But at least I found out now and saved my loved ones from scalded digits.)

And yesterday I finally prioritized some selfish sewing and tried to make a shirt from this Adorable Japanese Craft Book... and it is AWFUL. which is perfect since I made no muslin and used instead my expensive linen. What a doofus. I think the pattern is fine.. I'm just not doing great with the lack of English instructions, limited brain power and my not tiny petite Japanese body.

I think Betty needs to give herself a break!

Debra Roby blogs her creative life at A Stitch in Time and her journey to fitness at Weight for Deb.