Hi everyone! I'm Julie of Julie's Fiber Treasures. I discovered felting around 2013/2014 and feel like I have found my "thing". In 2022 I expanded my resume by becoming a Certified Felting Instructor through Sarafina Fiber Art which has allowed me to explore and expand my teaching capabilities. I enjoy learning new techniques, bettering my skills, and teaching others the wonders of fiber through felting.
Patti Barker
Patti is an award-winning, full-time American fiber artist who enjoys incorporating hand-dyed silk and fibers, as well as handspun art yarn into her unique felted garments and accessories. She makes her home in North Central Florida with her husband, Rex and two fine pups. Patti teaches felt making and shows her work in wearable art fashion shows and exhibitions all over the US. To see more of her work, visit pattibarker.com
Julie Benac
Julie Benac has enjoyed the textile, sewing and fiber arts for over 35 years. She owns Fresh Lotus Design, a fiber art design small business with her partner Patrick, right on the shores of Lake Erie in Michigan. Here they produce hand-woven & hand-dyed artisan garments, luxury fiber blends for spinners, weavers and felters, as well as an outstanding and hard-to-find selection of hand-dyed silk yarns.
Mary Berry
Mary Berry is the resident teacher at Fancy Fibers in Farmersville, Texas. Her preferred fiber arts are weaving, spinning, rug hooking, and dyeing both fabric and yarn. Fiber arts are her passion and she loves to share that passion with others.
Siobhan Boothe
Siobhan Boothe is a natural dyer, fiber artist, and educator located in Floyd, VA. She has been crocheting for over 12 years and began pattern testing and writing in 2017. As a dyer, her focus is on traditional natural dyes, as well as local flora, nuts, & trees found around her family farm in the heart of Appalachia. She dyes yarn used for knitting, weaving, & crochet as well as home goods printed with images of flowers & leaves. In her spare time, she is a mother, wife, & farmer of chickens & cattle.
Russell Boyd
Rusty Boyd – Rusty Boyd has been a fiber fanatic for over 35 years. He learned to crochet around age 9, then took up knitting at the young age of 33. Since beginning knitting, Rusty has had patterns published by Skacel Knitting, Inc., Love of Knitting Magazine, and Love of Crochet Magazine. He has self-published several patterns and is currently working on more. For the past nine years, he has coordinated the Southeast Men’s Knitting Retreat held annually in the fall. Rusty lives in Ahoskie, NC with his daughter, Eleanor, a son, Avery, and puppy, Lily, a Feist/Chesapeake Bay mix. His designs may be found on Ravelry at smalltownknitguy.
Varian Brandon
Varian Brandon started knitting at eight. A trip to the islands of Great Britain rekindled a love of color and created an interest in the traditions of Fair Isle design and construction. She is currently designing stranded colorwork patterns for several yarn companies, international magazines, and her own website. She has also created a collection of stranded hats entitled "Waiting". This book of patterns can be found on her website.
Currently living in Saluda, North Carolina, Varian has been teaching stranded colorwork and related knitting techniques at local yarn shops, regional fiber festivals, and for the past eighteen years at the Kanuga Knitting and Quilting Retreat in Hendersonville, North Carolina which she coordinates. Online, she can be found at www.brandonknittingdesigns.com or on Ravelry at varianbrandon.
Roiana Buckmaster
Roiana Buckmaster lives in Mt. Pleasant, TN with her husband, building flocks of Icelandic sheep and heritage poultry. She was taught to knit at age 6 (to keep out from underfoot), embroidery at age ten (to encourage sitting still), and plunged into the rabbit hole of the Fiber Arts World from there. Roiana has been teaching weaving and tatting for eight years at fiber festivals across the South and also at the farm shop (The Tog and The Thel).
Ronda Cassada
Ronda is a self-taught basket maker of 30 years and a local resident of Buncombe County. She has an Associate of Arts degree and teaches absolute beginner basket weaving classes in Asheville, NC. To see more information on classes and sample baskets go to: www.ronda-w-cassada-basketry.com.
Katie Clark
Katie Clark has been crocheting and knitting for 30 years. For many years, she taught friends and family and anyone who would sit still long enough how to stitch. It finally occurred to her in 2009 to teach professionally and began offering classes at the Knit Studio in Jackson, Mississippi and the Bill Waller Craft Center in Ridgeland, Mississippi.
She now teaches regionally and writes patterns as Katie Clark Crochet which are available on Ravelry. She has designed for Interweave Crochet Magazine and Jems Luxe Fibers. She is a proud member of the Craftsmen’s Guild of Mississippi, Chimneyville Weavers and Spinners Guild, and the Crochet Guild of America. She lives in Madison, Mississippi with her husband, daughter, two cats, and a ridiculous stash of yarn.
Visit www.katieclarkcrochet.com to learn more.
Nharah Clark
Nharah Clark is a fiber artist, instructor, and historic textile specialist. For the last six years, she has co-owned SPARKLE Studio, a working and teaching fiber arts studio located at Lowe Mill ARTS & Entertainment in Huntsville, AL. She is deeply immersed in historic reenactment and has devoted 25 years to learning and teaching the fiber arts methods of the past. Over the years, she has added fiber processing, spinning, weaving, knitting, felting, sewing, and embroidery to her fiber arts repertoire.
Henry Clemes
This class will be taught by the tag team of Henry and Roy Clemes. A lifelong woodworker and small business owner, Henry has been building fiber art equipment for almost 50 years and drum carders for over 40 years. Roy grew up working in his family’s woodshop and is the president of Lambtown Festival, the largest sheep and wool show in California. Together they have introduced many innovations to the fiber arts community and their equipment is known for being not only thoughtfully engineered but visually pleasing and durable as well. They regularly consult and instruct spinners, felters, fiber growers, and professional fiber artists in the use of drum carders for fiber prep. Their full lineup of equipment can be seen at clemes.com and you can find them on social media via @clemesandclemes
Vickie Clontz
Vickie's love of fibers, wool and folk art shine through in each of her classes and the 100+ patterns she has designed for her company, Annie's Keepsakes, which celebrates its 33-year anniversary in 2023! Vickie's projects have appeared in magazines across the nation and abroad, and she brings h er easy-going style and award-winning expertise to each of her classes and workshops. See more of Vickie's work and learn about her textile trip to France in 2023 on her web-site at http://www.annieskeepsakes.com
Beth Collier
Beth began spinning in 2004 after getting her first sheep. Shortly after she started her business, Three Creeks Farm where she sells her Shetland wool and yarn, Kromski products including wheels and looms, felting supplies, dyeing supplies and a variety of handmade items. She has been teaching spinning and felting since 2010. When not spinning, felting, weaving or sewing, she enjoys chasing her grandchildren.
Pat Cothran
Pat Cothran is a North Carolina Adoption Coordinator, and past member of the Board of Directors of Southeast Llama Rescue. She and her husband own Soggy Bottom Farm in western North Carolina, which is home to llamas, alpacas, a horse and a donkey, and five dogs. At an early age, Pat got involved in sewing, knitting, cross-stitch, needlepoint, ceramics, and other creative endeavors. Her current fiber-related interests include needle-felting, repurposing wool, and creating items from raw materials using the Taravia. She enjoys participating in the annual pack llama trials near Asheville, NC, as a member of the Pack Llama Trial Association (PLTA).
Milissa Ellison Dewey
Born in Chapel Hill, North Carolina, USA, Milissa is PhD-educated in Early Modern European History and History of Science and is an Honors Scholar at Large in the University of North Carolina system, a classical flautist, and a journeyman woodturner. She has worked in the fiberarts since 1994, and in woodturning since 2009. Milissa is widely recognized for her work as a woodturner and also as a competitive spinner: in the 2017 Spinzilla, Milissa placed 2nd place among independent spinners and 5th overall internationally...using only antique equipment! In June 2018, she was featured on National Public Radio demonstrating and discussing her beloved "sock knitting machines".
Sue Dial
Sue Dial got her first spinning wheel in 1989, and has been working with polymer clay since 1995. She teaches both polymer clay and fiber related classes regionally, and sells her work in several area yarn shops and galleries. She lives in Little River with her 2 dogs, 2 cats, and 2 angora rabbits.
Katelyn Dunn
Meg Evatt
Meg Evatt started knitting when she was 17 years old. She checked a book out of the library and taught herself through trial and error. After retiring, she has studied and honed her knitting skills and knowledge. Meg began teaching knitting classes in the Upstate area to help other knitters learn new techniques, new stitches, increase knitting skills and troubleshoot knitting problems. Meg expanded her fiber skills to include dry needle felting, Dorset button construction, and even how to avoid injury while crafting using good ergonomics techniques. Meg teaches classes at local retreats and Palmetto Yarn Shoppe in Campobello, SC.
Chelsea Fehskens
Chelsea has learned about the fiber world from farm to yarn living in the Blue Ridge Mountains of Virginia. Raising Finnsheep, learning to shear and self taught processing, dying and spinning wool opened the world of fiber. When she is not chasing three kids she can be found teaching, sewing project bags and processing wool.
Jean Glass
Jean Elizabeth Glass has been playing with beads and fiber in one way or another for 30 years. She loves to share her passion with anyone who is interested and has generously shared her knowledge during demonstrations and teaching classes at SAFF, the Pittsburgh Knit & Crochet Festival, Stitches, The Fiber Festival of New England, DFW, and many other shows.
Tom Godleski
Tom Godleski has been carving wood spirit faces for the past thirty years or so. As well as being a wood carver, Tom is also the lead singer, bass player, and primary song writer for the Asheville bluegrass group, “Buncombe Turnpike.” Tom has also written four plays. His play, “Fresh Preserves,” won the 2009, “Scriptfest,” playwright competition at The Southern Appalachian Repertory Theater at Mars Hill University. Tom’s other interest are, storytelling, gardening, woodworking, landscaping, and rock masonry. Tom and his high school sweetheart, Terri, live on the property where Tom grew up in the Emma community of Buncombe County. They have two grown sons, Taylor, and Bryan. Tom and Terri have ten Shetland sheep, four alpacas, seven dogs, five cats, three angora rabbits, and one donkey.
Melissa Gray
Melissa Gray is a Needlefelting artist and mother of 3 living in SE NC with her husband, where she raises Fine white Corriedale sheep and horses. Her work will be displayed in the booth for East Carolina Corriedales and is currently in 2 galleries in the Southeast in Wilmington and New Bern NC.Her work was also displayed at Vogue Knitting live in Chicago in October 2012, and at The Butler Museum of American art in December 2012-2014. In the Spring of 2013 she has been requested to teach at the John C Campbell Folk Art School and has been a teacher at SAFF for 7 years.
Constance Hall
Weaver, spinner, knitter. Fiber lover. Rigid heddle weaving is as close to instant gratification as one can get in the world of fiber arts and teaching it is a blast. Articles published in Creative Knitting and Handwoven Magazine, Cover of Spin Off magazine as well as Little Loom magazine and patterns on the Schachtspindle.com website.
Eileen Hallman
has been spinning cotton on the charkha since 1985, weaving with it since 1986, and has been teaching since 1998. As a cotton enthusiast, she also dyes it with natural dyes. Her specialty is indigo; she has been growing and researching the use of the fresh leaves for non-vat dyeing since 2006.
In 2018 she began marbling with the intent to use natural dyes. She has developed natural dye inks for use in marbling, starting with tannins as both mordant and dye.
Cynthia D. Haney
Cynthia Dianne Haney, a spindle maker, is passionate about teaching people how to spin. She designs spindles and turns them on the lathe to aid students with high quality performance. Enabling students to make the yarn they want with a spindle. Teaching beginner spinners, of all ages and abilities, since 2011. From individual lessons to specialized classes at guilds, Southeastern Animal Fiber Fair, Dallas Ft. Worth Fiber Fest, Maryland Sheep and Wool, and the MidAtlantic Fiber Association. A Virginia native her woodshop and Cynthia Wood Spinner business is in Nelson County. More information and social contacts on CynthiaWoodSpinner.com
Karin Hedberg
My grandmother was the first person to introduce me to needlework. Since then I've been a lifelong crafter and have enjoyed doing and trying all kinds of needlework. I picked up punch needle embroidery a few years ago and have loved doing it and teaching it. The projects are usually small and very easy to finish, and you can add your own variation and flourish to any project. I especially love inspiring young people to get into crafting and making.
Cecilia Ho
Cecilia Ho of Greenville, SC, was born into a family of designers in Hong Kong. Since 2013, Cecilia relocated to South Carolina from Canada, and has taught thousands of students through one-one-one private & group felting workshops. Currently, Cecilia is a South Carolina Verified Teaching Artist running week-long fiber arts integration programs for k4-12th grade students across SC. Throughout the year, Cecilia acts as fiber art instructor running adult workshops at Greenville Center for Creative Arts, Spartanburg Art Museum & many regional communities. She often holds felting demonstrations at museum, gallery & festival (ie High Museum of Art, Smithsonian affiliations museums, Artisphere). Cecilia has taken part in multiple juried contemporary & fine art exhibitions, fashion shows, and magazines & TV interviews. FELTasticFashion is the business created in 2011 which Cecilia designs & packages all-inclusive felting DIY kits, and also act as official retailers for Ashford NZ & Clover Japan. Her hand felted art works can be purchased at Woolworth Walk Art Gallery in Asheville NC. Daily inspirations and creative process often shared on Instagram @FELTasticFashion. Workshop calendar, project kits & felting supplies available from www.FELTasticFashion.com
Susannah Johnson
Susannah Johnson has been spinning for over 30 years, and teaching whenever she can get somebody to sit still long enough. She weaves, spins, hand-combs, dyes with natural and commercial dyes, and enjoys being a sheep midwife. She owns BellaLuna Sheep & Wool Co., a flock of BFL, Finn, Merino crosses and East Friesian. Milking sheep gives one-on-one time with the ewes, cheese, yogurt, and super-moisturizing sheep milk soap!
Tammy Jordan
Tammy is a fourth-generation fiber artist who enjoys sharing her passion with everyone she meets. She has a fiber-arts business, Goldieknots Montana, specializing in Montana-grown wool, yarn, spinning fiber, and Made in Montana gift items. Prior to moving to Montana, she lived in Southern California and the Pocono Mountains where she was a former Humane Education specialist for the SPCA. Her teaching style is fun, creative, and interactive. When she’s not on the road teaching or in her studio creating, spinning, knitting, or felting, you can find her spending time with her dogs, sheep, horse, and other barnyard critters.
Jessica Kaufman
Jessica has her Masters degree in Crafts Education, and has been leading hands-on arts programming at schools, summer camps, and workshops for 16 years. In 2016 she opened WAXON Batik & Dye Studio LLC, an open batik & tie-dye studio in West Asheville. Jessica continues to teach traditional and contemporary crafts skills around the region, with a focus on textiles & fiber arts. Her patience, kindness, and love for teaching guide her classes to success.
Elaina Kenyon
Elaina is shepherdess at Avillion Farm in Efland, NC. The farm is a diversified fiber enterprise - home to German,French and English angora rabbits, Angora goats, Shetland and Jacob sheep and Suri alpaca. The rabbits and their fiber were her first fiber love, starting in 1993, and is still her favorite fiber to spin and blend with other fibers.
Barry Klein
Trendsetter Group owner/designer Barry Klein has been knitting for 50 years. He started by working in his family's knitting store, where all patterns were designed for the knitter's body. For the past 35 years he has worked as an industry teacher, doing knitting classes all over the world on land and sea.
Barry has designed knitwear for magazines, television shows, ice skaters, and movie stars; authored 5 knitting books; and worked as a spokesman on Knitting Daily and other television knitting shows. He loves to share his love of yarn and everything that can be done with it. Barry has been voted one of the Top 10 Men who Knit/Design throughout history.
Learn why 'Let the yarn do the work' is Barry's favorite motto.
For more about Barry, go to trendsetteryarns.com
Melanie Koenig
Melanie has been enamored with all things fiber since her grandmother taught her to knit and crochet when she was five or six years old. She has spent a lifetime delving deeply into every fiber art you can imagine. She has even travelled to Peru and Bolivia to study knitting and to Mexico and Guatemala to study Mayan backstrap weaving and embroidery. She began teaching and sharing her vast knowledge with others over thirty years ago and has a reputation for being a patient, fun, motivating teacher who is really good at making complex things easy to understand.
Lisa Lamb
I'm a self taught knitter that's only been knitting for about 20 years... But a life long crafter. My Grandma taught me to crochet when I was 4 and I've spent my free time since learning and experiencing different crafts. A few years ago I was asked to teach a class and I've expanded my knowledge and experiences since then, learning and teaching at Knit Inn's and SAFF. It's been a fun and exciting time.
Claudia Lampley
Claudia started rug hooking in 2000 and began teaching in 2005. She is a certified McGown instructor, a member of the Tarheel Ruggers and the Merrie Mountain Hookers guilds and a juried member at Dogwood Crafters in Dillsboro, N.C. She has tried many other needlecrafts, but rug hooking has become her passion. She loves seeing a simple drawing come to life as it is hooked.
Judith MacKenzie
A textile artist for the last 30 years, Judith's love for textiles has led to many fascinating jobs including a National Research Council Grant to investigate industrial silk dyes and the repair of the King of Afghanistan's carpet. A teacher in the United States and Canada, her work appears in private and public collections.
Grace McFetters
Grace McFetters has studied various fiber arts since 2013, starting with knitting. She began to explore weaving in early 2017. Grace established her fiber studio, Transcend Fiber Studio, in 2018, and formalized her fiber business in early 2020. She has taught Ukrainian Easter Eggs since 2011, and began teaching fiber arts, including knitting, weaving, hand spinning, and dyeing since 2018. As Grace grows as an artist and continues learning new techniques, she continues to add to her teaching repertoire.
Jillian Moreno
Jillian Moreno is the author of the best-selling spinning book Yarnitecture. She teaches all over and writes about spinning on her blog, the KnittyBlog, PLY Magazine and Spin Off Magazine. She can’t stop writing and teaching about spinning, wool, yarn and making things. She reads British murder mysteries, plays with fiber every day and is prone to break into song.
Pat Murray
Became interested in RugHooking while in the antique business in 1995. Involved in the fiber arts since 1997. Enjoy all aspects of the art from pattern to choosing colors to make patterns come alive.
Member of Tarheels Ruggers, Merry Mountain Guild. While a member of Shockley Slip of Virginia was chairman of their fiber auction which raised funds to further the education of all fiber Arts. Taught workshops this year. Am a Certified McGown rug Hooking teacher.
Phyllis Narus
Phyllis has been weaving since 1996 and instructing since 2000. She is the proud owner of R&M Yarns (since 2005) in Georgetown, TN. She enjoys teaching "beginning & beyond" weaving workshops at the R&M Yarns Fiber Art Studio throughout the year. She loves the enthusiasm and personal satisfaction on the faces of the students when they finish their first weaving projects!
Justin Near
Justin Near is a Nashville fiber artist and homeschooler who has a passion for sustainability and supporting local and regional communities and economies. Growing up, Justin was surrounded by crocheting, knitting, embroidery, and sewing, and dabbled in many of those as well as closely related fiber arts. As an adult, not long after beginning their homeschool journey, a door into the fiber world was reopened at a young child's birthday party where wool and spindles were the theme. Fast forward, and Justin is now knee-deep in the fiber community, teaching at fiber festivals, writing about fiber, and developing a soon-to-be regional fiber business. In her day job, Justin builds, manages, and supports websites and has a strong love for learning new technology. This carries into the fiber arts world, which is very closely related to the sciences - dyeing and chemistry, spinning and physics, design and engineering, and weaving and programming - so Justin feels quite at home here and hopes to pass on that love and passion to as many people as possible so that they, too, can experience the magic and beauty of working with raw, natural materials.
Bex Oliger
Bex grew up in her mother's (Carol Leigh Brack-Kaiser, author of Continuous Strand Weaving Method and Nature Provides Dyes for Rainbows) weaving and dyeing studio. She has been weaving, spinning, natural dyeing, and knitting for over 35 years. Bex is currently a knitwear designer and owner of Hillcreek Yarn & Fiber in Columbia, MO. She and her husband travel to fIber festivals across the country to vend and teach knitting, natural dyeing, and weaving.
Jackie Ottino
Jackie's favorite natural dye is Cochineal, and her favorite wool breed is Icelandic. Between travels teaching dye workshops, she designs yarns and colors for several Maine based yarn lines. In between all of that she drives her kids to swim meets and knits sweaters while cheering them on.
Martha Owen
Martha began her adventure in spinning at the John C. Campbell Folk School, in Brasstown, North Carolina in 1978. Since 1980 her extended family has included sheep and angora rabbits. Also a banjo player and known to tell a story or two, Martha's interest in sheep and wool, music and dance, have carried her quite literally and joyfully around the world. Some say she is a wool nerd but her sheep say she is outstanding in her field! Martha is a member of the Southern Highlands Craft Guild since 1988, is currently a Resident Artist at the John C. Campbell Folk School (folkschool.org) andis proud that she won the Local Cloth fashion show 2016 for "best use of local products" for her piece: North Carolina Fair Isle
Sallie Pollock
Being a needle worker at heart, I always wanted to learn to tat. I tried and tried from books, but could not get the "flip"!!! While still teaching 8th grade English, I came across a newspaper article about a nearby group of tatters. Needless to say, I became a part of that group and they taught me a lot about tatting and we have fun all year long. We decorate Christmas trees in old mansions for the county Christmas tours. We attend workshops and have our own workshops . We teach tatting all year everywhere!!! In addition to the tatting, I love to work filet crochet. I enjoy creating my own patterns and crocheting them. I have a beautiful family- my husband/best friend, takes me everywhere I need to be to teach. Our daughter is a Family Nurse Practitioner who adores her job and owns her clinic. Then there is me, retired from education for about 15 years, I enjoy spinning, knitting, crocheting, rug hooking, embroidery, dying threads, but I especially LOVE tatting and thread crocheting Last but not least by any means is Tuck, my precious French Bulldog who is that one dog of a lifetime. His breed came about largely in part due to needle workers and lace makers. Come take a tatting class and see just how easy this old art is and how you can make it new again! Filet crochet is so simple to do and designing your own piece is so rewarding. Once you try it you will be hooked!
Amelia Read teaching as Garripoli
Amelia Garripoli learned to knit at her mother’s knee; her fiber journey blossomed in 2001 with a home—and llamas—of her own. Since then, she has explored spinning, weaving, dyeing, nalbinding, and sock machines. A passionate teacher, she leads workshops at fiber festivals, guilds, and e-spinning Zoom classes. Her work appears in Spin-Off and Ply, and she’s the author of Productive Spindling, Power Spinning, and two Spin-Off spindle videos. She spins, weaves, and plays string games as she explores fiber festivals across America. Find her at askthebellwether.com.
Esther Rodgers
Esther is a full time fiber artist from Mebane NC. She is known as a creative art yarn spinner and for her unique fiber preparation. Esther is also a felter, weaver and knitter which gives her the perspective of how these creative yarns can be used. She is constantly innovating her spinning techniques to create new textures and is on the cutting edge in terms of yarn design. Esther is very conscious of where her fiber comes from, sourcing her wool from local and friendly farms, directly from wonderful shepherds with happy animals
Esther is an enthusiastic and patient teacher; possessing both national and international teaching experience.
She is a regular contributor to PLY magazine, with articles in the Autumn and Winter 2013, and Summer, Autumn and Winter 2014, and Spring and Autumn 2015. Her press also includes being featured in Ashley Martineau's 2013 book, Spinning and Dyeing yarn, Lexi Boeger's 2012 book Handspun, New Spins on Traditional Techniques, the Winter/Spring 2011 issue of Knitscene magazine and the Fall 2010 issue of Spin Off magazine. She is currently working on her first book.
Amy Ross
Amanda Sadowski
Amanda Sadowski is a Certified Wool Classer, Licensed Judge for the Pygora Breeders Association (PBA), Chair of the Fiber Committee for the PBA, Award Winning Hand spinner, Level 1 Master Spinner, Clinical Research Coordinator, Statistician, and Instructor. She has been instrumental in advancing the Pygora breed through her research efforts on fiber quality, production, and management which helped her obtain the first Permanent Grand Champion Pygora Buck and Doe for fleece in the history of the breed. Amanda has been a fiber artist for the majority of her life, but it wasn't until she was in a bad car accident and told she would never walk again, that she was led to raise Angora rabbits, Pygora goats, and Merino sheep with her family on their farm in Northwest, Indiana, called Labor of Love Farm. Her experience in raising, processing by hand, blending, spinning, and creating products has given her a unique perspective on what is desirable in a fleece, what preparation is best for specific types of yarn, and their intended end-use. Her experiences with teaching, mentoring, and judging gives her the greatest joy which is not only to impart knowledge, but to kindle enthusiasm in fiber animals, fiber production, and fiber arts.
*By the Grace of God, Amanda is walking again today.
To learn more visit www.laboroflovefarm.com
Amy Shelton
Instructor Amy Shelton is a fiber artist, instructor, and crochet designer. For the last six years, she has owned SPARKLE Studio, a working and teaching fiber arts studio located at Lowe Mill ARTS & Entertainment in Huntsville, AL. She is an expert crocheter who has been crocheting since the age of 9. Over the years, she has added fiber processing, spinning, weaving, knitting, felting, sewing, and embroidery to her fiber arts repertoire. She served on the Crochet Guild of America board of directors for four years and as president for two years.
Diana Sullivan
Did you know that you can create exquisite knits with a knitting machine? Learn how to create lovely knitted projects, and finish them beautifully, all while having more fun! Diana has many years experience teaching hand knitting, machine knitting and crochet, and has published numerous books, patterns and DVDs. Diana has the “dianaknits” channel on YouTube with almost 2 million views, and writes the Diana_natters.blogspot.com blog, chock-full of patterns, tips, ideas, and instructions, the busiest blog in the machine knitting arena, and a must-see site for fiber artists.
Heidi Sunday
Lifelong crafter, numbers nerd and former yarn shop owner from Mobile, AL I love to Knit, Crochet and Tat, Weave.
Michele Tway
Growing up, Michele Tway was surrounded by fiber artists. She's the fourth generation in her family to wield a crochet hook, The third to embroider and sew; the second to bead and quilt. The ladies were master technicians. Her grandfather rarely worked from a pattern, preferring to create his own. Their work was primarily framed or worn. Michele has always preferred to create stuffed and sculptural designs. After an extended detour, where she earned a master's degree, wrote computer code, developed software training manuals and conducted corporate training; she gave herself permission to pursue her own dreams of playing with yarn all day and making things with her crochet hook. She is a member of The Southern Highland Craft Guild and known for her mixed media and crochet bird sculptures. Michele is always eager to share her love of crochet and began formally teaching crochet classes in 2019.
Beverly Van Hook
Peyton Waggener
I began my journey as a knitter and I have blossomed. The kind of art I practice ranges from useful to whimsical. I strive to elevate the humble. Delicate nuno felted silk scarves and garments, practical hand-dyed and handwoven rugs, unique hand-beaded and felted jewelry, elegant handspun shawls, and fantastical needle felts are all outlets for my creative inspiration. Unexpected elegance and luxury attract people to my art.
Julie Wilson
Julie Wilson and her family own a farm in Fines Creek, North Carolina. In 1990, two sheep came to the Wilson family. Since then, Jehovah Raah Farm has grown to Shetland sheep, alpacas, llamas, Angora goats, Angora Rabbits, and Scottish Highland cattle. Julie has been spinning since 1990, and has retired from teaching high school Special Education for over 30 years. Julie has been with SAFF since its beginnings in Winston-Salem and has taught the spinning class since instruction was offered. Satisfaction guaranteed by Julie.
Q Wirtz
Liza Q. Wirtz, better known as Q (aka the Chief Feline), runs multifaceted fiber-arts business The Foldout Cat from her home studio in Alabama with the frequent and welcome assistance of partners Fiber J and Maker J and the help of a fluctuating number of cats. Q has been weaving in a freestyle/free-spirited tradition since 2015, carding multi-fiber batts and rolags since 2018, spinning since 2018, and dyeing since 2021. She teaches freestyle weaving, art-batt carding, and basic experiential spinning with the same philosophy that infuses her praxis: create from your heart, make what gives you joy, and put beauty into the world. Q wholeheartedly believes that everyone's an artist and that giving people access to fiber-arts tools and learning lets them prove it to themselves.
Q also sells one-of-a-kind art batts built from the Foldout Cat's unique Batt Buffet, handspun yarn, hand-dyed microbatch yarn and fiber, simple fiber-arts tools, and handwoven finished items. She has taught, vended, or both at fiber events and workshops in multiple states, including Alabama, Arkansas, Colorado, Georgia, Kansas, Kentucky, Indiana, Michigan, Mississippi, Missouri, New York, North Carolina, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Tennessee, Texas, and Virginia. Find her as FoldoutCat on Facebook, Instagram, Bluesky, and TikTok and on her website, foldoutcat.com.