What is Craftsy?

If you're a regular visitor to the online crafting and quilting community that is the web, you've probably come across  Craftsy. If you're like me and tend to get easily distracted and find yourself hopping down way too many virtual rabbit trails, you've been trying to ignore the plethora of resources and classes that the site and online community offers.

But my blinders have been ripped away! My friend Robin gave me a little glimpse of one of her Craftsy classes when we were together this past weekend. They were very well done and she was really enthusiastic about them. The teachers' are very conversational on screen and present their material in an orderly way. Instead of a scripted class, instructors follow their outlines on camera to create an authentic and engaging teaching experience.

Most know about Craftsy's classes on all kinds of crafts, covering quilting and sewing, knitting and crochet, baking, painting and more. The classes are online and on-demand and you can retake a class as many times as you want and you can pause and re-play as much as you need to learn as much as possible. How many times have you taken a class in real life and wished you had a pause button for the teacher?

But they also have a patterns marketplace (Free Quilting Patterns at Craftsy) where independent designers can sell their patterns; a supplies shop with great deals on yarn, fabric, and class kits; and a projects section where members share pictures of their latest craft successes. I have been asked occassionally if I have a pattern for some of my projects, maybe I should check out how to sell patterns there. (Then again, I imagine my first step is to actually recreate my designs!)

They currently have over 23 free mini-classes to explore (Free Classes at Craftsy), and as a Craftsy affiliate, I will be getting to try a regular class for free. (This is where I fully disclose that as an affiliate, I may have a financial reason for promoting them, yada, yada. What can I say? It's nice to make some pocket change for the time I put in here. Never fear, my thoughts are still my own!) I am looking forward to taking Machine Quilting with Templates from Kimmy Brunner( her Online Quilting Class) as it should help me design my ruler work!

How about you? Have you taken any Craftsy classes? There are quite a few classes from some of my favorites in quilting, Leah Day, Angela Walters and Cindy Needham.