Back to school – for YOU!

I’ve been seeing a lot of cool new online classes being offered in various places, and I thought I’d share a little roundup of the ones that are speaking to me. Maybe you’ll find something you’d like to take, as well!

First up are two classes I have signed up to take myself.

Let me start with Gatherings Through the Lens because this class actually starts TODAY!

Holly Clark is teaching this photography workshop at Big Picture Classes. It features four weeks of instruction aimed at helping you take more effective photos at all of life’s little events. This is a topic near and dear to my camera-carrying heart, so I’m very excited to be taking this class!

Workshops at Big Picture Classes all include a special gallery and classroom community that allows you to easily share with other members of the class if you want to. That’s been one of my favorite parts of previous BPC classes I have taken. The feedback of the instructor and your classmates is invaluable. Not to mention how inspiring it can be to see how others are interpreting the same set of instructions. It’s a very effective model, I think.

So, will I see you there? Click here for more information or to sign up.

Class number two is a crochet class: Professional Finishing for Perfect Crochet with Linda Permann.

(That graphic up there brings you to all of Craftsy’s crochet classes – so many great ones to choose from!)

I like Craftsy. It was through Linda’s Embellishments class there that I learned to crochet in the first place. This new class looks perfect for someone like me who is comfortable with the basic techniques and wants to take things a bit further. I signed up for this one as soon as it was announced, but I haven’t watched it yet. It seems like the perfect thing for a Fall afternoon, so I will probably dive in to it then.

My favorite thing about Craftsy classes? They are all self-paced by design, so I can watch whenever I have the time and the inclination.

Here are a few other workshops that have caught my eye (I haven’t taken any of these, but if I had unlimited funds, and unlimited time for taking classes, I totally would):

• The Essential Guide to Finishing Handknits (w/ Anne Hanson) at Craftsy
• Knit to Flatter (w/ Amy Herzog) at Craftsy
• Improve Your Crochet: Essential Techniques (w/ Edie Eckman) at Craftsy
• Capture Life (w/ Rebecca Cooper) at BPC
• Photography 201: Introduction to Manual Mode (w/ Elisha Snow) at BPC

Like I said before, I love taking online classes. I am almost always in “learning mode” with any craft I undertake. In fact, when I stop being excited about trying new things, that is usually the point where I move on to some other creative pursuit for a while.

I hope one of these classes grabs you, but if not, both sites have plenty of others to choose from. Craftsy has a fairly large selection of free classes, actually, so you can get a little taste of the way they do things (and learn something new at the same time) with no financial commitment whatsoever. Here’s the full list of Craftsy free mini classes to choose from.

Happy Learning!

(Full disclosure: the Craftsy and Big Picture Classes links are affiliate links, so I do get a small commission if you sign up for one of them. That’s not my motivation for writing this roundup, but I do appreciate the support!)