(This is our first in what we hope will be a series of interviews with folks who like to make stuff).

Catherine Newman, author of Waiting for Birdy, and the Ben and Birdy blog, is a fantastic cook, jigsaw puzzler, trash-talker, lollygagger, and friend. She’s also always making something. I recently sent her some questions to find out what she’s been up to lately and learned so much about her that I may now send out questionnaires to all my friends. Try it–so illuminating! I personally feel that the homemade pube/dryer lint beads (yes, you read that right) could find a home on Etsy. Thanks, Cath!

What kind of crafter are you? Plotter and planner or just-wing-it type?

A little of both. I am a wing-it-type overall, very scrappy and always wanting to use stuff we already have in the house, and not follow a pattern and not wait too long for the glue to dry. But if there’s something I have in mind, I will try to make sure I have the materials I need.

Oh, many, many types. Like you, I love doing tiny things. My friend Emily [Neuburger] published a book called Show Me a Story, and the signature project is something called “Story Stones” where you basically modpodge a miniature paper collage onto a rock, and I could have made those forever. I did a mason jar, a pear, a cup of coffee, and a star. I was technically only there to help my daughter, but I think she left the table long before me. (so glad I’d had the random impulse to fill a bag with stones at the P.town beach!) I also love anything that involves turning clothes into better clothes (cutting t-shirts apart to make skirts, e.g.) or that involves felting wool sweaters and cutting them up and making patchwork blankets.

My biggest Martha Stewart moment? Gosh. Those wool blankets are so gorgeous I can’t even be modest about them. So maybe that. But weirdest? I have made prank barf (out of glue and paint and oats). I tried to make beads out of dryer lint, and they were so disgusting, with pubic hair sticking out of them, that we couldn’t stop laughing.  Oh, another MS moment: I made the kids velvet/cashmere (repurposed fabrics) cupcake stuffies for xmas, and they came out so cute! I was copying something Birdy had seen at Barnes and Noble, only mine were nicer.

I really, truly like both. We have this game Modern Art–it’s a very complex board game with an auction theme–and all the art in it was so terrible. There are, like, 100 pretend paintings and they were all so ugly. So the four of us sat down and made all new tiny paintings for the game, and it was one of the best days of my life. So I love that–love sitting with the kids to make Fimo donuts, or beading together. But I also love to be just me doing something, like sewing.

Ah, please see above! Modern Art cards. Artist Trading cards, which are just little magazine collages we do on cut-up cereal boxes, then cover in duct tape. Love those.

Ah! That’s a good question. I have surprised myself by being able to bite my tongue and not offer the kids all of my excellent advice, even though it would make their trivet or puppet or coin purse SO MUCH NICER.

I love the book Cute Stuff for inspiration when crafting with kids, especially when we’re trying to think of presents to make people. I love Show Me a Story (above). I love Alabama Chanin for sewing, and my friends’ sewing book Improv Sewing [by Nicole Blum and Debra Immergut].

I am making Birdy a patchwork wool blanket from all of the aqua and turquoise sweaters I’ve been saving and felting for years. I made Ben a pink one. They like to say that these are their “college blankets,” which makes me want to cry.