When you have a hobby that you love, sometimes it’s hard to wait until the time is right to begin passing on your love of it to your kids. But when the moment is right and you’re all ready to begin sharing the joy of quilting, here are some tips to help get everyone through the process with only happy moments and memories being created.

Patience Above Everything Else

The most important thing you have to realize is that even the simplest quilting project can take a really long time to complete. Don’t force your kids to be doing something you know they don’t have the attention span for, because it will only lead to everyone getting frustrated. “When you begin lessons, if you’re seeing that there’s not really much of an interest, it may be best to hold off on the quilting lessons for a little longer. There’s nothing wrong with waiting for the right moment to teach,” explains lifestyle blogger from Let’s Go And Learn and SimpleGrad.

Safety First

Quilting involves lots of sharp, pokey things, which can be a little bit dangerous around new learners. It’s a good idea to keep things organized in your workspace, and remind kids about using caution when using scissors, pins, and other sharp instruments. If you’ve got any doubts, it may be best to just do the cutting and pinning yourself.

Give Them Options

You may be dead-set on a certain project that you think is just perfect. But if your kid isn’t interested in it, it likely won’t go over well. If a child is able to choose the project they’re going to work on, there’s a much higher chance that you’re going to be able to keep their attention focused on that project. Sure, it may not turn out exactly as planned, but as long as an interest is sparked, you can continue widening the scope of projects.

Take a Tour

There’s no need to get into specific details, but giving kids a general idea of how a sewing machine works and what you’ll need to do to get things done. “Pressing the foot pedal, feeding the material, keeping your fingers away from the needle, and any other basic information would be great to include in the lessons you’re teaching. A great tip for helping new learners see their seam allowance mark is to run washi tape across the stitch line,” says crafts blogger at Writing Populist and ViaWriting, Anna Adams.

Hand Quilting or Machine Done

There are great benefits to both hand quilted projects as well as those that are machine quilted. Machine quilting always seems to be a huge thrill for kids. But there’s always something amazingly fun about hand quilting a project. It’s also much quieter and when you’re quilting with kids, you can go at a slower, more comfortable pace.

Keep It Easy

Kids can do some pretty incredibly things, there’s no doubt about that. But when they’re just learning the ropes of quilting, it’s best to keep projects simple if you have the choice. Start off small so you can pique your kid’s interest, then gradually build up to tougher projects.

“If things are too difficult from the get-go, it’s hard to get kids interested and keep them involved. Even though projects may seem incredibly simple for an experienced quilter, they may be really interesting to a new learner. Interest is everything, so if you can grab a kid’s interest that’s essential,” explains educator Sandra Bunnell of My Writing Way and Studydemic.

Pick Fun Things

There are so many small projects you can do that will be incredibly fun and interesting for kids. From small mug rugs and coasters to little projects for their dolls, kids will be interested in anything that is fun and geared towards their interests. Pillows are another great project to introduce to kids, because they are incredibly interesting to make and they’re also usable.

Enjoy the Time!

With quilting, precision and accuracy is key. But you may have to sit back, relax, and allow you kids to just have fun and enjoy the experience. Things may not turn out exactly as planned, it may take longer than it should, and it may be a little less perfect than anticipated, but the important thing is you’ve got to enjoy every moment enjoy each and every stitch.

Chloe Bennet is a working full-time mom.

Guest Author

I decided to start with a snake. Tubes are relatively easy, and if you make it wavy, it looks like a snake. I cut into the leg of the pants, getting two roughly similar pieces and some odd gray fabric I hadn’t realized was along for the ride.

From there, I got a needle and thread, and started hand-sewing the two pieces together along the sides. A possible technique to use here is to poke the needle through the fabric from the same side every time, looping back to the front. In general, look at the hems of your clothing, and see if you can’t figure out what the path of the thread and therefore the needle is. At any rate, I sewed the pieces together, leaving the mouth of the snake open. Ostensibly, this is where I should have worn a thimble, but it was never the same finger that the needle pricked – the spiteful thing.

Here’s where you can learn from my mistake. See, that gray cloth which will be the inside of the snake’s mouth, should be on the inside of the mouth right now. I thought I was being clever, but no. When you turn the snake inside out, you can also turn the weird little pocket the gray fabric makes inside out. That way the entire snake is round and photogenic. Also, make sure to sew one gray mouth bit on both mouth flaps on the original snake. They are the hard and soft palate, I guess.

Looking at that snake, I feel as though it belongs in Nightmare Before Christmas. If that’s an aesthetic you are going for, that’s cool too. Now, that is one hungry snake. To keep it from devouring the souls of your sleeping roommates, try stuffing it with the very fabric from which it was cut. You can use cotton batting, like what you might find in stuffed animals and pillows, but I knew my stitching wasn’t particularly tight, so the stuffing would show through.

You’re a crafter, Harry. At any rate, wrap some cloth around a chopstick or pen and stuff it down the snake’s throat. You may find that it won’t reach all the way back, so you should bunch the snake up around the chopstick and push the material off into the dark bowels of your misshapen creation. You may need to pack it in with the chopstick, and then stuff more cloth after that. Once the body is firm, put some of the scraps into the little mouth pockets from before. This will give the snake a sense of maturity instead of appearing as a sock-puppet.

Crikey, what a ripper! Sadly, I only thought of that quote once while making this thing, and did not say it aloud. At any rate, once you have everything stuffed, it’s time to sew the mouth shut. Specifically, at the back of the throat, where the pocket edges meet.

Like so. You can even attach a wire hanger to the bottom of the snake’s jaw, and you will have yourself a Muppet. Now you can entertain younger relatives, quote Indiana Jones, and throw snakes at people. Use this power wisely, and you will gain great influence throughout the land.

Have I inspired you? Do you also have a terrible habit of wasting food? I would be very interested to see if others have followed in my rambling footsteps, so if you have made something inspired by one of my articles, take a picture and send it to ldsblogs@moregoodfoundation.org. Label it: Crafts for Brandon. If you do, that picture will be at the end of my next article, with your name attached. If you made something beyond the fantastic scope of my chronicle, you might consider writing a guest article and sending it to that same email address to be considered as a guest post. It is always inspiring to see what art you may see in the mundane.

Brandon Quist

Brandon is originally from Olmsted Falls, Ohio. He has studied both at Baldwin Wallace college and Brigham Young University, and is currently pursuing Chemical Engineering, among other things. He considers himself a jack of all trades, and a master of none. In his spare time, Brandon enjoys knitting, guitar, reading, origami, writing, and photography.

Cut away the corners, giving yourself the tail end of a tear-drop shape. That way it looks more bird-like. Then find the center of balance by trial and error, and mark it somehow. This can be a little difficult, since writing exerts a certain amount of pressure, which will make the whole thing tilt and probably fall if you aren’t careful. It is at the time of taking this picture that I developed empathy for all the left-handed photographers. As you can see, my right hand is occupied, and my camera really wasn’t meant to be operated in a sinister fashion.

Remember that center of balance? That is now the bird’s beak. Cut away the front edge to get that wing shape that is so very important to the illusion of the thing. Having said that, be careful that you don’t cut too deep into the heart of the cardboard, or you may very well end up with a center of balance that is not part of the thing itself.

I hope you saved those cardboard scraps from earlier, because now we are getting topographical. This is also when you can learn from my mistake. As you can see, the wings are pretty lumpy on this side, which makes the trick to the balancing bird a bit obvious. What you can do is to glue the pieces over the wings as you see in the picture, wait for them to dry, then flip the entire thing over and glue the body pieces on the other side. This way the wings will look like they are being swept low, as opposed to arched high. Once this is done, it still looks rather angular and obviously cobbled together. The solution?

Waste food. Yes, that is some printer paper torn up and dipped in a flour-water solution we all know and love as paper mache. It doesn’t take much; I mixed up the stuff in a cereal bowl. Once you have your bird smoothed out, keep in mind that the flour will dry yellow on the paper. If that bothers you, feel free to paint that bird with all the colors of the wind, or your acrylic bottles.

That’s how it looks when it’s dried. You are now ready to entertain nearly anyone for the entirety of their child-like attention span, which is to say ten minutes at the most. After the novelty wears off, make a game of perching the bird in odd places. Alternatively, if you paint it really well, you can glue it to a hummingbird feeder as a decoy. Fly on over, the sugar-water’s fine.

To read more of Brandon’s articles, click the image.

Have I inspired you? Do you also have a terrible habit of wasting food? I would be very interested to see if others have followed in my rambling footsteps, so if you have made something inspired by one of my articles, take a picture and send it to ldsblogs@moregoodfoundation.org.  Label it: Crafts for Brandon. If you do, that picture will be at the end of my next article, with your name attached. If you made something beyond the fantastic scope of my chronicle, you might consider writing a guest article and sending it to that same email address to be considered as a guest post. It is always inspiring to see what art you may see in the mundane.

Brandon Quist

Brandon is originally from Olmsted Falls, Ohio. He has studied both at Baldwin Wallace college and Brigham Young University, and is currently pursuing Chemical Engineering, among other things. He considers himself a jack of all trades, and a master of none. In his spare time, Brandon enjoys knitting, guitar, reading, origami, writing, and photography.

I’m older. Old enough to learn from people and cultures that are far different from my own. I’m old enough to learn from people who believe in different gods. I’m old enough to recognize that there are minds wiser than I that see and learn from the Iliad and just maybe I should humble myself and learn as well. I’m old enough to learn from people who have different opinions than myself. Old enough to admit that 14-year-old me might not be the best judge of good literature. I wonder if we read some classics too early.

I must admit the first chapter was rough. I still struggle to get past the way the Achaeans’ and Trojans’ view women, like a thing to be used and traded and dominated. Instead of using that as a reason to discount the story, I want to learn from it. Are there men in our culture who view a woman as a thing to be used and dominated? How does that affect all of us?

After reading a few dreams and godly quarrels and birds flying I had to remind myself again that I am mature enough to learn from people who are different than myself.

Then I find myself interested in the story. I’m more able to overlook differences and see similarities. Instead of wondering at their strange gods and why they would ever listen, I started considering the advice we listen to in this age. Are we any better? We self-diagnose on the internet or even Facebook and sometimes don’t take good rational advice like, lose a little weight or eat less junk. We ourselves like to sit around like gods, eating and drinking and using violence as entertainment putting in our two bits, sometimes increasing the violence and the drama for added entertainment factor.

I read books like the Iliad because when I am folding laundry and doing dishes, I want to have thoughts in my mind. Thoughts like: what does it take to be a leader? Do I motivate like Agamemnon or Ulysses? I want to spend my time driving wondering how the author makes little comments about some of the men who die–making their deaths more meaningful and war more obviously senseless. I like to think while I’m rocking a baby about what I’m reading and whether I worship or make sacrifices to things that don’t increase the peace. Perhaps not in prayer or at church, but maybe I worship with my time and praise, and the songs I listen to. Maybe I’m not sacrificing 100 goats, but instead my precious time towards increasing the fear and division in the world, instead of doing the much harder work of creating peace. Am I less foolish than the ancient Greeks?

Learning at Home
To read more of Britt’s articles, click the picture.

I read because my mind demands that I use it. I read because I want my children to never stop learning. I read because my parents haven’t stopped learning yet. I read because I want to vote and act based on the wisdom of generations instead of the whims of the media. I read because I’d rather spend at least some of my life face to face with the greatest authors of all time than face to face with the television show of the moment.

So I’m reading the Iliad, because if nothing else I want my children to have a mom who can learn from people who don’t think exactly like her.

What are you old enough to read now?

Britt Kelly

Britt grew up in a family of six brothers and one sister and gained a bonus sister later. She camped in the High Sierras, canoed down the Colorado, and played volleyball at Brigham Young University. She then served a mission to South Africa.

With all of her time in the gym and the mountains and South Africa, she was totally prepared to become the mother of 2 sons and soon to be 9 daughters. By totally prepared she means willing to love them and muddle through everything else in a partially sleepless state. She is mostly successful at figuring out how to keep the baby clothed, or at least diapered, though her current toddler is challenging this skill.

She feels children naturally love to learn and didn’t want to disrupt childhood curiosity with worksheets and school bells. She loves to play in the dirt, read books, go on adventures, watch her children discover new things, and mentor her children. Her oldest child is currently at a community college and her oldest son is going to high school at a public school. She loves to follow her children in their unique paths and interests.

She loves to write because, unlike the laundry and the dishes, writing stays done. Whenever someone asks her how she does it all she wonders what in the world they think she’s doing.

Go to any grocery store, and you will probably be able to nab a nice shallow box like this one. Specifically, the dollar store, where you may also find those large glass gem thingies. It turns out you only need one bag, but it was only a dollar, so I played it safe.

It is important to glue the middle gem with the flat side facing up, so it can lead all the other sheeple glass gems in its hipster glory. But seriously, that one has to be upside down. The rest you can glue however you like, but try to make it symmetrical if at all possible.

Like that. Now just hang it on a wall and give it a pretentious name, like “Maruchange the World of Glass.” Actually, don’t. That’s a terrible idea. Instead, carve a hole on opposite sides just behind the center-edge glass gem. A hole the size of a quarter should be good.

Note that incredibly valuable coin sitting on the hipster shepherd. Pretentious wall art has become the great arena of taking turns flicking a penny. The game is penny hockey, and the goals are carved into the very board. Pretty simple, pretty cheap, pretty fun.

But that’s not enough for you, is it? I hear your time-shifted voices, dear demanding, hounding, unreasoning readers. You echo in my ears and move my hand, preemptively answering your cry for more cardboard shenanigans.

Ironically, that yardstick does nothing to give you a sense of scale, since you cannot see either end, nor the unit markings. Rest assured, that pencil has got your back, telling you that what you are seeing is a large square of cardboard. What that yard stick did do is provide the width and the straightness of the columns on the cardboard.

The jig is up, the game is afoo- no, it’s chess. Admittedly, with a 14X14 board. That’s almost wide enough for two whole chess sets on either side, minus the second king and queen and attendant pawns. If you do decide to go that way, I would recommend being able to move two separate pieces a turn, or it will take forever. Also, as you fill in 98 squares with black marker, go from the top down so that you don’t mark up your palm-side so much.

Of course, it would be a shame to waste all that space in the middle with unending plains. Enter the step hill thingy. Cardboard doesn’t want to do all those right angles, so you have to get persuasive with tape. For rules, consider that a piece cannot stop on a vertical space. Thus hills become impassable walls for pawns, and hideous speed bumps for bishops.

You can also go with blank spots, where nothing can move over. For another element, flip it over and it becomes a ramp passable only to rooks and queens. Not pictured is a piece that bends space, or possibly a wormhole from one space to another. Try mixing in some battleship, where a sheet in the middle blocks you from seeing how your opponent is setting up their board. Play a few turns, then remove the sheet and play as normal.

Chess is celebrated as an unsolved, closed game. While that is true, it doesn’t have to be, if you dismantle the thinking box and rebuild the game in your own image.

To read more of Brandon’s articles, click the picture.

Brandon Quist

Brandon is originally from Olmsted Falls, Ohio. He has studied both at Baldwin Wallace college and Brigham Young University, and is currently pursuing Chemical Engineering, among other things. He considers himself a jack of all trades, and a master of none. In his spare time, Brandon enjoys knitting, guitar, reading, origami, writing, and photography.

– Paper of any sort

– Flour

– Water

– Balloons

– Toilet paper rolls

– Tape

As you might have guessed, the paste is a flour/water mixture. It turns out, flour can do most of the things you want, and only a few of the things you don’t. Like explode. Ye olde paste is exactly what people are referring to when they talk about eating glue. I guess kids liked bland things back then. As for the exact ratio, just wing it. Ideally, it should look like pancake batter, but feel free to experiment with more or less flour.

As you can see, an empty cereal bag is a fine work surface. You will also note that balloon. It turns out, soggy paper needs something to cling to in order to dry in any useful shape. For the purposes of this article, I taped half-tubes to the balloon, and a smaller section for the nose. Keep in mind any time you want to make something cute, make it round with little stubby appendages. People adore helplessness.

At one point, I ordered something online. I now have a lot of brown packing paper, so this is a pretty good use. You just dip your fingers in the paste, and smear it on the torn paper strips. Try not to get too much on the paper, just make it soggy on both sides. After about five strips, your hands will be perfectly suited to chasing people around the house, with your deadly starchy touch.

Now that you have given life to a balloon and some bathroom refuse, you should let it dry out somewhere. You can actually dry it out in an oven on its lowest setting, which may turn the paste into a clear, rubbery substance. Or you can set it out in the sunlight or something if you have things to do. It is important that it is fully dry before you add another layer of paper. If you don’t, your sculpture will go the way of Halloween pumpkins, and rot from the inside out.

Now, while you wait, try making other things. Aluminum foil is your friend here, easily molded and somewhat firm. Take this opportunity to make yourself a phantom of the opera mask, or any other kind of mask so that the world will never find you. As for me, I made a tree.

As you can see, I cut some branches out of a toilet paper roll, and taped them to other scraps of cardboard until it looked like a tree. The foliage is modeled by that handy green balloon, and brown paper makes pretty good bark. If you want, you can take napkins, toilet paper, or paper towels, and get a certain texture from pasting it on. (I did nothing of the sort)

That’s what it looks like when dry. A word of caution: When popping architectural balloons, be very careful. Use the old “tape and pin” method to slowly deflate the thing. That tree there imploded a little bit, partly because a lot of the branches were still taped to the balloon. On the other hand, the pig’s balloon popped without causing any damage.

It may be past Thanksgiving, but piñatas are forever.

(Until you beat them in a blind rage.)

Brandon Quist

Brandon is originally from Olmsted Falls, Ohio. He has studied both at Baldwin Wallace college and Brigham Young University, and is currently pursuing Chemical Engineering, among other things. He considers himself a jack of all trades, and a master of none. In his spare time, Brandon enjoys knitting, guitar, reading, origami, writing, and photography.

My husband on the other hand was a voracious reader. He read everything from science fiction to “How It Works” encyclopedias and teased me about my magazine reading. Somewhere along the middle of having children and living life, I started writing opinion pieces for a newspaper column in San Diego because of a public school issue very close to me and my family. Then it happened: I could not stop reading. There was not enough time in the day to read everything I wanted to read so I had to pace myself. Now, 25 years later, I have played catch up on most of the classics, teach a history/ literature class for teens and write book reviews. It’s crazy how such a weakness could be turned into a strength.

Reading to children helps them to become better readers as well and I read to my own as much as possible. All nine of mine love to read and with both parents’ examples in their life, they love books as much as we do.

Non-fiction was where it was at for me. Reading biographies, how-to-books and interesting political writings filled my life when I wasn’t changing diapers or cooking dinner. I learned that the pen was mightier than the sword and for me fiction was a waste of time. Boy, was I ever wrong.

Belonging to a writer’s group, I began to edit and review fictional stories. I have read more novels in the past 10 years than I have ever read before and they are dessert for me now. A well written story with a great moral or tender thought can teach better principles than most Sunday School classes. Why? Because, you are sucked up into the story so deeply that when you are hit with a true gospel principle, it stays with you for the rest of your life.

For example: I recently read a magnificent novel called The Dreamer by May Nicole Abby. It was a remarkable, adventure story of a woman who was at the end of her emotional rope. She did all she wanted through her educational pursuits, racking up degrees and studying around the world. She was a prominent professor at a high ranking university, yet something was missing and she didn’t know what. At wits end, she throws herself off the edge of a cliff in hopes to find what she is looking for and falls through a time portal which takes her back to the 1700’s. At the end of her story she says this: “Sometimes I cannot help marvel at the woman I have become who gave up the pursuit of fame for love and family. At first I tried to return to my work, but it was impossible with so much to do for Mallory (husband), his career and our home and especially once our first child came and needed me so. There was no time for it. So tenderly, I put it all away. I thought woman like me were weak. But it takes all my strength and courage to put my children and husband before myself. I know I won’t be read about in text

Building Strong Families
To read more of Valerie’s articles, click the picture.

books and newspapers. I know I will live and die in general obscurity. Mallory will be read about perhaps, but not me. My children might become famed and acclaimed, but not me….. But without me, these, my loved ones, would be lost. Somehow I am the adhesive that binds us together as one and I have pondered in awe of my power. My words are their words. My kindness or cruelty, theirs. Their voices seem to be the echo of my own.”

Like long parables, these fictional stories can pierce the heart or strike upon exactly what the reader was looking for in life. Fictional stories have this power for good or for evil and that is an epiphany I have thought about over and over again. Books are food for the soul: all children should learn this. So if you are like I was so long ago, find a delicious desert of a book and read, read, read. You will not regret it.

Valerie Steimle

Valerie Steimle has been writing as a family advocate for over 25 years. As a convert to The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, she promotes Christian living in her writings and is the mother of nine children and grandmother to twelve. Mrs. Steimle authored six books and is a contributing writer to several online websites. To her, time is the most precious commodity we have and knows we should spend it wisely.
To read more of Valerie’s work, visit her at her website, The Blessings of Family Life.

Look at that beautiful vista, those rolling hills, that blurry car, and the doorframe of the car clipping the upper left corner. Inspiring. At any rate, the first thing to do is make a rough sketch of what you want to paint. You don’t have to draw a lot of details, just zones of color.

Notice, you can transcend the limitations of photography, like car door frames, but it requires some skill at drawing. There’s always a tradeoff. Once you get a drawing you can live with, it’s time to gather supplies. The paints themselves are pretty easy to come by; I got a set from a local dollar store. You will also want some sort of covering for the table; a few layers of newspaper is probably fine. Also, get a container of water and something to mix the paint on. I used the left over lid and bowl from one of those microwavable noodle lunches. Finally, get a piece of paper to paint test streaks on.

Try to start with the lightest colors; they should dry before you start painting with darker colors. This prevents the dark colors from seeping into the lighter areas. As you can see, I started with a diluted yellow:

See those dark greenish brown marks? I was trying to get to brown, but the paints got out of hand. Rather than waste an odd color, I decided to add some texture that would be partially covered up later. After washing the paint off the lid, I tried again. It came out fairly close to another part of the landscape, so I started filling in that cliff face.

Note the white space between the blobs? That makes that part of the painting “pop.” It’s a bit like the reflective highlights shiny things have. Where do we go from here? Trees. Lots of trees. A tree is a beautiful, poor life choice. Any attempt to depict a tree is doomed to be wrong. At any rate, lots of narrow green smudges is the order of the day.

Look at all that white space. Also, try to keep perspective, with closer things larger than far away things. I did okay, but brushes are not precision instruments. Now, a word of warning about watercolors. You paint something? You are stuck with it. Oil, acrylics, those are more forgiving, you can paint over mistakes. Watercolors are like accusatory elephants that never forget.

Exhibit A: that cliffside shadow. I’m not sure what I was thinking, but what I got was a deep lovely green that had little to do with the actual color I was going for. On the positive side, I was able to add some texture to the yellow mountain bit with diluted paints. In fact, that is a major technique to master: dilution. Adding water to your little paint mixture can make it much lighter and allow you to paint it as under layer, as well as an accent to what is already going on.

It may look like I went overboard with the “under layer” of green, and I did, but not too much. The thing to remember about watercolor paint is that it dries lighter than when you paint it. It’s had some time to think things over, and it forgives you. Notice as well the white space I leave in the under layer, giving shape to the carpet of forest.

When you think of concrete, you think gray. That’s because your mind is a dirty liar. Concrete is often gray, but what matters is the color you see, which is often influenced by shadows and reflections. If you scroll back up to the original picture, you will see that the concrete roadway is closer to a slate-blueish-green. Note the other areas getting filled in. Those are actually gray, and it shows.

Once the first layer of paint dries, you can come back to that same area and put on some more paint. It adds texture, and it’s a nice, slow, and steady way to approach a certain darkness without going over.

That cliffside still haunts me.

Oh hey, the sky. You may have been wondering when looking at the original sketch, “Where are all the clouds?” They were where they always are, in your heart. Which is to say, too troublesome to draw out, so I just sorta winged it. The thing to remember about clouds is that they are mixtures of white and gradations of blue. Thus, when painting clouds, leave space for the white bits, and go from sky blue to nearly gray with white.

The finished painting with the sample paper. It’s pretty wrinkly. There is paper specifically for watercolor painting, and presumably it won’t wrinkle. My solution is to wait for the paint to dry, then while the paper is still damp, to leave it under a box of books. It flattened out pretty well.

The camera puts on twenty pounds of shadow. In truth, watercolor paintings tend to be pretty light and airy. (That cliffside is still glaring at me) All that is left to do now, is to check out the Beatles Yellow Submarine movie and gain a new appreciation for that animation department.

Brandon Quist

Brandon is originally from Olmsted Falls, Ohio. He has studied both at Baldwin Wallace college and Brigham Young University, and is currently pursuing Chemical Engineering, among other things. He considers himself a jack of all trades, and a master of none. In his spare time, Brandon enjoys knitting, guitar, reading, origami, writing, and photography.

Go to Part 1 of this series on learning to play the guitar.

Bar chords

Before we get to the chords themselves, a little musical theory is necessary. While there are eight note names (A B C D E F G), there are twelve tones in total. This is where sharps and flats come into play. For instance, between A and B there is A#. Keep in mind, though, that A# is the same as Bb. The full list goes like this:

A A#/Bb B C C#/Db D D#/Eb E F F#/Gb G G#/Ab

Notice that B and E don’t get a sharp, and that C and F don’t get a flat. That is because, while there are usually two half steps between each whole note, there is only one half step between B and C, and E and F.

The point of all this is, each fret on your guitar is a half step. When you make a bar chord, you hold down all the strings with your pointer finger, then hold down the chord shape with your other fingers. For instance, if you hold down your pointer finger on the second fret and make an A chord with your other fingers, that makes the B chord (A plus two half steps makes B). You can do the same thing with the E chord shape, as well as the C chord, though the C chord is a little harder.

Bar-E Shape

A tip when doing A-shaped bar chords: Rather than trying to get all three fingers onto the strings, try pressing your ring finger across multiple strings. You may find that you tend to mute the e string accidentally; if so, use your ring finger on the top two of the A chord and your pinkie for the last one.

Bar-A Shape

It may seem like a lot of work at first, but keep practicing. Bar chords are nice in that you can change chords quickly just by moving the shape up and down the frets. For this reason, and for the unique sound they make, you will find a lot of guitarists use bar chords when writing songs.

Picking patterns and base notes

Now that you have a good grounding in chords, it’s time to make use of it. Strumming is all well and good, but picking patterns lends a sense of complexity and melodic movement. A picking pattern is a pattern for plucking strings in relation to a chord. Most of them start with the base note of the chord, which is usually on the E or A strings. Here are the base notes of each chord:

A     B     C     D     E     F   G

e—————————————–

B—————————————–

G—————————————–

D——————0——–(3)————–

A–0—2—-3——————————-

E————————0—-1—3———

Notice how F seems to have two base notes? That’s because the chord shape I taught you in part 1 is actually an abbreviated form of the F bar chord. Now, while you can use your thumb to strike each string, it is better (and faster) to use your other fingers, and use your thumb to strike the base notes. Here are two picking patterns to try out, using the E, Am, and D chords:

e————–0————————0————————2———-

B———0——–0—————1——1—————–3——3——

G—–1—————1——–2————–2——–2—————2–

D—————————————————–0———————–

A————————–0————————————————–

E–0————————————————————————–

e–0—————0——————-2——–2————————————

B———0——————1———————–3——————————-

G————-1——————2———-2—————————————-

D—–2—————–2————-0———————————————-

A——————0——————————————————————-

E–0———————————————————————————–

Experiment with different chord progressions, different patterns, and so on, and you are well on your way to writing a song.

Bending, hammer-ons, pull-offs, and slides

These techniques are mostly used to play solos and riffs, but are good to know and play around with.

Bending is when you push the string down and to the side, and makes the pitch go higher. On acoustic guitars, you can generally bend a string one whole note higher, and it’s easier to do so further away from the head of the guitar. Electric guitar strings have a bit more give to them, and you can bend those about two whole notes higher. In tab notation, bending is signified like this:

e——-4b5——-   and e——-8b10b8——

The number after the ‘b’ indicates the tone you are trying to bend to. Sometimes, you will get e—8b7—, which means start off bending the string to the eight tone, then pluck the string and bring it back down to the seven tone.

Hammer-ons and pull-offs are a pair of techniques you do once you have already plucked the string. With a hammer-on, you bring a finger down on the fret indicated, making it sound like the tone jumps to the new note. With a pull-off, you remove your finger from the fret, letting the lower note ring out. Sometimes simply removing your finger won’t affect the sound too much, in which case while you remove your finger, have that finger pluck the string.

Hammer-ons are notated like this: e——2h3—— and pull-offs like this: e——4p3——

Sliding is related, where once the string is plucked, you keep your finger pressed down, but slide it up or down the fretboard to the indicated fret. It is notated thusly: e—–2/7—– and e——51—-

Don’t be discouraged if what I have discussed here is difficult for you, it took me a long time to build up the finger strength and patience to get these right. Just keep practicing, and play songs you like. You will gain a new appreciation for the hard work and creativity that musicians put into the songs they write. You may even be inspired to write and play your own songs, which can be very satisfying all by itself.

Keep playing, Dream Weavers!

Brandon Quist

Brandon is originally from Olmsted Falls, Ohio. He has studied both at Baldwin Wallace college and Brigham Young University, and is currently pursuing Chemical Engineering, among other things. He considers himself a jack of all trades, and a master of none. In his spare time, Brandon enjoys knitting, guitar, reading, origami, writing, and photography.

So I’m going to teach you about guitar. Guitarists have it easy in a number of ways, and it’s not too terribly difficult to pick up as an adult. The instrument itself can be fairly cheap, with online stores like offering guitars as low as $50, though local music stores may have better deals. Keep in mind, you do tend to get what you pay for, but there are sales and odd suppliers that might net you high quality for low prices. Generally, a good guitar ranges from $100-200. If you can, try to play a guitar before you buy it. One thing to especially pay attention to is how easy it is to hold down the strings up at the top of the guitar. Try pressing on your cheek bone until it stops squishing, and you feel the solidness of the bone. That’s about the right amount of pressure when holding down those strings.

Guitar: Obtained. Now What?

First, you must tune it. Each string should play a specific note when plucked or struck. From lowest to highest notes (and thickest to thinnest strings):

E

A

D

G

B

E

There are a number of ways of getting those notes right; there are websites and videos that will play the tones, there are pitch pipes (they sound like a six-note harmonica), and good old guitar tuner gadgets that clamp onto the head of the guitar and tell you what note you are playing. To tune the string, turn the knob one way or the other to raise or lower its pitch. If you try to tune it too high, it may snap, and if too low, it will rattle. Even after you tune it to the correct note, the string will tend to stretch until it gets used to the new tension. If a string does break, don’t worry; it’s pretty cheap to replace.

Reading Tablature and Chord Diagrams

I honestly feel sorry for most classical musicians. Sheet music is not really made to complement any instrument I know of. Tablature (or tabs), on the other hand, is a good graphical representation of what to do with the guitar. Each line is dedicated to a string on the guitar, and the numbers on the line tell you where to put your fingers. Look at the neck of the guitar. See the spaces between the ridges? That’s where you press the strings down. The first space at the top of the guitar is 1, the next is 2 and so on. Zero just means don’t press down on that string, and x means don’t play that string at all.

Chords:   A     Am     C       D     Dm     E       Em     F      G       G7

e———-0——0——0——2——1——0——0——1——3——1——

B———-2——1——1——3——3——0——0——1——0——0——

G———-2——2——0——2——2——1——0——2——0——0——

D———-2——2——2——0——0——2——2——3——0——0——

A———-0——0——3——x——x——2——2——x——2——2——

E———-0——0——x——x——x——0——0——x——3——3——

While looking for tablatures online, keep an eye out if it says “tabs” or “chords.” Tabs will generally show you the individual notes played, and are more accurate to the source song. Chords tend to just show what chords go along with what sections, and thus don’t take as much practice to make it sound somewhat like the song. Keep in mind, a lot of tabs and chords are fan-produced, and might not be completely accurate. You may have to adjust how long and when you play chords, or even change or drop chords entirely.

There will be songs that require alternate tunings, at which point I would recommend having a tuning device. More often, there are songs that require you to capo your guitar. A capo is a clamp specifically made to hold down strings in a fret. This essentially changes the key you are playing your guitar in, and is useful for playing the easier open chords, rather than barred chords, which take a certain amount of finger strength to hold down.

Practice playing the guitar

Practicing changing chords is very important. You need your fingers to be quick, and to remember chord shapes. Start off strumming slowly, giving yourself plenty of time to change between strums. As you get better, increase the tempo. A good way of doing this is to find a song with simple chords, and play it. It helps, as well, to sing while playing the song, so that you can keep to the timing and remember where you are. As you play, your fingers will get sore. Over time, your fingers will develop callouses on the tips, and this will help you play longer. Just be careful about playing after a shower, or any time your fingers are wet for a while. The callouses will be soft, and tend to peel off if you aren’t careful. If it has been a while since you last practiced, you may find you will have to develop callouses again. This is just a fact of life for guitarists; though you can use these callouses to poke hot things somewhat safely, so there is that.

I’ll be writing about more advanced things next week, but this should be enough to get you started. One of the nice things about guitar is there is a lot of popular music that can be played with a basic understanding of chords. Find something you like, keep practicing, and you will be well on your way to a satisfying musical hobby, or an alternate source of income as a street performer.

Brandon Quist

Brandon is originally from Olmsted Falls, Ohio. He has studied both at Baldwin Wallace college and Brigham Young University, and is currently pursuing Chemical Engineering, among other things. He considers himself a jack of all trades, and a master of none. In his spare time, Brandon enjoys knitting, guitar, reading, origami, writing, and photography.