Apron Strings Fabric

Squeee! I got some happy mail today! It was 5 yards of linen fabric that I designed and printed at Spoonflower! It's called Apron Strings.

In April (barring any postponements due to the coronavirus), I am giving a presentation on the history of aprons. My mom and I have amassed over 70 vintage aprons over the last year and have at least one sample for each decade from 1900 through 1970. I've researched styles and trends, histories on companies that sold aprons and apron kits, and gathered vintage patterns and catalogues featuring aprons. I'm hoping this presentation goes above and beyond the typical apron program people have given.

I've purchased a portable umbrella clothes line to hang the aprons on and I'm working on a backdrop to hang additional aprons for display. I'll have a table for the printed material, such as patterns and catalogues, and that is where I ran into trouble. I wanted a tablecloth for the table that fit the apron theme but couldn't find any fabric that had aprons on it. So, what's an aspiring fabric designer to do? Of course, I designed my own fabric!

I wanted it to have a 50's vibe, so I drew aprons from that era and placed them on a background of cream polka dots on my favorite color of vintage green (well, almost my favorite color of green, it's a little bit more mint than jadeite, but I like it). Although it's hard to tell from the photo, the print is rather large, with each apron 3"-4" tall with 1/2" polka dots. 

I decided while I was ordering fabric, to order enough to make a 54" x 120" tablecloth for the refreshment table also. Can't wait to see it all together! I'll share more later....

~Sharla

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~Sharla

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Last Day To Register For Immersion Course

My friends, Bonnie Christine and Skye, at the Immersion Retreat in November. Photo by Callie Lynch. www.callielynch.com

Just a friendly reminder that there are literally just a few hours left to register for my friend Bonnie Christine's Surface Design Immersion Course! This 8-week course is the bomb!!! I've learned so much about surface pattern design, using Adobe Illustrator, creating repeating patterns, finding my style, creating a brand....I could go on and on (and I have in my past posts this week)! I've also found a new group of friends and peers to enjoy the journey with and have made life-long friends at the Immersion retreat. I hope you'll join me this year for the incredible learning experience. Just click the link below for all the details about the course and how to register!

 Click Here For Bonnie Christine's 

Surface Design Immersion Course

     Information & Registration      

Registration closes tonight - Tuesday, February 26 - at 9 p.m. EST (that's 8 p.m. for my friends in Central time) and won't be available again until 2020! So don't wait another second to join!

Just a few of my friends that I've met through the Immersion Course! Photo by Callie Lynch. www.callielynch.com

See you in class!

~Sharla

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Permission To Play

They say that all work and no play makes Jack a dull boy - or Sharla a bored girl! I tend to get really focused (my husband says obsessed) on whatever I am working on. That focus can take the fun out of things and it feels more like work. But Bonnie Christine has given me permission to play - play with pencils and paints and just create and have fun! 

It was one of the most liberating feelings I experienced through Bonnie's Surface Design Immersion course. If you, too, are missing the joy and fun in your artwork then I encourage you to register for the 8-week Immersion course!

This course is pack full of all the technical things you need to know about creating patterns in Adobe Illustrator and on the business side of surface pattern design, but it also provides an encouraging space to have fun and explore your creative side that will lead to finding your style too.

If you're ready to find the fun in your artwork, explore your creative side and find your style, click on the link below for all the information on the class and registration for the Immersion course. 

 Click Here For Bonnie Christine's 

Surface Design Immersion Course

     Information & Registration      

Don't dally though! This course is only offered once a year and registration closes on Tuesday, Feb. 26! See you in class!

~Sharla

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Expand Your Creative Wings With Surface Design Immersion

The best thing about Bonnie Christine's Surface Pattern Design Immersion Course for me was the encouragement and support to explore my creative side. As I've said before, I don't consider myself an artist but rather a doodler. However, the Immersion course and all of my awesome classmates inspired me to get out of that proverbial box and try new creative outlets - like watercolor painting! 

Watercolor painting of a succulent by Sharla of Thistle Thicket Studio

But what was even better was that Bonnie Christine then taught me what to do next with those creative bits and pieces after I made them! Like using Adobe Illustrator to convert them into vector images and creating a repeating pattern that could be used on fabric, wallpaper, stationary, wrapping paper, and so much more.

Watercolor after vectorizing in Illustrator

If the idea of creating products from your artwork appeals to you, then I encourage you to register for Bonnie Christine's 8-week Surface Design Immersion Course! Registration is open only once a year and it closes Tuesday, February 26, 2019 - so don't wait!

Click Here To Register For Bonnie Christine's

  Surface Pattern Design Immersion Course  

This course will open up a whole new creative world for you - just like it did for me!

~Sharla

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Registration Open for Surface Design Immersion Course

This time last year, I embarked on an eight-week adventure to learn how to use Adobe Illustrator to create my own textile designs. After looking at many different classes and courses, I landed on Bonnie Christine's Surface Pattern Design Immersion Course. I hadn't heard of Bonnie before nor had I taken any of her Skillshare classes but I just had a feeling that this was the course for me. And I was sooo right!

I can't say enough about how much I learned about Illustrator from the Immersion course. And I knew nothing to start out. I didn't even open the program for the first time until the first day of class. I knew it would be too overwhelming without some guidance. But from the beginning, Bonnie's knowledge of the program and her ability to explain each tool and how to use it in simple terms made the learning so easy and fun. 

But Bonnie's expertise in Illustrator wasn't the only thing she shared with her students. She also shared the business side of surface pattern design, from income streams to portfolio building to contracts and so much more. She also shared of herself, making herself available in video chats and Facebook groups, answering our questions as we worked through the course at our own pace. In fact, she still answers questions during her monthly video chat and in our FB group. 

This, hands down, was the best surface pattern design course I've seen. If it sounds like something for you, then I hope you'll join me in class (yes, I'm taking it again as a refresher!).

Click Here To Register For Bonnie Christine's

  Surface Pattern Design Immersion Course  

Hope to see you in class!

~Sharla

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The Business of Surface Pattern Design Free Mini Course

I'm not one that likes to give testimonials. They always feel pushy and a little fake. But I couldn't help but want to share about Bonnie Christine's new mini course called The Business of Surface Pattern Design. If you've always wanted to learn how to turn your artwork into surface patterns or want to design your own fabric (like me), wallpaper, wrapping paper, etc., then Bonnie Christine is the best instructor I've come across.

Last year, I took the plunge and enrolled in Bonnie's Surface Pattern Design Immersion course. I was nervous because I consider myself a doodler, not an artist. I had never even opened up the Adobe Illustrator program much less know anything about how to use it. It was the best class experience I have ever had the pleasure of participating in. Bonnie's in-depth knowledge about Adobe Illustrator, her willingness to share her knowledge about the industry and what kind of income can be possible (she even shared her income and expense stats throughout her design career). Her classes were thorough and easy to follow and understand, and her willingness to answer questions, critique work and be your personal cheerleader was so wonderful. And of course, the opportunity to attend the Immersion Retreat and spend three creative days with Bonnie and fellow classmates was so inspiring!

The Business of Surface Pattern Design course is a free mini course and will provide insight into the art of finding your signature style, how to stand out from the crowd, exploring different income streams and possibilities, and how to promote your work like a pro. This free course will give you a sneak peek into Bonnie's teaching style and provide you with some great info. It's a great way to see if the Surface Pattern Design Immersion course may be for you in the future. 

Want to join me for Bonnie's free mini course on The Business of Surface Pattern Design? Then click here to register, and keep an eye on your inbox for the first lesson to arrive this Monday, February 11! See you in class!

~Sharla

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Perseverance

Last year I was blessed to be able to participate in Bonnie Christine Forkner's new surface pattern design class called Surface Pattern Design Immersion. I learned how to use Adobe Illustrator to make repeating patterns for textile design - and so so much more. (I'll have more details about the upcoming class and how you can join in future blog posts!)

Bonnie has a surface pattern design membership group called the Flourish Surface Design Dig that I'm a member of. This year, she has a monthly design challenge to help us create surface patterns for our portfolios, collections, etc. The month of January seemed so busy (with what, I don't know!) so I didn't get around to opening up the email with the challenge details until a couple of days before the deadline of January 31. Her prompt for the January design was to pick a word of intention for the year and create a design that represented that word. Ugh! I'm not good with that sort of thing.

But I forged ahead because I wanted to participate. Trying to choose a word had me stumped. But after the lackluster responses I received at market on my portfolio, I knew I could easily quit and give up, which is something I really don't want to do - so I began looking at words like persistence and persevere. I wanted to represent my word with a floral drawing so I researched what flowers might represent any of these words. I hit upon the word 'perseverance' when I found that bindweed, that noxious weed we continually fight on our farm, symbolized it. (Just to be thorough, the magnolia also symbolizes the word perseverance, but it isn't a flower/tree native to western Kansas so it has little meaning to me.) So I set about sketching a bindweed flower and it's arrow-shaped leaves, which is really the identifying part of the plant. I was thrilled when my farmer hubby identified my drawing as bindweed without hesitation!

The background in the first photo is my finished design. I was really happy with the design and the limited color palette I used. But, one of the comments I received at market about my designs was the use of outlines on my motifs. It gives the designs a vintage feel, which I like and I feel is my style, but on more than one occasion I was told by art directors that their company did not have any more room for vintage-inspired designers. So I decided to play around with my flowers and create a pattern without lines and this is my first attempt. 

I didn't have a lot of time to work on this because, as I said, it was near the deadline and I was actually spending the next 4 days at my mom's for her annual Sisters Sewing Retreat, which is always a fun way to celebrate her birthday. Hopefully next week I'll have a couple of quilt finishes from our retreat to share (tops are finished but needs to be quilted)!

~Sharla

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Merry Christmas (And A Christmas Collection To Share)

Seasons Greetings. Happy Holidays. Feliz Navidad. However you say it, I'm sending you warm wishes during this joyous season!

I wanted to share a few designs from my Christmas collection that I showed at quilt market in November. The reindeer print above is the hero print and these are a few of the coordinates.....

And here are a few of the mockups I made for my portfolio to showcase the collection.....

And, of course, I had to design a tea towel!

I also designed a quilt that I am hoping to get written into a pattern in the next few months. I also have another announcement coming later this week, so stay tuned!

~Sharla

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My Trip To Quilt Market As A Designer

Really? It's almost December? And I'm over here still trying to recoup from my trip to Quilt Market and the Immersion Retreat that was at the beginning of the month!

As I've mentioned a couple of times on the blog, this year I spent quite a bit of time learning Adobe Illustrator and surface pattern design. The culmination of all that work was a portfolio containing three fabric collections that I showed to a few fabric companies at Quilt Market in Houston. I approached the opportunity as a learning experience to gain feedback on the direction of my style and designs.

I went armed with my portfolio that I made myself. The cover features the focal print in the fall colorway of my collection "Lena", and the bow is one of the coordinating prints. I had the fabric printed at Spoonflower. 

The inside cover and title page also featured coordinates from the Lena collection printed on paper. I named the collection Lena because the collection was inspired by a piece of fabric that I inherited from the hubby's great-grandmother Paulina "Lena" Dierks.

I designed a tea towel that coordinated with the collection and featured Lena's recipe for peppernuts or pfefferneuse. The above photo is of the page in my portfolio featuring the tea towel.

I had the tea towels printed at Spoonflower and gave a tea towel (with a USB drive with my portfolio tied to the ribbon) to each art director I met with. I also had business cards printed featuring the Lena floral on one side and a coordinate with my contact info on the other side and attached them to each tea towel ribbon tie also.

Of course, if any art directors happen to be interested in seeing this collection, please contact me via the email on my contact page and I'll send you a link to my online portfolio.:)

Stay tuned and I'll share snippets of the two other collections in my portfolio soon!

~Sharla

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Immersion Retreat

Whew! It's been a whirlwind couple of weeks. With my mom riding shotgun, I headed to Texas for some spoiling of grandkids, shopping, antiquing, visiting family, International Quilt Market and finally, the Immersion Retreat.

Bonnie Christine, Skye McNeill and me at the Immersion Retreat. Photo by Callie Lynch. www.callielynch.com

What is the Immersion Retreat? Well, it was one of the most amazing experiences I've been honored to participate in. The Immersion Retreat evolved from the Surface Pattern Design Immersion class that I took this spring from instructor Bonnie Christine Forkner. Bonnie is a textile designer for Art Gallery Fabrics, Skillshare instructor extraordinaire, and such an inspiring and genuine person. I learned so much in the Immersion course about using Adobe Illustrator, the textile market, and the business of surface pattern design. It was such a great learning experience that no one wanted it to end. And then Bonnie came up with the awesome idea of holding a retreat so that her students of the class could meet, share, bond, and learn from each other. 

We gathered outside the Quilt Market hall for our first lunch together.

My retreat experience started on the first day of Quilt Market in Houston, where several of us met up with Bonnie for lunch, followed by a walk of the market floor. Somehow, though, we all kind of went our separate ways after lunch and never walked the market floor together. I think we all had appointments and other things that we had planned while at market. I was so busy I forgot to take any photos, except for this photo as we began to gather before lunch. I'll be sharing more of what I did at market in later posts.

As we arrived at the Immersion Retreat, we were greeted by warmly lit, rustic buildings and a cozy campfire.

The Pearl Barn at The Prairie At Round Top. Photo by Callie Lynch. www.callielynch.com

Table setting inside the Pearl Barn. Photo by Callie Lynch. www.callielynch.com

Another shot of the Pearl Barn. Photo by Callie Lynch. www.callielynch.com

On the second day of market, I traveled to The Prairie At Round Top where our Immersion Retreat was held. The Prairie is a beautifully rustic bed & breakfast. The historic homestead was originally renovated by the creator of shabby chic, Rachel Ashwell. The Pearl Barn, where we ate our meals, was decorated by the Junk Gypsies and featured on their TV show. The setting and décor was such a laid back relaxing atmosphere, and was a perfect reflection of our instructor Bonnie's style.

Bonnie held a 2 hour Q&A, sharing her knowledge with us.

Bonnie also shared her talents with us, painting linen goodie bags for each of us. Photo by Callie Lynch. www.callielynch.com

A moleskin notebook covered in one of Bonnie's fabrics was inside each goodie bag. Photo by Callie Lynch. www.callielynch.com

Bonnie is such a caring and giving soul, and she is willing to share so much of her knowledge and talents with everyone. I have learned so much from her.

Photo by Callie Lynch. www.callielynch.com

Although the location was amazing, it was the 36 creative women who gathered together for two days of sharing, supporting, creating and encouraging each other that made for such a tremendous experience. I truly feel like I made some life-long friends who will be there to support me as I pursue my creative dreams.

Flower sketch.

But alas, after an evening of drawing, it came to an end all too quickly and mom and I had to head back home to Kansas. I left with a renewed motivation and a ton of ideas that I want to tackle all at once (which means I'll probably be spinning my wheels for a few days until I settle in and start working down my checklist). 

~Sharla

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