Looking Forward to the New Decade

Looking Forward to the New Decade

Resolutions have never worked for me. Instead, passion and goals are a much better motivator and reason for doing.

I don’t know about you but something about a decade change feels like it should be a big year. The last ten years I’ve been an artist, fabric designer, magazine editor, and back again fabric designer/author/quilt pattern designer. I achieved all those goals through continued education and passion. I’ve created an impressive amount of work during the past decade and this blog is visual proof of all that hard work.

Soul Searching

I’ve been struggling with whether or not to host some sort of quilting sew along or follow something I’ve been aching to do for a few years now—reconnect with painting. I know all of you would love a sew along and Maureen Cracknell and I have been kicking the tires on ideas but between our schedules and fabric collections it’s been very hard to nail anything down! The amount of advance work and prep is more than either of us can give right now. That doesn’t mean it’s an absolute “no” it just means I have nothing to announce at this time. Pursuing other aspects of Surface Design and being an artist means I need to put myself into my work 100% and follow my passion. This feels like the year to make that happen.

Georgia O’Keeffe exhibit Brooklyn Museum 2017

What I Need Right Now

One of the presents to myself at the end of last year was to buy the Georgia O’Keeffe Living Modern book from Amazon. I’ll have an affiliate link at the bottom of this blog post.

I was very fortunate to see the Georgia O’Keeffe exhibit at the Brooklyn Museum in 2017. The book and exhibit are more than an exhibit of O’Keeffe’s paintings—it’s about her intentional life style to reflect her art in every aspect of her life. Her clothing, home decor, minimal life style, and everything she touched supported her aesthetics. The exhibit placed her beautifully constructed and designed clothing amongst her paintings and photographic portraits. She was what we would call today a social media/branding genius. From her carefully curated outfits of black and white for studied portraits of her, of her with her art, and at home her Instagram feed (if she had one today) would be so polished and cohesive without even trying. I can only aspire to have such laser focus!

Georgia O’Keeffe exhibit Brooklyn Museum 2017

Georgia O’Keeffe exhibit Brooklyn Museum 2017

Georgia O’Keeffe exhibit Brooklyn Museum 2017

Now, I’m not saying I’m going to go off the deep end and becoming a minimalist or making all my garments but I would like to be more deliberate in my choices and find my painting voice again.

I’ve dabbled in many mediums and currently am in love with gouache because of it’s poster-like qualities and how it was used by textile/surface designers of the past. If you follow my Instagram @sharonhollanddesigns feed you may have seen my series of book covers. This is just something for funnies on the side—my real love is oil painting landscapes.

Book Cover Art by Sharon Holland

I love old books and especially the poster-like illustrated ones. The Old Santa Fé Trail is a book I own that’s a first edition, signed by the author in 1897. I saw a later edition online that had a green cover and liked that better than my copy so I took some liberties for decor purposes and went this a more colorful coloration.

I’m currently working toward having some of these book cover art offered as prints whether is will be from my website or from a print on demand service—it’s one of my goals for this year.

Book Cover Art by Sharon Holland

I had given my sister an original book cover painting for Christmas and had framed it before sending it off. I envision a reading nook or home library with my framed art and totally need to make a piece for this sunny corner in my office!

Mathew Boudreaux of @misterdomestic on Instagram is hosting an Auction for Australia that began Wednesday January 8 and will run until the following week. I will be adding a select number of prints to the auction so be watching his @mrdauctionhouse handle for my listings.

Continued Learning

The key to achieving goals is to never stop pushing yourself and never stop learning. Every new experience can build off old skills and open your mind to new possibilities—that’s why I love SkillShare.

Peace, Love, and Joy by Sharon Holland

Whenever I want to learn something or improve upon what I already knew—especially with technology that moves so fast—I can find it on SkillShare. If you’ve debated about trying SkillShare in the past this may be the year, the decade to give it a go! I am a SkillShare Ambassador and with it have the pleasure to give you a referral link for a Premium Free Trial of SkillShare. The Premium Free Trial gets you into every and any SkillShare course you’ve been wanting to see for two free months. You can learn a lot in two months but just think what you could do in a year!?!?

Right before the holidays I had a few extra moments and sat down with my iPad and Dylan Mierzwinski course on Illustration Practice: Lettering & Florals with Adobe Fresco. The wreath illustration above is what I made after watching her course and learned how to use a program I’d not tried before and loved it!

Bonnie Christine Focus to Flourish on SkillShare

My memberships (and your free trial) gives me access to Bonnie Christine’s new Focus to Flourish SkillShare course. Here, Bonnie gives us helpful insight into how to use our time wisely as creatives, create good habits, set goals, and basically go from dreaming to doing. Bonnie has inspired me to do more with my skills and find that balance between work and life. She also has corses on surface pattern design and is a phenomenal teacher.

Robert Joyner SkillShare courses

One of my very favorite fine artists to follow on SkillShare is Robert Joyner. His loose, expressive brush strokes, use of color, and technical skills help me to keep a fresh approach to my work. I’m basically going to go through every one of his course to get my oil painting mojo back!

Looking Forward

Prairie Flower by Sharon Holland

I do have a quilt in progress and will release a new pattern the end of this month or early February for sure. It’s called Prairie Flower and was the first quilt I made for my very first ever fabric collection with Paintbrush Studios (Fabri-Quilt). It seems fitting that this quilt started the last decade and brings in this new decade with a fresh remake.

Also, I’m working on a new fabric collection for fall of 2020 for Art Gallery Fabrics and over the next couple of month I’ll get that wrapped up. It’s very hard to work on that stuff behind the scenes and not be able to share for another half a year. Such is the life of a designer—I’m not complaining!

Wishing you all the best in 2020!

I am an Amazon Associate site and earn from qualifying purchases on the products I’ve linked below. The helpful products selected are the same or similar to materials used to make the project(s) in this blog post or related items I think you may enjoy.

My Signature Sampler Week #13

My Signature Sampler Week #13

Wow, we’re starting the fourth and final row of our sampler quilts! Block #13 is the Antique Tile block that’s part of the Art Gallery Fabrics AGF Quilt Block Collection. Find the fun YouTube video and step-by-step instructions for the Antique Tile block HERE.

Remember, if you’d like written instructions to accompany the video tutorial, expand the text below the video for MORE information.

If you're just joining in on the fun, take a look at my first post for this sew along and pick up the quilt layout and color book page to start planning your sampler! The My Signature Sampler is based off block instructions from the Sewcial Bee Sampler (SBS), Community Sampler (CS), AGF Quilt Block Collection (AGF), and the blocks from the Quilter's Planner 2018 magazine (QP). If you have different favorite blocks and would rather include them in your quilt, please feel free to make this sampler with your own signature-style. 

If you need extra help with your patchwork or would like to learn how to control the direction of your prints in half-square triangle units and other piecing techniques, visit my Tutorials page for lots of great tutorials all in one place. Also, when making any Sewcial Bee or Community Sampler blocks you can access the original blog posts for each block and find additional tips and tutorials for piecing. If needed, just use the search bar at the top of the this page on the right and simply type in the block name.

Don't forget our blocks will be set on-point so if you have a fussy cut center, cut it on-point for best results. Note: I don't recommend cutting any other pieces of the blocks (other than a center square on-point for fussy cutting) because it will create bias edges along the outside of the block and increase chances of distortion. Keep any bias edges in the center of the block.

My blocks are made using Art Gallery Fabric Pure Elements for the solids together with prints from the Signature fabric collection that I designed for Art Gallery Fabrics. 

For stock lists of online shops that carry my Signature and other collections I've designed for AGF, visit my Fabrics page or the Where to Buy page on the Art Gallery Fabrics site.

I've been adding my setting triangles to my finished blocks as I make them and have been sticking to original layout in the first week handouts. I'm using a combination of my Perennial print from Printemps Fusions and Untamed Beauty Daybreak from Signature as the background setting of my quilt. 

The setting triangles are made by cutting a 9-1/2'' square on the diagonal to make two setting triangles. Be mindful of print direction, if applicable. See Community Sampler Week #13 for block setting instructions. 

If you're interested in adding a chevron border to your sampler quilt, take a look at the week #6 blog post and pick up the border supplement PDF. I'll review the border option closer to the end of this sew along but just in case you wanted to sew or plan ahead, you have the information now.

More Sewing and Artwork

Along with working on my sampler quilt I’ve stitched up a couple new free patterns I’ll be sharing with you over the next few weeks and am still finding a little time to paint.

I’m currently playing around with gouache paints and did this botanical study of a hydrangea bloom. I think my botanical paintings added to the sew along posts look right at home with my garden inspired quilt!

Hydrangea by Sharon Holland

GIVEAWAY

Every Friday when I reveal a new block to My Signature Sampler, I'll also be posting the weekly giveaway. This sew along is being sponsored by the most amazing companies and have generously donated incredible prizes to share with you. 

OUR SPONSORS

Art Gallery Fabrics | Hobbs Batting | The Quilter's Planner | Quilters Candy Box | Bloc_Loc | Dritz | Omnigrid | Fat Quarter Shop

THIS WEEK'S GIVEAWAY SPONSOR IS: THE FAT QUARTER SHOP

The Fat Quarter Shop was founded in 2003 by Kimberly Jolly. An avid quilter, Kimberly began her shop as a side business while still working a corporate position, cutting, packing and shipping right out of her house during evenings and weekends. From the very beginning, she was committed to delivering top-notch service for every single order and customer. As the Fat Quarter Shop's reputation grew, Kimberly decided to make it a full-time operation. Her husband Kevin joined her not long after, and with his help, lots of hard work, and a tireless commitment, the store began to grow. Over the past few years a few more people have joined the staff! As a team, they continue to branch out with the best fabrics, exclusive kits, quilt clubs, BOMs, and more. And they will always be driven by the passion that Kimberly founded the store upon, which is always giving you the best products and service!

SHOP  *  PINTEREST  *  TWITTER  *  BLOG  *  FACEBOOK  *  YOUTUBE 

For this week's My Signature Sampler giveaway, our friends at Fat Quarter Shop are giving one luck winner this 10-pc fat quarter bundle of my Art Gallery Fabrics Signature collection in the Foliar color way! A majority of my sampler quilt uses the prints from this color way.

Giveaway now closed. Congratulations to Julie Spears!

Note: This giveaway is open to EVERYONE! If you're a "no reply" or anonymous commenter, please remember to include your email address in your comment--you can't win if I can't get a hold of you!

1. Simply leave a comment here under this post for your first comment entry.

2. Follow Fat Quarter Shop on any of their social media platforms (see links above). Just let me know that you did by making a separate comment here to record that entry. (Separate comment-second entry). 

3. My followers get a third entry! If you follow me via subscribing to my posts, on Pinterest, and/or Instagram, just let me know by making a separate comment here to record that entry. (Separate comment-third entry).

4. Help spread the word!! I know that many of you already do, so I thought it would be nice to add that as another way to enter! Spread the word about the My Signature Sampler sew along on YOUR instagram, Facebook, Twitter, or on Pinterest by pinning any of my pretty images in this post. (Separate comment-fourth entry) 

That’s FOUR possible entries! Enter now through Monday, September 17th! The winner will be picked at random around 4pm Eastern. I will post the name of the winner on this post once they've been notified and responded to my email.

Don't forget to enter into this same giveaway on Instagram by posting images of your sampler inspiration, sampler fabric pull, or blocks. Use the official #mysignaturesampler hashtag every time you post your My Signature Sampler makes (to a public account) and you're automatically entered into the weekly IG drawings as well! See my Instagram giveaway posts @sharonhollanddesigns for full details. 

Happy sewing!

Sharon