Hi everyone!  Thank you so much for all of the nice comments about the gift tags and the move.  In the midst of this big transition, I have been trying to be very diligent about writing down 5 things I am thankful for each day.  Without fail, each week I find myself writing down a thoughtful email or funny thing that you have said here.  Thanks for that.  It means a lot.

We got home late last night from our trip to Seattle.  It was exhausting, but successful!  We found an apartment and turned in our application.  The new place is in walking distance to (drum roll, please)… the library.  That sort of sealed the deal for me.  I’ll have a nice place to work during the transition while we wait for our stuff to arrive.

We realized on this trip that we have some fairly large furniture, so it’s going to take some creativity to fit everything in the new place.  I am relieved that we decided to go for the sensible option with the most storage.  I am already thinking about how to cozy it up a bit.  We will finally have a use for our hardly-ever-used flannel sheets and all of those soup recipes I have been saving up for the cold weather which never seems to arrive in LA.

We stopped by Lake Washington on our way to the airport yesterday and snapped a few photos.  The water, the trees, they are all calling to me now — making it ever so slightly easier to unwind the cords that are tethering us here.  We are one foot in each location now, doing that funny in-between dance.  Now we gather our strength for our next big number.  January is going to be gone in a flash.  I can tell.

[All images courtesy of Thomas Knauer.  Patterns for these projects are available for purchase from Thomas' shop]

Hi everyone.  I have one more designer interview to share from Quilt Market — and today, it is the incredibly awesome Thomas Knauer.

Thomas is celebrating his debut with Andover Fabrics.  I had the good fortune to be sitting next to him at the Andover sales meeting, and he made me feel instantly at home.  Thomas is one of the most enthusiastic and generous people I’ve met to date.  (Not just in the fabric/quilting industry, but in life — so if you haven’t connected with Thomas yet, I encourage you to head over to his site now.)  Pear Tree, his first line, is in stores now, and Thomas is on a roll with two more lines, Flock and Savanna Bop, coming up next.

I really enjoyed his answers (especially to question #3) and hope that you do as well.

What are you most excited to be showing off at this show?

Phew!  That’s a questions and a half.  Since this is my first Market with anything to actually show off to the world I kinda want to say everything!!!  But I’ll be good and will narrow things down.  While I love Pear Tree (how could I not love my first line) and all the quilts and pillows I’ve made from it, I think I am most excited to be debuting Flock.  I really feel like I am getting close to the fabric I see in my head with this one.  I know, one might think that if I see fabric in my head it should be easy to get it down on paper, but it isn’t for me.  The thing about the way I see things in my head is that it is rarely visual; it is more often a description accompanied by a feeling.  Perhaps I shouldn’t call it seeing things in my head, but calling my designs the things I read or hear in my head just sounds crazy.  Anyway, Flock feel so personal to me for some reason, and I am so happy with how it has turned out.  It really feels like bits of me on cloth.

What keeps you inspired?

Oi! Another tough one.  Inspiration is a tough concept for me.  I rarely think of myself as being inspired; I think of myself more as a grinder.  My entire career I’ve had to work at being creative.  It is more a mental effort than a visual one.  Ideas rarely come to me; I feel around in the dark corners of my brain for them and eventually find the kernels of ideas in the mess.  Then I work them over again and again.  If anything I’d say that process is what keeps me inspired.  Oh, and of course my amazing daughter.  So much of what I design is so I can make stuff for her out of it.

What advice would you give to someone else who wants to pursue their own creative dream?

Make more.  Seriously, that’s it.  That was how I taught design back in my professorial days, and that is how I continue my practice now.  I have enough designs in reserve right now to do at least four more lines (if I added a few new ones for continuity within each collection).  When I first sent designs off to Andover I had three complete collections, two of which are thankfully on the trash pile.  I’m pretty sure I could rework those two lines into good collections, but my interests have already shifted.  Pear Tree just shipped and I am already finalizing my fourth and fifth collections.  And working on sketches for numbers six and seven.  Make more; you can always hold them back in reserve for those times when the ideas aren’t clicking, or let them sit for further revision (revision is always good, even if you end up going with the original version).  But the main reason to make more is that it will help you get better.  Between gallery, museum, academic, and now textiles I’ve been doing this for twenty years and I still see myself getting better every month.  So, make more.

What has been the biggest surprise you’ve encountered when designing fabric and patterns?

The fact that people like what I’m doing.  I’m not kidding.

Hi everyone.  Today, I am wrapping up the last of my Quilt Market designer interviews!  Thanks for all of the wonderful feedback on these.  I’m so glad you are enjoying them.

There are a few additional people I contacted after the show and haven’t heard from yet, so I may pop in here from time to time with a few updates.  However, before I close this chapter, I wanted to talk to Pam Vieira-McGinnis of Pam Kitty Morning.  I think most of you probably already know and love Pam, but for the few who don’t, let me fill you in — Pam is an incredibly talented (and very well liked) quilter/pattern designer/sewing genius who is celebrating her first line of fabric with Lakehouse Dry Goods.

Pam really knows how to keep a secret, because a year ago she was patiently listening to me blab on and on about trying to get a fabric deal while she had this killer line tucked up her sleeve.  Last show was her big reveal, and now she actually has finished, printed fabric in her hands.  Pam was hanging out at the Lakehouse booth and I got to pick her brain a bit.  (There’s cute Pam below on the left.)

What has been the biggest surprise you’ve encountered when designing fabric and patterns?

Biggest surprise? ALL OF IT! Holy cow who could have imagined all this? When my friend Sandy started showing me some photos and blogs in 2006 I felt like a whole world opened up to me. Everyday I was sitting down at the computer with coffee and finding out about things I had never heard of. Then she convinced me it would be fun to start a blog and the rest is crazy history! I could never anticipate how wonderful it would be to connect with people all over the world over a cup of internet coffee.

What keeps you inspired?

Inspired? The people! The projects. The fabric! Before, magazines and tv and our local quilt shop would tell us what was going on in quilting and crafting, now we have a feast right at our fingertips. And in our pj’s! You can read about creative journeys, browse photos in Flickr and Pinterest, Twitter and Facebook will hook you up with the trend of the day. Of course sometimes it’s a double edged sword. It can be intimidating to see what other people are up to. If I’m feeling inadequate I turn away. Everyone has a place at the internet table, pull up a chair and sit down!

What advice would you give to someone else who wants to pursue their own creative dream?

Have your own creative dream? Pursue it! There’s a ton of info out there just waiting for you to find it.

I’m back with another designer interview from Fall Quilt Market (only a couple to go now).  Today I’m talking to someone who is not just a very talented artist, but also someone I consider a great friend – Monica Lee.  Monica and I met while taking Holly Becker’s Blogging Your Way class, and she is one of those encouraging, funny, generous girls that you hang onto once you’ve found them! She always has some sage been-there-done-that advice and knows how to make me laugh, so talking to Monica is a win-win.

I want to apologize for the so-so photos from this post.  Timeless Treasures has a large, beautiful booth but the spot lights make it hard to photograph (although everything sparkles in person).  Monica shared some of her photos with me at the bottom of the post because she actually had two areas in the booth and I missed one!

Check out her answer to question #3 and be sure to go read her great blog series, The Care and Feeding of a Dream.  Great stuff!

What are you most excited to be showing off at this Quilt Market?

I feel like I am having to choose between two babies since I have two collections that came out at this Market!  One called The Neighborhood which had been hanging out in my portfolio waiting for its’ moment in the sun.  I created this entire story around what happens in a neighborhood — the play, the pets, the houses, the memory making.  I dipped into my own childhood and made a print with roller skates and jump ropes, jacks and marbles.  The second collection is actually a quilt top with my Cardigan Girls on it with all their sassy sayings.  I love that these girls are encouraging but sort of quirky at the same time.  I am really happy with the coordinates from this collection since these were all original watercolors.  I was impressed that it translated so well onto fabric.  We came up with the cutest sleeping bag pattern for young girls to whip up out of the quilt top, perfect for a first sleepover and I designed it with ties instead of a zipper!  Ez Peezy!  It will be a free pattern on the Timeless Treasures website soon.

[Photo from Monica Lee]

What keeps you inspired?

So many things keep me inspired!  I love books and magazines.  I used to travel all the time and that left a wonderful imprint on my heart and in my mind.  But if I were to choose the greatest inspiration to me it would have to be people.  I feel like I did 100 years ago in my flight attendant interview when everyone said, “I just love people!”  I actually do love people.  I can soak up other peoples’ stories all day long.  And FYI – I did NOT say that in my interview.  I told them that I thought variety was the spice of life and travel offered me quite a bit of variety… ugh!  Variety and no sleep!  Just say no to red-eye flights!

[Photo from Monica Lee]

What advice would you give to someone else who wants to pursue their own creative dream?

Get clarity of your vision, write it down (I call it road mapping), put a plan in place to make it happen!  And here is a biggie that no one talks about… prepare for the “meantime.”  As we head towards our creative dreams often we wake up without any recollection of what we are doing!  At least I know I did!  I have had days when I have let my mind wander into, “What was my dream again?  What am I headed towards?”  Or the days when you think you are the only one on the planet who is pursuing a dream.  I think we all have things, people, circumstances that can derail us and I would encourage you not to let that happen!  I have a blog series that I have been writing, The Care and Feeding of  a Dream in case you find yourself a bit stalled!  I will be your cheerleader!

What has been the biggest surprise you’ve encountered when designing fabric and patterns?

If I were to really narrow the “surprises” down it would be just how quickly people can make quilts!  I don’t remember my grandmother kicking them out so fast.  My fabrics arrive right before market, and I can’t believe how quickly they are sewn up (quick shout out to Heidi Pridemore from The Whimsical Workshop who has sewn up my goodies for this market!  Amazing!)  What I love but am not surprised by is just how nice people in this industry are!  I genuinely enjoyed every minute of this show.  I think that just goes to show that “people who make things are lovely people.”  Ohhhh, I may have to go tweet that!

I think I have an addiction to toast.  For the past five days or so, I’ve eaten nothing but pies, pie-flavored milkshakes, cake, and buttered toast.  I think there was a Thanksgiving dinner in there somewhere, too.  I am usually a fairly healthy eater, but someone purchased a loaf of white bread — and I’ve been on a downward spiral ever since.  I know I’ll make it back to my whole grain lifestyle, but right now,  I’m in the kitchen with the white fluffy bread and a stick of butter if you need me.

These photos are making me think of butter again.  All that yellow!  I told my husband that I think Thanksgiving is a waste.  Who needs turkey?  Where’s the holiday where you eat nothing but brownies and toast?

Our holiday was the perfect blend of getting out and staying in.  We even made it out for a nice long walk through the L.A. Arboretum on Saturday.  The ginkgo trees had turned bright yellow.  The dense, scalloped leaves looked like flowers wrapping around each and every branch.  Gorgeous.  I need to remember to get outside as much as possible this month.  It’s too good to miss.

The truth is that December is crazy busy.  I know it is for everyone, but I’m just saying “me too!”  Big deadlines.  Big changes.  Too much shopping to do and not enough time to meditate on the “perfect” present.  I am sneaking in some peace and joy wherever I can.  And I’m learning that I have to initiate that.  Grace doesn’t arrive automatically with the ornaments or the bows or the songs.  It’s something I have to ask for – daily.

(And interestingly enough, never seems to arrive at the mall or even at the holiday events.)

As we kick off this next season together, I wish you a huge helping of peace and joy too.  Are you ready for it?