I knew my fabric scrap hoarding would eventually come in handy...

I hope you all had a wonderful weekend. What did I do? Well... I spent mine doing a little bit of this...
And some of this...

Oh, and even a bit of this...


That's what color pitching for textile design looks like... at least in my world. I was told that "matching fabric to fabric" was going to be the best way of getting as close to the color I want for my designs so I've spent countless hours over the past few days matching fabric scraps to my Pantone book. See, I already had Pantone swatches assigned to every single color in my collection so it was just a matter of finding the closest match in fabric and then we were good to go.

But in some cases that was easier said than done. There were some colors that came so easily I actually was convinced for a split second that this would be a piece of cake. For instance, my red (PMS 485)... the first red swatch of fabric I pulled out of my stash was such an amazingly perfect match that I actually yelped with delight. My brown was surprisingly easy to find too... I think I held on to two pieces of fabric and debated for like 30 seconds till I settled on the one I loved best. The rest of the colors... hmmm... not so much. Especially my pale blue and pale pink which appear on the background of two of my colorways. Those took me like 2 whole days to find the perfect match. I turned my sewing room upside down trying to find the correct match. I must have held dozens and dozens of swatches up to my Pantone book and repeated, NAH!, over & over until I finally had that EUREKA! moment.

I want to take a moment to thank all of you who commented, emailed and even called me in the past few days to talk about my tired post. I am feeling much, much better now. I am still going to go get some bloodwork done this week to see if my iron levels are low but for now I think perky Patty is back. See, I just get so immersed into my work that when something doesn't go right it just turns my whole world upside down. This past week was like that. It seemed like I was encountering challenges everywhere I looked. First, my camera wasn't functioning properly and I couldn't figure out what was wrong with it. Then I couldn't find a place where I could print my designs for the color pitching. The first place had very inept workers and the second place I tried had the worst customer service I have ever encountered. Of course, that put me in a terrible mood and I decided to take matters into my own hands and try to print everything myself on my own desktop printer.

Well, have you ever had one of those days where the stars seem to be aligned just for you... where everything just finally seems to fall into place? This past Friday was like that for me. After the crappy week I had, I really needed a day like that, I tell ya.

It was Sophie's last day of Kindergarten, so we headed off to her school for their 1-hr. farewell session. My camera all of a sudden decided to fix itself. I snapped away happily for a whole hour. (That's Sophie there to the right posing with her teacher, Mrs. Fish, who she will miss dearly) Then I came home and popped in a movie for the girls and decided to give my little desktop printer a try and see how my designs would print out. WOW! I seriously couldn't believe how beautiful these looked! Who needs Kinkos or that other place, whateveritscalled? I was in printer heaven! Then as if that wasn't awesome enough, a friend of mine called in the early afternoon and asked if I wanted to bring the girls over for a playdate and sleepover because their kids were asking about them. Seriously? Am I dreaming? It was too good to be true! I was able to work uninterruptedly all afternoon and then Jon and I went out for sushi that evening... the perfect end to the perfect day.

The rest of my weekend was spent wallpapering the walls of my basement with my printed out fabric designs and tiny scraps of fabric. Now I am done and can breathe a huge sigh of relief. These will be on their way to MMF tomorrow morning and then I will wait impatiently for my first round of strike offs to come in. OH, and I do want to mention that I am so sorry I cannot show better sneaks at this moment. I know I promised them over and over again. But I've been advised not to actually show them until my strike offs are here for various reasons, so I will oblige even though it kills me as much as it kills you... believe me.

For now, I can share the name of my line and a logo I did for it. This will be the artwork on the selvedge of my fabric (OMG I actually shook a little as I typed that last line... the whole thing is still a bit surreal to me!)
My debut line of fabric (available in Fall 2008 via Michael Miller Fabrics) is inspired by Andalucia, Spain’s largest region and the one which evokes the most powerful images of a country famed for its flamenco, fiestas, bullfighting and raw passion. Andalucia gave birth to Pablo Picasso and it's the setting for one of the most famous operas of all time, Georges Bizet's Carmen. Its spectacular Moorish architecture and medieval villages seem frozen in time while it's modern cities, rich in culture and music are a delight to all who visit them.

My designs draw inspiration from the deep textures of the Moorish palaces, the vibrant colors of the Flamenco dresses and even the unique flavors of the wonderful Spanish dishes. It's a collection that is very dear to my heart and I hope it inspires you to create something wonderful with it. :)