The Bear's Blog

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 My business has just been growing, and growing, and as a result, my design time has been shrinking, and shrinking!  I am so thankful to all of you for enjoying and supporting my designs :o)  I finally got to the point where I could no longer do it alone.  I shouldn't say alone, as my mother-in-law, Karol, has been coming over 3 days a week to help me with orders, pattern packaging, inventory, etc., but there was just so much "business" to be done in the business, that I just couldn't handle it and also put out new designs... which is really the whole point, isn't it?  So I hired my wonderful friend, Megan.  The situation couldn't be more perfect, as I was looking to hire and she was looking for work with both of her kids now in school.  She has not only a business degree, but a great deal of experience in management, customer service, and marketing. She just stepped right into the whole Wooden Bear mess with no problems.  So, it's back to designing for me (yippppppeeeeeee)...

I just got my "Tweet Others with Kindness" fabric, and now it's time to design with scissors of fury to prepare for market and design new projects for both Red Rooster, and for a new book I will have to accompany the line!  Here are just two, small peeks at some of the characters from the line...

I already have design ideas I'm really excited about, so stay tuned for the results!

And FYI, the fabric is showing at the International Quilt Market (wholesale show, end of  October, Houston, TX), and should ship to quilt shops later this year/first part of next year.  After market, I'll post some pictures of some of the finished projects and book information.
  

 
 

Can't Resist

I love making the graphics for fabric.  I did a little self-taught crash course in Adobe Photoshop in January of 2008 so I could learn just enough to make my own brochures for market.  That's when Red Rooster approached me to design fabrics for them.  Designers use different art forms to design their fabrics, and I thought maybe Photoshop would be best for me.  I've learned a lot and have hopefully grown over the past two years.  And it's so liberating!  When I was only designing patterns, I would just do simple sketches.  For appliques, all you need is a good outline.  Your line has to start and stop in the same spot.  You have to be able to cut out each piece, so it must make a complete shape.  But with sketching, I can add shading and details and an arm, for instance, can just blend into the body. 

So I have these graphics, and I keep thinking I could do more with them.  So I made some pins and magnets for promotional items for market that use characters from Happy Haunters.  I really like how they turned out.  I will definitely be using the magnets on my fridge this fall.   
I'm thinking of selling them in a pack- you will have to let me know what you think.  I will also have at least one page of color graphics in the book for you guys to copy and cut to use for gift bag tags, small cards, etc. for projects.  So the magnets could make a good addition to gift bags for your happy little haunters.