Arbor Lane’s humble beginning started with this lovely rough sketch. Every one of my quilt designs starts with my own hand, pencil, and paper. I spend so much of my day at the computer, I welcome the back-to-basics of sketching and playing in my journal. And that’s exactly what I was doing here: dreaming of [...]
Posts under ‘Journals’
Confused about Color?
I put together a list of the many resources I’ve created over the Color Mastery journey and put them into one place for you. Wow. No excuses not to have outstanding color in your quilts any more!
Color Tips for Quilters by Maria Peagler
Bookmark on Delicious Digg this post Recommend on Facebook Share on Linkedin [...]
Colorful Quilt Inspiration
One of the questions I’m most often asked is “Where do you get your inspiration?”
My short answer? ”Everywhere.”
That’s usually not the answer people are looking for. They want specifics, like publication name, date, and page number, so they can see it too. Unfortunately, it doesn’t work that way.
I don’t rely on any one source for [...]
Quilting Unit Study for Homeschoolers in E-book Form
I’m proud to announce my Quilting Unit Study for Homeschool Families is now available as an e-book on Smashwords. No matter what e-reader you use, the file format you need is there. Kindle, Stanza, Palm, PC, Mac, Sony, or even for online reading. They’ve got it all.
The cutie on the cover? My little guy, about [...]
Quiltmaker’s 100 Blocks: Old Glory is Mine!
When Carolyn Beam from Quiltmaker asked me to participate in their 100 Blocks issue I was thrilled to contribute, as Quiltmaker is the magazine I recommend most to my students. It’s a great learning tool, and their 100 Blocks collector’s issue does not disappoint. It’s packed with appliqued, pieced, and mixed-technique blocks, so no matter [...]
Self-Portrait
I took this photo of me around Mother’s Day. I’m in my bedroom, painted a creamy yellow color, which I love but so many find it difficult to get right. Behind me is a quilt made for me by my bee group: we each asked for specific blocks that we would put into a quilt, [...]
Magical Moments
Sketching mesmerizes people. When people learn I’m a quilter, they often offer comments such as, “Oh, my grandmother did that,” or “I’ve always wanted to learn how to do that.”
But tell them I sketch, or even better if they see me sketching, and they are truly facsinated. They stop what they are doing to watch [...]
Nesting
I feel like Dorothy after she dreams of faraway places and travels to Oz, only to find out there really is “no place like home.” I adored every moment of my book tour, all the women (and men) I got to know personally, their stories and quilts, and spring Quilt Market was a fantastic experience.
And [...]
February Newsletter Hot Off the Press
February’s Quilts & Creativity newsletter went out this week, and I can’t wait for you to see it. It includes last-minute details on my book launch this Friday, an opportunity to win a color consultation with me, the scoop on fresh, innovative spring color palettes, a sneak peek at a new product I’ll be [...]
Terry Atkinson’s Keeping a Color Journal!
Terry Atkinson over at Atkinson Designs got inspired from Color Mastery and is starting her own color journal. Read the details here.
Interested in starting your own color journal from Color Mastery? Email me photos of your journal with the book and I’ll post them to the Color Mastery book blog! Send them to info [at] [...]
From Sketchbook to Art Quilt
(You’re gonna want to scroll down for this one.) So what does all this stuff about sketching have to do with quilting? It prepares you for the single moment that inspiration strikes. I want to make a quilt of a house, a bird, a cup of coffee. I want to make [...]
A Rich Sketching Resource
Thumbnail Sketch by Maria Peagler
If I’ve peaked your interest in sketching, check out Katherine Tyrrell’s blog Making a Mark. Katherine is a pastel and colored pencil artist who has developed a wealth of lessons on sketching and keeping a sketchbook. She doesn’t include quilters or fiber artists in her blog, only drawings [...]
Capturing the Moments
At some point in my sketchbooks, I stopped using them as a place for only my ideas and inspiration, but also as a place to capture the daily moments of my life by drawing them. My husband had given me the book How to Make a Journal of Your Life , and it really [...]
Imagineering in My Journals
I’ve always thought Disney had it right in calling their employees Imagineers. What a cool job title – getting paid to bring imagination to life. I do my own imagineering in my journals, using two techniques I talked about in my podcast: mind-mapping and 100 Questions.
Mindmeister is a great online resource for [...]
My Journals’ Evolution
As I continued to keep journals, I started adding my own ideas, designs, and dreams to them. I would still sometimes cut and paste from magazines and newspapers, referring to color schemes or styles of art I liked.
Here I liked the African women repeated across the page. Simple design, yet effective.
I also like [...]
My Journals’ Humble Beginnings
Keeping a journal has transformed my art. It’s hard to believe initially I resisted keeping a journal of any kind, as writing is my profession and I didn’t want to do more of it at home. Surely I keep visual journals and sketchbooks as well, but I started by keeping a simple journal [...]
Keeping a Journal Podcast
It’s here! My podcast is here! I’m excited to share with you the first Quilts and Creativity Podcast: Episode 1: Keeping a Journal. I’m new to podcasting, so it’s just me, no background music or other fancy additions. Just great content. The Keeping a Journal podcast talks about [...]
