February News

A lot has happened since I last posted.  Due to the huge loss of the 50 movies and the printable lesson for the PE-Design NEXT/Palette 9 tutorial, the tutorial will not be produced.  I'm sorry to all of you whom have been waiting for it to be finalized.  This tutorial was started in January, 2012 and over 600 hours was put into it.  Everything was saved to an external hard drive, which failed miserably.  I also experienced quite a few problems with my laptop at the same time.  Because of the loss in time and data, I decided that I could not go back and start over from scratch.

The web site has been updated and all embroidery related pages have been removed.  I'll continue machine embroidery, but only to enhance personal clothing and home decor as well as gift items for family and friends.  I am no longer digitizing designs for sale because there is so much theft and sharing out there.  It's disheartening to spend hours, days and weeks perfecting collections of designs, only to have them shared in groups.  I'll still digitize designs to use for my own projects because I really enjoy the creative process.

After taking some needed time off following the mishap with the software tutorial, I have re-immersed myself into my gourd art.  I haven't carved on a couple of previously started gourds in several months and I really have missed that.  Hopefully I'll have some progress photos to share soon.

I also participated in an AGS Certified Judge's course hosted by the Florida Gourd Society recently.  Although I've been a judge at gourd events in the past (not promoted as AGS competitions),  I thought it was about time that I became certified.  As a member of both the Florida Gourd Society and American Gourd Society, I'm looking forward to getting involved with events and competitions, making new friends and helping to promote the incredibly satisfying world of gourd art.

I'm taking a class to increase my wood burning skills by learning how to create faux leather tooled designs on gourds.  This is something I've wanted to learn for a number of years, and now I have the chance.  I'll share some samples as soon as I have something I'm proud of showing!

Hopefully you're involved in learning either a new craft or technique to expand your artistic horizons!  Until my next post, I wish you well.

Shari