Playful Designs with Patty Young

We have a very special guest joining us today! Please welcome Patty Young, who is kicking her blog tour off here for her brand new coloring book, Playful Designs! Take it away, Patty!

When C&T contacted me about creating a coloring book based on my previously released fabric lines, I was both thrilled and honored. All of my fabric designs usually start out as black and white line art and since I am a file hoarder, I have kept every bit of artwork I have ever drawn! Yes, as you can imagine, my archive folders are HUGE! Immediately I thought… SCORE, I have all the work already done! But then they said I had to narrow it down to 18 designs and that’s when the real work began. At the time of my contract, I had 14 lines of previously-released fabric, each of them containing anywhere from 10 – 20 original designs. Even without doing the math, I already knew I had some hard work ahead of me.

My contact at C&T told me that the age range of my target audience was 8 to 14, so since both of my girls fall within that range, I enlisted their help. We went through my extensive fabric collection and they pointed out their favorite pieces. Some of them, I already knew and others were a complete surprise to me. 

I also snuck in a couple of my personal favorite pieces, because, well, I loved the original line art versions so much that I thought they needed to be included. One example is my Playful Paisley design from Grand Bazaar. Not only is this one of my favorite fabric designs, but it is my absolute favorite page in this coloring book. I adore how the lines have varying widths that give it texture and richness. 

I see this book as a coloring book for “kids of all ages” really, because my 43 –year-old self still loves to color. I was pleased when I saw recent articles stating the de-stressing power of coloring books for adults and I thought, “How perfect!” Everyone should take time out of their busy schedules to color in a page every once in a while.

I hope you enjoy my Playful Designs Coloring Book as much as I enjoyed the process of creating it. Follow our Book Tour next week to see what my bloggers’ kids have chosen as their favorite pages to color. Below is the schedule:

11/10: MODKID

11/11: crafterhours

11/12: Melly Sews

11/13: The Sewing Loft

11/14: Dandelion Drift

11/15: Simple Simon and Company

11/17: Sew Pretty Dresses

11/18: Sweeter Than Cupcakes