In A Bookish, Quilty Mood

A binding being applied. First off, for the next five and three-quarter months, Gracious Mysteries is free on Smashwords! The second in my That Which Can Be Remembered series, it was originally released as a pre-order, hence the need for a price. However, I'm not really about charging for my novels, so I've set it as a freebie, but only through the Smashwords store. You can check out my entire catalogue on Smashwords, or find my books at other various online retail sites. Next, my goodness it's nice to 1) have finished my recent WIP. 2) Enjoy some warm temps! 3) Send off the Rainbow quilt and a mug rug to their new home. 4) Faff around with other coasters, binding strips, and myriad quilting hoo haa littering my big table. I did that today amid sunny skies, then went outside and planted six nasturtiums, about the extent of my gardening fever this spring. I truly have nothing in the tank in regard to seedlings, plants, etc. Instead I'm all-in for noveling and sewing. ...

Sweet Williams starting to bloom; they deserve a post of their own, lol. So right before lunch I finished my latest novel. Feels SO GOOD to have that done, in that 1) The last few chapters were a bit balky. 2) Wrapping up a book lately has felt precarious. 3) I am ready for a writing siesta. 4) I'm equally stoked to start (re)working the next installment! Liberation blends with satisfaction upon reflection, a big project DONE, but more await, which keeps me active. Yeah there's plenty of revisions ahead too, but a series can't start until the first part ends, so in closing one section, another springs to life. Am I shackled to the writing, perhaps. Yet it's a pleasant servitude, one that fills my entire being with a sense of purpose, interest, self-exploration. Why do I choose these characters, what do their motivations say about my view of the world, blah, blah, blah, lol. Yet those are relevant queries that now with a modicum of free time I can consider. This past wee...

This isn't about writing, sewing, or gardening. This post is about family, appreciation, and love. I was the blessed recipient of a plethora of relatives this past weekend; my two daughters, four grandkids, and one son-in-law arrived without prior warning, although my husband was in on the plan. Tears fell  as one group descended Friday night, then laughter rang when the second clan turned up Saturday morning. I earned over twelve thousand steps yesterday keeping up with grandchildren, their parents, and love that enveloped all of us. Yes I am thoroughly exhausted, ha ha, but the memories made are the kind that sustain for ages. One of the gifts I received is the above sign, painted by my eldest grandson; his mum chose four pics from a local craft shop, also bringing paints and brushes. The grandkids were let loose to embellish however they wished and the results were stunning, heartwarming, liberating. Children's imaginations are so unencumbered, their glee invigorating, their...

Another rainbow quilt in the making, more or less. After a rather giddy ten days of writing, I have hit not a stumbling block, just peering ahead at the final bend in the road. Suspense has built for the big payoff, about which I have mulled over EXTENSIVELY in my mind, ahem. It's not that I don't know what comes next, only that having approached it, mild trepidation has emerged. Once I write the next chapter, basically it's done, and then.... Then comes a few days of perhaps an immediate read-through or I merely set it aside, breathe deeply, then jump right into the next book in the series, which already sits at sixty-six K, but needs plenty of reworking and another twenty-thirty thousand words added. I wrote it first, the book that had been going well until it came to a grinding HALT , then a dorky final chapter was slapped upon it, but that nonsensical conclusion opened the door to what has turned into a series, at least within my own mind. LOL. Gotta have a sense of hum...

Machine quilting joy with plenty of pics; enjoy the colour-fest! Yesterday was spent mostly at my computer, reading over my fictional WIP. I'm nearing the end, very cool, and wrote a chapter and a little extra this morning, which initially I left as one long chapter, then I split the last scene off into a new chapter that I will complete tomorrow. Previously I would have kept writing, but as I have stated earlier, or certainly meant to note, I am attempting to pace myself because much remains and I will get there when I do. In the meantime, there are quilts to quilt and designs on the wall to cut fabric for and more quilts to consider, ha ha ha! Plenty to do, rain or shine. Perhaps the last of the machine quilting; I might hand-quilt the rest.   Pondering completions is a nice feeling though, in books or blankets. For the novel, the last few chapters feature big emotional payoffs, which I am itching to write, yet I'm not rushing those tear-fests. I cannot state enough how GREAT...

The ceramic frog keeps its glass eyes on possible intruders, ha ha ha. It was about one year ago that I returned to blogging about the writing. I can't recall why, perhaps related to getting That Which Can Be Remembered ready for publication. I had been out of the social media loop since the summer of 2018, after my mom died; I had no desire to do more than grieve, then move on, so blogging about the prose fell of the To Do list. Four years later.... Back on the blogging track I went. Then a few months into it, I added my other side gig of quilting to the proceedings. And now a year has passed, full of drama, both fictional and non. Plenty of quilts, a good deal of gardening in 2022 and very little gardening in 2023. The photo above is how a planter looks now, fairly choked with weeds except for the section my husband cleared about a month or more ago. Last year I had heaps of flower seedlings planted there, not that many of them lasted, lol. Our exceedingly wet winter put the kabo...

Rainbow quilt top done! I don't know exactly how many fat quarters I cut a few weeks ago, but it was A LOT. Plus I threw in a couple of fat quarter-ish pieces from my solids' stash, which made for a plethora of three, six, and eight-inch squares, when excising the seam allowances. Yesterday I finished the rainbow quilt, taking some nice shots of it on our laundry line that really only gets used for photo ops. The sun has been shining lately, perfect weather for displaying quilts, two others you can see on my Instagram account. The bright weather also lends itself to vibrantly hued quilts, and I'm thinking as soon as I make the back for the one above I'll design another with the spare squares. One more baby quilt remains on my current list of quilting To Do's, but we'll see how long the rainbow squares will hold out; I'm also in mood to use up various cut fabrics that are cluttering what little surface area exists in my office/sewing room. I'm in a mood ...

Some squares for my current quilt, which is nearly done! This morning in my WIP I killed off a character. I knew this person wasn't going to survive, but I hadn't known that today it was going to be the end for them. The chapter was meandering along, then WHOMP, a life was over. I sat there for several minutes afterwards, a little stunned. Then for the next hour or more I was still unsettled. Writing nearly every day, I have become fond of these folks, as though I have another set of relatives. Except now I have one fewer. I'm almost 72K into this story, definitely on the downhill slide. The fallout of said demise will now usurp the plot for a few chapters, then this novel will wrap up with a cliffhanger, leading into the second book of the series, which I actually wrote last month. That draft needs a fair amount of revising, then more added to it. But as I come to the end of what is the opener, I'm a little emotional, not having killed off a beloved character in a book...

Adding a striped border to this quilt, and happy with my choice. Two quilts are about done, one long lounging on the back of the sofa, the other for a baby girl due in June that I busted out last week. All that remains is hand-sewing the back of the bindings, an evening activity while I listen to basketball games or Star Trek Voyager or whatever else my husband happens to find on TV. I might embellish the baby quilt with a little hand-quilting, but I won't know if that's necessary until after it has been through the wash. If it's crinkly enough, it's done. The other quilt is autumnal in fabric nature, I don't even remember when I started it, obviously sometime last year. No wait, it only feels like last year because it has a fall-vibe. Wow, that's a little embarrassing. It had been on the quilt wall, or the first three rows of it, for a VERY LONG TIME, then just when I needed to clear the quilt wall to put something else there, I went for broke, slapped up the ...

Still some 3.5" squares to fill in but I'm liking this arrangement. Currently I'm in one of those rare head spaces where I am so into what I'm writing, I start to lose my grasp on reality. Yesterday for instance: the scene was set at lunchtime, some heavy melodrama raging. Upon completion, I was stunned to note it was merely nine thirty-six a.m. I would have sworn it was at least noon, more like half past one. But nope, still early-mid-morning in real life time. I'm in a different world right now, the writing pretty sweet while quilting overtakes the afternoons. I spent much of last week cutting fabrics, then quickly threw squares on the wall, machine-pieced them, then fashioned a backing, basted it together and it's already halfway machine-quilted, the binding ready and waiting. Then yesterday I took the leftover squares, sized 6.5" and 3.5", and began what I then mostly completed earlier this afternoon, pictured above. I told my daughters it was bas...