A Contemplative Life

Not from blogging, but from my book. Grandsons are back home, a great time had by all. From their lovely visit I earned a boat-load of peace concerning my long-distance grandparent status, in the manner that life is what it is and all of it's a blessing in one manner or another. That's a concise way to put it, maybe someday I'll expand on it. Right now it's enough to know they had fun, we did too, and now it's raining and I have a mild case of shingles and again I've retreived my novel, read several chapters today, and hopefully will write on Monday. We'll see what happens with that prediction! In the meantime.... Shingles. Sigh. Just about every spring since my first case back in 2019, I get shingles. This time they're on the right side of my lower neck. Which is safely concealed by turtlenecks because it's not warm with this storm which has produced thunder and lightning for most, merely rain for us. Which if you have shingles, is fine because you ...

For MANY reasons I have been especially thrilled for lengthening days and warmer temps, although gobs of rain have stymied a bit of spring's arrival, or the sense of its presence. The last two days have been GLORIOUS, and today will also be lovely. Tomorrow a little less bright, but certainly warm, then rain returns. This has been one of the wettest March's I can recall. One question is will April remain soggy, or will it dry up as though winter never occurred, as the last two April's have been. Won't know that answer for over a month, but it will be fascinating to discover. In the meantime, I have books to peruse, currently focused on The Hawk Book Two, which I began reading aloud today. Brave the Skies is the title; I'm still getting used to each installment having a title, lol. I'm also becoming accustomed not only to the joys and healing properties of spring, but of an idea my husband introduced a few weeks back that has been growing on me. We're consi...

I grew up with irises so these remind me of my youth. I thought about this last night while sewing basted paper shapes; I stitch a bunch together, then set them aside as blocks pile up, waiting for a good long while as I still need to sew a dozen more blocks, plus baste loads of four-inch squares. then sew all of that together BY HAND, ahem. Writing my current series needs to be considered in a similar labor of long-term love manner. Assessing my fictional WIP in such a way was liberating, because I never berate how much time I put into a paper-pieced quilt; those projects always emerge through a lengthy lens, no way to sew by hand as fast as machine piecing. Each block is akin to a chapter, yet for this series, it's more like sewing a few EPP quilts, lol. I just need to write/revise a little bit most days and know there's a great ending waiting for me. I actually did some writing today; I've come to the the part of this second book where much required alteration, so a half...

A wee sunflower newly placed in the garden! But I need to preface it with the notion that I feel like I'm cheating. Yet I've put a number of plants in the ground and in planters, so that counts, right? And they are live plants, lol, so yeah, I've kind of found my outdoors mojo, even during a mostly cloud-filled week. Boysenberry plant that I started last year from a tiny plug; it's the berry of my childhood and doing well. So why do I feel as though I've skipped many steps? Well, last year I started SO MANY PLANTS FROM SEED. Oh my goodness, I was a seed-starting fool last spring. It was our first full year at this house and with little rain and plentiful if not cold sun, I went nuts for veg and flowers. Not all of it did well, due to hungry deer and other critters and meh soil, as well as our mild summer weather. Did I burn myself out, perhaps. Our very wet and cold winter hampered my efforts this spring, as well as malaise from grief. Yet I'm making up for it n...

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. ...

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 ...

Other than the lower left corner, a cleared path appears. Of course there's the bed of irises to the left that need to be sorted but that's for another day, lol. Yesterday was sunny, today not so much. I try to be outside when the weather is truly pleasant, so I spent Sunday afternoon weeding the gravel path which leads to the greenhouse. The day became so warm I jettisoned my hoodie, using a very long screwdriver to extricate dandelions and such ilk from between the stones. One small section remains, but I'll get to it during our next spate of sunshine. Better to do a little weeding when I can so my hands remain intact for other pleasures. Which mainly means WRITING! I adore a good love story, have been itching to craft one, and it seems I've succeeded; the word count is improving, and after some odd tangents that were quickly reined in, I'm in a good flow both for how much is being written and the actual prose, lol. When words accumulate, that means I'm enjoyi...