Good Morning Everyone!

It looks like it's trying to be sunny here on the Pacific West Coast today, I sure hope it succeeds. I haven't been doing a lot of sewing lately due to work. I've been spending a lot of time down at the gift shop helping to get it ready for cruise ship season, which is now underway. It's a huge job, boxes and boxes of items to price and place on shelves.

I was watching American Idol last night and wow! what a show. I think each of the top 13 contestants got to sing with their idols. They sure know how to put on a good show and I was so happy to see Steven Tyler hit the stage with Dream On. Congratulations to Scotty McCreary for winning the title; and congratulations to Lauren Alaina for coming in second. I'm sure this isn't the last we'll hear from either of them.

I have a busy weekend at work - hopefully it'll be the last busy one now that the ships have finished with their repositioning cruises. Next week, we'll be on our usual schedule and I'll have more time to work on my quilting, knitting and planting some much needed flowers outside.

I hope everyone is enjoying this lovely spring weather and managing to get some quilting and knitting done. I'll be taking some stuff with me in the car to work on during my breaks, but I'm really looking forward to my two days off next week and getting some much needed things done around the house.

Happy Quilting and Knitting!

TGIF

Happy Friday to everyone who is reading my blog. In the Pacific Northwest, we've had all kinds of weather this week from snow, hail, sunshine, hurricane force winds - you name it, we've probably had it.

I've been working at the borders of my disappearing 9 patch quilt, in between meetings and other stuff that gets in the way of sewing. So far, I have a 4" white border, a 1" patched border using the fabrics I have in the quilt and will be adding a 2" white border today. Then, I'll be adding some applique to the 4" border in the form of 3D butterflies (I hope they work out the way I picture them). I'm loving this quilt - the colours are gorgeous together and it'll look so pretty in my livingroom on my burgundy leather couch.

I have a wool batt that I'm going to try. I bought this at a wool producing company in Alberta a few years ago. This quilt, I'm going to tie and add little buttons to it. It'll make a nice quilt to cuddle under on cold evenings when watching television.

I'm also going through a lot of my patterns for items to make for craft fairs in the fall. I used to do the craft fair circuit and haven't done it for a few years, but this year, I plan to get back into it again. I love meeting new people and knowing that my products are good enough to purchase.

I have some adorable decorator doll-type patterns I want to try too. The last time I made a doll was when my kids were little and I used to make baby dolls and clothes for my daughter and niece. I'm ready for a challenge now and have a few doll patterns just waiting for me to tackle them.

Have a fantastic weekend - I'm going to spend it sewing up a storm!

Back to Quilting!

Well, the book has been put on hold until more research has been done on it. In the meantime, we've been snowed in for the last week. This is what happens when you live in a city that doesn't get snow, one snowfall and the whole city shuts down. The one snowfall dropped over a foot of snow last Wednesday and we've had snow off and on since then.

With being stuck in the house (I don't own winter clothes because we don't have 'winter' in our piece of paradise), I decided to go through my stash of fabrics. Gee, I didn't realize I had so much. I started quilting about 30 years ago and I have at least that many years of a fabric collection. In 1999, I stopped quilting when my cousin and quilting buddy died. I returned home from her funeral with several quilts in various forms of completion. They've been tucked away since then - I couldn't even look at them, let alone do any quilting or sewing for myself. I used to work the craft sale circuit every winter to make extra $$$ but even stopped that. A lot of things have gone on in my life since then but last week, with the snowfall, I suddenly had an urge to start creating again.

I've been reading a lot of quilting blogs and getting lots of inspiration. In my stash, I found a couple of charm packets that I'd bought years ago. After some searching on the internet, I found a pattern for a disappearing 9 patch, which I put together in an afternoon. I loved it and had so much fun with it. The charm squares I had were both Moda, one was all pinks and the other was 'Poetry' - they look gorgeous together. Today, I"ll be adding borders and 3D butterflies to them.

Yesterday, we had rain all day and the roads were clear, so I ventured out to my favourite quilt shop and spent way more money than I should have but I was loving every minute of it and came home with some wonderful pieces of fabrics - I call them my 'shabby chic' collection - they have that old fashioned look in the lovely soft colour - love them.

Have patience with me on this blog - I'm really getting into trying to set it up nicely and will run into some bumps along the way, I"m sure. Happy Quilting!

February 19, 2010

It's another gorgeous day on the Pacific West Coast of Canada - more like a late spring day than winter. The daffodils are already in bloom among the snowdrops; the flowering cherry trees are in bloom and smell wonderful, the trees are already getting their leaves. People are wandering around in shorts and tshirts already - it's been a few years since it's been this mild.

I've been working on a crocheted tea cosy as a birthday gift for my mom for this weekend. I'm hoping to have it finished by Sunday when we go to visit her. Her other tea cosy is showing it's age and in dire need of replacing. After I've finished this, I have yarn ready to make the Goddess Tarot Bag - a pattern that I got off Ravelry. IT looks great and will be the perfect size to hold my tarot cards.

My book is coming along slowly. Hit a bit of a writers block, but I find that when the weather is this gorgeous and I start knitting or crocheting, my mind starts working again and I come up with ideas. I keep a pen and notepad beside me to jot down all ideas I come up with. I'm really enjoying this journey and it's a much needed journey to help me get over the loss of my father last spring. IT's still tough as I have to keep going to help out my mom as she isn't coping well at all. But it'll all come together in the end when we need it to.

I'll add pics in a few days

have a great, sunshiny day!

Sunday, September 20, 2009

The book is up to 25 pages and I'm doing a first draft as I'm going through - meaning that I'm writing several pages, then going through and editing and adding and changing things around. My head is filled with ideas and I have to get them down in the computer whether or not they run in a sequence. So long as I have the ideas down - I can add them where I feel it's necessary. It's a lot of fun writing and you can put down on paper things you would never say to others. My book started out as a love story and is turning into a mystery. I've had a lot of pointers from several books I've been using as guidelines 'How to write a mystery', Janet Evanovich's 'How I Write'. The latter is filled with so much useful information and is a virtual lifesaver when writing. If all prospective writers used Janet's book as a guideline - they'd all end up as published authors. Right now, I"m not too worried about a publisher - I just want to get my book written. I may even go the route of self publishing, so that I have complete control of my work - but I'll give that more thought as I go on.

To help pay for all of my time on the computer (the bills still need paying), I'm joining up with Partylite. It's an amazing candle company and is such a great help in paying the bills and repairing my 15 year old Jeep. With the Christmas season coming up - it can't help but do amazing. I had a party myself a week ago and the money made was astonishing. So, now I"m looking for people in Sooke/Sidney/Western Communities who are interested in holding a party for me or if they belong to a group or organization that needs to do fundraising - let me know. You also don't have to have a party but can contact me anytime to place an order. If you're a realtor, the candles make a great 'thank you' gift to your buyers when they first get into their new homes.

I'm still doing gel nails too although I can't realistically do more than two sets a day.

More on my book soon - it's starting to get exciting!

Have a great 'rest of the weekend'

Day 2

I just got up and I'm waiting for my coffee to finish dripping. Today is going to be a busy day. My hubby and I have an appointment this morning and this afternoon/tonight, I"m working at the gift shop. I won't be taking my computer with me but I'll have to take my notebook to write in. I always get ideas when I'm working and talking to the cruise ship passengers so I need an outlet to write down my thoughts.

Today, I'm working on my characters and I'm aiming to get one or two pages written about each of them. I still have to come up with names for a few but I know in my head what they're going to be like. The names will come with time and by the time this book is finished, everyone will have a name and a purpose.

I'm surprised I'm awake this early today. I went to a friends house last night for a 'candle party'. It was beautiful when it got dark and she had candles lit all around her back yard - what a sight to see!

Thank you for popping by and reading my blogs.

my first blog about my book

Last night, I went to see the movie 'Julie & Julia' with my husband. It was a wonderful movie and well worth seeing again. After watching the movie, it made me realize that with the committment of writing a blog, I may even get my book finished - just like Julie Powell did.

For the last 8 months, I've had an idea running through my head and about 2 months ago, I started doing research on location, characters and what type of book I wanted to write. For years, I've had people telling me I should be writing a book so now I'm going to try and get that dream to fruition.

As of now, although that could easily change due to where my characters lead me, my book is set in the town in which I live. I live in a rain forest where we have lovely summers and rainy winters. The longest research for me is coming up with names for my characters. I have finally decided on some 'old fashioned' names that work for them. Without giving away the story line - of which it is changing regularly - it is about a young woman who is being followed by this devastatingly handsome man. She doesn't know who he is, she has never seen him before. He's new to her community but he shows up everywhere she goes. She is starting to get a little creeped out about all of this but tries not to let it get to her. She's confided all of this to her best friend, who is curious about the strange situation. And so the story goes on . . .

I am hoping that by keeping a daily blog of my writing that this book will be finished within a year. I hope this will keep me on track and keep me writing like it did with Julie Powell. Thank you for the inspiration for committment to continue writing. I look forward to reading any comments about this venture.