Crafty Monday! Dual baby quilt edition.

Who remembers Crafty Monday? I do! And I’m finally posting another one!

Today’s quilts were both made for the babies of dear friends. (And if you’re a dear friend who’s had a baby lately and are wondering where your quilt is, keep in mind that these two quilts were made for May 2009 and August 2009 births.)

The first is “Emmy,” pastel prints in a brick layout. Bricks are wonderfully easy, and I highly recommend them if you’re a beginner thinking of making a pieced quilt. Why? Because the seams don’t have to match up. So you don’t end up with a wonky wannabe chessboard. You just end up with all of your lovely bricks.

The backing of this quilt is just a pastel rainbow stripe. I didn’t get any very good pictures of it.

(Click any of the images for a larger view.)

This next quilt is “Maeve,” for a little Canadian baby. I first found that woodland creature fabric last spring, and I had to have it. I adore those little animals. I was inspired by the colors to go with a less traditional scheme for this one, more woodsy, less girly. Some of the fabrics in this quilt are among favorites from my collection. And I love the black binding. It looks so crisp (if I do say so myself).

And a detail shot with a good look at the woodland creatures fabric:

In other news, I am moving right along on Book 2 and feeling good. Then again, I’m typing this at 2 o’clock in the morning, so what do I know?

Happy Monday, everyone!

5 comments March 22nd, 2010

The author will now look around.

My desk faces the yard, and over the past few weeks, my view has been considerably brightened by the blooming of the peach blossoms. I felt inspired to take a picture and share it, and then I figured, why not take a walk around and see what catches my eye?

First, my little peach tree. No fuzzy infant peaches yet, but I’ve seen the bees a-buzzin’, so here’s hoping…

Aren’t the flowers gorgeous? So delicate!

From the looks of the dwarf orange tree, it’s going to be a bumper crop:

The sad ivy bed, which I’m try to coax back to life after it got tented along with the house in July:

The french lavender, which decided all by itself that it belonged in our yard and has proceeded to thrive (voulez-vous fleurir avec moi?):

Strange little leaves on stilts!

The shady side of the yard:

Vs. the sunny side of the yard:

Beloved old oak canopy:

Red berries untouched by the cedar waxwings:

Cunning little pink flowers (this is called “pink clover”… it found its own way in):

This picture shows the retaining wall Winston jumped off of as well as the cement planter border he landed on (face first) back on July 4, 2008… a day that will live on in infamy, a bad dog back, and vet bills:

Neglected pepper plant continues, without human interference, to bless us with its horrible hot peppers (the husb rather likes them):

Sweet winding vine! Self-taught.

Naughty gopher! Wishing I hadn’t scared you away when the neighbor tried to dispatch you:

Dozens, maybe hundreds, of the most vile-tasting oranges ever conceived of:

The windchime is broken, but it still smiles (and chimes):

I’m starting to worry that the crape myrtle isn’t going to come back from winter! Grow some leaves, already!

Upstairs we have the succulent garden. The spiky plant which is on the left and in the middle amuses me to no end, because the one in the middle is actually a shoot from the main plant that decided it would prefer to run away from home:

And, lastly, Winston. Because no post about anything is complete without him. In the first picture, I thought he was just doing the Cavalier ‘tude thing with the nose in the air. Then I realized he was mad at the little reflection cast around the ceiling by my phone.

Cheers, all! Happy Thursday night (or Friday morning, as the case may be)… (try as I might, I can’t break this text off into its own paragraph. Just as well that we’ve reached the end, I guess.)

k.

5 comments March 18th, 2010

Good Time Tuesday! “Twice the fun” edition.

As I was going through a bunch of my files over the weekend, I suddenly remembered the “old” tradition of Good Time Tuesday! How I’ve missed it. Well, that’s not true. But I like the idea of it.

For today’s post, I’m going to borrow a meme from Kate at My Sphere of Domesticity. It’s called Two For Tuesday, and the idea is that you post two of something.

Sounds simple, right? But it’s NOT!

Actually, it is. I just felt like being dramatic.

My “two” for today will be photos. Just a couple of pictures that caught my eye as I was looking over my albums.

This first one almost got deleted (I have something like 6,000 pictures of Winston… lately I’ve tried to cull when possible). But when I took a second look, I found it charming and kind of interesting. (Click the image for a larger view.)

This one was taken in Ireland in autumn of 2006. I believe this was at an old castle ruin out in the country. There’s something magical about that kind of history. (Click the image for a slightly larger view.)

In other news…
The Daily Plah: Day 14
Currently reading: Bel Canto by Ann Patchett, The Liars’ Club: A Memoir by Mary Karr, and Of Time and Space and Other Things by Isaac Asimov
Song of the day: Earthbound by Rodney Crowell
Book 2 progress: Coming along!
Other notable facts: Woke up last night to the shaking of an earthquake. Just a small one, but enough to get your pulse racing and your dog freaked out. That was at 4 a.m., and when I tried to go back to sleep, my heart was pounding. I didn’t get any more good sleep and woke up with a headache. Thanks, earthquake! Geez.

And now, back to work!

1 comment March 16th, 2010

Tuesday Show & Tell

Yes, I realize that it’s kind of late in the day, but by golly I’m going to get in my weekday blog post! By hook or by crook.

The Daily Plah: Day 9 (It’s day 9, right?)
Currently reading: SuperFreakonomics by Steven D. Levitt and Stephen J. Dubner, The Wednesday Sisters by Meg Waite Clayton
Song of the day: Let’s Go Fly a Kite, in honor of our windstorm
Other notable facts: I had lunch today with one of the fabulous book bloggers I’ve met over the past year, Vania of Reverie Media. We had a yummy lunch, some delicious pie, and went to a bookstore. Very fun and cool! As an author it’s fascinating to hear from the other side of the equation.

Now begins our show!

My copies of the Scholastic version of Bad Girls Don’t Die arrived today! I am getting lots of wonderful emails lately from readers who got my book at a book fair, which I find totally thrilling. (Looking at this picture now, I think I could have picked a book with tidier edges… when you are an author, you get books all jumbled together in a box full of packing peanuts. When you order them for real, you get nicely packed books. Not that I’m complaining!)

Here’s the tote I made over the weekend. The yellow strap is designed to slip your hand through so you can hold the bag by the bottom. I did this because I find myself wrapping the straps around all of my small purses so I can hold them this way. Measured flat, the bag is about 7×9 inches.

I bought two books today! Naughty Katie! Bad, bad Katie! But I really wanted both of these books. The first is Carrie Ryan’s second book, The Dead-Tossed Waves, the sequel to her zombie thriller The Forest of Hands and Teeth. The second is A Rainbow of Stitches, because I figured I have all these craft books I’ve never made projects from, so why not buy an embroidery book and have some patterns to not embroider on my non-existent projects?

I also got fabric. File again under “naughty Katie” and “don’t tell the husb.” But seriously, I had promised myself that if I saw cute mushroom fabric, I was going to buy it. And I can’t just go around breaking promises to myself about buying things I’m not supposed to buy. You have to admit, that’s some fabulous fabric.

Guess who’s not impressed? Seriously. As I type this, Winston is in his crate, barking every five seconds in his “help me, I am so sad and pitiful” voice. This is a picture of him sitting on a baby quilt I’m not finished binding.

Happy Tuesday night! See you tomorrow!

6 comments March 9th, 2010

Crafty Monday: Charlotte’s Hearts

Today I’m featuring a baby quilt that was made for the second daughter of a friend of mine. If you’ve read the acknowledgments in Bad Girls Don’t Die, she’s the one I call the “beta beta reader.”

Anyway, Charlotte, also known as “Chuck,” was born last September, and I promptly procured all the supplies for this quilt. My original plan was to make it all heart blocks, 4 wide by 5 high, but as I started making hearts, I discovered two things:

(1) Heart blocks are kind of a pain in the neck to make

(2) The blocks didn’t look good at all set right up on top of one another.

Now, objection #1 only affected me insofar as, given the choice between making 20 heart blocks and making 12, I immediately favored the idea of making 12. This still took a fair amount of effort, but that part didn’t bother me at all. Every baby deserves a fair amount of effort on his or her part. If I didn’t think so, I wouldn’t make quilts for the dears.

However, given the opportunity to bail on those final eight, you better believe I took it.

In answer to objection #2, I found a brown polka-dot print that would tie everything together, and then used the pink and brown faux-stitchy looking bit in the corners. I alternated those, stitchy design vertical and then horizontal, and vice versa on every other line of sashing.

Naturally, I sewed the last row on upside down, and had to rip out that giant seam and sew it back on.

The batting in this quilt is the bamboo-cotton stuff, which continues to delight me, as it is both warm and flexible AND has a nice heft to it, too.

I quilted down the sashing, 1/4 inch in on each side, with a straight stitch. Then I outlined each heart with a little zigzag, which–thankfully–was much easier than I thought it would be. Nothing like outlining the birds on the bird quilt.

So this one was about a year in the making… but Chuck (and her mom) are well worth it.

So there you have it! Happy Monday!

k.

6 comments September 21st, 2009

Crafty update: Keaton’s quilt

Hi, all! Happy Monday!

Today I’m spotlighting a baby quilt. This is “Keaton” (as all of my quilts are named after the babies they’re made for).

It’s a patchwork quilt with a monkey & tropical theme. I included Keaton’s veddy veddy impressive monogram at the bottom, along with a row of zigzagging. Initially, the whole quilt was going to be zigzagging, but after I made that one row, I realized that I would actually rather drink a bottle of nail polish than make eight more of those evil things.

(Click for closer look.)

I started with the patchwork and then put the borders on. I’m chagrined that the inside border is light polka dots and it includes pink, but Keaton is a very serious, manly little baby, and I’m sure he can live with a few pink dots in his life.

Then I added the green border and the monogram, and then I felt like it still needed something. For some reason, I have a slight aversion to making square baby quilts, although I have done them before (see Julia) and certainly haven’t had problems with the results.

Anyway, just when I was feeling like I wanted a little something more, I remembered the evil zigzag that I’d sewn long ago and got that out. I had to trim it to fit, but I like the way it’s a little underscore and adds length.

The backing is the same blue and lime plaid in the zigzag. I quilted with zigzag stitches, except around the monogram, which I did in the ditch with a straight stitch. I also added horizontal lines of zigzagging in the space on the sides of the monogram, which you can see here:

I used bamboo/cotton batting, which has that wonderful floppy hand right out of the bag. Before I washed the batting, the quilt measured 44 inches by 55.5 inches. After washing, it had shrunk to 42.5 inches by 53.5 inches. So that bamboo definitely shrinks right up! I think it shrinks more than cotton. I learned that after a previous encounter and compensated, size-wise, in the construction.

Thanks for joining me! You can check out more of my crafty stuff by visiting my Flickr photostream. And I’ll have another crafty post soon! I’ve been making custom tote bags.

Tomorrow I have some fun newsy tidbits… nothing too exciting, but please swing by and check them out (on your way to visit me at the Debutante Ball)…!

7 comments July 27th, 2009

Q: Why did the chicken cross the road?

A: To get to my post about laughter over at the Debutante Ball!

Oh ho ho ho ho, see how I did that?

Who’s hankering for a Winston pic? Me, too! Here he is (with Mom–that is, me) in the pool in Palm Springs. He’s pretty comfortable on the raft. Especially with a half-deflated beach ball to beat up on. (It’s just being in the actual water that throws him off a little.)

2 comments June 23rd, 2009

Ways in Which I Heart New York

Smiling by the pond in Central Park:

Admiring the statue of Balto, the Siberian Husky whose famous “serum run”, to bring medical treatment to the city of Nome, Alaska, inspired the Iditarod sled race:

Taking pictures of important landmarks:

Debuting my book trailer:

Seeing Broadway plays and meeting up with amazing actor friend Greg Jbara, who plays the father in “Billy Elliott”, and showed us around backstage after the show (the husb was there, too, but I cropped him out):

Having lunch with the Delightful Editor, the Wonderful Publicist, and Agent M (who refused to have his picture taken!), and getting my paws on THIS, a REAL book!–click for a closer look:

Taking the cover off to find that my book is done in the colors of Astronaut Ice Cream–I think designer Beth Clark has been reading my diary or something–what author is lucky enough to get METALLIC PINK letters on her book???–click for a closer look.

We had such a great time and ate SO MUCH DELICIOUS FOOD (omg) and saw so many awesome things and could have easily stayed another week.

But at the end of the day… it’s wonderful to be home.

6 comments March 20th, 2009

Apologies and comedy–apomedy?

Sorry about the comment troubles! I’ve been getting lots and lots of comment spam, so I tried a special little plug-in to fix it, and the supposedly “1%” of people who have problems with the plug-in are apparently 80% of my blog readers! D’oh! I changed it back. It’s worth deleting comments about cheap pharmaceuticals to hear from my friends.

What’s this? A brilliant idea for a sequel?

(Yes, I’m procrastinating on my Project X revisions, so sue me!)

I have many ideas for sequels, so maybe I’ll try to post them once a week! Lucky y’all!

7 comments March 8th, 2009

Picture meme (a long time coming)

It is hiiiiiiiigh time I got around to doing a meme I was tagged for, oh, three months ago–by Maggie of Maggsbunny (who has a Chow Chow and a new (to me) adorable short hair cut). It’s a photo meme where you go to your photo files and find the fourth photo from the fourth folder and then post it. I even went as far as finding the photo the day she tagged me but then I couldn’t remember where I’d saved it and I was out of town and at the dog show and here we are in February.

So without further ado… (click for a closer look):

This photo was taken in October, when there was a fire across the San Fernando Valley from us. It’s probably taken from the street level (higher than the house), because there are trees in our view… yes, looking at it, that pine tree is off to the left of our house.

Until we moved to the hills, I never thought too much about the Santa Ana winds or “red flag days” or any of that stuff. Now you can bet I pay attention!

As part of the meme, I am supposed to tag four new people. I like pictures, so I’m going to tag:

1 – Tom (I’m assuming we’ll get some puppy pictures out of this!)
2 – Christy, because she said she likes to be tagged
3 – Elbee at Sew Little Time
4 – Larramie at Seize a Daisy (although I’m not sure if Larramie does memes)

As part of the excitement, I am not even going to tell these people they were tagged! Bwa ha ha.

Thanks, Maggie!

11 comments February 5th, 2009