Just for fun

Made a few cards to go with some books I gave away in a contest. These were fun to make. I had to keep them simple because I was on a time crunch - which seems to be my life the last little while. I am actually quite happy with these, mostly because I have been coveting Fancy Flourishes by PTI for awhile now to use as a background stamp, but I have been trying to hold back on my crafting spending, trying to use what I already have. So when I took a closer look at Turning a New Leaf set, I noticed that one of the stamps, if I stamped it off, would work perfectly as a background flourish. And it matched the leaf I die cut from the same set.

Stuff used - Rustic cream card stock for base, Spring moss for leaves and stamped with spring moss, Blueberry Sky felt, cut with a Flower Fusion die, Harvest Gold stamped with Summer Sunrise and cut using a Spellbinders die (sorry, can't remember which one but I love it). The sentiment is from the 2011 Anniversary set. Thanks for stopping by.

creativity

If you check my website, you will notice that I do other things beside write. I sew. Knit. Embroider and, more recently make scrapbooks and cards. All my life I've been doing one type of craft or another. When I was young, I would knit sweaters and make up stories. I would sew and dream up heroes for the romance I wanted to write someday. It was all so much fun. So pleasant and inspiring.

And then , so many years after that, I started writing. At first, it seemed to be just another hobby but when I sold my first book and then my second and third and fourth, it became much more than that. It became a vocation. And soon I started writing more and more and craft less and less. To date, I have 37 published books behind me. That represents a lot of time sitting at the computer and working. When our youngest son moved out of the house, writing became my entire focus and my passion. I would spend every day at the computer and sometimes, even the evenings. The sewing machine gathered dust. The knitting got shoved into a cupboard. I didn't have time for this fooling around. I was a writer and writing consumed all my time.

Then, a couple of years ago, as I was fiddling with a story line, I felt it. A general malaise. Disinterest. Reluctance to get going. I just didn't 'feel' like writing. Now, as a professional, I know that I can't work just based on 'feelings'. But I also know that there has to be some spark, some ember that glows in the background that makes me want to tell the stories. I wasn't sure what was going on and kept whining to my writing partner that I just didn't want to write. I had scads of time to do it. Whole days yawned ahead of me that I could spend, sitting at the computer. But I didn't want to be there. Trouble was, I didn't know where else I wanted to be. I got nervous about my lack of enthusiasm for crafting the stories I used to love so much.

Then our church held a fundraiser for our youth to go and work on an orphanage in Honduras. They were going to have an auction and I was asked if I could donate something. But other than my books, what? I started rooting through my cupboard and found a bunch of dolls that I had bought at one time, still boxed up. At one time I'd had dreams of clothing these poor, naked things, but my writing took over my life. So I pulled them out, hauled out the numerous scraps of material I'd had sitting around from years of sewing. Most of them were too small for anything else except doll clothes.

While I sorted and fingered material and laid out the fun colours and patterns on the floor of my office, the ever present deadlines taunted me, telling me. I didn't have time for this fooling around. I had to get back to work. But I knew work would just mean staring at a computer screen and sighing. So I stayed where I was, sorting lace and buttons and trim, memories of the joy this work gave me seeping into the day. And as I did, I made a decision. In spite of the reality of having a book to finish and another set of galleys to check over, I was going to find time to make some clothes for a doll and donate them to the auction. I would work in the evening, that was all.

And I did. But as I cut and pinned and sewed and snipped, an interesting thing started happening. The story I just couldn't get excited about, the characters I couldn't care about, started slipping around the edges of my brain. They started talking. The ideas started flitting around. My mind started playing with story lines. It was as if my mind played as my hands did. And slowly, slowly, the embers started glowing again. I was excited to get back to the computer to put down the ideas that came to me as I sewed.

The picture you see here is of a set of clothes and doll that I am donating to yet another auction. And while I was sewing these clothes, I was working on another series of books I want to do. I was letting the characters play around in my head as I worked. It was fun. And this week, I'm back at the computer. Back at work.

But since making those doll clothes, I've learned to give myself some craft time as well. Some time to fill the creative well I had been drawing from far too deeply for far too long. I've let colours and paper and fabric and textures back into my life and I'm having fun doing other things beside writing. It was an important lesson to me.

As for the doll? She and her clothes sold for a goodly amount of money. Multi purpose crafting.

how I roll

I'm starting a new series of books and this time around I'm figuring out all three characters in the series at once. It's been fun - scribbling and thinking and moving things around. Thought I would give you a bit of an insight in how I start a book. This is Stage One. The fun stage. The stage when everything can get dumped on the paper without editing or second thoughts. This is when I'm usually singing and smiling and my world is well.

Today I start Stage Two. This usually includes at least one phone call to my writing buddy to whine and complain about How Hard This Is!!! She just listens, then tells me to get back to work. Which I do. So today, the smiles will fade and the work will carry on.

PTI challenge #2

My next offering in the PTI challenge.

And the inside of the above card:

I made a huge mistake with this one. I was having so much fun working on the inside that by the time I was done and had the inside pasted in, I realized, I hadn't stamped anything or done anything with the front of the card. Usually that's my entire focus! So I had to fiddle a bit to get that right and I have to confess, the front is not my best work. But it was fun to do and I learned something in the meantime.

PTI - Shaking all over

I've stepped outside my comfort zone for this PTI challenge and made an interactive card. I've always wanted to try this, and this challenge was my chance to, well, challenge myself.

I used Heart Prints and Turning a New Leaf for the background, and Heart Prints for the waterfall part. It was fun.

PTI newest challenge

I put this card together for another PTI challenge and because I wanted to make a card for a very sweet girl. The only thing not PTI on this card is the background paper and the ink for the pink flowers. The first image is the sketch from Nichole Heady's Blog which I used as my inspiration. I changed things up a bit, but that's what inspiration is for, right? A starting point. Thanks for stopping.

One more PTI challenge card

This is my last card I made for this challenge. And now, back to my regular job. This was a lot of fun and I hope to participate in a few more challenges. I used all PTI products for this card except for the plain ordinary pencil crayons I used to colour the image.

PTI freebie challenge

Another card for the challenge. All PTI products this time. Such fun.

PTI Challenge #2

All PTI - all the time.

PTI 5th Anniversary challenge - Image Freebie

This is a card I made for the PTI 5th anniversary challenge using the images Nichole Heady put up on her blog. This is also my very first challenge! The paper and die cuts are PTI - the patterned paper is from Echo Park - Country drive, the doily is just a plain doily you can buy to put under cakes, the ribbon I picked up at Michaels. This was a fun challenge and I really want to say thanks to the PTI design team for all the work they put into making our crafting so much fun.

trying to stay current

Okay, it's been ages since I last posted here. A friend of mine stopped by here (hey Sandra) and mentioned that I haven't put anything up here. Truthfully, I keep forgetting about this place I've parked some of my words in the wind. Right now the wind is blowing leaves off the trees with a vengeance which really bugs me because I broke my camera and I can't take fall pictures. The leaves are a glorious splash of color right now. Like I said in my Facebook page, All Nature Sings. Right now I've got a book out called The Cowboy's Lady. It's part of a continuity I did with a few other authors. So that's been fun. My first book in the Home to Hartley Creek series, Rancher's Return, came out beginning of this month and hopefully should still be available . The second book called Daddy Lessons is out in March. I was in the Toronto offices of Harlequin and got to see the mockup of the cover. As usual, Gorgeous. The people at Harlequin Love Inspired do a great, great job of the covers. The third book of the series, Healing the Doctor's Heart, comes out in June and I'm currently working on the fourth book in the series. I hope you can persevere and find them all. For now, I have to get back to work. Take care all.

Fall

Fall is here and with it comes the beautiful colors. It’s like nature is singing. I love the changing of the seasons and the moods each one brings. When fall comes, I want to start baking again, making soup and taking care of my family. What kind of things do you find yourself doing in the fall that you don’t otherwise do?

finally

Keeping up to all the things I should be doing to promote myself is hard work! And it requires consistency, something I seem to be allergic to. I figure sitting down to the computer every day to write is doing pretty good already. Anyhow, thought I would try to keep up this blog a bit more regularly just to keep my name out in this particular corner of cyberspace.

And now, back to my regularly scheduled writing.

A moving experienceq

I've moved my blog to a new space on the web - my home page. I spend more time on my web page than I do on this blog, so if you want to read my meandering musings, check out my website, find out what's new with my writing - Plus you can enter to win a cool canuck canoe complete with cleansers.

Click here to go to website

All the Tea in China

Ni hao. I am writing this post from a hotel in Beijing with a newly acquired and deep admiration for Jack Bauer. I don't know how he does it. I was up for 23 hours, travelling, and for most of that time the biggest decision I had to make was chicken or pork when the steward on the plane asked me my meal preference. And in spite of that very low key mind power, by the time I hit 22 hours, I was fading and fading fast. However our hosts recommended that we try, as quickly as posible, to jump into local time so I dogged my way through conversation, got a few third and fourth spurts of energy and then drifted down again. I fell into bed thinking I would sleep for hours - 6 hours later - wide awake. So today will be another long day, but today we go to the Great Wall of China and a few other sights. I'm counting on the stimulation of being in this new and exciting place to keep me going, but most of all I'm figuring the shopping. Jack has his 'save civilization scenarios to keep him on his game, I'm going to count on bargaining to keep me up and going. For further bulletins, check out my own blog A Few Words in the Wind

All The Tea in China

Jane Orcutt, a fellow author, passed away this winter. Jane's dry wit and keen grasp of ideas made for interesting discussions on the writer's loop we were both a part of. This same writer's loop would meet at a retreat before the Christian Book Sellers Convention, now known as ICRS, International Christian Retail Show. There were a number of years that Jane, myself and a number of others were unable to attend the retreat, so Jane had the idea of creating our own cyber-retreat. Things ended up getting a little crazy at the cyber-retreat, often pirate themed. Jane spear-headed the craziness and many of us went along for the ride. Now, Jane Orcutt has a book out called All the Tea in China. Marlo Shalesky, author, has this to say about the book, "With its rich detail and saucy characters, All the Tea in China is fun romp around Cape Horn and into China. I loved the spunk of Isabella, the mystery of Phineas, and the allure of a country so distant from our own. Hats off to Jane Orcutt for such an enjoyable read!"

I have the book on order myself and will blog further about it when I've read it. But knowing Jane and knowing how she never failed to make me laugh and/or think, I'm looking forward to the book. You can purchase it by following this link:

http://www.amazon.com/All-Tea-China-Rollicking-Regency/dp/0800731794/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1/002-8254854-4592837?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1180708494&sr=8-1

I'n sooo sick

Flu season is upon us and against our will, my husband and I are participating. He started it. He usually does. And he shared it with me. Coughiung, sputtering, sneezing, nose blowing - the usual detritus of illness beside my bed. Cough drops, water bottle, kleenex old and new. Yeah. Until one morning I woke up, after five days of hacking and sniffing and thought, "This is much, much worse." I couldn't think, couldn't put on my glasses, my head ached and when I blew my nose . . . .we shall draw a curtain of charity on this scene. Suffice it to say, I was in bad shape. I got dressed in a haze, drove to the hospital in a haze, hoping that I wouldn't have to explain and justify why I needed medicine. My previous doctor didn't always listen to my self-diagnosing and would often balk at prescribing me something unless I could explain the symptoms in gory detail. No deviation. So I was suspecting I might have the same difficulty this time around, with my new doctor. However, I was pleasantly surprised. I sat on the bed in the outpatients department as my doctor listened to my chest, explaining that I had to lift my shirt so he could. He asked me a couple of questions, he scribbled something on the magic pad and I had my entree into the wonderful world of antibiotics. When I was relating my "I was a patient" story to my husband and how easy it all went, he looked at me and frowned.
"Did you wear that shirt to the hospital?" he asked.
I knew it was clean. I grew up with a mother who always told us to put on clean underwear anytime we left the house. Just in case.
"Yes. It's not dirty is it?"
He laughed. "No it's perfectly clean, but no wonder you got the prescription so fast. That doctor took one look at you and said, this is one siiiick woman. Your put your shirt on inside out."

nature naturally

My friend was teasing me about being a lazy blogger. So here's me. Blogging again. My husband and I went on a little trip a few days ago and went through the Rocky Mountains on our way to British Columbia. I took this picture of one of my favorite mountains. It's informally called, the politically incorrect, Indian Head. Can you see it? Let me know if you can.

Valley of Betrayal

Valley of Betrayal
Today is my day to host Tricia Goyer's blog tour on her newest book, Valley of Betrayal.

The Story Behind the Novel: by Tricia Goyer herself

A few years ago when I was researching for my fourth World War II novel, Arms of Deliverance, I came across a unique autobiography. One B-17 crewmember I read about claimed to make it out of German-occupied Belgium after a plane crash due, in part, to his skills he picked up as a veteran of The Spanish Civil War. Reading that bit of information, I had to scratch my head. First of all, I had never heard of the war. And second, what was an American doing fighting in Spain in the late 1930s? Before I knew it, I uncovered a fascinating time in history—one that I soon discovered many people know little about. This is what I learned:
Nazi tanks rolled across the hillsides and German bombers roared overhead, dropping bombs on helpless citizens. Italian troops fought alongside the Germans, and their opponents attempted to stand strong—Americans, British, Irishmen, and others—in unison with other volunteers from many countries. And their battleground? The beautiful Spanish countryside.
From July 17, 1936-April 1, 1939, well before America was involved in World War II, another battle was fought on the hillsides of Spain. On one side were the Spanish Republicans, joined by the Soviet Union and The International Brigade—men and women from all over the world who have volunteered to fight Fascism. Opposing them, Franco and his Fascist military leaders, supported with troops, machinery, and weapons from Hitler and Mussolini. The Spanish Civil War, considered the “training ground” for the war to come, boasted of thousands of American volunteers who joined to fight on the Republican side, half of which never returned home.
Unlike World War II, there is no clear line between white and black, good and evil. Both sides committed atrocities. Both sides had deep convictions they felt worth fighting and dying for.
Loyalists—also know as the Republicans were aided by the Soviet Union, the Communist movement, and the International Brigades. If not for the weapons and volunteers from these sources their fight would have ended in weeks rather than years. While many men fought side by side, their political views included that of liberal democracy, communism and socialism. The Catholic Basque Country also sided with the Republic, mainly because it sought independence from the central government and was promised this by Republican leaders in Madrid.
Nationalists—or Francoists were aided mainly by Germany and Italy. The Nationalist opposed an independent Basque state. Their main supporters were those who believed in a monarchist state and fascist interests. The Nationalist wished for Spain to continue on as it had for years, with rich landowners, the military, and the church running the country. Most of the Roman Catholic clergy supported the Nationalists, except those in the Basque region.
During the Spanish Civil war, terror tactics against civilians were common. And while history books discuss the estimated one million people who lost their lives during the conflict, we must not forget that each of those who fought, who died, had their own tales. From visitors to Spain who found themselves caught in the conflict, to the communist supporters, Basque priests, and Nazi airmen . . . each saw this war in a different light. These are the stories behind A Valley of Betrayal.
Tricia Goyer, October 2006

Back in the Saddle

Disciplined living is something I struggle with. Take this blog for instance. I had so many good intentions to post every day - and then life gets in the way and I fail. I realize I haven't posted her for over a month! I can rattle off a list of excuses and it doesn't matter. You don't need to know. But I feel at times as if I'm being pulled in ten directions and I need to priortize. So, from time to time, this blog will be one of the first things to fall away. But today, though I'm not inspired - (this posting is the equivalent of a kid writing an essay about how hard it is to write an essay) - I thought I would at least make an attempt to get started again. So here I am, back in the saddle, tossing out words in the wind.