Make Something Monday

A Catherine Noon
What’s In YOUR Wallet? or Bag?

Happy Monday, Dear Reader!  I’ve gotten some of my design mojo back and have been playing with some different knitting designs.  This morning, as I waited for the bus, I checked the Bus Tracker tool.  It said the next bus wouldn’t be there for 27 minutes.  Aside from making me late for work, that meant I had time to get some knitting done.

Then, mid-row, what do I see but a bus? Holy crap.  Try stuffing size 10 needles in an already over-stuffed knitting bag and grabbing everything to get onto the bus.

MONDAY!

WIP

This is what I’m making with my size 10 needles.  One of my books has an afghan on the cover that’s made out of triangles.  I decided to take a twist on that idea and using a base of 35 stitches, make a sampler with leftover yarns and different textures.

This is a Turkish Stitch done in Lion Brand Homespun.  It’s a boucle-type of yarn and difficult to see stitch definition; however, I like the less dense look of the fabric.  I find the juxtaposition of the bias pull of the stitch with the decreased edge for the triangle to be an interesting opposition.

What are you working on?

The Eyes Have It

A Catherine Noon
The Sun

Every year, I struggle with Christmas and the holidays and what they mean to me.  Much like my forays into 3-D, my forays into what the holidays “should” be like are colored by the past and by expectations.  I remember when my parents separated when I was ten, and I believed my mother “ruined” Christmas.  The magic was gone.  I couldn’t understand why my father couldn’t be there and we couldn’t just celebrate like we had in years past.

Tolstoy said that every happy family is happy in the same way, but each unhappy family is unhappy in its own way.  Melanie Beatty said that in alcoholic families, everyone’s angry: Mom’s angry, Dad’s angry, even the dog is angry.  That last one stuck with me – even the dog?  She’s right; my dog knew something was “up.”

Why do I bring that up now?  As I learn how to make the holidays mine after all these years, I’m finding that the past is much with me.  Which brings me to the Ojos de Dios, or “Eyes of God.”

The Huichol people believe that these amulets bring blessings and luck upon the person for whom they’re made.  When a person is born, an ojo is made for them in the central temple.  Ojos are also made at the inception of new business projects, marriages, and other beginnings.  It’s a way to attract the benevolent attention of the deities onto one’s own life.

Enlightenment

A friend of mine suggested some years ago to make the ojos using cinnamon sticks and embroidery floss.  The idea caught fire in my mind and I love the shiny effect of the weaving.  By varying the weaves, you can create more complex structures; but just by using a simple overdyed yarn you can achieve beautiful effects with relatively little effort.

Water

I made these ojos for my office.  I wanted to bring blessings on our work, and to remember that it’s the holidays.  I’m trying to capture some of that sense of magic they had when I was little.  I’m not sure what made it magical, which is part of the challenge; I don’t know what I’m searching for.

Fire

One year, my cat Marina kept batting down all the ornaments I’d put on our tree.  She broke several of them and made a mess.  By end of the holiday, all the ornaments were grouped in the top 18 inches of the tree, leaving the rest to the lights.  The next year, I made ojos for the whole tree – a whole canister of them.  It made me incredibly happy to do.

That’s part of the magic, then – making things.  I think that we humans are crafty creatures and that making things with our hands is part of what satisfies us.  So our holiday this year has centered around handmade things – from food to decorations.

What about you?  
What makes the holidays magical for you?

Home for the Holidaze

A Catherine Noon

BurningBright300I’m with Neal Harrison today, the star of BURNING BRIGHT by me, A. Catherine Noon, and my partner in crime, Rachel Wilder.  We figured, since it’s the holidays, we’d find out a little more about what our favorite Dom does when the mistletoe is overhead and eggnog perfumes the air.

ACN:  Welcome to NGWN, Neal!

NH:  Glad to be here!

ACN:  So, I read that you have a mixed-religion household.  How does that affect your celebration of the holidays?

NH:  We celebrate Christmas as an American holiday, since it’s become so consumerized and is in all the stores and stuff.  My family wasn’t super religious growing up, so it didn’t loom very large for us.  Doc is Wiccan, so he celebrates the Winter Soltice, or Yule.  Steve is Christian and likes to meditate and retreat from the world.

Steve pokes his head into the room:  I heard that!

NH:  I know you did, big guy, that’s why I said it!

ACN:  Gentlemen, gentlemen, one at a time, please.

NH:  But you wrote us multiple men at a time, we figured that’s –

ACN: MOVING RIGHT ALONG NOW.  So tell me, what did you get as gifts for Doc and Steve?

NH:  I haven’t yet.

ACN:  Really?  But you seem so organized and buttoned-up in the book!

NH:  Appearances can be deceiving.  It’s only the 11th.  There’s plenty of time.

Steve hollers from the hallway:  I’ve already got presents for everyone!

NH:  Yeah, and they’re probably already wrapped and hidden.  Wait til I tell Doc where your hiding place is!

ACN:  Now, now, that’s not fair.  You’ll ruin the surprise.

NH:  Yeah, but then I can get some ideas.  ~He grins~

ACN:  Do you have any special menu plans for the holidays?

NH:  Yes.  We called the special menu “Holidaze.”  We’ll be serving Hot Buttered Rum from the 20th through New Year’s Eve.  It’s an old secret family recipe.

ACN:  Wow, that sounds really yummy!

NH:  Thank you.  If your readers would like to find out more about me and my restaurant, they can check out BURNING BRIGHT, available now from wherever fine books are sold.

ACN:  Happy holidays to you and yours!

To win a copy of BURNING BRIGHT of your very own, just in time for the holidays, tell me in the comments:
What is your favorite holiday beverage (alcoholic or not)?

Here’s the details on the rest of the hop, including the grand prize.  Visit at least five of the participating blogs and leave a comment to be entered to win.

Happy reading!

Tina Christopher Grand Prize of a $50 All Romance eBooks Gift Card and the choice of 3 of my books

Dani Wade $10 Amazon Gift Card

Nona Raines A digital copy of Nicely Naughty 2–Erotic Christmas Anthology & $10 Gift Card

Harlowe Wild A Surprise Prize

Leela Lou Dahlin A copy of Rumor Has It or A Haught Date and a $10 Amazon gift card

Angel Payne A $15 Amazon Gift Card

Taige Crenshaw A $10 All Romance Ebooks eGift Card

Jianne Carlo One copy of Prymal Lust and one copy of That Pearly Drop

A. Catherine Noon eCopy of Burning Bright (or other backlist title)

Lara Archer A $10 Amazon Gift Card

Leela Lou Dahlin A copy of Rumor Has It and a $10 Amazon Gift Card

Cynthia Sax The choice of any eBook from my backlist

Ella Sheridan An e-copy of any backlist book

Two for Tuesday

A Catherine Noon

I was looking for a lolcat to adorn my post today, so I asked Google, “lolcats all of thems.”  This is one of the ones that came up and since I guffawed out loud – sorry, “lol’d,” I figured I’d better use it.

Why?

Because lolcats.

ANYway.  I have not one but TWO posts for you today!

The first is at the Chicago Region of National Novel Writing Month.  Just because you didn’t “win” NaNo doesn’t mean you lost.

The second is at Torquere Press’s blog, Romance for the Rest of Us.  I got to musing about my daily round and shared pictures.

Hope you’ll stop by and show me some love in the comments! Happy reading!

Two for Thursday!

A Catherine Noon

Happy Thursday!  I know, I know my post title doesn’t rhyme.  Par for my week.  The heat went out at our building last night, so my brain hasn’t thawed yet.  I’m applying liberal servings of coffee.

I have two posts for you today!  One is by me, ~waves~, because I’m over at Beyond the Veil today talking about – what else – NaNoWriMo!

The second thing I have for you is a chance to win prizes! Woot! My buddy Dani Wade is up at the Nice Girls Writing Naughty blog today with some tips on staying the course – if you’re feeling discouraged, this post is a great pick-me-up. Plus, she’s giving away a prize to one lucky commenter – AND you will be entered to win our grand prize of $25 USD to All Romance eBooks.

Happy reading!

November Is NaNo Time! Join Us For Tips, Tricks, and Prizes!

A Catherine Noon

Today kicks off our NaNoWriMo extravaganza at the Nice Girls Writing Naughty blog.  Your first post is by the fabulous Leela Lou Dahlin.  Leave a comment and be entered to win a prize from her as well as a chance at the grand prize, a $25 gift certificate to All Romance eBooks.  We have other prizes throughout the event, including a copy of Sealed by Fire by Rachel and I (or a choice of our backlist).

What are you doing NaNo this year?  If you’re not yet tempted, what might you write if you decided to?

Yarnglee

A Catherine Noon

So, I’ve been on a major yarn hiatus.  I’ve been doing calligraphy like a madwoman; I’m filling notebooks with the stuff (and no, that’s not a typo; yes, I mean more than one).  Let’s just say I had to order a second set of practice markers because I used up the ink in the first set.  See what I mean?

But I’m feeling the bug again.  I’m beginning to see that this is part of my normal pattern (which only took me fourteen years to figure out, but let’s not go there, kthxbi).  I seem to set knitting aside around May or June and pick it up around September or October.

We celebrated our tenth wedding anniversary this year – yay! – and went down to southern Illinois and St. Louis to poke around.  One of the shops had some lovely Lana de Oro and I had to get some.  I’m thinking socks.  50% wool, 50% alpaca.  Michael picked heather grey, I picked heather lavender:

The lavender has bits of other colors in it, more as shading than a true ombre.

The lighting is weird because I took these outside.  I tried to get a close-up and the camera changed the coloring.  Sigh.  Must.learn.Photoshop.

Can you tell I’ve been playing with the grey hank?  ~blush~  But this is the grey with the lavender; I’m thinking that I’ll use a small mosaic in the cuff of each sock in the opposite color.

It’s really not as pink as it seems in this picture.  But I’m excited.  I may even use the toe-up technique, though I think I should do the first set with practice yarn first.  We shall see.