Tag: Rachel Wilder

  • D Is For… Dogs

    D Is For… Dogs

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    Dogs, and the people who love them.  If you love dogs, then you get it.  If you don\’t, then you don\’t.  It\’s that simple, really.

    Our sixty-five-pound bundle of joy came to us eight years ago from the Anti-Cruelty Society in Chicago.  She\’s gotten comfortable as a part of our family.  She likes to take her half of the bed out of the middle, leaving my husband and I to find what space we can in the remaining spaces.

    Author Lynda Barry, who wrote What It Is, suggests thinking about all the dogs you\’ve ever known.  Where did they all go?  That question rang like a bell to me.  I\’ve used it a couple times in prompt circles and the memories come back more strongly each time.

    What about you, Dear Reader?
    What\’s your first dog memory?

  • C Is For… Calligraphy

    C Is For… Calligraphy

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    Before the printing press, there were pens and paper.  The art of calligraphy is from the Greek, Kallos graphos, or beautiful writing.  Like the printing press, there\’s an ancient history of calligraphy in Asia, and it\’s even tied to meditation practices.

    I discovered calligraphy when I was about ten years old, when one of my classmates\’ handwriting caught my eye.  She wrote so beautifully, letters that were even and round on the page.  I studied her writing for four years, endeavoring to copy it.  I finally succeeded and, in the process, discovered the art of calligraphy.  The Scheaffer calligraphy set that I was given as a gift opened a new world to me.

    Despite becoming good at it, I dropped its pursuit in college due to family opinion that I should focus on college and the necessity of making a living.  About eighteen months ago, I re-discovered the art.  The technology in felt-tipped pens is much better than when I was young.  In particular, my favorite is the Zig brand double-tipped pen.  I found a set of six of them and played for a few months, before buying one of each of the colors available.

    What about you, Dear Reader?
    What art did you play with as a child that you have picked up, or might like to, as an adult?

  • B Is For… Books

    B Is For… Books

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    Books.

    They\’ve been around for a while now.  When I was younger, I thought that we Westerners invented them, but it was the Chinese who came up with the printing press 400 years before Gutenberg\’s bible.

    Whoever first did it, I\’m ever so grateful they did.

    The first time I started using the library on my own, I wandered the stacks of my grammar school\’s library.  I didn\’t know how to find books I liked, and it was so hard to figure it out from the covers.  They were blank, hardbound books with dark covers that held secrets between their pages.  How do you dig into them, short of reading all of them, to find out which ones you enjoy?

    I remember their smell, these old books.  I read somewhere that the smell was a unique combination of a bug that eats paper and the decomposition of that same paper.  I don\’t know if that\’s true, but I love the idea of a real bookworm.  My favorite author back then was Phyllis A. Whitney, who wrote mysteries.

    What about you, Dear Reader?
    What is the first book you remember reading?

  • B Is For… Bargello!

    B Is For… Bargello!

    \"\"Today\’s letter, B, can mean many things. My favorite in terms of crafts is Bargello, the Italian needle art that resembles flames and waves. The image to the left is a common style, with the colors undulating back and forth across the canvas but all relating to each other in their pattern.

    It\’s a simple pattern to work, because it\’s essentially vertical or horizontal. There\’s no fancy stitchwork involved, just carefully placing the stitches neatly one beside the next, offset in order to create the characteristic wave or flame effect.

    A quick search of Google images reveals many, many modern interpretations of this relaxing art; I recommend wandering around or, if you\’re ready to take the plunge, grab a kit and try it for yourself. For the brave at heart, you don\’t even really need a kit. Just select some colors and play with the wave effect across a swath of mesh fabric.

    What about you, Dear Reader?
    What\’s your favorite craft that starts with the letter \”B\”?

  • Sound – A Poem

    Sound – A Poem

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    The sounds are still,

    Silent now in the wake of madness.

    The crowds came through like locusts,

    Digesting everything in their path as

    Huge earthmovers rearrange landscape.

    The air is frigid and wet, an arthritic\’s nightmare.

    Paper detritus blows in the breeze, a dance without music.

    The anniversary has passed, the revelers gone home,

    Their legacy filling the large garbage trucks

    That will prowl the predawn streets before traffic.

    But here, now, it\’s still night, and cold, and

    The sounds are still.

  • Happy Sunday – Emerald Keep Is Available For Pre-Order!

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    Emerald Keep is out in the wild! It\’s available for pre-order from Torquere Press. I\’m so excited!

    a Rafflecopter giveaway

  • Join Me, and a Lionfish, at Delilah Devlin\’s Blog

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    The next stop on the Keepsake Tour – join me at Delilah Devlin\’s blog for a visit with a lionfish.

  • The Keepsake Tour: Join Me At Robyn Bachar\’s For an Interview

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    Another stop on the Emerald Keepsake Tour is ready for you.  C\’mon by and join me at the amazing Robyn Bachar\’s blog for an interview.

     

  • Day Seven of the Keepsake Tour

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    Happy Almost-Spring!  It\’s warming up, finally, and I actually got to walk home from work yesterday!  Very exciting.  Almost all the snow is melted, leaving what hardened rime of muck there is to hulk like a menace in the shadows.  (Hmm.  Must be feeling poetic, lol.)  We\’re going to the zoo today.

    But first, I wanted to show you the lovely scarf that Rachel is making for the Keepsake Tour!  This is the second of the two grand prizes.  It\’s a little less GREEN in real life, but it\’s hard to get the digital camera to cooperate.  She used a large needle, so the fabric is nice and cushy.

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    This next image is a different angle, but you can see the honeycomb pattern of the half-double crochet stitches that she used.  She likes this pattern because it crochets up quickly and makes a nice, lacy fabric that\’s warm.  She used a soft, synthetic yarn that\’s easily machine washable so it\’s not fussy to care for.

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    The lovely quilt underneath it was made by Anna Xavier, who is an amazing textile artist in her own right.  Rachel handed me a pillow when I said I was cold and I just stared it her, thinking, what the heck am I gonna do with a pillow?  Wear it on my feet?  She came over and flipped it open and it spread out into a lovely blanket.  Magic!  🙂

    So, Dear Reader, here\’s my question to you:  now that the weather is warming up in the Northern Hemisphere and not yet too bitterly cold in the Southern Hemisphere, what outdoor activities do you like to do?  

    Remember, all commenters during the Keepsake Tour will be entered to win some neat keepsakes, including this Emerald Keep Scarf, hand-crocheted by Rachel Wilder!

     

  • Join Me At The Divas of Desire, and Why I Knit

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    I was invited to visit The Divas of Desire to share a bit of why I knit. I hope you\’ll join me!

  • Thoughtful Thursday, 3D and Writing

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    Welcome to Thoughtful Thursday, where we chat about 3D and writing.  Today I have a bit of a twist on the topic.  Since Book 2 of the Persis Chronicles, Emerald Keep, is out on April 8th, I figured I\’d share a little bit about knitting and 3D and use the opportunity to share about the book, too.

    When Rachel and I created Persis, we wanted a world that valued handicrafts and the home arts.  The job of a homemaker has become invisible and thankless, thanks in part to the fact that it\’s largely women\’s work.  The women\’s liberation movement in the United States did a lot to emancipate women from being chained to the kitchen sink, but as a consequence, their traditional work of raising children and caring for the home became less than laudable.

    I have a friend who is about thirty-five years older than me.  She decided to stay home and raise five boys of her own, as well as twenty-nine foster children.  She told me that she\’s endured a lot of grief from women friends who said that she wasn\’t living up to her full potential, and that she was oppressed.  That made me sad, because she\’s an incredible mom and creates a home in which people enjoy spending time.

    Because of that, we wanted the home arts to be elevated in importance such that they were considered to be a critical part of society.  The job of the Keeper is a desirable part of the fabric of life.  Developed to support miners and livestock farmers, the Keepers are trained to manage household bookkeeping, cooking, and various arts.

    For our book release, we\’ve both made scarves.  The picture at the top of this post is the Emerald Keep Scarf.  I knitted it because I love to make things, and this was fun to do because it was referential to my own book.  I felt closer to the world we created by making something for the book, which is an unexpected side benefit.

    So tell me, what do you like to make, whether it\’s a meal or something artistic?

  • Announcing Day One of the Emerald Keep Keepsake Tour – Celebrating the Release of Book 2 of the Persis Chronicles!

    \"emeraldkeep\"Welcome to my new home on the web! Over the course of the next month, I\’ll be migrating here permanently. The Blogger blog will still be available in the archive, but we made the decision to move to this one because it makes it easier to keep everything in one place – all the writing, the knitting, coffee, and chocolate you could possibly want. And of course, cats. It\’s the internet. We must have cats.

    But for today, rather than cats, I\’ve got something even better for you, Dear Reader!  It\’s the brand new cover of Emerald Keep, hot off the presses – well, at least hot off the cover artist\’s computer.  The artist is Brandon Clay, and you can see more of his work, here.

    The Keepsake Tour is a little different – instead of giving away gift cards or other electronic media, we decided to give away something tangible.  We also have a double Grand Prize – since we\’re Noon and Wilder, we figured that it made sense to have two prizes.  I\’ll be making a hand-knit Emerald Keep scarf, and Rachel\’s making a hand-crocheted Emerald Keep scarf.  Two lucky winners will be selected from a drawing at the end of the tour.  How do you enter?  Well, that\’s easy!  Simply leave a comment along the tour and you\’ll be entered in!

    Check back for the rest of the tour, daily between March 8th and Release Day, April 8th.  We\’ll have behind-the-scenes tours, outtakes, peaks at research and hand-drawn maps, and excerpts.  If there\’s something in specific you\’d like to see or read about, tell me in the comments, below.

    We\’re glad you found your way to to us.  Thank you for reading!