Posie Gets Cozy

Fall Things

Thank you so very much for all of the ornament kit orders!!! Your enthusiasm is so precious to me, and to Andy, and to Clover Meadow, who loves nothing more than to lay on the floor with her head on his feet while he winds yarn into bundles or cuts rick-rack. A few feet away, I'm working on the new kit pattern while he assembles (and in answer to a few questions that came in this week, yes, patterns for both kits will be available as downloadable PDFs after we get all of these kits made and shipped in October). Outside, through our big open windows, we hear the rustle and ping of hundreds of acorns falling from the huge oak trees across the street. I think one falls about every minute or so. It's a nice little work environment, I must say.

I sat in the backyard and took some pictures from my Adirondack chair the other evening. The yard is very nasty now, overgrown, weedy, with smashed and rotten plums all over the ground and spider webs — huge, almost-invisible spiderwebs — laced between any two things, usually right across doorways. Yesterday I stepped  quickly out the back door without doing my usual reconnaissance (with my Chinese broom held in front of me, thwapping freely at all potential webby areas), and immediately walked into a big one, saw the big fat-butted spider that had been sitting in it shoot [smartly] off to the side and disappear as I flailed around in a panic and then spent five minutes pawing at my head and spitting web out of my mouth while doing the panic-jig (pick up feet quickly while turning in a circle and smacking yourself repeatedly and making worried-kitten noises). Eventually I was able to pick the half-eaten carpenter-looking ant out of my hair — I saw it and got so freaked out I whipped that thing across the yard as if it were a grenade and pulled a little muscle in my shoulder, then did a whole-body shiver from head to toe. It was quite a performance, I must say. I called it "Autumn in Oregon: Not for Arachnophobes." I'm sorry you missed it.

I am getting a late start today. I almost always wake up around 5:30 or 6 a.m. But last night I couldn't sleep so I woke up at 1:50 and didn't get back to sleep until 5:30. Which is about when Andy and Clover woke up and Clover ran across the bed straight for my face with her big, cold nose. I grumbled at them and they bounded away and bounced downstairs and I slept until 9, which is . . . I never do that. The day's half over now already!

From 1:50 to 5:30 a.m., I was reading Julia Child's My Life in France, which I couldn't put down. It's about book writing and book publishing as much as it is about France. She is so cool. What a cool lady. I treated myself to a little shopping spree at Powell's the other day and have a new stack of books on my nightstand. I must put my new book list together. I have lots of craft books to mention, too. So many beautiful books these days.

We have a fun but busy weekend around here. Farmer's market for sure. We'll get to the Mt. Angel Oktoberfest, and later go to a wedding (I haven't been to a wedding in ages.) And then on Sunday afternoon at 2 p.m., Portland crafty ladies Susan Beal and Diane Gilleland and I will be at the Hollywood Public Library giving a panel discussion on our experiences writing craft books.

This is part of the Writers Talking series, and I think it's going to be really interesting. The three of us had breakfast here yesterday and talked for four hours straight, but I promise we saved some good stuff for you! We'll give you the skinny. For more local author fun, Amy Karol will be at Powell's on Burnside on Sunday night at 7:30 p.m. with her new book Bend the Rules with Fabric, and you know she'll have cool stuff to show and tell 'cause that's how she rolls.

Mystery Summer

By noon yesterday, I had a little list of recommendations based on your comments — thanks!!! What a great bunch of suggestions. We rode our bikes down to our local mystery bookstore (don'tcha love those). We took a few recommendations from the ladies there, after warning them that we were lightweights when it came to mysteries — we loved them, but they could not be too scary. I really wish that mysteries didn't always have to do with, you know, dead bodies. But mysteries are, by definition, plot-driven, and I really like that. After many years of reading mostly contemporary "literary" fiction, my tastes in leisure reading have changed considerably. I'm going for stay-awake whodunnit rather than self-awareness and enlightenment lately. I'm sure that's not fair to mysteries. I'll let you know after I get through this pile. The lady at the bookstore said she reads three to four books a week! (Last week she was on vacation so she read five!) Awesome.

I have a bunch of others that you mentioned on my future to-read list, but yesterday I got:

The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie by Alan Bradley. Started this yesterday and am on page 74 already (I am a slow reader, but this is going fast). Loving it so far.

The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society by Mary Ann Shaffer and Annie Barrows. Lost count of how many people have recommended this book to me! Not sure what's going on with the "pie" theme and me. Perhaps should stop reading to bake pie to eat while reading.

The Unfinished Clue by Georgette Heyer. Bought entirely for the cover. I do that.

Hostile Makeover: A Crime of Fashion Mystery by Ellen Byerrum. It's on Lifetime this weekend. Don't judge me. Or, you can. It's okay

Andy got Fer-de-Lance by Rex Stout, the first Nero Wolfe mystery. We used to really like the Nero Wolfe series when it was on A&E (except that he was always screaming about something, which was sort of annoying, and worrisome. But Archie was cool). We like TV mystery. And I am still hoping to run into Timothy Hutton around town (we saw them filming an episode of Leverage by the baseball stadium a few weeks ago). I was also REALLY hoping to run into Keri Russell, too, because I love her. It would be cool to run into Harrison Ford, but not as cool as Keri Russell. (HF and KR were here in town filming a movie recently, though I don't know if they're still here.) And I would tell her how much I loved Felicity. Because I did.

Grilled Shrimp, Patches, and a Book

Okay, where are we here. Let's start with the grilled shrimp. These are the Grilled Spicy Jalapeno and Lime Shrimp Skewers from the summer 2009 issue of Cook's Illustrated: Summer Grilling issue. This is a great issue. We actually have all three of the current Cook's Illustrateds around here: grilling, the June issue, and the Summer Entertaining issue. Andy got a subscription to the regular magazine for his birthday, and it is a great magazine, especially for scientifically minded people, since it really goes into the hows and whys of cooking in a very user-friendly and approachable — conversational — way. Each recipe details the process of discovery in creating the best version of the recipe, much like the companion television show, America's Test Kitchen, does, if you watch that (I TiVo it). Good stuff. Lots of extra information about buying shrimp, what kind of skewers work best, and  . . . grilling everything. I forgot that all of their on-line recipes are protected, so in order to access the shrimp recipe on-line you'll need to sign up for a 14-day trial if you are not a member; we made the recipe exactly as written so I can't copy it here for you. But this is a great issue and those guys work really hard on this stuff so you won't be disappointed if you get do sign up, or buy the magazine on the newsstand.

Next: Patches! The magical patches. I don't think anyone guessed the special technique, so here it is! To make a square patched pillow cover, what you do is this: Take a square of featherweight fusible interfacing the size of your finished cover plus seam allowances to every patch seam and side seams and lay it, fusible side up, on a cutting mat or a flat cardboard box — something big that you can carry over to the ironing board. Then lay out all of your patches with their cut edges butted right up next to each other in very straight rows and columns. Then take the mat over to the ironing board and carefully transfer it to the ironing board to press. Press all the patches lightly but securely to the interfacing. Then, with right sides of the patches together, fold the outermost column of patches down along the "gutter" created by the tiny space of interfacing between columns, and stitch the seam, using a scant 1/4" seam allowance. Continue across the width of the pillow in this way, and press all of the seams in the same direction (pressing only on the right side of the fabric). Turn the pillow cover 90 degrees, and repeat for all of the rows. Voila! You have a pillow cover front in minutes!

I will be putting together a pattern with step-by-step instructions for the two pillows pictured above in the next week or so. I think you could use this technique for anything that requires a certain amount of body — pillow covers, of course, but also placemats, table runners, seat cushions, potholders, maybe even little girls' dress bodices, or the hem of a skirt, or jean cuffs, certainly bags. It's absolutely perfect for bags. I don't think it's perfect for actual quilts that you are going to wash and sleep under, because of the interfacing, but that's just me; I like floppy cottons in my quilts, and since the interfacing is synthetic it won't allow the quilt to behave as you might like. But it's a really cool technique, and I am making pillows like a crazy woman for all my summer birthday presents, and some to sell in my web shop. I think I'll probably make pillow kits available, too, with cut patches, interfacing, piping, and backing for a 16" pillow, since I have cut hundreds and hundreds of patches in the past couple of weeks. These patches are very similar to the ones that I cut for the Tanglewood Bags and my cats' living-room pillows last summer -- a bit of Liberty lawn, a bit of solid, a bit of really cool contemporary quilters cotton. I am still loving this look so much. I wish I had known about the technique then, because those pillows took forever.

Speaking of the web shop, I have finished seventeen Jane Market Bags for you! I was trying desperately to make twenty, but I just can't make any more. The cool thing about them is that they are true stash bags — all of them are made out of fabrics that I already had on my shelves. I am going to try and get them all photographed and in the web shop early next week, so I'll let you know when they're there. I am trying out some new computer code that I'm hoping will eliminate the possibility of two people buying the same bag at the same time, so we'll see about that. But these are truly one-of-a-kind and can't be replicated, so I am keeping my fingers crossed about that, so no one is disappointed (my least favorite thing about having a web shop).

Lastly today, my first summer reading book is Little, Big by John Crowley. This is my fourth time reading it — I first read it at the perfect time in my life for it, and it's probably my all-time favorite summer book. I had started and stopped a couple of my new books recently, and then just had the urge to go for the sure thing, since I know it will be good. It's not for everyone, but I love it. And isn't that the coolest cover image ever? So perfect for this book. If you've read it, you know.

Sewing Green

I finally had a chance the other night to really sit down with my friend Betz's new book, Sewing Green: 25 Projects Made with Repurposed and Organic Materials. It's such a wonderful book, filled with so much great information and fresh, bright, beautiful Betz-ish projects. I loved her idea for making reusable fabric produce bags to replace the plastic ones offered by the grocery store (and even the farmer's market) for lettuces, apples, onions, and such — all the fresh vegetables and herbs you purchase, and even nuts and other dry goods.

For my bags I used osnaburg, a loosely woven cotton fabric, and followed Betz's pattern pretty closely (though she had cool printed leaves on her bags, and I just wound up stitching on some of the scraps from all the Jane Market Bags I'm making up for you — I have eleven done so far and am going for twenty, so stay tuned). These are classic, unlined drawstring bags, with very easy-to-follow directions if you've never made one before. I made twelve yesterday.

Please be impressed that I am optimistic enough to think that either Andy Paulson or I might ever come home with twelve bags of produce in one shopping trip.

The check-out person will have to open each bag to see what's inside, and the bag will weigh slightly more than one of the lightweight plastic bags, but I think it will be okay. These can be tossed in the laundry when they get icky, but they're small and shouldn't use up too much energy to wash, I wouldn't think.

 

I've been working on getting my little kitchen really organized. I went through the cabinets and cleaned them out (which always feels good) and I redid all of my spices — some of them were so old I am sure they'd been there for all nine years we've lived here. It's amazing how much room is wasted with things you don't use unless you really stay on top of it, you know? Slowly but surely I am reorganizing things to be more efficient, simpler, and less overwhelming. This almost always translates to a psychological de-cluttering that I find intensely (not to mention immensely) satisfying.

OMG! IMB!

Raining, raining, raining. Rainy afternoons this week. I have a new cookbook called The River Cottage Family Cookbook by Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall and Fizz Carr. I LOVE this book. I am reading it cover to cover and I'm about halfway through. What I love about it is that it is basically written for young adults, so it is thorough yet totally unintimidating, and I have already learned so much about the basics that I didn't really know. I also really love the photography — it's very homey and natural and just . . . not precious, somehow. It's gorgeous, and exactly what I've been looking for without even knowing that I was looking for it. I am really excited about this book.

In the past twenty years that I have been cooking, I honestly don't think I have ever made my own bread. Like, bread that has to be kneaded and rise and be kneaded and rise, etc. I'm not sure why, exactly, but I suppose I was just intimidated. And lazy. And I just didn't think I could do it so that it would actually be good. It seemed like a lot of work for something that would be sucky. Because baking bread had always seemed to me like reupholstering stuff, or dyeing your hair, or making Chinese food — not something you can ever do as well at home (at least I can't).

But when I read the recipe for raisin bread, I knew that I wanted to try. I thought it would be perfect for a rainy afternoon break. I had a new cast-off piece of countertop granite to knead on that my neighbor gave me, and I hadn't yet used it.

In the pantry I had everything I needed except for the orange marmalade (so I used honey), and I forgot to mix the raisins in with the dry ingredients, and I realized later that I had used active dry yeast instead of instant. But look: DOUGH!

It was so cool. It worked exactly as they said it would. Kneading, it turns out, is NO BIG DEAL. I kneaded the dough, which started out as a shaggy, lumpy blob and slowly became smoother, more elastic, and, I have to say, beautiful [wipes away tear]:

I know that breadmaking is sort of a sacred art. I had read about the mysterious alchemy of yeast, flour, and water before. I had heard people talk about dough in terms both passionate and humbled. In that moment when the dough comes together, you feel, for just one second, like you get it.

It's really, really neat. Thank you, book! I put the dough it its bowl to rise for two hours, and I have to tell you that I was pretty excited.

'Night 'night, darling! Time for your nap.

By four o'clock, it had indeed doubled! Just like they said! It rose to a "great big puffy, ballooned mass, twice its orignal size"! I punched it down (fun) and kneaded it a bit more, then laid it nicely in its pink pan for twenty more minutes before popping it into the hot oven.

When I opened the oven door I said, out loud,

"OH MY GOD! I MADE BREAD!"

'Cause I did!

Almost there.

Yesterday was one of the big photo shoots I had planned for the book. This was the last big one, the one with my model, Beauty Nicole. That's what I call her. She's also the most patient and the nicest girl in the world. Even though a porch swing she was sitting on fell out of the porch ceiling and she got hit in the head with a two-by-four (from the ceiling) six days ago (I didn't really know this until we were fussing with her hair and had to be careful about where she'd just gotten two stitches removed), she modeled five projects perfectly. I really, really hope she has the weekend off, poor darling. I wish I had baked her some cupcakes to take home, at least.

I get a little anxious about these photo shoots. The "vision" we're trying to translate is such a wily, capricious thing. When I am designing something, I almost always have a vision for it, a specific environment. It's a setting. I can hardly think of anything that doesn't inhabit a very specific setting in my imagination as it's coming to life. Since I was very young I have always designed things this way, whether I'm making embroidery projects or short stories: There's always a place. It often comes first. My friend Andy Greer once said to me after a fiction workshop when we were in grad school together, "Well, I'm not sure what's going on in your story, but I know what all the characters are wearing and what the wallpaper in everbody's room looks like." And I was like, "Oh good! So you got it, then!"

I'm getting more relaxed about photo shoots in general, I think, which is good, in general, for the almighty blood presure, but good aesthetically, too. I've been involved in enough of them now to know that holding on too tight just squashes the sponteneity and naturalness right out of anything. I "know" this, of course, but it still takes a conscious effort for me to remember that letting go is Good, not Bad. But you gotta let go at just the right amount, and that's the tricky part. It sort of feels like doing a triple axel (as if I could even stand up on ice skates, but we'll just say) — you let go enough so that you can lift off and spin, but not so much that you can't land it. And maybe even attempt a teensy wrist flourish: Ta da! [There. Skate on.]

Part of what contributes to the intensity is just the weirdness of working alone for so long, only getting to talk to editors and art directors on the phone, usually in abstractions and generalities, and then trying, when there's only that one day to get it right (since, trust me, rescheduling a photo shoot is not something anyone anywhere ever wants to have to do), to get something that pleases all of us equally, not to mention pleases our future audience. It's ultimately a collective vision and I feel a great responsibility for that, since a lot of people and a lot of time and a lot of effort (and money) is involved. Part of it is just simple performance anxiety, which has always plagued me. And part of it — maybe even the biggest part of it — is just something that comes with experience, I guess. Is that right? Because all of it, not just the phototography but everything about making a book, has been so much easier and so much better the second time around. I think I'm surprised I had the capacity to enjoy myself this much.

Anyway. These are just the things I think about, now that I am almost there, and almost done. Just two more project photos to go now. But I'll be far away from needle and thread, camera and computer this weekend: I'm digging in the dirt. If the weather holds out.

Whew, what a week! Good week. Too much working and not enough anything else (I can always tell this because my shoulders feel like rocks) but it's been great and I am happy. The photo shoot on Thursday went really well. Andrea and Andy helped so much. I can't remember if I mentioned it, but for the past few months I have been lucky enough to be hanging out with the amazing Andrea of Hula Seventy, talking to her about the concept of this book, and getting the benefit of her incredible photographic eye. The girl just sees things. She is a born stylist. On top of that she is so kind and gentle and enthusiastic, even though it frequently feels like most of what amounts to "assisting" at a photo shoot isn't about making aesthetically valuable contributions but just jumping when someone bleats, "Can you get that/move this/dust that/straighten that/lower it now/recharge these batteries/hold this reflector for me, please?" [if they even remember to say please].

But it all matters. And she (and Andy) does it all with such generosity that you resolve to be more generous yourself, in general, because — that's nice. That's just so nice to be around. And I like to think that it — those happy conditions — shows in the shots. All our conversations and brainstorming and fiddling go into the day, and, with any luck, the thing that appears on film matches our visions, our hopes for that little scene. Sometimes it just doesn't work, and then you have to switch gears. But sometimes it does. So much of embroidering and writing and sewing is solitary, a personal labor of love. It simply blows my mind when anyone else cares enough to share it. I'm so grateful. Because sometimes it takes a village. And if cool, kind people live in your village, then . . . jeesh. Score.

There's this interesting phenomenon that happens with a big project that evolves as it goes along. Let's just say you are writing and photographing an embroidery book, for instance. Let's just say you are a lunatic who is writing and photographing an embroidery book. It starts as an idea — something that you can sum up in one sentence or so. You hammer out a proposal that includes ideas for thirty projects — and most of these (at least most of mine) are literally conjured out of thin air. You pluck them out of your brain like hazy new plums. Some will stay, some will go (right now you don't know which). Some use techniques you've never done before (don't tell!). Some should take a normal person several weeks, even months — not days — to complete. Thirty is a lot, and at this point, you're just going for quantity. Can one person even think of thirty things? Are there even thirty things to make??? No. Yes. There are. You write things down. You sketch and color and plot. You try to think of something for everyone. You try to think of that one thing that might inspire someone to try something they've never done before, to pick up a needle and go. You think, "I really need guest-room curtains," and design some.

But then you start working on the projects and they start changing and growing and getting bigger, and getting better. You go with it. You just keep stitching. Go go go. While you're stitching, you're thinking, even though it looks like you're just watching Gossip Girl. When not stitching, you're looking through old books, thumbing through your fabric stash, wandering the aisles at the craft store, cooking dinner, petting the dog, worrying about stuff, cleaning the house, trying to keep the bills paid, occasionally walking in the woods, sometimes taking an unrelated break to make a pincushion, and dreaming, and the ideas begin to bloom.

And as the ideas grow and come to life, the book goes from a concept to an actual collection of real things. You stitch and you're committed — each project you start becomes a committment: the book will now be like this and not that — no time for regrets or second-guesses. You must keep going, and also you must go quickly, because that's how publishing works. No time to go back and redo, or rethink it, really. But this is okay — this is how things stay light. There's a right amount of time: enough to do it well, but not so much that you're spinning your wheels, revving, stuck somewhere because you have time to be stuck (you don't).

Because then it's time for the photos, and you have this moment where you're standing there holding a cross-stitched apron and you realize that all of the thinking, all of the designing, the hours and hours and hours you spent stitching the thing, it all goes into that one photo. You generally just get that one photo with which to honor that project. Very few people (like, maybe seven) will actually see the project in real life. And you love your project. Your project has become your BFF since you never leave the house anymore and all your real friends have forgotten you exist and won't remember until April 15 (the manuscript due date) when you come tearing out of the house singing show tunes at the top of your lungs. You want to get it right. Otherwise, what's the point? If this — stitching things — is what you're doing with your life, if this is what you believe in (and I do), then you want to get it right.

But it's funny because, as lofty as your Photographic Goal is, you are constantly brought down to earth by your very prosaic circumstances: The light is bad (this is March in Oregon — there is no light), there's too much clutter, you're stressed about the economy, other stuff, the house is damn tiny and you can't pull the tripod back far enough to minimize the distortion, it's pouring rain, you suck at taking pictures, and at everything, all things, in general.

But then sometimes you get a day that feels just right, where everything comes together, with really cool people, a little alchemy. And that was last Thursday. It happened to be the eleventh anniversary of my accident, the thing that brought me to all of this in the first place. Sometimes you get a day where it — your project/your life, in all its flaws, ommisions, and challenges — is still better than you could've hoped, and the photo says more than you even knew you knew about it. That's the hat trick. Even getting just one is enough to keep you going. Even if no one else notices it but you. And I think we got a few. At least a couple of pages of heart and soul.

Lovely, dark and deep.

Last month, when we went to the art museum to see the photography exhibit about the Columbia Gorge, I bought a book in the gift shop called Portland Hill Walks: Twenty Explorations in Parks and Neighborhoods by Laura O. Foster. I started to read it that night, and immediately began conspiring with myself to take Walk #1, Willamette Heights to Balch Creek Canyon Loop.

I got pretty emotional when I was reading the book. I knew that something was changing for me because of it. Before my accident, I had been a walker. Walking defined so much about me. I can't explain to you how much I loved it. I tried one time to explain, but I don't know that I really got it right. In the years since 1998, walking has had to be replaced by other things that don't cause so much pain, or, worse, risk the fragile tissue we've worked so hard to regrow, but the urge to do it never goes away. Lately I have been desperate to get back to the woods, a place I grew up in; I didn't even really know how much I was feeling it until I was in bed one night a few weeks ago, reading the book by the glow of my tiny nightlight, and I started to cry.

That was sort of a clue.

But I think they were really tears of relief, in a way: The book had arrived.

It's a book of walks, joyfully (you can tell) taken, carefully detailed, lovingly described by Ms. Foster. She has a writer's sensibility, and writes like a dream, but she is also herself an editor, and editors have that uncanny ability to focus intensely on the small stuff — there are excellent maps, precise mileage counts and elevations, and very well indicated directions — while never losing sight of the big stuff: Historical information, fascinating anecdotes, and geological descriptions place you squarely in the context of the physical place you're walking through.

But what was different about it for me, as I looked at the maps and calculated the elevations and imagined the terrain based on her descriptions, was that I felt as if I were walking it as I was reading it, or at least I felt confident that I would responsibly know what I was in for if I walked it — if I went off-trail like this — in a way that maybe only the compromised can really appreciate. "Know" in a way that inspires confidence, and makes you think you can just begin. A small, private victory that may be different from most, or not something anyone else can imagine, or, at least, seems like less than they'd expect from you. But you know. You know you've scored the chance to change. And it feels like grace, something suddenly bestowed.

On Saturday, we went. Through neighborhoods we never knew existed (though that's not saying much, since we tend to circle the well-worn paths around our own quite happily, being both homebodies and creatures of habit) and on wooded paths we couldn't have imagined, Andy and Clover and I spent this misty, late-winter afternoon lost in slow steps and shared wonder. We felt very far from home, though, amazingly, we could look down and see the brew pub where we had dinner last week, the gleaming port, the river we cross every day, just below. What smells, of wood and water and hidden things, were these? What light, through this odd, fir-treed filter? Where were we, here on the green-fringed edge of the eleven-mile-long Leif Erickson trail, built in 1915 and planned as a conduit between several yet-unbuilt subdivisions named, optimistically, Maybrook, Ridgewood, Regents Heights? They would be abandoned and later forfeited to the city, since the dramatic, ravine-crossing road was doomed to repeated washout.

Whose house is this, huddled into the hillside?

To what secret place does this mossy-soft stairway lead?

Why has it taken me so long to get here, or is this, in fact, just the right time?

In and out of woods and neighborhoods we wove, shocked to find that the line between the two was blurred and indistinct (and, frequently and unfortunately, covered in invasive ivy). From the stately, enormous old homes and hushed, sleepy streets of Willamette Heights, we made our way down to the Wildwood Trail and into Forest Park, past the site of the old dairy, past mushrooms as big as dinner plates, and further into Balch Creek Canyon, which, according to the book, was named after Danford Balch. He had once owned the surrounding property and was hanged in 1859 for shooting the man who had married his fifteen-year-old daughter, while she (and five hundred other) Portlanders watched. As it turned from afternoon to late afternoon, we wound our way down to the creek.

 

Around the bend, a witch's house.

At the bottom of the canyon, toward the end of the loop, it was busier, more developed (a bright, new fence lined the path), and colder, and my lens started to fog up, which has never happened before.

 

Or else, the place is really enchanted.

Makes you wonder.

It is for me, anyway. It was almost 4.5 miles in all, and I made it the entire way.

A is for Another

As I've hinted, behind the colds, curries, and coconut custards, I am working on another book! This one is a collection of thirty embroidery projects that incorporate cross-stitch, crewel, and regular floss embroidery. It will be published, again by Potter Craft, in the spring or summer of 2010.

I have never worked as happily on anything as I am on this book. Everything — manuscript,illustrations, charts, and photos — is due on my editor's desk on April 15th. I started developing the projects earlier this fall, and every day of creating them has been so satisfying and enjoyable. I honestly think I will be sad to be finished with this one, which (for lots of reasons) I couldn't have said about Stitched in Time. For one thing, I have had a lot more time to work on this new book (as of yet untitled), compared with the wild-eyed and desperate dash-to-the-finish-line that was Stitched in Time, and that has made so much difference.

Last spring, soon after Stitched in Time was totally out of my hands and off to the printer, I started thinking about what I wanted to work on next. An article I'd written for Hallmark magazine had come out just a couple of months before; in it I told the story of my accident and talked about how important embroidery was to my recovery during that bewildering, terrible time. I hadn't really thought about embroidery, let alone done any really big embroidery projects, in a long time, but writing about it reminded me of how intensely connected I feel to this amazing medium. After the article came out, I received so many letters and emails from people who told me of their equally therapuetic experiences doing embroidery, and other kinds of detail-oriented, contemplative handwork. The letters really moved me. When my editor called and asked me what I was thinking about, I knew exactly what I wanted to do.

This book is a collection of my dream projects, really. I've interpreted so many of the things I love here — intricate cross-stitch motifs, vintage monograms, tolework borders, folky hearts and flowers, naturalistic botanicals, delicate alphabets. Some of the designs are old, treated in new ways. Some of the designs are new, incorporating traditional techniques and stitches. All of them, first and foremost,are things I just love. I'm so grateful to be able to contribute something to this medium that has given me so much.

I can't wait for you to see it!!! Now it's taking too long! :-)

Busy Season

Good morning, dears. It's silver outside, early morning. I love the way the Christmas lights look in the early morning. I'll take more photos once the sun really comes up. For now, all is calm and quiet.

I was totally cracking up at the comments yesterday on the plaid parade. Andy P. really does rock the PWS (Plaid Western Shirt). Major babe. I found out yesterday that he is getting all week off next week — a real winter break! — so I am thrilled about that. We head to Seattle this weekend for Urban Craft Uprising, so if you are in town, don't miss it!

Urban Craft Uprising
Saturday and Sunday, December 6-7, 2008
11 a.m. to 5 p.m.
Seattle Center Exhibition Hall
Seattle, Washington

Please note that I'll be there officially only from 1 p.m. until 2 p.m. on Saturday, signing books at the UCU booth, so please come see me! I'm very excited to go to Seattle again. We're only staying the one night this time, but still — I am excited to go to a big city decorated for Christmas.

I'm late in telling you about some of the really generous publicity I've been so lucky to receive for the book! I finally got it all organized and scanned for the press page at AliciaPaulson.com. I'm so grateful to Hallmark magazine, Romantic Homes, BUST, the Grand Rapids Press, Living Crafts magazine, and Sew Hip! for their gracious reviews and excerpts — please check them out!

I have created a Flickr group for anything you make from the book, so please head over there with your photos — I can't wait to see what you make!

I am sooooo sad to tell you that some errata has come in for the book, too. I knew it was probably inevitable that there would be, but oh darn it!!! My sincere apologies for this. I will be keeping an updated list on the book page at AliciaPaulson.com, and I'll post it to the Flickr group too. If you are working on a project and you have any questions about either the dimensions, or directions, or you just don't understand something, please post your question at the Flickr group so everyone can benefit, and I promise I will help out as quickly as I possibly can. Thank you!

Now, tomorrow morning at 9 a.m. EST (6 a.m. PST!) I will be doing an interview on Martha Stewart Sirius Radio. I don't actually get Sirius radio, so I can't tell you about it or how to get to it, but if you have it you presumably know how it works. The show is called Morning Living. I've never done a live radio interview before so I am excited about that. Must. Have. Coffee. Before. Speaking. At. 6 A.M.! Hopefully actual English will come out of my mouth.