A Novel Idea

the Library Phantom

2011-12-05T10:42:00.001-06:00

Well this is just seriously cool.

Magical Paper Sculptures left by 'Library Phantom'

My favorite quote from the article:

...it is an artful and generous reminder, in a world filled with self-serving publicity stunts, that adventures are out there waiting to be discovered in libraries.

If a typewriter and an iPad got together...

2011-11-04T09:01:00.000-05:00

If I didn't already want an iPad, this would seal the deal:

It's a vintage typewriter that connects to an iPad. A typewriter that connects to an iPad. I don't think my little blog can reliably contain all the awesome that is this typewriter.

I own two vintage typewriters myself: a 1930s Royal that's almost identical to the one pictured except it's green, and a black 1927 Underwood. They're both functional, can be difficult to use. I don't know if you've ever tried typing on a pre-WWII typewriter, but your fingers don't exactly fly over the keybank.

But this. This. A guy in Philadelphia repurposes old typewriters so that you can dock an iPad or plug in a desktop (via a USB port) and type away. And the real kicker - you can also use the typewriter with an ink ribbon to type on real paper, as it was originally intended.

Anthropologie sells them exclusively. In addition to this one, there are mid-20th century models available by Remington, Corona and Underwood, if you prefer a more Mad Men look.

And that brings me to the sad part in all this: they're $798. Yeah. Not going on my Christmas list this year.

But I'm still oddly happy that something like this exists in the world at all. I love old and vintage things - especially writing implements - and yet I love technology, too (hoping for an iPhone 4S soon). It's the perfect marriage of both. And if I ever sell my first novel, I'm so buying one of these.

What do you think - would you use this if you had one? Is it worth $798? You can see all of them here.

Skipping out

2011-10-21T13:25:00.000-05:00

October 15 was National Pregnancy and Infant Loss Remembrance Day. And to be honest, this year I just skipped it.

One thing I've learned through my own experience with the loss of my son is that there are vastly different forms of grieving - all valid, many helpful. But two women who experience nearly the same thing will deal with it in completely different ways. I know women who put it on like an armor, who spend hours at their children's graveside, who post Facebook photos of their angels, have birthday cakes for them, get heavily involved in loss support groups. And it's all fine. It's just not me.

I think about Graham every single day and I believe it will be that way the rest of my life. That is a good thing - a comfort, actually. But thinking about him doesn't send me spiraling down into bleak sadness like it once did. I have sad moments rather than sad days. Little by little, it gets easier to talk about him without stammering or clamming up. JB and I remember him and visit his little spot in the cemetery, but we don't make a big production out of it and we don't do it super-often. My life now is about my living family.

I skipped the balloon release this year, too. We have a great group of people - mothers, mostly, with stories like mine - who organize a balloon release and memorial service every year. Our family went last year, but not this year. And I don't feel bad about it.

I don't need a special time set aside to remember Graham. It's impossible to forget him. There's a Graham-sized hole in my heart where he was, but I rejoice that I will get to see him again one day. As Will grows up, he'll know about his twin brother, and he can ask us anything about him. Graham will be a happy topic, a loved brother and son who is separated from us only for a little while.

So I skipped Remembrance Day this year. But in honor of Graham, and of families like ours, here is my story that I wrote for last year's NPILR:

http://acvollers.blogspot.com/2010/11/1-in-8.html

Famous nouns in history

2011-09-28T12:05:00.001-05:00

I LOVE this. NPR's Morning Edition did a story about people whose last names became nouns. Like Henry Shrapnel, Jules Leotard and Lord Cardigan. (btw Lord Cardigan is an awesome name)

My maiden name was a plural noun. Maybe I'll do something so famous that my married name "vollers" will become a noun...

...Probably not. But a girl can dream.

Read about all the famous noun people here.

Famous peoples' libraries

2011-09-20T10:35:00.000-05:00

This is making the rounds in the bibliophile corner of the blogosphere, but I had to post as well. A semi-random website has comprised pics of famous peoples' libraries that you can view here.

My favorite is Nigella Lawson's. This, friends, is a library:

None of that design-y nonsense about arranging books according to jacket color, or hanging art in front of shelves. It's just books. Lots and lots of books. ...OK, and a record album of The Sound of Music (look in the lower right corner below the flowers). Because Nigella Lawson is awesome.

And as Nigella demonstrates, when you run out of shelf room, that doesn't mean you need to get rid of some of your books (the horror!). Just stack them on the floor, of course.

My second-favorite library from the list is, believe it or not, Keith Richards's library. I dig his blue fainting-couch.

I like the messy jumble. The perfect library ought to be lived-in, full of books you like, whether they're Hunter S. Thompson or Nora Roberts or 200-year-old first-edition classics. The absolute worst is when people buy matching sets of Federal Reporters so it looks like they have lots of hardback books on their shelves. I worked in a law office for two summers. I know what Federal Reporters are, and I guarantee you nobody wants to read them (not even the lawyers) and people aren't fooled.

I had a close acquaintance once who told me she never read books. Never read books. Like...never. She said she didn't really like reading. I nearly fell out of my chair. And - this is going to sound snobby but I can't help it - I knew from that moment we'd probably never be close friends.

I have no idea how to relate to that. Most people like to read something, whether it's trashy romance novels or self-help books or Twilight or...something. Heck, even US Weekly would be better than just not reading.

But the popularity of the Kindles and other e-readers make me hopeful - people still read, just in different formats. Sometimes I wonder if e-readers are going to make home libraries obsolete. I like to think not - that there's room for e-ink and regular ink. E-ink for reading on the go, and regular ink for filling a glorious room with books. Lots and lots of books.

Great (dead) authors on Twitter

2011-09-16T13:35:00.002-05:00

The folks at Mashable compiled a list of their favorite literary twitter accounts - not the accounts that just post stuff actually written by specific dead authors, but the ones that tweet in the voice and spirit of these writers. (Because those are more entertaining, of course).

For example,

Even if you're not on Twitter, it'd be worth it to look up some of these and scroll through, just for funsies. I (@acvollers) am definitely going to follow a few of those. Wonder if there are any good Charlotte Bronte accounts?

PS Post your Twitter handle in the comments, and I'm happy to follow you as well ;)

Important info (STOP)

2011-09-15T13:13:00.000-05:00

Is it dorky that I think this is so cool? You can send a telegram to anyone in the world.

Yes, really! It's about $6, so a bit more expensive than your usual snail mail. But next time I have momentous info to share with someone super important, I'm so doing this. They also have an "RSVP" option, so you could use these as fantastic wedding invitations.

And for all you diehard e-communicators, there's even an app for this.

Where I was, 10 years ago

2011-09-09T14:14:00.003-05:00

On my way to work this morning, the radio was playing a montage of audio clips from Sept. 11, 2001 and man...that never fails to bring a catch to my throat, even 10 years later. I did not know anyone who perished that day, but I don't think anyone who remembers the day can help but feel emotional about it, regardless of how much time has passed.

One thing I remember thinking in the months after it happened was that I wished I could go back to a time when the biggest worry in our country was something mundane, like balancing the budget. Funny to think about that now, after we've had such an uproar over that very thing the past couple of months. I'd still take that any day, to worry about the economy instead of worrying if our country was going to be attacked at any moment.

On Sunday, I'm singing in a big 9/11 memorial concert in my hometown. We're doing Mozart's Requiem, and I've been feeling kind of negative about it - like, wouldn't it have been better to sing something more uplifting, more patriotic, rather than a mass for the dead?

But I've been thinking about it this week. What I learned through my own experience with loss is that one of the most important parts of grief is to actually acknowledge someone died and is no longer with us. It's not healthy to gloss over that part as "depressing." So I think a beautiful Mass is actually very appropriate.

Now whether we'll sound angelic singing this very difficult piece of music is another topic completely...

Most years on or near the anniversary of 9/11 I repost my "Where I Was" story. I was 18 years old, a month into my first semester as a freshman at Auburn University. It's the kind of story everyone has, but I'm always interested in reading other peoples' accounts of that day, so here's mine, originally posted in 2007 and tweaked a bit over the years.

Where I Was
I still get a catch in my throat reading or hearing about that day. I don't live anywhere near NYC, or the Pentagon, or that field in Pennsylvania. I don't know anybody who died, or even anybody related to anybody who died. But I almost got a little teary-eyed listening to a one-minute radio tribute yesterday.

I woke up just after 9 a.m. CST on 9/11/2001. I was 18 and it was my first semester in college. I never turned on the TV that morning because I didn't want to wake my roommate, who didn't have class until later. As I flew out the door of our dorm, I saw a couple of people standing, watching the little TV in the lounge area by the front door of the dorm, but that wasn't unusual. I remember thinking it looked like there had been a plane crash or something on TV, which of course would have been sad in itself, but not momentous enough for me to miss my 9:30 Writing Seminar with Dr. Solomon, my best and most difficult professor.

I got to class but Dr. Solomon wasn't there yet. Everyone was talking quietly, excitedly, even. A few people, myself included, kept asking "what's going on?" and the two or three people who had seen the news were telling us something about a plane, and the World Trade Center.

Dr. Solomon walked in, looked at us, and said quietly, "You'd better go home. You need to be there to watch history in the making."

He didn't mean it in a callous way--he was dead serious and we all jumped up and ran out of class.

I got back to my dorm and called my parents. Mom told me that Dad, who works for the government and often travels to the Pentagon, was supposed to get on a plane around 10 a.m. for D.C. Fortunately, of course, all flights were grounded before then, but I had to call him anyway just to hear him reassure me he was fine. I woke up my roommate, turned on the TV.

That whole rest of the day was one long blur as a group of us gathered around the TV in my RA's room, watching the news all day long. It's weird now to remember how the horror of it all still hadn't sunk into our collective consciousness. I had to tear myself away from the TV to go to biology that afternoon because class wasn't canceled, and the professor taught almost the whole hour. I'm embarassed now that my sorority even held the pledge swap we'd scheduled for that evening, though the reasoning at the time was that cancelling events that brought us together meant the terrorists had won.

That whole day, as we sat glued to the TV, we kept saying how much the footage of the streets of NYC looked like the movie Independence Day. I remember thinking we'd seen so many disaster movies like that, it didn't seem real to watch it on the news--like CNN had somehow come across a really good piece of CGI animation.

It was so very hard to wrap my mind around the fact that those little dots falling from the towers were actual people, individual lives. It was unutterably horrific and sad.

I guess the true shock and realization came later. The next day it seemed more real. I stood in a long line to give blood, and went to a campus-wide candlelight vigil that night. I've still got my little piece of candle, and the red band they used to wrap my arm after I gave blood. Those are my small pieces of history.

I mark that autumn as the end of childhood for me. Maybe it would have been anyway, since I was a new college student, on my own for the first time and all. But it was also the beginning of uncertain times. I'm not sure anymore of America's place in the world, or even of our safety. That's not to say I live in constant fear. Most days I don't even think about it. But it is there, in the back of my mind. Some days it's more present than others.

--

I'd love to hear: where were you?

The Snacks of Great Writers

2011-08-18T12:53:00.000-05:00

What do writers snack on?

This New York Times article tells us, complete with illustrations of the snacks of authors both living and deceased:

At this moment, my snack options: some cut-up fruits & veggies my thoughtful MIL made me during lunch today, and a mint brownie my sister gave me yesterday. My willpower is waging the battle at this very moment, and the fighting is fierce.

My all-time favorite snack is a Starbucks Vanilla Latte (iced during summer). What about you? What are your favorite writing snacks? Do you share any in common with those above? I hope there aren't any F. Scott Fitzgerald snackers out there, but then he's famous and I'm not, so maybe Spam is the way to go.

Which "great books" did you hate?

2011-08-12T15:25:00.000-05:00

I enjoyed reading this column on Slate where the author asked a bunch of authors and literary types what their least favorite "great novel" is. If you can get past some of the self-infatuated posturing by the lesser writers (hello, Yale Review editor) the responses are pretty good.

My all-time least favorite "great book" is The Old Man and the Sea. It's the most mind-numbing book I've ever read, and I was an English major. We eat mind-numbing books for breakfast.

Hemingway in general doesn't do anything for me, and after slogging through that (thankfully short) book, I came away thinking he was probably hammered one day, maybe he'd just read Moby Dick, and wrote a bunch of crap, realized it wasn't long enough, added in several 3-page descriptions of unimportant items (jellyfish, for example), then decided to throw it at the publishing wall to see if it stuck.

And then nobody thought someone as great as Hemingway could possibly write such a boring and pointless novel, so they figured it must have Hidden Meaning. So they inflicted it on innocent 10th graders around the country.

So what about you? What's your least favorite "great book"?

on being Southern

2011-08-11T09:56:00.000-05:00

One of my favorite photography blogs posted a link this week to a column called Redefining the Southern Belle. It's from, appropriately, Garden & Gun magazine. (Best name for a Southern magazine ever.)

The beginning of the article is an essay, an ode to Southern womanhood. The rest is a rundown of successful Southern women of today. I mostly love the essay part; that is, mostly.

Being a Southern girl, I read these kinds of odes to Southern-ness often. (Southerners are nothing if not self-congratulatory.) I wonder if there are as many odes to other regions ...odes to being a Yankee? To Midwestern womanhood? Sounds weird just saying it - "Midwestern womanhood." Somehow I don't see women from, say, Kansas bragging about themselves too terribly much.

Most odes to Southernness end up being full of rosy stereotype and hyperbole, as you might expect. This essay is no exception. But there are gems in there worth noting and worth being proud of, if you are - like me - a Southern woman:

Southern women see no point in the hard way. Life is hard enough. ...When you are born into a history as loaded as the South’s, when you carry in your bones the incontrovertible knowledge of man’s violence and limitations, daring to stay sweet is about the most radical thing you can do.

There's also a great explanation - the clearest I've read - about why most of us go to so much effort on our appearances. Read on for the reason why.

Yankee girls, are you rolling your eyes? Southern girls, is this right on the money?

haunting tuesday

2011-08-09T09:02:00.000-05:00

Beautiful decay for your Tuesday:

You have to see these gorgeous photos from the book The Ruins of Detroit by Yves Marchand and Romain Meffre, of derelict and abandoned buildings in Detroit. They're so hauntingly beautiful.

But this one, a former public library, just breaks my heart:

You know how I love urb an and rural decay, so I HAD to share these. Sad and gorgeous at the same time. Check it out.

end of summer, beginning of "school"

2011-08-02T16:46:00.000-05:00

Starting next Wednesday, I'm sending my 14-month-old to school!

Well, not exactly school. We're putting him in a half-day "mother's morning out" program at a local church for one day a week. We love the program (we got the last spot!) and the director, the facilities are great and we've heard glowing recommendations.

But it is going to be SO HARD to leave him there. He stays at our house with my mom or my mother-in-law on weekdays while JB and I are at work (I know, we have the most perfect childcare arrangement) and I never feel bad about leaving him in the morning because he loves them and they love him.

But JB and I think Will interacting with other kids his age will help him overcome some of his developmental hurdles (left over from being a preemie and having a high-level brain bleed at birth).

I know the working moms with their well-adjusted daycare kids are rolling their eyes at this point - I know! I'm with you, really. The rational part of my brain says, come on, it's four hours, one day a week. The ratio in the class is two teachers for six kids. There are three outdoor playgrounds in an enclosed courtyard - one playground just for the littles - they go on walks and have a big open room with lots of toys. It really doesn't get any better.

Still. It's going to be hard to leave this with strangers:

sleepaway camp

2011-07-20T15:04:00.000-05:00

Ahhh summer. And summer camp. An article from Slate on what your enjoyment (or lack thereof) of sleepaway camp says about your character.

I went to an all-girls sleepaway church camp for a couple of summers in late elementary/early middle school. I didn't like it. I had fun sometimes, semi-enjoyed being there with my friends (when we weren't playing our own version of Mean Girls), never asked my parents to come get me, but overall...I didn't enjoy it.

As an adult, I don't like going on organized vacations with large groups of people, and never enjoyed pre-Rush in college where my entire sorority (200+) spent a loooonngg weekend crammed into someone's parents' lakehouse.

Apparently, what this says about me, according to the article's author (who also disliked sleepaway camp) :

People (like myself) who didn't enjoy camp tend to have a problem engaging in organized activities of all kinds. Later in life we often become criminals or sociopaths. The more respectable among us often become journalists.

Heh. How about you? Did you go to sleepaway camp, and did you like it?

a minor parenting rant

2011-07-19T12:50:00.025-05:00

You know what I hate? People who talk about "the good ol' days." How everything was so much safer, better, freer, happier several decades ago.

Really? For whom, exactly? White men?

It just chaps my rear when I hear people romanticize the past and hang their heads in defeat about the hopelessness of today. Because I think living during the Cold War - with threat of nuclear war hanging directly over our heads - was scarier. I think living during WWII - before we knew that good would win, that Hitler would die and that the concentration camps would be liberated - was worse. I think living pre-Civil Rights era - before we knew blacks and whites would one day share the same rights and the same drinking fountains, before we knew we'd have a black president, before we knew lynching and hate mobs wouldn't be the norm anymore - was worse.

And that's just the 20th Century.

C'mon, people. Every age throughout history has its good and bad. The number of annual murders today is actually lower than it's been since 1969. Even with millions more people living in our country. The crime rate itself is lower today than it was in the 1960s, 70s, 80s and 90s.

Which means America is actually a safer place today than it was during my childhood.

Which is why it also drives me nuts when the media gloms onto incredibly sad stories, like the murder of 8-year-old Leiby Kletzky, who was walking home by himself when he was abducted by a madman, or the story of Jaycee Dugard, or any of the sensationalized child-abduction stories.

Mean-spirited people, looking for somewhere to place blame in Kletzky's horrific story, say his parents shouldn't have let him walk home alone, even though his parents had gone over the route with him several times, and his community was generally considered a safe one. You can read the story (link above) and draw your own conclusions.

As an admirer of free-range parenting, and as a mother who has experienced the loss of a child, I just have to put my two cents in.

Bad things happen. They happen to children. And it is horrible. As parents, we do everything we can to keep our kids safe - physically, emotionally, spiritually. And that's how it should be. But we can't keep our kids in a bubble. Helicopter parenting suffocates children and teaches them that the world is a scary, horrible place, and that they aren't able or empowered to do anything about that. Kids can't learn that way; they don't grow and become confident, adventurous, curious, independent adults that way.

My son is 14 months old, so I have a while before my husband and I have to start making decisions about when and where it's OK for him to go without us. But I won't be basing my parenting decisions on a very sad and scary, but very rare situation. My son is in much more danger riding in a car each day - heck, he's in more danger of being struck by lighting - than he is of being abducted by a stranger. Those are just facts. Stories like Kletzky's tug our heartstrings and make us hug our kids a little tighter, but they don't change facts.

This article, I think, is a great one, about "dangerizing" childhood. My job is to raise a loving and loved child, confident in who he is and in his own abilities. The world now is at least as safe as it was in my childhood and I can't wait for my son to experience everything himself. A carefree childhood will be one of the greatest gifts I can give him.

So....Google+

2011-07-15T11:18:00.000-05:00

Anybody else on Google+? I joined a few days ago, after the Twitter hype intrigued me just a little too much and I found a coworker with a spare invitation. I bowed to the pressure.

It has not, however, changed my life. Or my online life. Or made me give up Facebook.

I like the idea behind it - using "circles" to choose with whom I interact, instead of having everyone equal, as it is on Facebook (i.e. on FB, there's functionally no difference between some girl who was in your Biology 1100 class in college, and your best friend). Here's a general description of Google+ and why some people like it.

I don't know if I like it yet - my online social network took several years to create on FB, and right now I've got an extremely random sampling of people in my Google+ Circles - two guys from my church, a girl from my sorority I haven't seen in six years, a few people from my office, etc.

BUT...Attention All the Single Ladies: according to statistics, Google+ is about 3/4 men right now, so...if you'd like to meet a sexy software engineer or web developer, you need to join, stat.

Anyhow, if you search "why Google+..." on Google, you'll get articles on a myriad of contradicting topics: why it won't hurt FB, why it will kill Twitter, why it won't kill Twitter, why it will fail, why it's better than FB, etc. etc.

One nice thing is that it gives me a chance to start over. I have 700 FB friends (I know, I know) and this is a great way to hit the reset button...except that I know about 20 people on Google+ so I end up adding to my circles people to whom I'm not particularly close, just so I can see how Google+ works. At least I can stick them in the "acquaintance" circle without their ever knowing.

Plus, you can add people to your circle, or they can add you, so there's no weird friend request and/or request-snubbing. If you don't add them to a circle, then unless you post stuff to everyone, they'll never see your posts.

As an early-ish adopter (blogger since 2005! FB since 2004! Twitter since 2008!) but not a particularly web savvy person, I'm still waiting to see whether this is worth my time.

In the mean time, I'd love to connect with more "friends" so we can see how this thing works. Maybe you do, too? If you're on Google+ and would like another "friend," come find me!

...I'm not exactly sure how you're supposed to find me, but maybe you can just, er, Google+ my name :)

our story

2011-07-11T15:22:00.000-05:00

The birth story of my two sweet sons is up at the Miracle Bash Blog; you can read it here. It's not the lightest read, but it is honest and tells more about what we went through last summer, and the amazing nurses who made our tough road a little bit easier.

The Miracle Bash and the Swim for Melissa events are fundraisers for the Melissa George Neonatal Memorial Fund, which raises money to purchase equipment and other items for the Level 3 NICU in my hometown, where Will spent the first 71 days of his life. He and Graham both benefitted from the cutting-edge medical equipment purchased by this amazing fund, which has raised more than $1 million for the NICU in the past six years.

The Melissa George fund was created by a local couple - Amy and Chris George - who went through an experience similar to mine in 2005, when Amy gave birth at 26 weeks to her twin daughters Melissa and Ann Catherine. Melissa died just a few hours after she was born, and Ann Catherine spent 68 days in the NICU before coming home.

You can read other stories of the babies who have been in our NICU on the Miracle Bash blog. It's amazing how many sweet preemies this fund has helped and blessed - including my own:

t-shirts. heh.

2011-07-08T09:10:00.001-05:00

Some funny t-shirts for your Friday: visit the Mental Floss store here. Funny, that is, if you think slogans like "Idioms are for the birds" and "I avoid cliches like the plague" are funny.

And I do.

There are also nerdy ones for the mathmatically and scientifically inclined, including a few I don't get. ("Mole Problems? Call 602-1023"...huh?)

After all...

photos of myself. also the 4th of July then and now.

2011-07-06T11:20:00.000-05:00

Except when I say "photos of myself," I don't actually mean I'm going to post photos of myself. Just tell you about having photos taken of myself.

It's for a new local magazine I'm editing. You know how the editor's letter in most magazines has a photo of the editor? This was a photo shoot for that photo. I had a fabulous photographer, and our truly fabulous art director came along to make sure my hair didn't look wonky and the photog got enough space around my face for the layout and whatnot.

A couple of weeks ago, we finished up a series of photo shoots where we took photos of locals for the first issue of this magazine. And I remember how we made most of these people hold poses that, to them, felt unnatural, but looked great. I found this morning that being in front of the camera is waaaaay harder than being the one behind it, yelling directions.

I have a feeling this probably has something to do with not being in control. Being professionially photographed feels awkward and vulnerable. A zillion worries ran in a continuous loop through my mind, including but not limited to the following:
- is there shininess on my forehead, nose, chin
- do I look fat
- do I have lipstick on my teeth
- is my cardigan hanging crooked
- do I look fat
- is my hair flat
- is my hair frizzy
- oh, and do I look fat.

Kind of takes the joy out of being photographed, if there is joy to be had being photographed. It gave me a new appreciation for models - their job isn't all standing around, looking bored. I'd like to think that if you only weighed 95 lbs. that would probably help make it a more confident experience, but knowing women, it probably wouldn't.

Later, once the photos came back and my art director sent me "the money shot,"all I could see when I opened the image were my flaws. Sigh. At least it's out of the way and I can go back to where I'm most comfortable: gleefully editing articles.

--- (this is my lack of transition) ---

I hope you had a great long weekend! We had a relaxing one, and took Will to see his first fireworks on Monday night. I fully expected him to freak out at the noise - prompting us to leave early - but he was a champ. It was way past his bedtime, but he sat in my lap, mesmerized by the fireworks. He only fussed occasionally. A brave boy!

I wish I had a photo of his sweet little face as he watched, but of course it was dark and my iPhone wouldn't oblige. But I felt an overwhelming joy as I watched him watch the fireworks, remembering this time last year and how far he's come.

Last 4th of July, he was still in the NICU. JB and I watched the fireworks from the same spot as this year, and when they were over, we drove to the hospital to visit him. Here's a photo my Dad sent yesterday, taken July 4 of last year:

So tiny. Believe it or not, he was so much bigger and better then than he was after he was born. He got to come home about three weeks later.

Here is one I took this past weekend, of Will in his little crab pool in our back yard:

So big and joyful! Happy belated 4th of July :)

Down with the Oxford comma

2011-07-01T08:57:00.000-05:00

Yeah, I said it. There was a Twitter kerfuffle (or is it kerfluffle?) yesterday about the potential demise of the Oxford comma, allegedly by the Oxford University Press. Turned out to be needless worrying...unfortunately. That unnecessary piece of punctuation just won't die.

As a journalist and devotee to greatness that is AP Style, I personally loathe the Oxford comma (except when it's absolutely necessary for clarity). My friend Cynthia sent me this awesome link to an LA Times article suggesting its replacement with a new usage: the Shatner Comma.

It's, genius, I, tell, you.

pinning things

2011-06-17T13:23:00.000-05:00

Do you know about Pinterest? I'm a little bit obsessed.

Ok, a lotta bit obsessed.

In a nutshell, you have virtual bulletin boards where you can "pin" images that you like. The boards can be organized according to whatever kind of category you want (fashion, travel, interiors, books, yellow polka dot bikinis). The images have their original webpage imbedded so you can click on them and return to whatever blog post or website they came from. It's a great way to create a visual scrapbook or cookbook, a DIY manual, fashion lookbook, to-read list and more.

You can "repin" images from other peoples' pinboards that you like, and best of all, you can install a little button on your browser bar so that if you're surfing the web and find an image you like, just click the button and you can add that image to any of your pinboards.

This thing is genius, and super easy to use. I like to just browse the "everything" category on Pinterest to see what people are pinning - it's extremely random and lovely. You can also follow peoples' boards and get inspired by their creativity.

I recently made a board for my 1930s mystery novel. I've seen so many actual "inspiration boards" people make, and I always mean to but...I'm inherently lazy and it just seems like a lot of work and would take up a lot of space I don't have in my house.

Enter Pinterest, and I can post any image I want - no space wasted, no printing out images, no cutting and pasting.

Here's my 1930s board. If you're on Pinterest, you can find all my boards here.

And a snapshot of my "Stuff I Love" pinboard:

An Alabama legend

2011-06-13T09:01:00.000-05:00

Yesterday, Alabama storyteller Kathryn Tucker Windham passed away. She was 93.

She's a legend in my home state. I picked up her first book, 13 Alabama Ghosts and Jeffrey, at my elementary school library when I was 7 or 8 and immediately fell in love. It's a collection of real ghost stories, spun only as a true storyteller can spin them. I bought my own copy when I grew up, and was lucky enough to get it autographed by Mrs. Windham a few years ago when she visited our local library.

She got her start writing movie reviews for her hometown newspaper when she was 12. She became a journalist and photographer after graduating college, and found her calling as a storyteller later in life. She was best friends with Harper Lee.

She'll be buried in a pine coffin she kept in a shed in her back yard - she used to go lie in it occasionally to make sure it still fit.

Kathryn Tucker Windham was an original, a historian who preserved the tales and and oral histories of this area that otherwise probably would have been lost.

You can read more about her in this fabulous obit from al.com.

Here's a terrific quote she gave in an interview with The Birmingham News last October:

My early stories were all ghost stories because I knew a lot of them and had collected a lot of them. But I began to realize that what we needed to be telling are stories about our own families, about people we know and love and care about. That's how you keep the memories alive. You don't forget the people you love when you tell stories about them and tell new generations these stories about them.

If you get the chance, go check out 13 Alabama Ghosts (or any of its spinoffs - 13 Tennessee Ghosts, 13 Georgia Ghosts) for some delicious, shivery, Southern gothic reading.

The fluffy bits

2011-06-08T12:22:00.000-05:00

I've been working past my writer's block by writing only the fun parts of my novel.

Oh, you didn't remember I'm still working on a novel? I can't imagine why.

The last time I blogged about it was only like seven months ago. C'mon, people, keep up.

...

Just kidding. This blog is supposed to be about my noveling, but the noveling posts have dropped off shamefully in the last year or so. I'd love to blame it on my adorable kid, but at least half the reason is that when I get home from work in the evening, after playing with him and making dinner, all I really want to do (and, subsequently, do) is hang out with JB and watch TV. I'm a recliner slug.

But I've been working on the 1930s mystery a bit more recently. Instead of making myself write in a linear fashion, which I have always done before, I'm writing the "fun" parts as they come to me. Y'know, a scene where our heroine is locked in the basement of a Chinese liquor store with her partner in crime, or the scene where she goes under cover as a cabaret singer. The fun stuff.

And I feel guilty about not pushing myself to do more of the meatier parts, but right now I figure 500 words of fluff beats 0 words of nothing.

If you're a writer (or any kind of artist) how do you make yourself just sit down and do it? How do you fight your propensity for procrastination? How do you resist the siren call of true crime shows and Castle and Parks & Rec and The Food Network?

ohdeedoh love

2011-06-02T09:47:00.000-05:00

My sweet son has his birthday shoutout up on Ohdeedoh today!

If you've got kids, or nieces or nephews, you'll love Ohdeedoh's fabulous posts on design, art projects, product recommendations and photo tours of real nurseries and kids' rooms. It's one of my favorite sites.

moms with computers

2011-06-01T13:37:00.003-05:00

Even with the profusion - nay, the glut, the overload - of mommy blogs out there, it's difficult to find ones you'd actually want to read.

Some mommy bloggers indulge in annoying blogspeak (ohmagawd, thismuch) or USE CAPS LOCK INAPPROPRIATELY. Others have so much sidebar flair their blog looks like Times Square dipped in scrapbooking materials. Some are all about giveaways! contests! OMG I'm sponsored by Kellogg's!!! And others are just not good enough writers to turn a mom's often mundane day-to-day into a sparkling gem of a post.

This has been a long and roundabout way to mention one of the most beautiful and thoughtful blogs (by a blogger who is a new mom) that I just stumbled across: Aura Joon. Check it out, even if you're not interested in mom-things. Her posts are lovely essays on life, sprinkled with her own gorgeous photography. It's one of those blogs where you want to just relax and soak it in. She's real and honest and lovely.

This is a beautiful quote from her, from this post, where she talks about taking her infant daughter to museums, concerts and restaurants:

And even if she sleeps the entire time, one day she will wake up to find herself in the middle of the life we kept living, even after she was born.

My heart belongs in...

2011-05-29T00:05:00.003-05:00

Yorkshire! I know I need to do a more detailed post about our fabulous UK trip that we took a couple of weeks ago, but with 494 photos to sift through, I haven't had the blogging stamina.

But I will say the absolute best part of our trip was hiking the moors in West Yorkshire, near the Brontes' home village of Haworth. Even JB says it was his favorite part of the trip.

Probably because it looked like this:

And as we walked our conversations sounded like this:
Me: This is so awesome!
JB: I know!
Me: It's so desolate!
JB: Yeah!
Me: But beautiful!
JB: Yeah!
Me: This is so awesome!
JB: Babe, if you keep stopping to take photos, we'll never get there.

And there, specifically, was the ruin of a stone farmhouse called Top Withens, sitting all by itself on the side of a hill. Local lore says its location was the inspiration for the house of Wuthering Heights, in Emily Bronte's Wuthering Heights.

The roof has caved in, grass grows in the rooms, and the earth has built up over time so that there are some windows that are just a few inches off the ground. It's lonely and atmospheric up there - just perfect. How could it not be the inspiration for Wuthering Heights?

But I'm getting ahead of myself.

The moors are in fact beautiful and desolate, with grasses of every shade - dark red, black, bright green, gold. The weather the day we were there was chilly, overcast and windy. I couldn't have ordered a more Bronte-ish day.

The hike was supposed to be about a mile to the house. We were in completely inappropriate clothing (I was in a thin trench, scarf, jeans and Chuck Taylors; JB was in jeans and a ski jacket). I think we thought - a mile? Psh. No problem. We saw the abandoned house long before we realized that was where we were headed - it was a steep, windy climb up to Top Withens. Definitely more than a mile.

The tree in the far distance in this next pic, next to what looks like a square rock outcropping, is where Top Withens is. This pic was taken after we walked about a mile or so; the ruin looks deceptively near but the trail winds down the hill (you can't tell in this pic) and back up. For forever.

Along the way I even talked JB into taking a few pics of me...

There were a few other hikers once we got there (appropriately dressed in anoraks and boots) as well as a scruffy gray-black dog that looked exactly like Pilot would look - and I know I'm mixing Bronte novels but that's OK.

It was sprinkling a little, but stopped after a while. We spent about 20 minutes exploring...

(the only part with a roof overhead - it was way darker in there than this picture looks)

(the inside of the house, which you really can't access unless you crawl in through this former window; see the top of the doorway ahead?)

...and then - full of adventurous spirit, decided to consult the sign...

...and go to the Bronte Falls. So we headed down the hill in a different direction than the way we'd come...

See that stand of trees in the very far distance? That was still approximately 1/2 mile from our car. So anyway, after walking a while, it started raining. Which was OK until it...didn't stop. JB's ski jacket was water proof, but my trench coat was "water resistant" (thanks, Target) so I got damp and the back of my legs were soon soaked. Being the gallant guy he is, JB offered me his coat but I didn't want him wet, too.

On the moors there's nowhere to take cover, so we just had to keep trudging along. I pulled my scarf over my head like a Russian peasant. It helped, surprisingly well.

We used stepping-stones to get across a tiny creek, and climbed a few wooden ladders to get over fences.

At one point near the end, the trail completely ended at a sheep pasture. We climbed another ladder and just set out across the pasture (stepping carefully) and nodding politely at the sheep, who stared at us and skittered away if we got too close. JB told me later that he'd been a little concerned about being charged by a ram or something, but we never saw a ram - just lots of mommy and baby sheep!

I don't have many pictures from this part of the journey because we were wet and cold and tired by that point. We even skirted past the falls to get to the car sooner.

When we finally got in sight of the car, we celebrated wearily...

...and when we reached the car and made sure no one was looking, we changed clothes! And made our merry way toward the Lake District.

More pics later, I promise.

Needless words

2011-05-26T15:46:00.000-05:00

Cup of Jo has an awesome post up today about Kurt Anderson, the editor of New York Magazine, and how he made a list of words he hates and asked his staff not to use them.

The journalism major in me LOVES this. His list has mostly pompous, cutesy or trying-too-hard words that get overused, especially by the magazine crowd: celeb, eponymous, a who's who of, hubby. Using "queried" and "penned" instead of simple words like "asked" and "wrote."

As I had drilled into me by a hardliner journlism proffessor: Omit needless words! Vigorous writing is concise!

I would add to this list the practice of using food descriptors with non-food items, i.e., "his legs were yummy." ::Shudder::

Anyway, check it out. What words or phrases do you hate or think are overused?

P.S. What words do you love? One of my favorites is "defenestrate" because it has an awesome and incredibly specific meaning.

2011-05-24T09:38:00.000-05:00

Remembering my sweet baby Graham - he passed away a year ago today. He was beautiful and he was loved.

An utterly perfect verse from my morning devotion today:

May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, so that you may abound in hope by the power of the Holy Spirit. ~Romans 15:13

sigh.

2011-05-20T10:43:00.000-05:00

Some romance for your Friday. It's from a lovely Etsy store called The Love Shop. You can get it here, in several colors!

alllll the single ladies

2011-05-19T14:56:00.001-05:00

Ok, all my single lady friends. You need to know what you've been missing by not dating online.

Messages from Match chronicles actual messages people post on match.com. And it is hilarious.

You might meet "an Asset Manager for the wealthiest clients on the planet." Or a guy who "wanted to let you know that I have decided to marry and divorce you inside my mind."
This one is my sister's favorite:

Im a lawyer. Go and tell someone that a POWERFUL and well to do lawyer has contacted you. I will wait…Ok, you are now back I assume. Anyways, as I mentioned I am amazing at the LAW. I also do not put up with ANY woman’s crap, so check that at the door, babe. I am available Wednesday and we ARE gonna go to my place so be sure to bring a change of clothes.

Why are you still here? Go, my friends. Go and meet the man of your dreams.

a quick birthday post

2011-05-18T11:00:00.001-05:00

Mr. We're back from our trip to the UK and I'll post on it soon (hiking the moors in Yorkshire was awesome!), but I just wanted to type a quick post saying Happy Birthday to my sweet little boy, turning a whole year old today!

I'm remembering his brother Graham, too. We'll take flowers to his grave later today. This has been a challenging year, but one full of so many blessings.

Will's party is this Saturday, a backyard cookout full of friends and family, people who love him. A happy, healthy little boy is a big reason to celebrate!

notebook love

2011-05-04T11:50:00.000-05:00

If you are a writer (and even if you're not) you may be addicted to notebooks. I am. I have a zillion journals and notebooks dating to around second grade. They're lovingly (and oddly?) stored in an old hatbox.

A brand new notebook is pure happiness.

Now I have a new love and it is my red Write-Now notebook from Poppin, a new brand of office-supply products. I received the notebook for free, thanks to an awesome offer via a review on Notebook Loves Pen.

I'm using it as my commonplace book, with notes and lists and recipes and quotes and story ideas and everything in between. The cover is leather-ish, bendably soft, with an elastic band to keep it closed and a pocket in back for holding my important stuff.

Right now it's got, among other things, a recipe for baby-friendly frosting (for Mr. W's upcoming birthday), a pack list for my trip to London, author quotes, a description of a bad dream I had, contact info for a recommended Indian restaurant and a mile-long to-do list.

These notebooks are awesome. Nobody asked me to review them, but I highly recommend them if you're in the market for a new notebook. And really, who isn't?

we're OK

2011-04-29T10:57:00.001-05:00

Still without power here after the tornadoes came through Wednesday, but my family and I are safe and so thankful for that. I have never, ever experienced anything like Wednesday, when tornado after tornado rolled through here in North Alabama - it was incredible and scary. The death toll in our state has topped 200 and climbing, with nine of those in my county.

Please, please pray for the families who have lost someone or who have lost their homes and possessions.

I'm at work today with internet access - the newspaper where I work is running on generator power - but there are 160,000 in my city (including us) with no power, and hundreds of thousands more without power across North Alabama. We probably won't get it back until early next week, so we're looking at several more days of no electricity. The lines at the few gas stations that are running are forever long, and a hot meal has been difficult to come by!

Will and I are staying at my parents' house because JB is out of town on business. My parents don't have power either, but at least we're all together :)

If you are interested in more info or ways to help, you can check out al.com for photos, video, etc. and http://www.whnt.com/.

really a writer

2011-04-25T22:35:00.000-05:00

Restoration

2011-04-15T09:47:00.000-05:00

My devotional guide this morning told the story of a Barbara Brown Taylor, an Episcopal priest who was invited to be a guest speaker. Her host greeted her with the question “Tell us what is saving your life right now.” Taylor pointed out that most of us could say what stresses us out, what worries us, what keeps us up at night; but we give more of a rote answer to what saves us: God, our family.

I like the idea of pausing to think about what feeds my soul instead of what weighs it down. God of course, and my family, of course. But smaller, specific things can feed your soul as well.

For me, I love looking at green, growing things – gazing up at a canopy of trees overhead; watching the sunlight and shade play over the pastures in the little valley where I live; listening to the rustling leaves in the huge trees above my house. It’s soothing to look at creation and admire it. It “restores my soul,” to borrow a line from Psalms.

What restores your soul? What small things are saving your life right now?

Wookie the Chew

2011-04-08T13:32:00.000-05:00

This print is perfect! I would love it for Will's room. It appeals to JB's love of Star Wars and my love of literature:

The artist, James Hance, is mucho talented. He has several other prints featuring "Wookie the Chew" and he does a bunch of other amazing kid- and parent-friendly mashup art...and the prints are just $10! Love, love, love.

gratuitous cute baby pic

2011-03-23T10:35:00.000-05:00

I have to do this every now and then. It's like a compulsion! Here's Will, age 10 months. He has two teeth, a curl on top of his head, and clocks in at a whopping 17 pounds.

We're in high gear around here, getting ready for our big March of Dimes fundraiser, The Great Book Exchange. Part of me (the frazzled part) thinks I should have started out with something smaller; part of me (the excited part) is just praying this thing goes off next weekend without a hitch. Fingers and toes are crossed.

As always, you can learn more about why the March of Dimes is a cause close to my heart by reading this post.

Music from across the pond

2011-03-16T13:36:00.002-05:00

Because I’m still on a British kick (honestly I’ve been on a British kick since I saw Pride & Prejudice about 10 years ago but anyway) I thought I’d ask for your recommendations of awesome British music and share my favorites. I am not a music reviewer, but I'll give you a fan’s unsophisticated opinion. And I would love your opinions as well - sophisticated or otherwise :)

Adele is AWESOME. I’ve loved her since my sister burned her CD for me a couple of years ago. Adele just gets it. Any emotion you have – loss, love, anger, exuberance – she sings it. With soul. My sis and I are going to see her live at the Ryman in Nashville in June and I’m STOKED.

Her single “Rolling in the Deep” is getting lots of play on the local radio here in North Alabama, which means if you live anywhere else, you have already heard it. The rest of her new album 21 is also awesome. Her earlier 19 album is amazing, too. I recommend “Hometown Glory” on the 19 album and "Turning Tables" on the 21 album.

I just discovered Ellie Goulding like two days ago. Apparently she’s a fairly famous pop singer in Britain but not so much here – although she’s performing at SXSW this year, so I bet that will change. She writes her own songs and they’re so much smarter and more sophisticated than American pop singers (I’m looking at you, Katy Perry).

I’m normally not a huge fan of techno beats and synthesizers, which are fairly heavy in Ellie Goulding’s music. But her voice is ethereal and amazing, and the songs are so catchy. I just read a Rolling Stone review that called her music "folktronica" and said her voice "evokes a wintry day on a fog-swaddled moor." Um, yeah, actually.

Ellie’s album is called Lights (at least it is here in the US). Some of my favorites on it are “Lights,” “Starry Eyed” and “The Writer.” She also does a pretty cool cover of Elton John’s “Your Song.”

JB and I have loved Keane since their first album came out when we were in college. I was drawn to them because they used a piano instead of guitars. (I’m a sucker for piano – I’ve played since I was little). Keane has gotten progressively more techno-influenced over the years (must be a British thing?) which means LOTS of synthesizers on the newer albums…but there’s just something about lead singer Tom Chaplin's voice. It soars over everything else, it’s just gorgeous. “Again and Again” and “The Lovers are Losing” from Perfect Symmetry are some of my favorites, but everything on Hopes and Fears and Under the Iron Sea is good. I’m still deciding what I think about the newest album, Night Train.

Kate Nash is not for everyone, and I haven’t gotten her new album yet, so I’m only going on the Made of Bricks album. But lyrics are a big deal to me and hers are so funny and smart. Her music is quirky and clever, and you can't help listening to it over and over. Some of her songs have bad language (there’s one called “S**t Song”) but if you can overlook it, the rest of them are awesome. My favorites are “Foundations,” “Mariella” and the super funny “We Get On.” I want to get her new album as soon as I can pry my ears away from Adele and Ellie Goulding's new stuff.

So do you have any favorite British musicians or bands? Other other favorites from anywhere? Please share!

P.S. I apologize for the lack of Adele in the Grooveshark widget. It was hating on Adele for some reason and wouldn't let me add her.

I apologize in advance for the exclamation marks

2011-03-14T09:00:00.000-05:00

I'm obsessed with England. I might have mentioned it a time. Or two. Or three. (You can read my groundbreaking hypothesis that there are only 30 British Actors in the World, in Parts I, II, III, IV and V.)

I'm obsessed with British people and British movies and British books and British-y things like tea and the BBC. If it comes from England, it is somehow a million times cooler.

Except I've never actually been to England....until now. This spring I am going there. To England. I AM GOING TO ENGLAND. The land of Jane Austen and Adele. Red double-decker buses and windswept moors. Tea and crumpets. Beautiful accents and Colin Firth.

AAAAAHHHHHH.

JB and I collaborated on the itinerary. Then he books the planes/transportation and lets me book the hotels because I might possibly have a teeny tiny control freak problem when it comes to hotels meeting my standards. Or so I've heard.

But JB has been awesome throughout the planning because while we are seeing what he wants to see, he's been so nice about letting me ~~dictate~~ propose our stops as we head north from London to Edinburgh.

I just felt deep down in my overly-sentimental heart that it would not be a trip to England if I didn't get to see a windswept moor. Am I right? And it follows that one of the best places to see a windswept moor should be the home village of the queens of windswept moors, right?

So we're going to Haworth! Home of the Bronte sisters!! JB was surprisingly accommodating about this stop, considering I've subjected him to every Jane Eyre adaptation ever made (except this one! who else is super excited about it??) and he refuses to see any more of them. Or any more Austen adapations...did I mention we're going to Bath, too?

But about Haworth. Jane Eyre is my favorite novel of all time and I just couldn't not see Charlotte Bronte's home. So we're going and we're staying here:

It has IVY. And it dates back to 1752! It's called Rosebud Cottage Guest House and it got amazing reviews on TripAdvisor.

I'll fill you in on the rest of our (planned) trip in a future post, but I just had to show you Haworth and the adorable Rosebud Cottage.

And admit something. I'm embarassed to say I have a romanticised notion of Great Britain that I fully blame on BBC movies. In my head I know there's nobody over there walking around in breeches or petticoats (except on those cheesy tours). I know Thornfield doesn't actually exist, just like I know the odds of running into Colin Firth on a street in London are impossibly slim, but those visions are hard to squelch.

In the interest of reality, have any of you been to England, and do you have any recommendations? We'll be in London, Bath, Haworth, the Lake District and Edinburgh.

Cheerful

2011-03-03T23:27:00.000-06:00

There's the old chestnut, 'Tis better to give than to receive,' but I think a more apt version is that it's easier to give than to receive.

I've learned so many new things, and new things about myself, while planning the big fundraiser. One of those is that I never realized how difficult it would be to receive things. Things for which I'm not paying.

I've said before that asking for monetary donations makes my hiney cringe, but throughout the course of our fundraiser planning, I've had to ask for donations of goods, services and time from a variety of people.

It's weird experience. For example, when I found out a local printing company would print 50 posters for us for free, there was a wave of elation first. Yay! YAY! And it was swiftly followed by a wave of guiltiness. Unworthiness. Who am I to ask people to part with their time or their goods for something that I want?

And while of course it's for a good cause, it still amazes me how generous people can be. Why is this? The world is so full of good things and good people; it shouldn't surprise me every time that these good people are willing to help when asked.

I help teach preschoolers at my church on Wednesday nights, and our Bible verse last night was 2 Corinthians 9:7, part of which says "God loves a cheerful giver." It's a popular verse somebody probably taught me in the same Wednesday night preschool class about 25 years ago, but it's particularly relevant to me right now. I'm surrounded by cheerful givers, from my friends who are generous with their talents, to people who spend time collecting and moving boxes of books, to the marketing director of the local grocery store that's donating free-trade coffee, hot tea and bottles of water for 250 people.

I'm not saying we haven't been turned down (a t-shirt place turned down my friend yesterday when she was asking about shirts for our event) but overall, I'm surrounded by cheerful givers. It makes me want to be a more cheerful giver. I've helped with plenty of philanthropies in the past, but I'm sorry to admit it wasn't always with cheerfulness. Maybe I cared about the cause, but I wasn't necessarily cheerful about giving my time or whatever else that cost me something.

There are so many needs out there, so many sick and hurting people that need help, it can seem overwhelming to hear or think about. And you end up hardening to it a little, which I guess is partly natural because if you had to think about all of the sadness in the world all the time, you'd probably never get out of bed.

But we do what we can, and if we're doing it right, we're cheerful about it and it's a huge blessing to us to be able to give to other people. And it comes full-circle at some point because we will all - at some time or another - be the ones receiving the blessings rather than the ones giving them. I think maybe the key is to be a cheerful receiver also. Because as much as I'm blessed by people giving to me cheerfully, I think I can be a blessing by receiving cheerfully as well.

Old Menus!

2011-03-01T13:00:00.000-06:00

In researching for my 1930s mystery (yes, I'm still writing that one), I came across a tremendous resource.

The Los Angeles Public Library Menu Collection is a database of menus from every era - it's phenomenal!

You can search by several different parameters, but I just wanted to see stuff from the 1930s so I typed "193*" in the date section and found dozens of restaurant menus, along with brief descriptions (i.e. inexpensive, type of cuisine).

There was the simple...

...coffee shops with cocktail menus....

...kitschy...

...and extremely colorful...

If you're writing any kind of historical piece, or planning a history-themed dinner party, or just curious how your parents and grandparents dined when they went out, you WANT to check out this site!

a smile (and a hug) for your Thursday

2011-02-17T14:39:00.000-06:00

Simple, yes. Cheesy, maybe. But how can you not smile when you see others smile?

this year on Valentine's Day

2011-02-14T14:31:00.001-06:00

I couldn't let V-Day pass without waxing poetically about the man I married....OK, OK I'm not a very poetic person.

But I'll say this. I married my best friend 5 1/2 years ago and it's the best thing I ever did. JB was my high school sweetheart, my first kiss, my first love. Even when we took that "break" during my senior year of high school, I knew deep down there was never anyone else. Luckily, he knew that, too.

We've spent nearly half our lives together. We got lost at Versailles together, buried our wedding cake together, and made midnight runs to Waffle House more times than I can count.

He proposed to me in the same place where my dad proposed to my mom. He bought me a vintage yellow bicycle, refurbished it himself and gave it to me for Christmas. I tolerate his obsession with sci-fi and he tolerates my obsession with grammar and movies based on British novels. Our Halloween costumes have included Dwight & Angela and lumberjacks. He supports my novel writing and tells me I'm awesome at it.

We had two sons together, endured the loss of one of them together. We've held each other up, cried and laughed together, and our relationship is stronger now than ever. We're raising our sweet, beautiful son Will together.

Our marriage is not perfect. But it's one of the best things in my life and I'm so, so glad JB is mine and I am his.

The Great Book Exchange

2011-02-08T08:43:00.001-06:00

I just had to share the logo for our March of Dimes fundraiser:

My amazing artist sister Kate created the basic concept and drew the adorable artwork. My friend Shannon -- a graphic designer extraordinaire, mom-to-be and the owner of this awesome etsy shop -- turned the concept into a fully-realized logo.

I knew we needed a branding logo, and I'm thrilled with this one. I especially love that there are two babies, like Will and Graham.

Ok. We've got a logo. Now the hard work begins to make this thing happen (eep).

P.S. If you'd like to join our team, click here. You can also like us on Facebook.

like the original, but funnier

2011-02-04T14:26:00.001-06:00

I love Beatonna's comics on Hark! A Vagrant. They never fail to crack me up. Recently she's covered topics as varied as 1980s businesswomen, Sexy Batman and Nancy Drew.

For your Friday entertainment, here's her recent take on a short story we all had to read in high school:

I laugh at this every. single. time. Seriously, click on over there. You'll spend the next 10 hours scrolling through her posts :)

a shameless plug...

2011-01-31T15:21:00.000-06:00

...for our March of Dimes team. You can "like" Team Will + Graham on Facebook here.

And, OK, a shamless cute baby photo of Mr. W, taken yesterday (it was so warm we went for a walk!) with my iPhone's hipstamatic app:

what it's really called when it's floating in the ocean

2011-01-28T11:03:00.001-06:00

OK I realize I'm descending into the depths of word nerd-dom here, but I thought this short piece from dictionary.com was fascinating: the difference between what is flotsam and what is jetsam, as well as the etymology of both.

Incidentally, the first thing I still think of when I hear the term "flotsam and jetsam" is this:

Ursula's pet eels from The Little Mermaid. Thanks, Disney.

fundraising season - eep.

2011-01-24T10:29:00.001-06:00

If you haven't already noticed my sidebar, we're gearing up for fundraising season with the March of Dimes. I'm the first one to admit I've never EVER liked fundraising. Didn't like it in elementary school, middle or high school. Didn't like it in college. Don't like it now. There's just something icky-feeling about asking people for money, you know?

However.

As you know, the March of Dimes is a cause close to my heart, so JB and I decided to start a team, called Team Will + Graham (named after our sons). It just...well, it seemed like the thing to do, so we did it.

This is NOT a plea for funds because, as stated above, I feel icky asking people for money. But I wanted to mention Team Will + Graham because if you are interested in joining, we'd love to have you.

It's absolutely free to join a March of Dimes team, and doesn't require you to donate anything at all. Of course we love donations of all kinds, from $5 to $25 and beyond. But we also just like the moral support of having team members and welcome anyone, whether you live near us or not. If you do live near us (North Alabama), you're welcome to join us at the actual March for Babies on April 16, or you can find one near you at the March for Babies website.

Since asking for money makes my hiney cringe (as The Pioneer Woman would say), we've decided to hold a big fundraising event instead: a big used book swap, with live music, a coffee bar, silent auction and more. I'm super excited about it, not the least because it involves books! The basic premise is that we collect a ton of used books (and, hopefully, books from the big box retailers, which have donation programs for nonprofit events like this). The day of the event, people come and bring their own used books, pay a small entry fee (which is how we make money) and then they can browse the books. They get to take home as many books as they brought, and the books they brought are put out on the tables for others to browse and take.

And then we'll have comfy couches, chairs, lamps etc. for reading and socializing, along with live music in one corner and a coffee/dessert bar in another. We hope to have a silent auction of the nicer books we're able to acquire (like a set of Harry Potters, a new bestseller, a signed copy of a book, or similar)

If you have any suggestions for gathering books, I'd love to hear them. Or ANY advice for a newbie fundraiser-er. JB and I have never planned an event like this, so we're open to all the tips we can get!

If you live in the North Alabama area and would like to help, e-mail me (link in the right sidebar) because we're holding a pizza/planning party next week to get this thing off and running.

Grammar ninjas - this one's for you

2011-01-12T13:42:00.000-06:00

Yes, and yes. Send this to all your grammar-challenged friends as a funny "quiz."

10 Words You Need to Stop Misspelling.

Via The Oatmeal. And some of my cool FB friends.

P.S. It's hilarious.

for the fashionable novelist

2011-01-11T10:04:00.000-06:00

As if this wasn't enough, Kate Spade has gone and done it again. I think the KS design department harbors more than a few bibliophiles and novel enthusiasts.

It's a Great Expectations Book Clutch. The back is awesome:

It opens like this:

And KS makes other book clutches, including The Importance of Being Earnest. I've also seen a bright yellow The Great Gatsby version (swoon) and one for Emma. See them and read more here. According to Vanity Fair, Kate Spade Creative Director Deborah Lloyd said, "We wanted to pretend we had our own publishing house." Don't we all?

Anyhow. If you have a spare $325 lying around I'd highly recommend spending it on one of these. SO cute. Mwah.

MYO baby food

2011-01-10T16:39:00.000-06:00

We're having a snow day today. We got 6-9 inches last night and the entire city (and probably the northern half of our state) has shut down. I didn't even have to go to work today - it's been awesome. I've spent the day baking and picking up around the house, working on some sewing projects, reading. JB and I showed Mr. W what snow is - that was fun for a while (until he'd had enough and started yelling his head off).

But I'm writing today because a few of you have asked about my experience making baby food. So here it is, for what it's worth. Mr. W's pediatrician had told us we could start him on baby food on Christmas. So I decided to start making baby food as part of my New Year's Resolution to help my family be healthier, cleaner and greener. Plus I love to cook, so it seemed like fun...and it is!

You can find baby food recipes tons of places on the internet, including this one, but my awesome mother-in-law gave me Healthy Meals for Babies & Toddlers by Valerie Barrett and I love it.

There's just something about having an actual cookbook in front of you, with big color pictures, that is so much better than cooking with my laptop or a print-out from the internet.

And there are tons of other baby food cookbooks. I inherited several from a coworker - including the famous one by Annabel Karmel - but the Valerie Barrett book has been my favorite. I have a feeling, though, they're all basically the same when it comes to baby's first foods. The toddler recipes are another ballgame and I can't wait to try them.

But back to the baby food. Bascially all you're doing is steaming a veggie, fruit, (or mix of veggies or fruits), then pureeing to a smooth consistency. Then you can serve as is, or freeze in little cubes for use throughout the month. This is what I do. It's super easy just to grab a cube or two from the freezer, defrost on the counter or in the microwave, stir, test the temp and feed.

And while there are a bunch of different ways to do this, I'll tell you what works for me. First my supplies, and then my methods. My methods...mwah ha ha ha haaaaa....er, just kidding.

My supplies:

1. A steamer basket like this one (and a pot of water).

2. A food processor. I completely - and I mean completely - lucked out in this department because my coworker who gave me the books also gave me her Beaba Babycook baby food maker.

It. is. AWESOME. I'd seen them (and drooled over them) at Williams Sonoma, but just couldn't justify the $150 price tag. But if you can get one of these used, or a relative offers to buy you one, DO IT. The veggies and fruits that come out of this thing are like velvet. Otherwise, I think a regular food processor works fine. That's what I had been planning to use. You could also try an immersion blender, or even a regular blender - just watch the consistency. You might need to press the puree through a strainer to make sure there aren't any pulpy pieces, depending on what you're pureeing.

3. Something in which to freeze the baby food, preferably in 1-oz. servings. I got three of the Green Sprouts Silicone Freezer Trays for Christmas and love them.

I did some research on this and chose these because they have 15 1-oz compartments (most of the other ones I found have 8-12 compartments), are a reasonable price, and the biggie: they're free of BPA, PVC, phthalates and other grody stuff.

4. a spatula

5. zip-top freezer bags

6. a freezer.

Ok. So I buy fresh produce (organic usually), then follow the directions in the recipes to cook the veggies or fruits. Usually it calls for steaming with the steamer basket, but I bake butternut squash in the oven in a pan of water, and a few of the fruits get simmered in a pot on the stove.

Then I put the soft, cooked fruit/veggies in the Babycook and usually add a little of the cooking liquid to thin it out. After it's pureed, I use a little spatula to transfer it into the silicone freezer trays and put those in the freezer. Once they're frozen, I pop them out and put the cubes in a zip-top freezer bag, labeling the bag with whatever the food is and the date.

Most of the books say the frozen baby food is good into the freezer up to a month, although I think Annabel Karmel says it's OK for six weeks.

But you wouldn't believe the gorgeous color from these veggies and fruits. It's technicolor compared to the store-bought versions. Making it was so fun that I got kind of carried away over a couple of weekends and now an entire drawer in our freezer is dedicated to bags of baby food cubes and looks like this:

Mr. W. is not a huge fan of most of the green veggie purees. I've done a broccoli-cauliflower and a peas-green beans-zucchini, and he won't eat more than a couple of bites of either of those. The one green veggie success has been spinach-and-butternut squash. It's green because of the lovely dark spinach, but the butternut squash - which I've also made by itself, and which he loves - hides the spinach taste.

Here is spinach-butternut squash, and apple-pear, prior to defrosting.

I just feed Mr. W out of ramekins...for some reason I can't find cute baby food bowls at Target that are microwave-safe, and I figure these work just as well. And of course we use baby spoons.

Mr. W. also likes plain butternut squash (which was his first food), carrots and all fruits. We have had fresh mashed banana, apple-pear (which is so delicious I want to make some for myself), apricot-prune (looks awful but he loves the sweetness) and apple-walnut. I made the apple-walnut from a recipe in the December issue of Parents magazine, which accompanied an article about why babies should be given nuts earlier than previously thought. Mr. W. hasn't had any problems with it and walnuts are super-nutritious.

So that's it. This is what works for us right now, and I feel good knowing exactly what Mr. W. is eating. Plus it makes me feel kind of super-mom-ish.

to be more crunchy

2011-01-03T13:31:00.005-06:00

I didn't make a list of resolutions this year; I just have one major resolution I'm planning to work on throughout the year. I want to help slowly move my family toward a safer and healthier way of life.

Helping the environment is great, but what I really want to do is reduce my family's exposure to toxins and chemicals. I want us to eat less processed food and use more homemade cleaners made from vinegar and baking soda. I want our containers and plastic items to be free of nasty stuff. I'm going to gradually transition all the makeup and beauty products I use to chemical-free versions, and make sure grody chemicals stay out of Mr. W's baby shampoo, butt cream, etc. (and JB's shaving/bath products, too)

I'm not an eco-crusader. And I know that generations (including my own) were raised with chemical-laden baby shampoos and plastic cups full of BPA, and most of us turned out all right. But the same could be said for the children of women in the 1950s and 1960s (and before) who smoked and drank while they were pregnant. No one told these women not to, and most of their babies were born OK, right? But who nowadays - except women with major issues - would drink or smoke while pregnant?

A recent article I read pointed out that we look down on women from that time for smoking a drinking while pregnant. And then it quoted a researcher who said that 50 years from now, what people will probably look down on us for is the amount of dangerous chemicals we allowed in our personal products, cleaners, plastics and other items.

I'm not trying to be that obnoxious greener-than-thou kind of person, and I know I have a steep learning curve. These kinds of sea-changes take a while to reach us in the South. My family recycles, we compost (when we remember), and a few other things, but we've been sadly lax about the kinds of products we use and in monitoring the healthiness (or unhealthiness) of the things we bring into our home.

I see this as a gradual move full of small, easy-to-implement changes. That's the only way it'll stick.

I'm starting the year off by learning to make baby food (it's going great! more on this later) and checking out the makeup from Alima Pure, a cosmetics company that has a low hazard rating from the Cosmetics Database. Alima is having a sale on eyeshadows right now ($5.50 each brings it down into the price range of the stuff I buy at Target and Ulta) and if you sign up for their e-newsletter, you can find out how to get free samples of their foundation - which, by the way, is cheaper than the Bare Minerals stuff I've been buying.

Speaking of cosmetics and beauty products, I found a little video that explains the basic reasoning behind transitioning from your (and my) beloved Pantene to something safer.

This video can be a little over the top and preachy at times, but the basic ideas are sound.

What do you think? Have you transitioned the products in your home to safer and full of less nasty chemicals? Any advice?

How to pose for pictures

2010-12-29T08:38:00.000-06:00

Genius, and just in time for New Year's Eve.

Via Daily Candy, in a how-to video a photographer explains how to easily pose in pics to look your best.

Jane Austen comic

2010-12-23T10:18:00.000-06:00

OK I had to post this:

By Beatonna, via Cup of Jo

Merry Christmas!

2010-12-22T14:38:00.002-06:00

Because it's almost Christmas and because I'm feeling lazy (but triumphant because I finally finished all my shopping last night) I'm fulfilling my blogging duties by posting some gratuitous-yet-festive photos.

The first few are of Mr. W in his cute little Christmas outfit my mom made him, and the rest are from my and JB's trip this weekend to NYC. It was c-c-cold but so fun. We window shopped on Fifth Avenue, strolled through Central Park at twilight and had a blast at the Weezer concert - they rock so much harder live than they do on their albums!

I wish you and yours a wonderful, cozy, exuberant Christmas, and a New Year full of good things.

xoxo

Anna Claire

Click here to view these pictures larger

For all your fake word needs

2010-12-16T09:43:00.000-06:00

It's like a copy writer's (or author's) best friend! IsThisAWord.com is exactly what it sounds like. A simple site where you can type in any combination of letters to see...well, if it's a word.

If it is, it'll give you the definition. If not, well, now you're free to go forth and trademark your shiny new word.

It's not just for Scrabble players and dictionary-haters. I could see how this could be helpful to SFF writers who commonly make up words and names for their worlds. I typed in "Gryffindor" and IsThisAWord said, "YES. But it's a proper noun, so whatever."

Gotta love a website with a personality.

Geek rock, city lights and the possibility of snow

2010-12-08T10:15:00.003-06:00

JB and I are headed to NYC in a couple of weeks, and I'm EXCITED.

His favorite band, Weezer, is playing a greatest hits concert that includes the Blue Album (The Sweater Song! Buddy Holly! Say It Ain't So!)...plus I've never been to the Big Apple at Christmas time. When we found out about the concert, JB and I kind of looked at each other and said, why not?

But, as with most things in life, there is good and not-so-good about this trip. First, the not-so-good:

1. We'll have to be away from Mr. W. for three nights. Sniff. He'll be staying with our families and will be perfectly fine...it'll just be hard not seeing him every day. But overall I think this is healthy for him and for us, too. I promised myself a long time ago that I wouldn't be one of those overbearing "my baby can't survive without ME!" kind of parents. I want him to grow up to be confident and independent. At least, that's what I keep telling myself as I contemplate not being able to kiss his chubby little cheeks for two whole days....

2. Bedbugs. I'm totally freaked about bedbugs. The good part is that one of my oldest friends lives in NYC and she has graciously invited us to stay with her. Which is great for many reasons, including that we don't have to be in a hotel room that may or may not have tiny unwanted guests hiding in the mattress. But bedbugs, if you believe the media reports (and, OK, maybe they are a bit exaggerated), are everywhere: stores, subway benches, theater seats. EW. Ew ew ew ew ew. I don't have many phobias - not scared of heights, the dark, clowns - but bugs? Ugh. ::shudder:: (But for a laugh, check out this guy riding through the streets of NYC dressed as a bedbug.)

But on to the good stuff. I'm so stoked about the good stuff.

In no particular order....
1. Skating in Central Park
2. Window shopping on Fifth Avenue
3. Wearing adorable coats and hats and scarves and boots AT THE SAME TIME, which is not always possible here in Alabama. I even have a new lovely goldenrod-color wool coat with buttons down the back that I've been eyeing since last year. And also some cute boots that magically make my legs look longer and skinnier. Because obviously the good people of New York have nothing better to do than admire what I'm wearing...but anyway.
4. Staying with my good friend, and getting to spend time with our former college roommate who is also staying with her.
5. Romantic hand-in-hand strolls through the city with JB.
6. Fun concert by a band I like but have never seen live.
7. Delicious food.
8. It might snow!
9. Seeing the Rockefeller tree.
10. Having our first mini-vacation (since baby) with just the two of us.

Christmas is a time for cheese

2010-12-06T10:15:00.002-06:00

You know I love cheesy made-for-TV Christmas movies. The perfect Mayberry-esque settings! The bad acting! The implausible romances! The return of child TV stars from the 80s!

My current favorite is The Christmas Card but I did see 12 Men of Christmas recently with Kristin Chenoweth and it was pretty darn awesome. Particularly if you like shirtless men. Which reminds me of that one with Melissa Joan Hart and Mario Lopez where she handcuffs him and brings him home for Christmas...good times.

I also like cheesy Christmas novels. Do you have any favorites? I've read all of the Mary Higgins Clark/Carol Higgins Clark Christmas mysteries and a few of the cheesy Christmas romance novels (of the non-busom-heaving variety). Now I'm looking for some new reads.

The Mischief of the Mistletoe by Lauren Willig looks good:

It's one of the Pink Carnation spy novels, which are always light, fun and entertaining. And really, what else do you want to read during the holidays? Tis not the season for heavy, dark reading.

Do you have favorite Christmas novels? (Or favorite cheesy TV Christmas movies?) Please share!

Merit badges

2010-11-23T11:00:00.000-06:00

Thank you again everybody for your kind comments on my last post. I love you all.

Lest we get too serious on this blog, here's something purely frivolous for your Tuesday.

I was never in Girl Scouts (not really the nature-ish type...too many bugs) but for some reason I like the idea of merit badges. Have you seen the Merit Badger? She creates brilliant little badges made "from electrons and love bonded together with 100% pure maple syrup."

In other words, she designs extremely specific online badges that she generously allows you to use anywhere - to gussy up your blog or deck out your FB page or what have you. Right now she's focusing on writers and readers. Click those links for entire lists of reader/writer goodness.

Here are a few of the ones I have chosen to award myself (because one of the best parts about these badges is you get to award them to yourself):

Coffee shop novelist

Feline Assistance

And my favorite...

Grammar ninja

P.S. The Merit Badger also created NaNoWriMo door hangers. Brilliant!

P.P.S. Clowns are the new vampire. I had no idea.
=
=

1 in 8

2010-11-17T13:30:00.002-06:00

This spring I became an unwilling member of a club nobody wants to join: mothers who have lost a child. And as a "member" I hear about local women - I can think of two women in the past month, both moms of twins - who have lost babies born prematurely. And the one thing I keep thinking every time I hear about one of these sisters in grief is that enough is enough. One out of every eight babies is born prematurely (before 37 weeks gestation). That's 1,400 tiny lives per day; more than half a million babies born each year who are too early, too small and too sick. They have to fight battles and slay dragons the moment they're born, just to stay alive. It shouldn't be that way.

In honor of those babies, in memory of my son Graham and in honor of my son Will, I'm sharing my story here.

I went to work on May 18, 2010 just like on any other day. I was six months pregnant with twin boys (they were spontaneous) and had been seeing a maternal-fetal specialist because there was a growing discrepancy in the size of their amniotic sacs, plus Graham wasn't growing as quickly as he should. We never found out a reason for this; twin-to-twin transfusion was ruled out. There wasn't anything the doctors could do other than monitor them closely.

At my weekly specialist appointment at noon that day, I had an ultrasound as usual. I figured JB and I would go out to lunch afterward as we always did. Instead, when it was over, the specialist sat us down and told us that the blood flow to the brain of our larger baby (this was Will) was slowing down. He would be in trouble if he wasn't delivered soon. JB and I were speechless as the specialist told us we needed to go to the hospital right then and get prepared for delivery that afternoon. I was at 28 weeks and four days.

JB and I were naive. We'd always known the NICU was a possibility with twins, but we assumed we'd be there a few weeks at most, easy-peasy, and the boys would go home. Anything worse was just the kind of thing that happened to other people.

I had nothing but the clothes on my back and my purse when we checked in at the hospital. Our families rushed up there, and luckily they brought cameras!

Will and Graham were born two minutes apart late that afternoon by emergency C-section. I got to kiss each one before they were whisked away to the NICU - they were tiny and beautiful. Will weighed 2 lbs 15 oz, and Graham weighed 2 lbs 7 oz.

Mr. Will and his nurse, the day after he was born

Both boys were on ventilators from the start, and Graham immediately began having major problems, mainly with his lungs. He and Will both fought so hard; I'm proud of their strength, their bravery and their fighting spirit. The NICU at the hospital in my town is top-notch, the only Level 3 NICU in the region. We had many good doctors and amazing nurses.

One of the doctors - JB and I called him Dr. Doom - told us the following day that Graham's outlook wasn't good. It was the worst conversation I've ever experienced, like someone was clawing my heart and punching me in the stomach at the same time.

I'll save you the extensive medical jargon and the scary days that followed. Basically, Graham's lungs were too weak to supply him with adequate oxygen - they'd already collapsed once - which meant his other organs...I'm going to stop writing about this part.

What I'd rather tell you about is his sweet face, that the top of his head was the softest thing I'd ever felt, that he opened his eyes a few times, that his oxygen levels went up when I was allowed to hold him, and that I got to hold him as he passed, while surrounded by all of our family who loved him. He lived and fought for six incredible days.

In the incubator a few feet away, Will was fighting his own battles. He, too, had trouble breathing and was on oxygen for weeks. He had a heart murmur that sounded, according to the pediatric cardiologist, like a washing machine. He had a Level 4 brain hemmorhage (the highest possible on a scale of 1 to 4) on the right side of his brain which had occurred sometime in utero and that we were told could cause anything from mild ADHD to severe developmental delays. His eyes had fragile vessels that had to be checked every few days to make sure they hadn't burst. To top it all off, about two weeks after he was born he contracted a staph infection - a serious problem for a preemie. Because of all the needle sticks he required (thanks to increased medication to fight the staph) the nurses began running out of places to stick him and he underwent surgery to insert a PICC line in his chest that remained for the duration of his NICU stay.

I say all of this not to complain or to list grievances, but to illustrate the long, hard road faced by preemies. We met and befriended parents whose babies faced every conceivable hurdle, from perforated bowels to brain swelling.

Will spent 71 days in the NICU before he was allowed to come home. Since then, he's had visits with the cardiologist, neurologist, orthopedic pediatrician, optometrist and pulmonologist, in addition to his regular pediatrician. Through it all, he's been strong-willed and tenacious. He's passed all of his appointments so far with flying colors. He's been developing normally for his adjusted age.

Will in October, age 5 months

For a long time I didn't have the emotional stamina to get involved - or even to want to get involved - in advocacy. But enough is enough. Truly. Parents shouldn't have to go through what we went through, and no babies should have to go through what mine did.

November is Prematurity Awareness Month and today is Prematurity Awareness Day. You can find more information here. The statistics are here.

I know the holidays are a time of giving for many families. If you are looking for an organization to donate to this year, I urge you to consider the March of Dimes or your local NICU. All babies deserve to be born healthy, and they all deserve their full nine months.

Added February 2011: If you'd like to join and/or donate to our March of Dimes team, you can visit Team Will + Graham.

Christmas a bit early

2010-11-15T20:40:00.001-06:00

After our first Halloween experience as parents, it's difficult to convey my utter happiness at having a pleasant, giggly baby for our Christmas card "photo shoot" with my awesome sister this past weekend.

But Mr. W behaved himself admirably and, with the help of my beloved Shutterfly (seriously I love this site, and they're not paying me to say it) I can cross "Christmas Cards" off my holiday to-do list.

Peppermint Dots Christmas Card

Make a statement with Shutterfly Christmas photo cards.

View the entire collection of cards.

Utter creepiness for your Monday

2010-11-15T13:38:00.001-06:00

You know I love rural decay. It's beautiful and sad, but there's some solace seeing nature reclaiming it. Urban decay, however, is another thing entirely. More sinister, more hopeless. And more deliciously creepy.

Don't watch this video alone, or in the dark (or do, if you're not a scaredy-cat like me). It's footage of the abandoned Six Flags amusement park in New Orleans. Make sure your sound is up because the guitar is lovely and haunting.

Via Epbot

2010-11-09T13:56:00.000-06:00

Perfect Christmas gift for book lovers:

Out of Print sells shirts with out-of-print book covers.

They've got women's and men's-style t-shirts, as well as kids' shirts! I dig this teeny Catcher in the Rye shirt for Mr. W...

...although it will be a few years before he is allowed to read the book.

For myself, I especially like the ones for Animal Farm, To Kill a Mockingbird and a 1930s Nancy Drew mystery.

As if the shirts weren't cool enough, for each one sold, Out of Print donates a book to a needy community through Books for Africa.

Yes friends, we all need one (or more) of these. Which one would you choose?

This sums up Mr. W's first Halloween experience...

2010-11-05T10:15:00.000-05:00

Mr. W was a lumberjack, so JB and I wore plaid shirts in family solidarity. A missed nap meant Mr. W. was an angry, screaming lumberjack for most of the evening while we trick-or-treated at JB's parents' house and my parents' house.

We did manage to have a fun evening anyway, once I resigned myself to what mothers through the ages have already learned: you have to adjust your expectations of any big event when a child is involved. JB could tell you I was silent and fuming on the ride to his parents' house (our first stop) because my dreams of getting adorable photos of him sitting in the leaves wearing his costume and "holding" his tiny axe that my artist sister made him were dashed. Wrecked by 10 pounds of cranky lumberjack.

Mr. W didn't even get to wear the beard I made him. When he finally stopped yelling his head off, he was sleeping and I didn't dare wake him for fear he'd start up again.

Another mom blogger (I'll try to find link) recently wrote that her son always cried on Halloween when he was younger and some of her favorite photos now are the ones where he's in costume and mad as heck.

And I actually think the one above is funny; note our forced smiles as he yells.

I have half a mind to dress him up again this weekend when he's in a better mood and get the photos we couldn't get last weekend.

Two of my favorite things...

2010-11-01T13:04:00.000-05:00

...England and libraries:

The red phone box that has become Britain's smallest library.

Also, did you have a fun Halloween? Mr. W. cried or slept the entire time and we didn't get many good pics, but I'm learning motherhood means adjusting your expectations of any special event. We had fun, anyway.

Also, has anyone started a NaNo novel yet? Today is The Day. For this year's NaNoWriMo, I'm going to try to write the other half of the novel I started during last year's event, a 1930s caper that is both ridiculous and fun.

So QWERTY it's cute

2010-10-29T13:25:00.002-05:00

Some fun for your Friday:

It's the All Typed Up Clyde from Kate Spade. If I had a spare $495 laying around (and I'd already solved world hunger) I swear I'd buy this. Maybe when I land that six-figure book deal.

Thank you, stylish Cerrissa for alerting me to this piece of awesome. I'm flattered you immediately thought of me when you saw it ;)

P.S. For a mere $95 you can score the Clyde's more Luddite little brother.

Font Nerd fun

2010-10-21T10:45:00.000-05:00

It's not really wasting time if you're honing your font-recognition skills.

Test your typeface knowledge with Typewar, where you see a letter and choose between two possible fonts. You'll get a score based on how many you get right, and you can see how you do compared to most other people.

Apparently most other people are really good at font recognition.

Via How About Orange.

Looking for a beard

2010-10-20T10:30:00.001-05:00

It's Mr. W.'s first Halloween. Yay for getting to dress a baby in a funny costume! I thought about going the pre-made costume route (particularly since I can't sew) but I just never found anything I liked well enough, plus I had no idea what size he'd be on Halloween. Three-month clothes are just now starting to fit him (!)

So he's going to be a lumberjack instead. I found the perfect tiny red-and-black plaid coat:

...a furry trapper hat from Old Navy and cute furry moccasins from Target (neither of which have a pic online, but I promise they're awesome). Also some teeny baby jeans that I really hope Mr. W. will grow into sometime between now and Oct. 31.

The finishing touch, I think, will be a beard. I want to make one out of felt.

I Googled "baby beard template" and came up with some really weird stuff, but just "beard template" yielded lots of options. I think I'm going to adapt this one for Mr. W.'s little face.

I also noticed the creator of that template has an Etsy shop that sells, you guessed it...fake beards.

The shop is called I Made You a Beard and it's full of...awesomeness. She's got all kinds of fake beards and beard-related art. I kind of want this moustache merit badge to pin on Mr. W.'s jacket.

JB and I are thinking about dressing up as a lumberjack and lumberjane - so we're a whole lumberjack family - for when we take Mr. W. trick-or-treating at our parents' houses.

What about you? Are you dressing up for Halloween, and what are you going to be?

*P.S. 10/21/10: I just realized I'll probably get a lot of weird Google hits thanks to the title of my blog post. Whoops. So if you are still reading this and you are looking for a beard of the non-Halloween-costume persuasion, this is not the blog for you. I'm sorry for the confusion, and happy hunting.

A few thoughts on press releases. And also cute animals.

2010-10-19T10:20:00.003-05:00

As a regional magazine editor I get boucoups of press releases, most of which are boring or not relevant to my publication. Those get deleted as soon as I glance at them.

But one particular organization sends press releases that I nearly always read. It's the Tennessee Aquarium.

The aquarium is in Chattanooga, Tenn. - a good four hours from my magazine's readers - and because I generally try to keep my magazine extremely local, I don't always have a need for the press releases.

But I read them anyway, without fail. And there will probably come a day when we're putting together a list of day-trip activities for the magazine and I'll almost certainly include the Tennessee Acquarium.

If you're a writer sending press releases on your book to members of the MSM, this kind of compulsive readability is something you want.

So I'm listing a few things I like about the Tennessee Aquarium's press releases:

First and foremost, I'll be honest. The communications manager who sends the press releases first won me over with...

...the cute. It's an Eastern Screech Owl, part of the “Thrills, Gills and Chills” animal encounters event running through Oct. 31. (Which, by the way, sounds really fun.) This was so adorable I forwarded the whole thing to some friends I thought would enjoy the pic, and maybe even the press release about the Halloween-themed event. A few months ago, the attached photo was of a baby penquin (!) sitting underneath its mom.

There's nearly always an attached photo with the aquarium press releases, and it's always of something cute or cool-looking. I'm not saying this would work for just anyone's press release - particularly if your book is about Nazis or something - and I know there are people who don't like attachments. But for what it's worth, I'm a sucker for cute animals and I WILL open this every. single. time.

Now for the nuts and bolts of the press release, which Thom (the aquarium's communications manager who sends the e-mails) absolutely nails.

1. The press release is in the body of the e-mail. No need for me to open attachments to get the general gist of the info.

2. The paragraphs are brief. There's never more than two or three sentences per paragraph, and there's a space between each paragraph. This makes easy skimming for me, which means I'll actually end up reading more of it than if Thom had packed everything into two or three giant paragraphs.

3. There's a sense of enthusiasm that comes out through the writing. Thom (or whoever writes these) doesn't pack in a ton of adjectives and overwrought descriptions, but there's always a feeling of "wow, this is so cool."

4. There's always a link at the end to an online press kit that includes photos. I've said this before, but you boost your chances of MSM press coverage by making that coverage as easy as possible for journalists and editors. You need an easy-to-find "press" area on your website that includes a downloadable high-res image of the cover of your book(s) and downloadable high-res photo of yourself. Then you'll also want a downloadable press release on the book(s) and one on yourself.

5. Lists. Put anything you can in list form: dates for book signings and events, places where the books are sold. Lists are easier to read and can sometimes give editors ideas for short blurb-y writeups about your book.

That's my two cents for the day. For a more comprehensive guide to press releases and getting MSM coverage, click here.

Autumn reading

2010-10-14T12:45:00.000-05:00

I'm a seasonal reader. Right now it's Dracula. Cliched, maybe, but I'd never read it before and it's quite good.

If you're into YA, check out Book-Scout's Autumn Reading List! Part 3, which is her compilation of great YA novels perfect for reading in autumn. I'm embarassed I've never read any of them except Frankenstein, but I'm making a trip to the library ASAP.

For more fall reading, check out Andrea's Autumn Reading List for picture books and middle-grade books.

What are your favorite books to read in fall?

I could die from the cute

2010-10-13T12:00:00.000-05:00

YA'LL. This is the most adorable site I've seen in a long, long time: Mila's Daydreams. If only I could be this creative with my pics of Mr. W.

Above is site creator Adele's tribute to The Little Prince! She takes beautiful, inventive photos of her daughter Mila while she naps, illustrating what she imagines Mila dreams about. The photos aren't all book-related, but, me being me, I thought I'd post my favorite of her literary inspired photos.

Adele says she does the photos as a "maternity leave hobby." Even more than I envy her prodigious photography talent, I envy her maternity leave. I don't know what the maternity package is in Helsinki, where Adele and her family live according to her blog, but I think Scandinavian countries in general are miles ahead of us. I could go on my soapbox about the abysmal maternity leave situation in the United States and how incredibly far behind we are from all other industrialized nations...but that's a discourse for another time.

Instead, let's just admire this adorable tribute to Mary Poppins (!)

Those shoes! That hat! I'm in love.

A love letter to Facebook

2010-10-11T13:00:00.010-05:00

I have 645 Facebook friends.

I don’t say that to brag – as if anyone would brag about such a thing – but to marvel at the strangeness of the internet. That's what happens when you sign up in college right after your school was added to the Facebook community back in the day (2004, I think). Friends accumulate and stay “connected” to you even though you only knew them for a few months in a class or internship, and haven’t seen them since.

I know lots of people who don’t understand Facebook (I'm married to one of them) or don’t see the point, or think it’s just a way for self-absorbed people to delude themselves into thinking the minutiae of their lives is interesting to everyone else. (Hello, that’s what Twitter’s for…I kid, I kid. Sort of.)

It's cool to make fun of Facebook, or wax eloquently about how it's ruining personal interaction, or do anything other than profess un-ironically that you love it.

But Facebook has made my life better. I’m not embarrassed to say it.

When JB and I went through the hardest few months of our lives this summer – the birth of our twins three months early, the passing of our son G after just six days, the 71 days that our son Mr. W spent in the NICU – Facebook was, simply put, how we knew we were loved.

Our families and close friends were with us during that time of course, and we felt loved and supported by them in person. But Facebook was how I kept our friends, extended family and church community up to date when JB and I were spending nearly all of our time at the hospital. We didn’t have the emotional strength for phone conversations, much less for telling the same thing over and over to different people. I could (and did) post anything I needed as my status update: the day and time of G’s funeral for those who didn’t know yet, updates of Mr. W’s slow-but-steady progress, photos of his sweet face.

The outpouring of love was overwhelming. I read and re-read the comments people left every time I posted a status update. It was like gulping fresh water when I’d been living with a parched throat. People who'd moved away, or who I hadn't seen since college sent their love and told me they were praying for my family. They congratulated us on every little achievement Mr. W. made – stuff I would have thought was so small that it would only matter to us: that the doctors upped Mr. W’s feedings to 10 ml of milk instead of 8, or that he went a whole day off the ventilator.

We attended JB’s 10-year college reunion about a month after the boys were born – Mr. W. was still in the NICU – and I was never asked the “oh, how are your twins?” question I dreaded. It seemed like everyone already knew, and I was grateful for that. People I only sort-of remembered from high school (JB graduated the year ahead of me) told us they’d been following us on Facebook, how handsome Mr. W. was and how they loved looking at photos of him every time I posted them. Near-strangers were praying for us. It's the most humbling, hope-inducing experience I've ever had.

We exprienced a veritable tsunami of love. It strengthened my belief in the inherent goodness of people. Facebook did all of that, and I’m thankful for it.

My Underwood Standard Four Bank Typewriter

2010-10-08T13:15:00.014-05:00

Some of you expressed an interest in my vintage Underwood typewriter. My parents gave it to me a couple of Christmases ago. I also have a lizard-green 1930s Royal that JB gave me - I'll save it for another post.

This is an Underwood portable typewriter with a standard four-bank keyboard. It still makes that thrilling clacking sound when you type and I'm sure it would work if I had the right kind of ink ribbon in it.

I think I'd originally said it was from 1918; it's actually probably from around 1927. On the back is etched a list of all of the patents, beginning in 1912 and ending in January 18, 1927.

It has a cover that latches on (the latch still works) :

It's like the great-great grandfather to the modern laptop case. I'm not good with weights and measures, but my son weighs nine pounds and the typewriter with case is much heavier...maybe closer to 15. I think it had a leather carrying strap at one point (see the metal strap holders above).

The keys are in great condition on the whole - they don't stick, but some of the arms (is that the right word?) that strike the paper take a while to return to their places. The spacebar has a crack down the middle but still works.

There's an envelope with a tiny key to the lock on the case, although the key itself looks much newer than 1927.

We also found a repair ticket from Dec. 31, 1971 under the typewriter. Cool, right? I love this kind of stuff.

The ticket is from Atlantic Office Machines, Inc., 12 Milosh Street, Clifton, New Jersey. The customer was named Gallo, and lived at 263 Orchard Street in East...something, I can't read it. It looks like Pcet. Anybody familiar with New Jersey?

It cost $15 to repair sticky keys, a "loose + jammed" H key and an "F stuck in air."

There's a metal plate on the inside of the typewriter cover that probably once had the typewriter's serial number but it's been either worn or scratched completely. The 1971 repair ticket says it's an "Underwood port. 4B153472" (or the B could be a 13) but that number doesn't seem to correspond to any of the Underwood portables on the Typewriter Serial Number Database.

I wonder how this little Underwood made it all the way from New Jersey to me in Alabama. I wonder what kinds of thrilling things have been written on it...novels, love letters, ransom notes...

I'm a nerd about old things. Aren't they awesome??

The Nursery

2010-10-07T13:15:00.004-05:00

*Read through to the bottom for a book giveaway in honor of this, my 400th post!

Designing Mr. W's nursery was a fun experience. It's the only time I'll ever get to put exactly what I want in his room, so I wanted to make the most of it. And I want to share it with you, because I got nearly all of my ideas online and I'm grateful to those others who shared.

I indugled my love for old things in this room, but the green crib was my jumping-off point. I absolutely did NOT want a pale blue room. Pale blue was just about all the nursery bedding and decor available for boys - at least in my price range, and it drove me nuts.

I got the crib at a consignment sale for an unbelievable $20 (it was super sturdy and I checked the serial number for recalls first). We sanded it - it was originally white - and spray painted it a lovely grass green. The spray paint is nontoxic after it cures for a few days. I chose orange and brown to round out the warm, vintage-y color palette.

And I also chose owls. I think they're cute and they seem kind of vintage, too.

My mom made the crib bedding and the curtains from chocolate brown dot and stripe fabric because I couldn't find anything else I liked that wasn't $400 for a crib set. The chest of drawers and the dresser were Craigslist finds. I wanted something mid-20th century and these were in great condition. (And small world, the sellers were the parents of one of my college professors; she was home for the weekend helping them sell their stuff and we had a minor freakout session when we realized we knew each other.)

This groovy orange lamp belonged to my uncle and is actually from the 70s. It falls into the so-ugly-it's-cute category. It's been sitting in our garage for five years and I'm glad to finally have a place to put it.

Oddly, it's been easy to find owls for room decor. I thought I was being creative when I picked owls over something more traditional, like teddy bears or jungle animals, but a pparently I was just jumping on a larger owl-loving bandwagon. This silver owl bank was a $10 Target find.

On the wall near his crib is most of the artwork in the room. There's an owl painting my mom got from Layla Grayce, and below it is a pointillist painting of Samford Hall (one of the oldest buildings my alma mater, Auburn University) that a close friend made for me when we were still in school. Beside it is a quote by Bo Jackson, Auburn's most famous football star. I like the sentiment and it was only $5 at Hobby Lobby, but it bugs me to no end that it says "...till you get there" in stead of "...'til you get there". Argh.

Above the Bo sign is a shadow box where I framed Mr. W's teeny hospital bracelet, and below the clock is a hanger with his name, made by Etsy seller LilaFrances. On the wall perpendicular to that (see in the first photo at the top of this post) are two owl paintings - one of a mommy, daddy and baby owl in the daytime; one of a mommy and baby owl at nighttime - that were painted by my super-talented sister.

Annnnd...my favorite part of his room, the library wall. We mounted Ribba ledges from Ikea to hold all of his picture books, and I painted letters I bought at Hobby Lobby for a dollar or two apiece to create the alphabet above. Both ideas I borrowed from nurseries I saw on Ohdeedoh .

I nurse Mr. W in the orange rocker, and we play cool tunes - Avett Brothers, Michael Jackson, Weezer - on the iPod player on the little table. I like that it continuously changes color, so it doubles as a nightlight.

The long dresser that matches the chest of drawers doubles as our changing table, and he can watch the trees outside while he gets changed. He LOVES trees.

Speaking of trees...We got the vinyl wall decal of a tree and owl from Etsy seller Simple Shapes. It was easy to put up and will come off cleanly when we don't want it anymore. I priced tree decals all over the internet, and this was one of the most reasonably priced for its size.

I made the owl mobile hanging over Mr. W's crib myself, with a wire Kikkerland Randon Photo Mobile, fishing line and felt owls that I made from an easy pattern I found here. I just printed out the patterns, bought felt in colors that coordinated in the room, cut out the pieces and used some simple stitches to sew them together. They're lightly stuffed with polyfil. Mr. W is just now noticing the owls and it's fun to watch him watch them.

We got an Ikea Expedit shelving unit to hold toys, etc. It's kind of messy right now, but I keep promising myself I'll get around to making it neat and pretty. On one of the shelves we've put a photo of Mr. W's twin brother, Mr. G; we're planning to always keep a photo of him in Mr. W's room. The baskets are Strapping Storage baskets from Land of Nod.

We've got cork squares next to the door to hold pictures and cards and pieces of mail. I still get excited when Mr. W gets mail - seeing his name on an envelope makes him seem so grown up :)

So that's it, folks. Mr. W and I hope you enjoyed the tour.

*Giveaway!

In honor of Mr. W's nursery, I'm giving away The New Kidspace Idea Book by Wendy A. Jordan. It's got lots of great pics and cool ideas for nurseries, kids' rooms, outdoor play areas and more! Just leave a comment and tell me about the decor in your kid's room or your own childhood bedroom (mine was yellow and very, very floral).

Entries are due by Monday, 11:59 p.m. CST. Please, only entries from those living in the U.S. (I'm sorry, international friends!). Be sure to leave your e-mail so I can contact you!

Typestaches

2010-10-06T13:00:00.005-05:00

This poster makes me laugh.

Perfect for font nerds everywhere.

Speaking to font nerds, find out which font you are (I'm TNR) by clicking here.

WANT

2010-10-05T13:15:00.001-05:00

I LOVE this print from Etsy seller Volume 25:

I actually have a 1919 Underwood typewriter that JB gave me for Christmas a few years ago and it really looks like this one, except it's black.

Plus, the best color in the world is yellow.

Plus, I like that it has "LOVE" on it.

Must add to my Christmas list ASAP.

Dress like Nancy Drew

2010-10-04T13:00:00.002-05:00

More Nancy Drew & Hardy Boys inspired fashion! Yes!

This time it's the Fall 2010 line from Dear Creatures, a clothing brand with a vintage-y vibe.

I am a longtime devotee of Nancy Drew. She's responsible for my deep love of mysteries and was, by far, the coolest girl I'd ever read about when I was 10.

Although my favorite Nancy Drew series was the Case Files, where Nancy looked slightly less 30s-glamorous and more...well...

...80s fabulous.

Anyway.

The Dear Creatures line is lovely.

Here's the description:

Fall 2010 carries on Dear Creatures' panache for all things nostalgic and narrative. A collection inspired by Nancy Drew and the Hardy Boys, the clothing reflects curious girls'and guys' instinct for smart and timeless fashion, the same instincts they assign to their crime solving adventures.

They've even got vintage-preppy, Hardy-esque looks for guys:

They're much more chic than the ones on the cover of the Nancy Drew & Hardy Boys Super Mysteries. Although the books were awesome, they are (hopefully) at least a few years away from inspiring a fashion line.

Look at yourself. Now look at me. Now look at yourself

2010-10-04T10:01:00.000-05:00

Check out BYU's awesome video on libraries (!), in the style of those funny Old Spice Guy commercials:

Some fangirly squealing over Christmas crafts

2010-10-01T13:15:00.010-05:00

If you are crafty at all - or know someone who is - you MUST check out Alicia Paulson's new felt ornament set for this year, called Snow Day. It is to die for! I just ordered mine and can't wait for it to come in.

Her blog, Posie Gets Cozy, is one of my favorites. It's just so....well, cozy. And lovely and homey and full of good things. My crafting talent doesn't extend past some simple needlework and mediocre scrapbooking, but I love seeing Alicia's beautiful quilts, children's clothes and other handiwork. Her photos of bicycle outings, state fairs, outdoor concerts, her own adorable pets and home are magical.

She's also quite literary. Here's her description of the Snow Day ornament set:

. . when I left the library, it was already snowing.
. . . . The sky was the color of a pewter cup.
. . . . . I buttoned my coat all the way up.
. . . . . . I warmed my hands in my woolen mittens.
. . . . . . . I walked through the city until the city faded away behind me.
I could've sworn that my old friend P.B. was watching me from behind the trees. . . .

Beautiful, right? I would love having an afternoon like that. Except maybe for the part about being watched by a polar bear. Unless it was my friend, of course. Not many polar bears here in Alabama.

You need this blog in your life. And if you like sewing , you need these ornaments in your life.

Le Petit Prince would be proud

2010-09-30T16:22:00.003-05:00

When I was younger, my favorite animal was a sheep. Maybe that's why my longtime friend Cerrissa (she lives in NYC, is awesome, and has the best wardrobe of anyone I know) sent me a digital sheep this afternoon. It's part of The Sheep Market, a fascinating project where 10,000 people were each paid 2 cents to "draw a sheep facing to the left" on a computer program that recorded their drawings.

Go here, and click somewhere on one of the teeny gray squares to watch a sheep being drawn.

I'm not sure the humor was intentional, but it's funny to watch. Whoever drew the sheep Cerrissa sent me (you can "send" sheep to your friends--highly recommended) started out making careful curlicues for its wool, but that must have gotten tedious because by the end the curls were just huge pointy ovals that went outside the lines of the sheep.

Anyway, it made me smile, and I liked the project's connection to Antoine de Saint-Exupery's The Little Prince:

"If you please--draw me a sheep..."

When a mystery is too overpowering, one dare not disobey. Absurd as it might seem to me, a thousand miles from any human habitation and in danger of death, I took out of my pocket a sheet of paper and my fountain-pen. But then I remembered how my studies had been concentrated on geography, history, arithmetic and grammar, and I told the little chap (a little crossly, too) that I did not know how to draw. He answered me:

"That doesn't matter. Draw me a sheep..."

Literature inspiring technology: that's awesome.

Also, sheep are awesome.

P. S. Here's a video where the creator explains how and why he did it.

Southern noir

2010-09-14T17:21:00.003-05:00

I'm reading Crooked Letter, Crooked Letter by Tom Franklin and can't. put. it. down. In a nutshell, it's a modern day mystery twined with a 30-year-old mystery, all set in Mississippi. The realism reminds me of a Dennis LeHane novel like Gone Baby Gone, but the grittiness is polished down by Franklin's Southern roots. That probably makes no sense, but just go read this book.

The dialogue is just...it's a revelation. Franklin is a genius at nailing the soul of a dialect without getting into clunky, hard-to-read (and often insulting) phonetically-spelled words. The rhythm of speech is spot-on for the region. Lovely, lovely writing. I won't even go into how well-rounded the characters are. I feel like I've met every one of them in person.

I'll post a more detailed review on the blog when I'm done. I haven't read anything by Franklin before, but you better believe I'm going to find his other books after finishing this one. Plus, the guy grew up here in my home state...represent and all that.

You can read a super-good interview with Franklin over at Allan Guthrie's Noir Originals. In it Franklin explains what the title means, although if you grew up in the South and know the book's about Mississippi you can probably guess.

On fire for Fall

2010-09-09T14:05:00.000-05:00

Fall is my favorite season. It makes me feel like doing very specific things, including but not limited to the following:

1. Undertake craft projects. Right now I'm cross-stitching a Christmas stocking for Mr. W. Yes, I said cross-stitching. Also I'm finishing these cute ornaments I began last year. They're by Alicia Paulson and I visit her blog religiously. I wish I lived inside her life sometimes; it's just so lovely and homey and inviting.

2. Go to Hobby Lobby and look for more craft projects to start.

3. Re-read favorite books like Jane Eyre or the Harry Potter series. Also deliciously creepy, wintry mysteries and ghost stories.

4. Bake. Last year for Christmas I got Cherry Cake and Ginger Beer, a cookbook with recipes from well-loved children's books (think Paddington's marmalade buns), and I really want to try some out. The author, Jane Brocket, is British so all of the children's books included are delightfully British-y. Brocket has a blog that's also lovely and almost like a British companion to Alicia Paulson's.

5. Buy candles and keep them burning whenever I'm at home. I'm not too picky as long as they're fallish or winterish scents.

6. Read the newspaper and do the crossword. I know I should be reading the newspaper every day all year (especially seeing as how I work for one) but sometimes it just doesn't happen in the spring and summer. Not sure why.

On Monday morning I combined Nos. 5 and 6 and would definitely NOT recommend it. I was reading the newspaper at the kitchen table where I had a yummy-smelling candle burning nearby. (you can see where this is going.) It only took me a second to realize the newspaper was on fire, but when I tried to blow it out, the fire just spread, sending blackened bits of the national news section showering onto the table and floor. I considered and rejected several options...
1. blow on it some more. Nope, that didn't work the first time.
2. step on it. Nope, I wasn't wearing shoes.
3. find a fire extinguisher. Nope, seems like overkill...
So I ran to the sink, threw the flaming newspaper in and turned on the tap. Problem solved. Plus, only a small corner of the lifestyle section was damaged (and by damaged I mean burned away) so I still got to finish the crossword.

It's the small things in life that make us happy.

The Vintage Automobile Picnic

2010-09-07T15:26:00.004-05:00

I'm researching for my novel, which takes place in 1919, and came across a scan of a fantastic magazine article from the Ladies Home Journal, July 1916.

It's via the Wearing History blog (which is awesome, by the way).

As a magazine editor, I think it's fun to see that multiple-product pages (always a headache to produce) aren't a recent invention. Don't you love the automobile tent at the bottom, which is "Ready for No End of a Good Time"?

If you can't read the tiny print, surf on over to the original post and click on the image for a high-res version; it's worth it, especially to read the menu. "Cold Boiled Tongue in Glass" sounds delightfully gross, but the "Hot Scrambled-Egg and Bacon Sandwiches" would be fantastic on a picnic today.

Laundry

2010-08-29T11:53:00.000-05:00

Yesterday I was pulling a load of Mr. W's tiny clothes from the dryer and felt a rush of pure happiness. Over laundry, which normally would be weird. But it wasn't.

Mr. W spent 10 weeks in the NICU. Many of those weeks (OK, most of them) were filled with uncertainty. A few of the worst weeks, it was a real possibility he wouldn't make it. We didn't know if we would ever get to bring him home to live with us.

Friends threw us baby showers during that time - it was after he was born of course, because he was so early. After every one I would come home, remove the tags from all of the cute little clothes, wash them in the special baby detergent, dry them, and fold them carefully into neat, clean little stacks. It was one of the few things I could do for him at a time when just holding him was dangerous to his health. It was one small thing I could control - having his clothes perfect and waiting.

I would look at those little stacks, carry them into his room and place them just-so in his dresser, thinking about our house being ready for a baby when no baby lived there. I wondered every single time whether he'd ever come home and wear the clothes. Whether I was preparing for a day that wouldn't come.

And then it did. He came home, he wore the clothes, spit up on them, peed on them, even grew out of them.

These days his clothes aren't folded quite as neatly. The little stacks aren't as precise. Housework is still the same chore it's always been. But the laundry makes me joyful sometimes, and the messy jumble of clothes in his dresser drawer reminds me I get to lavish my time instead on a squirmy baby with a milky smile.

Weeeellll, obviously

2010-08-17T13:36:00.000-05:00

My little hometown has spawned a YouTube sensation. Have you seen it? This video clip of a news broadcast from our local station went around town a few weeks ago:

Followed by the song by some guys in New York, which is even funnier, and became a viral YouTube hit as well as a top-ranking iTunes download:

And now apparently it's a worldwide sensation. The UK's The Guardian wrote a whole article about it, super interesting, especially when talking about the racial implications. Read it here.

2010-08-15T12:54:00.002-05:00

One of the quickest and easiest ways to improve your writing is to kill your first paragraph. It's probably crap anyway.

But no, you say. That's where I put my beautiful introduction with its clever phrasing and creative words.

Nope. Just kill it. You'll thank yourself later.

As part of my day job, I edit lots of copy by freelance writers. At least 70 percent of the time, their first paragraph or two isn't worth keeping. Heck, when I write articles (or blog posts, for that matter) my first paragraphs usually aren't worth keeping. Nine times out of 10, you get to the meat of what's happening in the second or third paragraph.

It's still important to write those opening sentences anyway. It's your brain's way of getting out all of the introductory crap so you can focus on what's important in the second paragraph.

For instance. My previous blog post was basically about my love of office supplies and some cute notebooks I'd found. But I didn't get to the point until the second paragraph. The first is a complete throwaway:

I don't know about your neck of the woods, but here school has already started. In practical terms this means nothing to me since I'm neither in school nor have a child in school. And because I'm staying home for a few weeks with Mr. W, I don't even have to brave school traffic on my way to work in the morning.

Reading it now, I realize the post would have read much stronger without it. The second paragraph gets to the point more quickly:

But like most self-respecting writers, I have a great affinity for office supplies. Pens and notebooks in particular. And now, even though I'm not going back to school and even though I do most of my writing on the ol' laptop, I feel like I deserve some lovely new pens...

I know there's a place and time for flowery language and clever phrases and whatnot. But I tend to take a journalistic approach to fiction writing - get to the action, now! Just for fun, take a look at a piece of your writing (not after you've just written it; wait a day or two) and see what it would look like if you 86'd your first paragraph. Especially if it describes the weather, the scenery, the heroine looking at herself in a mirror or any of those other cliches the editor blogs tell us not to do.

I'm trying to do this more often with my own writing (though obviously it's not as often as I should, given my previous blog post), whether it's my novel-in-progress or an article for my day job or a post for this blog. I'm starting to realize the first paragraph rule is probably going to apply to the entire first scene of my novel...but I'll break out the red pen on that one later.

Back to school shopping...for myself

2010-08-12T10:35:00.001-05:00

I don't know about your neck of the woods, but here school has already started. In practical terms this means nothing to me since I'm neither in school nor have a child in school. And because I'm staying home for a few weeks with Mr. W, I don't even have to brave school traffic on my way to work in the morning.

But like most self-respecting writers, I have a great affinity for office supplies. Pens and notebooks in particular. And now, even though I'm not going back to school and even though I do most of my writing on the ol' laptop, I feel like I deserve some lovely new pens. Pens with thick ink. Mmmmm pens. Mmmmm thick ink.

But notebooks are where it's really at. I had a gazillion of them when I was growing up, full of unfinished story ideas and lists of character names, and lists of stuff I liked, and journal entries and a million other things. I still love notebooks, and a while ago ordered a set of these:

It's a set of three personalized notebooks from Paperwink. Yes, I did need them. The coolest thing is that you get to customize the little vintage-y labels on the front of the notebooks with your name, book title, website or whatever you want. And you get to pick colors. They're the perfect size, thin, and they're only $15 for the set.

You know you need these. At least, I know I needed them. Just call it your own back-to-school present to yourself.

Trespassing

2010-08-05T16:20:00.002-05:00

I'm working on my Southern Gothic novel, and procrastinating (with a purpose, of course) by looking through awesome dilapidation and decay on Flikr.

Some good ones:

I'm back

2010-08-01T11:16:00.003-05:00

We finally brought my son home from the NICU last Tuesday, 71 days after he was born. He's already 5 lbs 7 oz and doing great. Apart from the usual crying spells, he's an easygoing baby so far.

And now that JB and I have had nearly a week to get in a routine with him, I'm feeling more like myself...albeit a mommy version of myself. (Gratuitous baby pic at the bottom of this post.)

And now that I'm feeling more like myself, it's time I got back to writing. I haven't written much on my novel since I gave birth. Visiting the NICU three times a day for 10 weeks will suck your energy faster than anything. Now that we're finally home, JB and I are planning on a few dedicated novel-writing hours per week at least. (He may be a right-brained engineer, but he's got his own writerly streak.)

I used to think I might never be a truly "great" writer (whatever that is) because I'd never had any major hardships or pain in my life. It seemed to me that most of the great authors wrote from loss. But now that I've experienced loss, I don't know that it has or will necessarily make me a better writer. Maybe it's too recent. I've thought that writing through my loss might help me deal with it - and it has, in journal form - but I'm not sure if or when I'd be able to translate that kind of life-altering event into written expression.

What about you? Do you write from loss or hardship? Has it helped you? I'd love to know.

And now on to a brighter topic...

THIS is what I get to hang out with every day:

Coming home + baby pics

2010-07-14T08:14:00.009-05:00

The NICU docs have finally given us a go-home date for our son - we can't WAIT to bring him home. All told, he will have spent 70 days there. And while we love the nurses and he's received wonderful care, leaving that place will be one of the best days ever.

A few photos to show how big he's gotten - nearly 5 lbs.!

Better days

2010-06-08T16:41:00.003-05:00

It's time for a happy picture:

My little boy is still in the NICU, but doing better. We hope he's home in another month or so. Guess now I need a good bloggy nickname for him :)

Prayers please

2010-05-30T12:07:00.000-05:00

My younger son passed away May 24 after six days of life. He was an amazing fighter - his body just wasn't able to keep up. We are blessed to have had him for the time we did and I'm so thankful to have been his mom.

His brother will be in the NICU for several more weeks and has his own share of challenges. Please keep all of us in your prayers.

-AC

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

Introducing...

2010-05-21T13:42:00.003-05:00

Our twin boys were born at 4:56 and 4:58 p.m. on Tuesday, May 18. They are beautiful! At only 28 weeks along, they will be in the NICU for a while and the little one especially has some respiratory problems, so JB and I would appreciate your prayers for our boys. I'll try to be back with news and pics when life isn't quite so hectic.

Spycations - they're for real

2010-05-18T13:00:00.001-05:00

I'm a fan of the ABC show Castle, which comes on Monday nights (9 p.m. CST).

Hello, it's about a mystery writer...who actually gets to help solve crimes. Yes, please. And it's adorable. I highly recommend catching up on reruns this summer if you've never seen it.

Anyway, last night's season finale murder victim was a man participating in a fake spy adventure. Because I'm a dork, I was reading EW.com's recap of the episode and the writer was lamenting there aren't real companies out there (he'd Googled) who offer "spycations" like the one on the show, where you are given fake spy assignments on self-destructing pens and you chase down top secret documents, etc.

And then through browsing the comments, I found that there in fact IS a company that offers this kind of spy experience. Is it in NYC or any other too-cool city? Nope.

It's in Alabama. Oh yeah. Like two hours from where I live. Plus they offer group spycations. How much fun would that be for a birthday party? It's probably crazy expensive, and it could be hard to overcome feeling kind of silly while you're playing, but if you're like me and had a weird childhood obsession with spies it could be completely awesome.

Check 'em out: Spy With Me Vacations.

How to Dress Like Nancy Drew

2010-05-10T15:51:00.000-05:00

For those who love(d) Nancy Drew, get her outfit from The Hidden Staircase here:

Absolute genius from Martha B. at the Nibs blogette. Click on over to see where she sourced each piece.

Never go to bed alone

2010-04-29T13:30:00.004-05:00

I LOVE this tumblr of book collections, called "Book Lovers Never Go to Bed Alone." It's got scads of photos of peoples' libraries, from artful and quirky to elegantly Martha Stewart-ish to metal-shelves-in-a-garage-ish.

It's perfect for book storage and display ideas, particularly if you've got your own out-of-control collection. Between JB's sci-fi/fantasy series (which have like a million books each) and my classics/historicals/mysteries, plus every book I ever read in college as an English major - um, lots - we've already outgrown the shelves we've got.

I seriously wish we had a non-functioning fireplace (or a fireplace at all). Sigh. How do you store your books?

Just because

2010-04-28T12:27:00.000-05:00

If JB gets to put our twins in cute-geeky Star Trek onesies, you knew I had to find some cute-geeky writerly onesies.

I'm thinking these are pretty dadgum cute...

{Twin Copy & Paste Onesie Set from Babycakes & Decor}

One day your character could top a Forbes list

2010-04-26T13:17:00.000-05:00

Heh. Every year Forbes magazine comes out with its Forbes Fictional 15, a list of the top richest fictional characters. This year, Carlisle Cullen jumps to the top, with an estimaed net worth of $34.5 billion. Naturally anyone would be rich who's been alive 370 years and has a "daughter" who can see into the future.

(BTW, does anyone else think actor Peter Facinelli looks bizarrely unnatural with blond hair?)

Anywho, Carlisle tops a widely varied list filled with other fictionally wealthy people like Bruce Wayne, Artemis Fowl, Chuck Bass, Tony Stark, Jed Clampett and Jay Gatsby. Also, inexplicably, the Tooth Fairy.

(Jay Gatsby makes a much better blond, fictional billionaire, in my opinion.)

I don't tend to write super-rich characters. But as a writer, I figure if you (or your character) makes nearly any kind of list in a national publication, it's a good thing.

If you've got a billionaire and want to see her or him on the list, here's the criteria, according to Forbes (and an explanation of why the Tooth Fairy makes the list) :

To qualify for the Fictional 15, we require that candidates be an authored fictional creation, a rule which excludes mythological and folkloric characters. They must star in a specific narrative work or series of works. And they must be known, both within their fictional universe and by their audience, for being rich.

Net worth estimates are based on an analysis of the fictional character's source material, and valued against known real-world commodity and share price movements. In the case of privately held fictional concerns, we sought to identify comparable fictional public companies. All prices are as of market close, April 12, 2010.

We reserve the right to bend or break any of our own rules — so yes, we know Uncle Sam and the Tooth Fairy are folkloric.

Who's your favorite rich and fictional character? I'll always be partial to Mr. Darcy, myself.

Alot of cute

2010-04-24T17:22:00.000-05:00

One of my favorite coworkers from my days on staff of my college newspaper sent a link to us former staffers of a too-funny blog post: The Alot is Better Than You at Everything.

If you're a grammar lover like myself, you'll love it. A lot. And if you aren't, at least the art will make you giggle:

What I'm doing instead of writing (or, apparently, blogging)

2010-04-22T14:00:00.001-05:00

Eeep. My last post was in MARCH. How unpardonable.

It sounds whiny, but being pregnant takes so much energy. And time. I honestly had no idea. I originally thought I'd get lots of writing done before the babies get here, but I haven't written a thing in weeks. Bad, bad, bad.

Instead, my time and energy have been spent in manners both important and frivolous, including but not limited to the following:

-worrying about the babies, who have a growing size discrepancy that the specialist originally thought might be TTTS (but probably is not).

-driving back and forth to the big city to see the specialist every other week

-rejoicing the babies are completely healthy so far (yeehaw!)

-spending hours and hours researching various cloth diapering methods. I swore I wouldn't cloth diaper twins, but now I'm getting sucked in. Any recommendations? FWIW I'm leaning toward the snap-on, one-size pocket diapers by Happy Heinys or FuzziBunz (are diaper names crazy or what?). I also like the adorable, flushable-liner gDiapers:

-scoping nursery design ideas on Ohdeedoh

-reading Changeless by Gail Carriger. It's thoroughly entertaining escapism:

-lusting after and being given the most beautiful and frivolous diaper bag on the planet by my amazing and wonderful parents:

-going on a three-day babymoon to Rosemary Beach (although we didn't bring Lucille this time, for obvious reasons)

-scouting and buying retro furniture on Craigslist for the nursery

-making owls for the crib mobiles:

(get pattern here)

-spending three hours registering at Babies R Us, which is a completely different planet

-watching American Idol (go Crystal!)

-and watching Castle (a MUST for mystery writers! and Nathan Fillion fans!)

-not sleeping

-sleeping semi-comfortably (albeit undignifed-ly) thanks to my Snoogle:

-thinking about my novel but not writing it.

-growing cankles

And there you have it. I could have gone on and on, but I've already broken my promise not to post much about the babies or being pregnant. I'm sorry about that. My guilt over it is only outweighed by my guilt at being a lazy no-posting blogger, so this is the kind of post you get.