Beka hails from the Great White North (aka Canada), where she reads, dreams, and doodles away. She loves bringing characters from the written page to the visual eye, and dabbles in pencil and coloured pencil and the occasional watercolor. Her dream is to one day get into digital art and save some trees.
Random Doodles 4/25/2017
I was traveling last week and my knitting was going almost as fast as we were.
I’ve been so proud of myself for this project. I ordered a batch of custom dyed yarn from my friend Merry Elizabeth at The Writer Knits Etsy Shop, found a pattern, consulted with my housemate/best friend/big sister about how to purl, and merrily went along making it. It’s a Daisy stitch. I tried to make a chart for it and that was a complete failure, so I just photocopied the pattern out of the knitting recipe book and carried that around. It’s a scarf; long and thin, and I have no idea how long it will end up being. It’s about the yummiest thing I’ve made, and that’s including the autumnal jewel tone craft spun silky yarn with sequins that I knitted into a scarf for my housemate. *swooning*
I’ve not been very motivated to write this week. Knowing April was going to be super crazy busy, I set my Camp NaNo goal really low, at 6,000 words. I had that done halfway through the month. After my book came in the mail, I haven’t really done any writing. Just enough to make it by for my Write Everyday For A Year challenge. More than a hundred words a day, anyway. It’s mostly been blog posts and poetry.
I wrote a poem in ten minutes on Friday night, to humor my friend Phoenix (Phoenix’s Facebook Page) who wanted a word war. I don’t even know exactly what to make of the poem. It’s odd and I think I need to revise it. I was tired.
I planted peas last week, and found a frog, and weeded ten feet of a twenty-eight foot garden bed that didn’t get planted last years so is all full of grass and weeds and things. I’m going to plant it this year so the grass and weeds and things need to go.
I’ve got my glass globe up in my apple tree, and am continuing on my rock wall down there in my corner. The bulbs I dug up from the garden next door last summer before the house was sold, took, and are sprouting. So are my irises. The lilacs out front got badly crunched by the heavy snow this winter and need to be cut back and thinned out.
I drew the other day too. It’s been a while since I’ve done that.
Copyright 2017 by Annie Louise Twitchell
Spinner of Secrets, Update Seven
phew
*heavy breathing*
Spinner of Secrets is ready for the next steps. Professional proofreading, then back to me for formatting, and my friend Hannah has offered to help with the cover design.
It was so hard getting here.
I had to learn to let go of so much. My insecurities, my feelings of inadequacy, my pride, my disbelief in myself. I desperately wanted to get this story published and to do that, I had to learn to be brave.
I shared a poem several weeks back, called Jump.
It was so important for me. I had to learn to stand on my own two feet and I had to learn to decide, this is good.
Not good enough.
Not just okay.
Not that will do.
Good.
I don’t really care if other people don’t think it’s good. I didn’t write this one for other people. I wrote it for me. I wrote it to tell a story and in telling the story, I learned my own.
And while I want this story to connect with other people and for other people to enjoy it as much as I do, I’m not sure if that’s the most important thing for this book. There will be other books. It’s inevitable. I’m as likely to stop telling stories as I am to stop liking rainy days and good books. But this book, this journey, has been about me growing up, about me learning myself, about me connecting with myself.
The Christmas Ladder
The Christmas Ladder is a short story inspired by my own family history. The man pictured below is my great-great grandfather, Reverend W. Merton Snow, a good number of years after the events in the story.
Photo Credits to the Original Photographers
Story Copyright 2016 by Annie Louise Twitchell
‘Christmas Ladder’ painting by Annie Louise Twitchell, 2016
This story is based on real people and real events, however, this presentation is the Author’s interpretation.
Pumpkin Moon
October is always a busy month for me, so all I have for this week’s blog post is some Harvest/Halloween stuff:
Copyright 2016 by Annie Louise Twitchell
The Importance of Tigers, Camp NaNo April 2016
“All of my children have taught me something. Abbi first taught me how to be a mother. Theo taught me that sometimes your own worst enemy is yourself. Vivi taught me how to see beauty in broken things. Sonya taught me that being wild is okay. Jason taught me that sometimes being angry is a good thing. And Nathan… Nathan taught me the importance of tigers.”
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‘The Importance of Tigers’ – pencil and Sharpie sketch, ALT |
Anyway, I wrote my 12,000 words that I wanted to write for the month, and I am shifting back to editing and revising my Spinner of Secrets, draft seven. I’ll probably be talking about that this next month or two, so if you’re in conversation with me and I suddenly yell something about Aleya and Kyle, and violently scribble things on a sticky note, please just quietly roll your eyes and wait until I finished scribbling before you continue talking.
Copyright 2016 by Annie Louise Twitchell
Artwork Copyright 2016 by Annie Louise Twitchell
Annie Lou, Artist
Smaug, one of my favourite dragons. |
This is the dragon I sketched while I was supposed to be working on math competition work. And Daddy dear, before you get indignant that I wasn’t paying attention to you, please observe that the above drawing is almost entirely lines. That style of drawing helps me concentrate, just like knitting helps me listen better. I was listening most attentively. I promise.
Bag End. |
So anyway, I do lots of other stuff besides writing, when the mood strikes. Every so often it strikes violently and I am left breathless, staring at a piece of paper in bewilderment.
Copyright 2016 by Annie Louise Twitchell