Digital Book Launch - Preparations

I'm just a teensy bit excited... 

I've 'dressed' my garden room ready for Tilda's Book Launch on Friday! I now have a rainbow dreamcatcher up, my books out, and my very own gallery of imaginary gemstones ready for the competition winners to be announced...

(I've also spent a few hours drawing in the book that's going to be the prize copy as well)

See you on Friday!

Soxploits - or a Coronasock update

The pace has slowed, but I've not stopped knitting... 

Since I last wrote about my soxploits, here and here, I've knitted even more. Think I might need help for this unusual addiction, cos I counted how many pairs I have in my drawer, and I reckon it's almost three dozen! Makes it easy to do a full wool wash of socks though.

Anyhoo, onto what I've created more recently. 

The first pair I knitted since my last update, I didn't keep. The wool was a bit of a pig to knit with for a start and I knew if I wore these, I'd remember the issues I had with them rather than enjoy wearing them. Strands of wool are twisted you see, and sometimes the 'twist' goes opposite to the way you naturally knit, in which case your lovely smooth wool begins to separate into thinner strands. Or the twist goes with the way you naturally knit, and in some cases ends up twisting the length of wool back on itself. As it did in this case. (Sometimes you can prevent this from happening by starting your knitting from the middle of the ball, but as I couldn't find that end in this particular ball, I was stuck.)

Anyway, the number of times I had to dangle my socks in thin air to allow the wool a chance to untwist itself... Ugh! The colours didn't knit up how I expected them to, either. The label states no two socks will be identical, and that's fine, but the stripes of each colour were so wide, one sock ended up green and the other pink. Didn't like that, either.

Fortunately, a neighbour had asked me to knit her a pair of socks (and for sock-knitting lessons once we're allowed to meet up) and as her feet are the same size as mine, I gave her these.

The next sock project was for a friend I met at Charnwood 2016; Bridget had two pairs of West Yorkshire Spinner socks already (you can buy them direct from the company) but she asked me for another, long enough to be welly socks. So...Passionfruit Cooler was the wool she chose, and when it arrived I got knitting. I used a different pattern this time - one which uses a 3.25mm needle instead of the 2.5mm I'm used to, because as this was a longer sock than I'm used to knitting, it might speed things up. 

When I got to the toe of the first sock I posted it to Bridget, to check the sizing. All good, so when she posted it back, I finished the toe off, knitted the other sock and sent them off. They looked a bit odd, because they were knitted all in rib; it's a very stretchy pattern but the garment always appears too thin to fit when it's off a body. I chose rib because I'd wanted to be certain that, if my tension was a bit off on the different sized pins, the socks would be more forgiving when worn. 

Pair number eleven completed.

My rainbows on the left and
Bridget's welly socks on the right.

And then I knitted my rainbow socks... Squeee! Again, West Yorkshire Spinners wool (they are my new favourite brand, I think) in shade Rum Paradise. And yes, I know it's pink rather than red before the orange, so it's not a 'proper' rainbow, but I just love the colours. 

I had to get a bit clever on these, otherwise the stripes would have been wider and then all out of sync when I got to the bottom of the heel and beyond. So I ended up only knitting three/four rows of each new colour down the heel (lots of ends needed to be sewn in as a result!) and by luck rather than judgement, it all worked out so my colours continued in sequence. Hooray! Pair twelve...

They are gorgeous to wear...

 

And then I went on to pair thirteen. I should've guessed there'd be problems, by the number. The lovely plain purple merino is gorgeous to knit and shows lace beautifully (I'd already knitted two pairs in this brand of wool) but could I get the lace pattern I wanted to knit right? Could I heck. I eventually chose a 'zig-zag cable' pattern, which isn't a true cable at all, and they worked out fine; the end result was worth the hassle.

 

And onto pair fourteen... Another WYS pair, in either English Rose or Peony, I can't remember which! It's a lovely pinky-purple tweedy effect when knitted, but boy oh boy. Previously I'd knitted almost a whole sock in it before deciding I didn't like whatever pattern I'd used and pulled it all back. The wool has been sitting in my wool bag now since before Christmas, and I've not felt inspired to do anything with it. The time felt right to have another go.

I found a basketweave cable. Didn't like the look of it. Tried a lace pattern. Didn't like that, either. Tried another...aaaargh! Nothing looked right! I needed something that complimented the tweedy effect, but...then I started playing. I made up a pattern, based on a widened and elongated moss stitch and at last, I was off. And finally, I have socks I like!

 

My next two pairs will be for an old uni friend and her partner, who live down-under; they'll be odds-and-sods versions so I'll share them when they're done, cos I never know what they're going to look like until I get going on them!

At least you won't be bored reading about socks again any time soon... There's some news to be posted later this week about an official book launch event for Tilda and the Mines of Pergatt, so keep your eyes peeled for that, and get your competition entry in soon!

Bye for now!

National Writer's Day

No, I didn't know there was one either! But there is, led by First Story. You can find out more about it here , but essentially it aims to promote and celebrate the pleasure and power of creative writing.

As part of the day, there's a challenge... 

HOW TO DO THE #247 CHALLENGE:

1. Write a 24-word story on a piece of paper (or record on video) starting with ‘One day…’
2. Take a photo of your story or take a photo of yourself with your writing
3. Share your original pieces of writing via Twitter, Instagram or Facebook, using #247challenge.
4. Tag three friends!

Simple! Why not have a go?

Here's mine:

How to Launch a Book - Digitally

I've started to think about how I mark the publication of Tilda and the Mines of Pergatt.

An actual launch is, most likely, going to be out of the question. Heck, I don't even know if the physical book is going to be available initially, or if it will start off as an ebook only. So Tilda 2 isn't going to be getting the kind of launch party I threw for Granny Rainbow...

But it's always good to celebrate publication, and some people are doing it virtually in this time of social distancing and restrictions.

My dilemma is related to my target audience. My novels are aimed at middle grade readers - 9+ years - and for certainly the lower end of that scale, you wouldn't expect the kids to have access to some forms of social media. An interactive chatroom kind of launch is therefore pretty much out of the question. Of course, I realise that a lot of my readers are a bit older and potentially could do chat rooms etc, but I want to be as inclusive as possible to ALL readers.

So what could I do instead? Here are a few thoughts

1. Ask for questions in advance, and answer them as part of a recorded Q&A that goes up on youtube.

2. Record myself reading the first chapter of the book.

3. A competition - perhaps I could do some illustrations in a print copy (assuming they are available) and you win that if you send me a pic of you, with the book (digital versions would be allowed!) as your entry? I did it for Tilda of Merjan. (read about it here.)

4. I can't remember the name for it, but a campaign to share across social media something about Tilda 2 - photo, snippet of text, a link to wherever the book is being sold - on a specific date and time.

5. Some kind of homemade book trailer...

Would you even bother tuning in to a virtual launch, or simply buy the book to read?

Hmmm... It would be good to know what you think, as I'm relying on you, Reader of the Scribbles, for support!

Coming out the other side of covid-19

So after almost 8 weeks of lockdown, the UK is beginning to open up.

There are very different views on this, as you might imagine. Some want things to happen quicker, to get the economy going again. Others are saying it's happening too fast, considering how many people have already died and combined with the fact that the all-important R rate is so close to 1, it will take very little to allow the virus to take hold again.

My own personal view is that as a country, we should have acted firmer, quicker. We should have continued testing and tracing in the early stages. We should have taken notice of predictions years ago that a pandemic was bound to happen sooner or later, and we should have been better prepared for it when it came.

However, hindsight's a wonderful thing.

Suffice to say that Family Squidge are very much still staying at home at the moment to see what happens in three weeks time... We have been bereaved once because of Covid-19, and we don't wish to experience any more losses.

So how are we coping?

We've settled into a routine of slow starts and late nights. As the Squidgelings continue to complete uni assignments and revise for exams, we tend to do our own separate things during the day and come together every evening for dinner. The highlight of the week is pizza night - often on a Friday - when Mr Squidge makes the dough and we all choose our own toppings. It's better than any takeaway!

I'm still posting daily positives on facebook so that even on the toughest of days - when I have no motivation or feel I've not achieved anything - I can look on the day and find something good. There's only been one day when I really couldn't find anything positive, and in posting that very fact I found it; the kindness and care of friends.

I'm still struggling to write. This is partly due to increased interruptions from the family, but mainly because I can't seem to concentrate. My brain seems to want to flit from one thing to another, which means that I have knitting, colouring, writing, quilting, and embroidery projects on the go at the moment. I'm plugging away a little at a time when I do have the brainpower and focus. I've been doing some critique for a couple of friends though - somehow finding things to improve is a lot easier in someone else's work than in my own at the moment!

Church is problematic. I've had times in my life when I've felt far from God - the advice is usually 'pray harder!' At the minute I feel as though I'm relying on others to pray for me, as I can't find the words. It's not as though there isn't any church at all - I've been astounded and moved by the way the church has mobilised itself to continue to meet the spiritual needs of Christians and the practical needs of people in communities at a time when the physical buildings are closed. My own church has a weekly online service, which is great, but it's not the same. Might never be the same again...

And I think that sums up this point of the pandemic in a nutshell for me. It's a very different life we're living at the moment, and we're nowhere near 'out the other side'. We've perhaps jumped over the first hurdle, and are beginning to adapt, but life will be lived on the edge for some time to come yet.

Photo: New Scientist

Pairfect Socks?

An update on my coronasock exploits...

I wrote a blog about coronasocks a while back - you can read it here, but do grab a cuppa first, cos it's a long one!

There I detailed progress so far; six pairs of coronasocks completed, and my first lot of sock wool hand dyed. I also finished a pair of socks that had been begun by a friend's mum-in-law, but I didn't count them as I was only completing someone else's project.

The good weather meant I had a break from socks after that. I spent time in the garden instead, did a bit of editing, and reconnected with Discworld. However, the last couple of days I've been feeling a bit rough. I don't think it's THE virus, but I have been fatigued and achey and out-of-sorts, so I'm keeping to home and picked up the knitting again.

I knitted my hand dyed wool.

My lovely rainbow-dyed hank

And I was very disappointed.

The  lovely rainbow wool didn't knit a rainbow at all...it knitted speckly. And there was LOADS of cream - the original base colour of the undyed wool - which made some of the colours knit as stripes. And the lovely vibrant colours...weren't. Well, not in the first sock.

First sock at the bottom, second still on pins at the top

The first sock came out all muted tones - the yellow and orange were really pale. The second sock - well, the colours were much brighter. I did toy with the idea of knitting a third sock and seeing which two out of the three matched best, but they didn't look too bad once they were finished; 

I've obviously got a lot to learn about placing colours on the hank at the dyeing stage if I want to get thicker stripes. Or limit myself to two or three only...

But that's Pair number 7 completed. Feeling a bit rough still, I started on Pair 8: Pairfect Socks. 

The theory behind Pairfect Socks is that the ball has enough wool for two socks, which will match perfectly, because a section of yellow wool is the marker for the beginning/end of the colour pattern repeat which is the end/top of each sock. 

It sounded intriguing and I rather liked the pattern as shown on the label.

The reality is...different.

For a start, if I knitted the socks up as on the label, they'd be knee-highs. So I had to keep breaking into the wool to take bits out. I could've just knitted through I suppose - but I didn't. Here's the first sock:

Spot the differences...

And here's the wool left over from it...

Not the most economical of ways to knit matching socks - I'll end up with exactly the same little balls once the second sock's completed, too. 

To be honest, I've never had much problem matching my socks when using non-pairfect socks, so I don't think I'll bother using this kind of novelty approach in future.

Ah well, you live and learn! And I'm off to knit coronasock number 16.

Once a writer, always a writer?

I've recently joined a facebook group for students who went to my primary school in the 70s and 80s.

There are some amazing memories being posted - strange how names and events come back to you when you see the photos of old schoolmates. I found a few photos of my own, and although I recognise many faces, I don't often remember the names that should go with them... It's still something I struggle with, if I'm honest. I can remember you and things I know about you, but not your name. (In fact I can forget a name within moments of being told it...)

Anyway, in reminiscing and looking for the photos I found my old junior school reports, which cover Years 3 to 6 in modern schooling. What became apparent in reading them was that, from early on, I was writing stories, reading lots, and generally being creative rather than mathsy or sporty.

It was especially interesting to read about my writing...

Y3: Katherine thoroughly enjoys reading. Her creative writing is imaginative and carefully expressed with colourful descriptions and good vocabulary. She has learned to join her writing, but now tends to be rather untidy occasionally.

Y4: Katherine reads very well and seems to enjoy reading both to herself and aloud. She puts her spelling and vocabulary to good use in her creative writing, which is always lively and interesting, and sustained at length.

Y5: Creative English has been outstanding. She is able to express feelings and details and shows a sympathy for her characters. She writes lengthy stories and her punctuation, grammar and spelling can be so accurate that they hardly need correcting. She has an extensive vocabulary and her work is most enjoyable to read.

Y6: In her creative English work, Katherine is highly imaginative. She produces lively, spontaneous poetry full of descriptive phrases. Her stories are lengthy and follow a well developed plot. The excitement generated by the dialogue and the action shows that Katherine derives much pleasure from writing her stories. Punctuation, sentence structure and use of paragraphs are excellent. Her extensive vocabulary reflects her love of words and the depth of her reading.

Reading them actually made me a bit sad.

While the reports indicate that I've always loved reading and writing, and that I used to write decent stories even as a child, the reports make me realise how much of that joy and ability I lost over the years that came after.

When I think of how many years I've spent, re-learning the art of writing stories after a decade in a microbiology laboratory and another ten as a stay at home mum, there's a little bit of me that can't help wondering whether I should've tried harder to become an author earlier in my life. Especially now that my current ambition is to have published all five of Tilda's stories by the time I'm 60!

Mind, having said that, I'm also a believer that things happen at the right time; I know that if I'd not changed focus to science and worked as a trainer in microbiological awareness, and if I hadn't spent so many years training as a guider, then I wouldn't have developed my presentation, workshop and  and speaking skills which have been so vital to my school visits and talks. If the physical act of writing stories had all come too easily, I wouldn't have had the opportunity to seek out help, and as a result, make such wonderful writing friends. If I'd never offered to help listen to reluctant readers at my children's school, I'd never have even thought about writing stories for other people to read.

Maybe, sometimes, you need to let a talent rest, so that you can rediscover it later? But not just rediscover it - rediscover it and combine it with a few other skills you've learnt, so that it develops into something even bigger and better?

I wonder what 11 yr old me would have said, if you'd told her back then that one day those creative writing stories would mean she'd one day be published and passing on her love of writing to children her own age?

Squidge's Writing Prompt #1

I realised I haven't written much about writing recently. You can thank CV-19 and my current fixation on knitting socks for that!

However, I have been posting prompts in our NIBS (writing group) facebook page as we can't meet in person under current UK restrictions. And there have been some surprising results. I received two emails out of the blue from folk who either don't or can't attend meetings due to distance; they were sharing what they had written as a result of the very first prompts I posted. They were lovely pieces, too - bowled me over!

Now, although there are lots and lots of prompts out in the world already, (just search 'writing prompts for...' and you'll see what I mean!) I've decided that I will start a habit of posting a weekly writing prompt here on the Scribbles. I will endeavour to try to write something myself based on it and share it with you. There's no pressure to share what you write yourself unless you want to (if you do, either post a short piece (200 words max) in the comments below or post it to your own blog if you have one and paste a link below) however it would be good to know if you find the prompts helpful.

Here goes...have fun.

Squidge's Scribbles Writing Prompt #1

There were two stark choices. 

One : open the box. 

Two : don't.

Corona socks

OK - this is definitely a grab-yourself-a-cuppa-first kind of blog! At least it might go some way to relieving your lockdown for a while...

Got your beverage of choice? (Mine's a G&T tonight!) Then read on...

I mentioned in a post from a couple of weeks ago that I was struggling to find focus in this current crisis, and my creative urges had led me to knit socks. This is partly because it doesn't take much brain power; I'm very familiar with the pattern I use, so if they are plain knit or some of my odds-and-sods socks, I can knit a pair to fit myself (shoe size 3 and 1/2) in two or three days if I'm not doing much else.

I decided to call them coronasocks - for obvious reasons, I hope - and so far, as we go into week 4 (I think - I've lost count) of 'stay-at-home' in the UK, I have made rather a lot of them. I don't mind showing them to you now, because half have gone to their recipients, and the others are being parcelled up to be put in the post this week. Take a gander...

Pair 1 complete - red, white and blue.

Pair 2. Odds-and-sods purple and green

Pair 3 - yellow and grey odds-and-sods. Really pleased with this colour combo

Pair 4 - lace-topped burnt orange

Pair 5 - odds-and-sods random

Pair 6 - odds-and-sods turquoise, though pink and purple snuck in too

I'm currently knitting Pair 7, another odds-and-sods pair in green and orange; one sock's completed and the other is at the heel.

I did have to order some more sock wool, as a friend has asked me to complete a UFO (UnFinished Object) for her, and while I was ordering that, I got tempted and ordered these:

The heathery-grey ball is really luxurious, and I wouldn't normally have gone for something quite so expensive. The pink is an Arne and Carlos Pairfect - the yellow strand you can see marks the start of the sock (you cut the yellow off first!) and there's another strand somewhere else in the ball which marks the start of the second sock. Now, I have small feet, so I will have to wind off lots of wool to get to the repeat, then wind it back into a ball the other way so I end up with two balls of leftover that match, so that's going to be interesting!

Incidentally, I do get a bit anal about matching up the repeats in patterns, even if they are fairly random. I end up with lots of little balls, so I decided the other day to join them all together into one big ball. There will be a pair of 'Surprise!' socks knitted, once I've wound a ball of about 60g....

The other thing I ordered was a skein of undyed merino wool. I have always loved hand-dyed yarns, but they can be very expensive. I'd looked up how to hand-dye using food colouring, which seemed a darn sight cheaper - I decided I'd have a go. It was a lockdown project.

Here's how I got on...

You can find all sorts of tutorials and videos telling you how to hand-dye - I used this one to take me through the process, but there are many others. So I'm going to assume that if you want to have a go, you'll look it up and won't need me to repeat everything in detail...

So... The food dyes I used are Dr Oetke gel colours, and I bought the full range of colours. The only colour I didn't use in this first experiment was the pink, but it was good to try all the others and see how they came out on the wool.

This is the wool in to soak for half an hour in warm water, to which 3 tablespoons of white vinegar had been added. 

I laid clingfilm over my work top, making sure there was plenty beyond the end of the hank. The skein had most of the water squeezed out of it so it was damp. I got a small art brush and started to paint the colours in blocks... 

I had to manipulate the wool to get coverage throughout, but needed to be careful - any dye on my hands or splashed onto the clingfilm, and a colour would get transferred to areas where I didn't want it to be.

Now I had in my head an idea...I wanted to try to create a pattern in the colours that, yes, would follow the rainbow, but would also end up knitting as solid stripes with speckles in between. So in the spaces, I jabbed a gel-dye-laden fork all over the place, making sure the colours overlapped a bit. Here's how it ended up; 

The next phase is to fix the dye. I realised I couldn't simply roll the wool in the clingfilm, or I'd contaminate my carefully separated colours - either because of splashes on the film or where the two sides of the skein touched. So I overlay another sheet of clingfilm over the wool, pressed it well down and then rolled it. I ended up with a rainbow coloured sausage!

My microwave is a powerful one (900W) so I blasted my wool for 3 x 2 minutes at 50%, with a minute or two in between each heating. I think the sausage was well and truly cooked - you can see the condensation inside the film.

Most instructions told you to leave the wool to cool, but I was too impatient... I unwrapped it. It was flippin' hot, so I got a bowl of cool water and as I cut the clingfilm away (it had gone a bit crispy and melted together in places) I let the hot wool go into the water. Looked like rainbow spaghetti!

It took three rinses until the water ran clear - I probably should have done a couple more as the red dye was still leaking a bit of orange when I squeezed it out ready to hang to dry. Found a coat hanger and - 

Ta dah!

Now there is always an element of pot luck in how the dye actually comes out. My speckled sections had worked pretty well with green, blue, and purple...

But came out as more of a gradient between the orange, yellow, and red.

                                          

I have no idea whether this was due to the wetness of the wool when I applied the dye; whether I put too much of these lighter colours on the wool when speckling; or whether these dyes act differently on the wool for some reason. 

It didn't come out exactly as I'd imagined - but it's not bad for a first attempt! 

So there we are. My first skein of hand-dyed wool. And it seems appropriate that it's rainbow coloured, considering how much the rainbow has been used as a symbol of hope in these difficult times. I'll let you know how it knits up...but I may not get round to it very quickly (my fingers are itching!) because I've started to get back into writing again for the first time in ages. Might be time to give the knitting pins a rest and focus on words for a while...

Feel free to share any lockdown projects you've got on the go with me - always good to hear what everyone else is up to, creatively.  

Musical mayhem, mid-Corona

The Squidgelings are both rather musical.

Squidgeling J plays violin and recorder very well, but has also dabbled with guitar, mandolin, viola, harp, penny whistle and piano, and is currently teaching herself the melodeon to accompany the Folk Society at their sessions.

Squidgeling T's main instrument is the bass guitar, but he is also pretty proficient on 'normal' guitar, has dabbled in keyboard and played the double bass previously, too.

Being in lockdown - and at home for an Easter holiday that's been indefinitely extended for the foreseeable future - Chateau Squidge has therefore been rather more music-full of late. I've really enjoyed hearing folk tunes from one bedroom and bass lines from another.

However, one unintended consequence of the shutdown and imposed social distancing has been the desire to learn - and manufacture - even more instruments.

Chateau Squidge has been echoing to the sounds of;

1. A homemade low flute, made from a length of pvc pipe using some very detailed instructions.

2. Homemade bagpipes, cobbled together from a bin bag, a straw, the new low flute, a recorder, and plenty of gaffer tape. (If you fancy making some yourself, here are the instructions!)

3. An alto saxophone. Now, Mr Squidge is talented, (he helped make the first two) but not THAT talented. He hired one, as T expressed a desire to learn the sax and this seemed a better way of trying it out than committing to a purchase.

Cat in a (sax) box

By the end of today, J had played recognisable folk tunes on both the low flute AND the bagpipes (the latter was rather short and sweet because there's a knack to keeping the bin bag topped up with air through the straw) and T had managed to work out how to play (a rather ropey version) of 'Happy Birthday' on it - a challenge set by Mr Squidge for T to achieve in time for his birthday at the end of April. (Thank goodness for the garden room - it was definitely easier to listen to the sax from a distance...)

Not sure what tomorrow holds...

Maybe earplugs? 

Fighting to find some focus

Life is still very up and down, isn't it?

I've taken to posting my daily positives on facebook, because otherwise it's very easy to only see the limitations and negatives of these strange times.

Writing feels incredibly difficult at the moment. Not the blogs so much - they've almost gone back to being an online diary, like in the very early days of the Scribbles. But the novels...

I thought that as we have all this enforced time on our hands, I'd set about editing Tilda 3. Unfortunately I seem to be making things worse, not better. I can only do small chunks at a time, which isn't helping the story to flow. And yesterday... I had a particularly tricky scene to rework. I can see the action clearly in my head, but trying to write it from Tilda's deep viewpoint? By the end of two hours, it felt as though I was walking through treacle. I'd only got through two pages, and neither of them felt very improved.

I couldn't seem to get into Tilda's head at all, and it made me wonder whether there's an element of coronavirus crisis causing it? We're all going through so many changes so quickly in the current crisis, maybe I can't actually lift my subconscious focus from myself? Not that I'm being selfish - more that, like at other times when Life has got in the way of creativity, Life at this precise moment feels really big and scary and the effect that has is to shut down any creative juices that might otherwise be flowing. Survival mode, rather than comfy creative mode?

Except creativity hasn't shut down completely. I'm knitting socks again. They're relatively quick to knit, can almost be done with my eyes closed, and they don't require much brain-power, so it feels an easier outlet. The only difference is that these 'coronasocks' are being knitted for other people because I've got a drawerful of them already and don't really need any more...

Red white and blue for Squidgeling J, purple and green for E 

I'm also colouring in, which is why I took delivery yesterday of Jacqui Grace's book, Images of Hope. We all need hope at this time, don't we...? But I also like Jacqui's style and find it restful to create something unique, based on her work. Again, it's something I can do without using much brainpower.

One I did earlier in Words of Grace Devotional also by Jacqui

One waiting to be done in the new book

Hopefully, as this new 'normal' gets more normal, the focus will come back. I'll keep on trying to edit in between the colouring and knitting and who knows - maybe Tilda 3 will turn out OK in the end.

If not, maybe my next book will be all about knitting socks.

Stay safe and well. 

Me - on film!

Well, that was an experience!

There are lots of people turning to video as a way of keeping in touch, keeping fit (I had my first virtual dance class last night in my garden room!), helping to keep kids educated, etc etc etc.

We're finding it rather useful at church, too, especially now that the UK is virtually in lockdown and all places of worship are closed, even for private prayer. The vicar's already posted her first short video message, and our leadership team have held our first virtual meeting, too.

As part of our attempts to keep in touch, we're trying to encourage folk to get involved, and one of the things we're focusing on is rainbows; It started in Europe, where children stuck rainbows in their windows to cheer each other up, and it has spread.

For me, rainbows are important. One of the earliest posts on the Scribbles said a little bit about it...you can revisit it here. So how could I resist an opportunity to put a rainbow in my window...? Yesterday, one of the highlights of my day was to see a little boy - dressed in a superhero costume, out for a walk with his mum and younger sibling - who stopped outside my fence and yelled "Found one!"

So the two things of course had to be combined; I made a video for our church community, encouraging them to get involved by putting a rainbow in their window too.

Assuming I've done it right, you'll be able to see it below...

So if you feel like joining me, stick a rainbow in your window, too! 

Stay safe, Scribblers!

Creativity, faith, and COVID-19

So...the world's a very different place at the moment. COVID-19 is affecting all of us in different ways, but it is significantly changing our lives. I don't intend to say much more on that, other than stay safe and well, readers, if you can.

I do intend to say something about creativity and faith in these times though.

Creativity keeps me sane. If you're a regular reader, you'll know I knit (socks mainly - got two pairs on the go at the moment!), quilt (there's one needs quilting), draw (occasionally) and arrange flowers, all on top of writing. To that end, I will have plenty of projects to work on if - when? - the UK goes into a stricter lockdown period.

If you're a regular reader, you'll also know that I'm Christian, currently a churchwarden, and my faith is important to me - although I tend not to write too much about it here.

You may well have seen that the Church of England has suspended all public services at the moment; on the one hand, that is a huge relief as leadership teams all over will have been thinking how best to protect what can be in some parishes an elderly and vulnerable church family. On the other, it's challenged us to become more creative about keeping in touch and continuing to provide spiritual support when public shared worship is not possible. Some churches are live streaming services, others (like my own, hopefully) will have sessions where the building is open for personal prayer. We are still trying to work it all out...

But this blog is about combining my faith and my creativity, so it's about to get more personal.

Over Lent, my church has been running a course based on the Psalms. If you're not familiar with them, they are songs and poems which encompass every aspect of human emotion and human life, and can be a source of great comfort. Angry? There's a psalm expressing anger. Fearful? Ditto. Full of worship and thanksgiving? Still got one.

Anyhow, I didn't sign up for the course, but decided to attempt a Bible Journal, sketching pictures brought to mind by various verses within both the psalms that were being used on the course and from the lectionary psalms (the daily readings). Now, I don't claim to be an artist. At best, I can replicate something I see - a copyist. But I've had a go...

(If you don't recognise the words for the Psalms, it might be because I have The Message, which I find more accessible...)

You might be asking why on earth am I blogging about it now, when I don't usually blog my faith 'stuff'?

It's me, being creative. If you are reading this, and you are a person of faith, I hope it encourages you, or provides an idea for engaging with your faith in a different way. I'm going to carry on being creative, and every now and again I'll share the results.

Mind you, that means you might also get pictures of socks or quilts or short stories, too!

Stay creative, Scribblers.

Finding Inspiration for Your Stories (When your writing needs a retreat - Part 2)

The first of the workshops provided by Isabel Costello as part of my recent retreat was about Inspiration.

As a writer, I'm often asked "Where do you get your ideas from?" My stock answer is usually "Everywhere!" Let me give you a few examples...

i) The time we found a bird carcass in our chimney, which sparked the idea for a horror short about a young chimney sweep who perished.
ii) The transparent acrylic guitar spotted in a music shop window, which gave me a title; The Glass Guitar.
iii) The tradition Sardinians used to have of making a mourning blanket, which became a second-placed-in-a-competition story.

You get the idea.

Well, we (the retreatees) were asked how we would define 'inspiration'. My own definition was - 'the thing, seen or heard, which sparks the idea for a story and makes me ask what if...' There were plenty of other suggestions, but my favourite was 'the intake of breath - the 'oooh!' - moment'.

And apparently that was spot on. The word 'inspire' comes from the Latin inspirare - to breathe in, or to breathe life into.

A more formal definition is 'the process of being mentally stimulated to do or feel something, especially something creative.' It is, essentially, the moment of creation. The lightbulb moment. The seed with potential to grow.

So where does inspiration come from? As in, where in our brains does it happen? There's a lot of evidence that it arises in the subconscious part of our brain - the limbic system. It involves the subconscious, or dreams, or imagination, and is NOT, strangely enough, related to words - even though the form it eventually takes will be written in an author's case.

You'd think that there would be a finite number of ideas to have, wouldn't you? We've probably all heard there are only seven story types - but there are a darn sight more than only seven stories in the world, aren't there? Writers are inspired to see new connections, new ways of using things that already exist - and it's THAT which brings us the rich variety of fiction available to us.

But ideas don't always make it much beyond the inspiration phase. Every author probably has a number of manuscripts or half-finished stories languishing on the laptop or in a notebook. How do you know which idea to run with? Which has legs of its own and will run in a direction you didn't expect? For me, it's the ones that I have the most questions about - but the answers keep coming. It's the idea that keeps growing, 'getting bigger and brighter' was how Isabel described it, before she gave us our first prompt; a woman is standing in front of a house.

We began to throw a few ideas around - there was something inside she wanted. It was her childhood home. She was stalking someone. Destiny lay beyond the front door... As we talked, we started to build on the basics and the suggestions got more involved. The 'growing bigger and brighter' was happening. Right there. In that moment!

Inspiration can be found in many and varied places and from much of our lived experience, but wherever we find it, we often find an emotional connection and depth. We draw on how we felt, what we saw, the smell of Grandma's baking or the sound of a song playing on the radio which was playing when... Sensory memory plays a huge role in bringing a scene alive - not only to ourselves, but to our readers.

We used a few more prompts to explore inspiration through place and sensory memory; 'two people walk over a bridge' was the first, and picking a couple of objects from the table was the second. For the first, as usual, every one of us came up with something entirely different even though we'd been given the same starter. The second was much more varied, as you'd expect, but even when two people chose the same object the resulting writing was very, very different.

Here's what I chose, and what I had time to write in the session:

Look closely after you've read what I wrote - can you see what's missing from
the photo that I included in my scene?

     The mist swirled around his feet as he approached the gates. He knew this path well, had walked it many times before. It was still there, slightly soft under his boots after the recent rain but well trodden and familiar. Yet he remained on edge, wondering whether his memory of the way would be sufficient to prevent a stumble or a turned ankle now that he couldn't see it.
      The gates were a ghostly grey, the mist muting their usual shade of wrought iron. They stood open, twice the height of a man, their elaborate swirls and curls writhing along their width.
      He hesitated, peering up at the ornate crown topping their span, admiring the craftsmanship of their creator. 
      And then he put his hand into his pocket and drew out the talisman. His thumb played with the simple cuts which made up the face...

What do you do though, when the ideas dry up? When inspiration isn't filling your head with the next perfect scene in your novel or providing the story you hope is going to win you that competition and big prize?

We spent a little time listening to a recording of Liz Gilbert talking about taking fear and creativity on a road trip. Liz is the author of Big Magic - Creative Living Beyond Fear. And Fear, we came to realise, is not only a close friend of Creativity (everyone has doubt demons or imposter syndrome for example) but is also something which closes us down creatively and reduces our ability to find solutions. It goes back to a basic physical reaction - fear exists as part of our natural fight or flight response. How can we think creatively about how to catch an elephant when the darned thing's chasing us across the savannah? (Must point out here - that's my analogy, not something we were told! Just in case I've not hit the nail on the head). Our brain just can't tell the difference between a physical event (I'm being chased by an elephant!) or a mental one (I don't know what to write next!) We have to get past the fear in order to deal with the problem.

There are various things you can do as an author to get the inspiration flowing past or around the block. Stick your character into an unexpected situation and write about how they react. Break away from the new stuff - go back and edit what you've already done. (That's a favourite of mine when I'm stuck.) Take a long walk in the fresh air. Leave what you're struggling with and find a scene you DO want to write about (I do this ALL the time - my first s****y draft is full of notes like 'describe the room' or 'Bleurgh! This isn't working' that I revisit at a later stage). "Make s**t happen", as the lovely Julie Cohen once told me.

I think, by the end of the workshop, I realised that 'inspiration' is a single word, but it covers an awful lot of 'stuff'. The very act of nailing it down seems to make it lose its magic - how can you possibly explain what happens in your head when you have that moment of clarity and the first spark of something utterly amazing? I get inspired all the time - I throw ideas out ten-a-penny when I'm working with children. I dream vividly, and often incorporate bits I remember into my work. (Though quite what I shall do with the image of a golden Landrover with a large transparent-sided canopy on its back, driving down the High Street in town...only to realise once it had passed me that it was a Popemobile and the Pope was standing under the canopy, waving to everyone, I have no idea. Answers on a postcard, please!)

Inspiration is a mystical, fleeting thing. The real magic lies in what we - I - create with it...

Socks

My home town has a historical link to hosiery. Sadly, the factories have closed now, and there's very little hosiery production - if any - left. We do have our 'Sockman' though, a quirky statue in the market place who sits admiring a single sock on his outstretched leg.

I'm doing my bit to keep the hosiery link alive though, as I've had a bit of a binge on the old sock-knitting front recently.

People often say they must be complicated to knit, and I'd have to say that yes, it takes a while to get to grips with creating a sock, but once you've got the knack, it's really quite easy. I have one pattern that I use over and over again - I know exactly how the end result fits my feet - and I've mastered the art of holding the four double ended pins so I don't get in a tangle.

They're an easy project. Portable, quick (I can knit a good half of a plain sock in an evening while watching TV), and rather addictive. There are so many beautiful colourways, they seem to grow really quickly when the wool keeps changing colour. I now have so many pairs of hand knitted socks, I can do a complete wool cycle wash, just for them! They are so much better for my feet - I have had chilblains perhaps twice since I began knitting socks about ten years ago. Previously, it was every single winter... Woollen socks (most are 75% wool) last a lot longer too - I've not thrown any out yet.

Also - complete bonus - they give me thinking time when I'm stuck on my writing.

So, if you're interested, here are a few I've made since the autumn...

The wool for these were all gifts. The centre and right pair are the most beautiful merino wool, so very silky to wear, and hand-dyed. The rainbow striped ones have a very thin silver lurex thread, which makes them sparkle. 

All of these have lurex thread in, too. The blue-purple I knitted for my mum for Christmas; had to undo the toes and take them back a little, as I'd guessed the size slightly wrong! But that's the beauty of these socks - they take very little effort to make them fit correctly. The red-green, I knitted for Squidgeling J, also for Christmas. The final ball is a purple-grey-pale lime mix that I'm going to knit for myself at some point. Have decided you can't beat sparkly toes...

I've only knitted one purple sock so far - that wool was a pressie at Christmas. The West Yorkshire Spinners random green was picked up on the way to Bristol; we have to stop to plug Sparky in to get us all the way there, and there's a shopping outlet with a charger AND a super little wool and yarn shop. So each time we've stopped there, I've been tempted by new colours and have succumbed to a ball. Or two. I liked the fact that in the case of WYS, I'm supporting the British wool industry as well - not many places hereabouts stock this particular brand. 

Now these have a story behind them; I was asked whether I'd be willing to make a couple of pairs for someone. She preferred handmade socks but was unable to source them from the family member who used to knit them for her. And - this shocked me SO much - she'd have to pay around £20 a pair if purchasing via Etsy. Seriously - £20 a pair! (Mind you, if the wool costs around £8 a ball minimum, it doesn't give the knitter much per hour of knitting...) I said yes, checked her shoe size and knitted up a pair of odds-and-sods fairly quickly. Forgot to take a pic of those, but she loved them, they fitted - hooray! - and I agreed to knit up two more pairs from wool she'd already bought. They're the ones in this pic. (The blue-grey ones are cabled, but shhhh, don't tell her! She's not picked them up yet.) 

Before you ask, no, I'm not going to make a habit of knitting socks for other people!! For a start, most people's feet are bigger than mine, so it takes longer. Secondly, if I'm knitting, I can't write. And thirdly, my fingers can get quite stiff if I do too much in a period of time (like two pairs in a week). 

I enjoy knitting socks, but I'm going to have to ration buying the wool. I have a bagful of leftovers - I could probably keep myself in odds-and-sods socks for the next ten years, without adding any extra colours. 

See what I mean? I did use some of the stash to knit little stars to use as decorations on my brown-paper-wrapped Christmas gifts this year, but it's not made much of an impression on the pile. 

Maybe I can allow myself to buy one ball a year? Oh, and if I'm bought a ball, I won't refuse it!