Turning Stash to Treasure

When I wrote HOOKED ON MURDER I didn't know what a stash was let alone have one.  To those not in the know stash refers to a supply of yarn.  By the time I wrote HOOKS CAN BE DECEIVING I had an overwhelming stash of yarn.  It had taken a long time to realize that it took a lot less time to buy yarn than to make something out of it.  And it was dangerous to walk across the room the yarn had taken over.  So many things to catch my foot on.

I began going through the yarn I had and following the idea of the Marie Kondo method started to give away the yarn that didn't bring me joy.  I brought bags to my knit and crochet group and gave some charity.  I also looked for ways to use up the yarn  kept.   I knitted wash clothes, started cowls I could work on in the car (when I was a passenger, of course).  But the project that I like making the best are granny square afghans.  For me it is all about mixing the colors and textures.  I like to separate the colors with black yarn which it turns out I have a really lot of.

I included the actual pattern for them colorful blankets in ON THE HOOK.  As I was looking at the

ones I've finished, I noticed  they reminded me of the seasons.

Winter

Spring

Summer

Fall

They are easy and relaxing to make and best of all are turning my stash into something useful.

Book Covers

No sooner sent in the corrections for the galley pages of GONE WITH THE WOOL, when my editor sent the art work for audio version of HOOKED ON MURDER. Shortly after that she sent the proposed cover for HOOKING FOR TROUBLE.

All these titles and books are getting a little confusing even for me. The art work for the audio version of HOOKED ON MURDER is pretty much the same as the book, only on the back there is a photo of me a and the actress who will do the reading.

I think the art department did a spectacular job on the cover of HOOKING FOR TROUBLE. I have mentioned before that the plot has to do with things Molly sees going on in the yard behind hers where a huge house has recently been built. It just so happens a huge house was recently built in the yard behind mine and might have been a bit of the inspiration for it :-).

Based only on my description they came up with something that looks a lot like the house behind mine. Unlike the one in the book, no one is living there yet. In fact they just put it on the market last week. Will anyone ever realize that a fictional murder took place there? Below is the view through my fence.

I am awaiting the edits on HOOKING FOR TROUBLE. I know they will come any day and then I’ll have maybe two weeks to go over the manuscript. In the meantime I have come up with another pattern to include. I had already put in a pattern for a scarf done with Tunisian crochet, but then I had Molly teach somebody how to crochet and have them make a simple beanie. When I first taught myself how to crochet I made a beanie. It was also the only project I made until many years later when I found the kids’ kit to make granny squares.

It took a few tries and different yarns before I came up with a pattern I was happy with. When I get the edits back, the pattern will get included. The amazing thing is it takes only about $1.25 worth of yarn and not too much time.

I have gotten some nice notes from readers lately. It always makes me happy when they say one of my books gave them an escape from a bad week or from not feeling good. My truest wish is that readers have a smile when they finish one of my books.

In the Blink of an Eye

So, I was on my way to yoga, feeling all mellow. It was a beautiful spring day. The orange trees have started to blossom and the air is sweet with their fragrance. And, at least for now, it seems like the “check engine” light coming on in my car last night was a false alarm.

There is a four way stop at my corner. I even mentioned it in Hooked on Murder. It’s the intersection that Officer James was hanging around looking for people who ran the stop signs. I wish he had been there tonight.

I stopped and noted both streets were empty. As I moved forward to make a left turn, a car roared out of nowhere, and flew through the stop sign to my left. I slammed on the brakes, but was sure there was no way it wasn’t going to hit me. In the few seconds, it was like time slowed down. I managed to note there were two boys in the car. Either teens or twentish. The car was dark gray and too expensive for them to have bought it with their own money. Somehow our cars never made contact. They continued on, not slowing for a moment as they rushed on down the street.

Shaken and muttering to myself about what I thought of the driver, I continued on my way. As I drove on, I realized I had a choice. I could stay tense and preoccupied with what had almost happened. I could keep feeling angry that not only did they go through the sign, but didn’t even have the sense to slow down after they almost hit me.

Or I could look at it the other way. I could be thrilled that by some miracle they had not hit me. I was okay. My car was unhurt.

I chose the latter. I let the whole thing go when I got to yoga and surrendered myself to the class. By the time we’d done our final relaxation, the whole episode had moved to the back of my mind.

I can’t control what happens, but I can control how I take it.

Have you ever had a near miss like mine? How did you feel afterwards?

The R Word

There is something nobody has talked about. The big R. Just a few days ago a gym friend of mine who knew me before my books deals asked me how I handled all the rejection. The easiest answer was that I just kept going.


But after I talked to her, I started to think about it. How did I keep on going despite boxes of rejections - everything from poorly reproduced copies of letters, to personal letters, to the we liked it, but not enough sort of letters.

The first answer that comes to mind that when I succeeded it was so sweet. The first time I remember feeling that way was in fifth grade. It was a particularly bad year for me. The first teacher left on a maternity leave and after that was followed by one substitute after another. Most of the time the class was bedlam. But in the middle of all that we had an assignment. I don’t even remember what it was just that I made up a story about going to Paris and Tokyo. Most of the information I used for the Paris part came from the cover of Seventeen Magazine - a beautiful shot of a model in front of the Eiffel Tower. My Tokyo trip was based on what I learned on the Mickey Mouse Club. I just remember something about cooking on a teppan grill. My story was a huge success. The teacher, which ever one it was, read it in class. It was my first shining moment in school.

Something similar happened in high school English. I wrote my first mystery story about jewels being smuggled in bird’s feathers. Most of my English papers didn’t please that particular teacher, but she liked the story well enough to read in class. It was my second shining moment in school.

And then in college everything changed when I started to work on the student newspaper. I began writing news stories. Seeing my name in print was pretty cool, but not as cool as when I started writing a weekly column. After all the years of being on the outside looking in, I was suddenly on the inside - all because of my writing.

I dreamed of working on a newspaper when I graduated, but that didn’t happen. It took years and years of writing all kinds of different things. There were lots of disappointments, and some victories. What kept me going was that just like my shining moments in school, the victories were so sweet that I was willing to climb over rocks and hear a million no thank yous to get to the yeses.

I had just about given up on ever selling a book. I was ready to give away the book I had on how to promote your first novel, figuring I would never have use for it. Maybe the Woman’s World stories, the one script I sold, and the assorted newspaper and magazine pieces were going to be it.

Even so I kept sending out the young adult mystery I’d written. Every time I dropped it in the mail, I said to myself that sometime it wouldn’t come back. And then it didn’t. Instead I got a call from a small publisher saying they wanted to publish it. That was just after new year’s in 2006. Blue Schwartz and Nefertiti’s Necklace came out in September of that year.

Meanwhile I had the idea for a crochet mystery. That summer I met my agent at a RWA conference and discussed the idea. She said the magic words. “If you write it, I can sell it.”
Right after Blue Schwartz came out, I wrote the proposal for the crochet mystery series. My agent sent it to Berkley and St. Martins. And within two weeks, both of them wanted it. From no books, I was in a bidding war. Well, not exactly a war. Berkley upped their offer and I went with them.

The first time I saw a copy of Hooked on Murder face out in the Border’s in Chicago, all the no’s to get there fell into the background. It was the sweetest moment of all.

Nobody exactly told me how to handle rejection. My father definitely did let me know it was part of writing. My advice is to concentrate on those sweet moments when you get accepted and maybe to keep some chocolate around to get you through the times when you’re not.

Crochet Photos

A while back I got several emails from people suggesting I post photos of the crochet patterns included in my books on my website. Since there aren’t photographs of the finished products in the books, it did seem like a good idea. A good idea, but something I would have to focus on to complete, so I put it off.

The combination of my web guy saying he was going to Africa for six weeks and the fact that I was making some changes to my website finally got me to get it together to do the pictures. It sounds easy, particularly these days with digital cameras. Just snap a few pictures and upload them. Well, it isn’t quite that easy.

First, I couldn’t find any of the Filet Bookmarks from By Hook or By Crook, so I had to make another one. Ditto with the Granny Square Washcloth from Hooked on Murder, though it went a lot faster. Where to take the photos was also an issue. I thought of a bench in my yard that gets nice light, but finally turned my dinging room into my photo studio. The three french doors with a southern exposure let in good light. Then there was the matter of how to display the projects. The bookmark and granny square were pretty easy. My son lent me a black fuzzy board that made a good backdrop for the smaller pieces. I wanted to get a dress form to put the Hugs of Comfort shawl from Dead Men Don't Crochet on. Well, I was looking for an excuse to get one anyway. Joann’s had them on sale, but when I went to the local super store expecting to buy one, I found out they are by order only.

I couldn’t wait for the dress form - remember my web guy is off to Africa next Monday. So, my dining room chair got to wear the shawl. I used the same chair to drape the Cuddle Blanket from By Hook or By Crook over. That was after I got my cat off of the shawl and cuddle blanket. He had rolled them together and was on the way to turning them into a cat coccoon. He left his mark on the black fuzzy board, too. Thank heavens for those lint remover wands.

I popped my memory stick in my computer and looked through the photos. The cat was in on that too. Fourteen pound Rocky has this habit of coming up behind me and jumping over the back of my chair and landing on my shoulders, then working his way into my lap where he does his best to get me to pay attention to him instead of whatever I’m trying to do. So, it took longer than it could have to choose the photos and send them to my web guy.

There was a lot of back and forth between us getting it straight what photo went with what book. Who could blame him? There are a lot of hooks in the titles and he isn’t a crocheter.

Now at last the photos are in the right order and connected with the right book and out there for everyone to see at www.BettyHechtman.com.

My Tool of Choice

This week we’ve been writing about our favorite tools. For me it’s pens. I love all types, but I particularly favor fine line felt tips and roller balls.

My real appreciation of working with a pen started when I was an art student in college. When I drew with a pencil, the drawings were vague, tentative and basically wishy-washy. But as one of my teachers pointed out, my work in pen was much bolder and better. There was something about going for broke with the black pen that gave me courage. Even if the drawing was off and I drew over it to try to repair the mistake, there was much more vitality than in my efforts with a pencil. The pressure that it is unerasable seems to work for me.

When I’m playing around with a crochet idea, I take notes as a go. If I do it in pencil, I tend to erase the directions I tried, but that didn’t work. I keep erasing and writing in the latest attempt until I find the one that turns out. But if I work in pen, I’ll just draw a line through the bad directions and write in the next try. I hadn’t thought about it, but the pen way is really better. Then I have a road map that shows how I got to the final pattern that works.

There are some pens that I like the best. I’m not fond of the clicky kind of ball points or gel pens that have thick points. I found Staedtler triple ball M pens at an art store. I swear those pens make my handwriting more legible. I also like Staedtler sketch pens and the hard to find Sanford Expresso pens.

When Hooked on Murder was coming out, I splurged and bought a Mont Blanc pen thinking I would use it for signing. But I was too worried I’d lose it, so it’s never made it out of my workroom. I think the Sharpie fine line is much better for signing anyway. And they are cheap enough that losing them isn’t a concern.

I like fountain pens, too and have a bunch of them, but they are too messy to carry with. Then there are my pens with the different points that stick onto a handle. Those are to be dipped in india ink for drawing. I have some Italian glass pens I got at the Tuesday Morning store that are still in their boxes. I think they are mostly to look at anyway.

Oh, I forgot about Le Pens. They are trim little felt tips that are good for writing or drawing. I found the Le Pen in the bag of different kinds of pens from my last trip to an art store in Chicago. I’m just a fool for pens. Like art supplies and yarn, pens of all types feel full of possibilities to me. I am writing this under duress. I have a cat on my lap fighting for attention by hitting the keyboard. I think he’s trying to tell me I’ve said enough about pens. He’s probably right.

Aloha

I’m in Kona, Hawaii at Left Coast Crime. It is supposed to rain 11 days a year here. It was raining last night when I arrived and is raining again today. I am taking that as special. Not that the rain is bad here. Except that the wet pavement made my feet sleep out from under me this morning as I was carrying some bags back from the gourmet market. Not that that was too bad either. Some man came to help me up, apparently expecting the worst (he said something about how easy it was to break an elbow). I was fine. Not even a scrap or scratch. I got up and continued on back to the hotel.

This is the first conference that actually has my books in the onsight bookstore. It was pretty cool to walk in and see Hooked on Murder, Dead Men Don’t Crochet and Blue Schwartz and Nefertiti’s Necklace all on display. So when I have my signing time, there will actually be books somebody might want me to sign.

Last night on the flight I was crocheting the pouch purse for the fourth book. I love crocheting on a plane. It is like meditating. I don’t think, my fingers move and I totally relax. One of the fight attendants asked me what I was making. I explained about the crochet mysteries and gave both her and her partner flight attendant bookmarks for Dead Men Don’t Crochet. She got all excited about the book marks and the books, she wanted to give me an on the house drink. Hopeless non drinker that I am I declined. Instead she opened the snack drawer and gave me cheese and crackers and a bag of nuts which was a welcome gift as I got to the hotel late and food operations were limited. The gift became my dinner.

I love Hawaii. Every place I’ve been on the islands is great. This is my first trip to Kona. My room has a balcony with an ocean view and I could sit and look out forever. There are some side trip possibilities. I’m pretty sure I’m going to go whale watching. Ah, I looked up and the sun is beginning to come out even as I still here the tinkle of rain hitting something. I’m going to go look for a rainbow.

Email and the Author

In the old days if you wanted to contact an author it was a whole production. I wrote a letter to Herman Wouk once. I had read and reread Marjorie Morningstar a number of times, but the letter was actually about The Winds of War and War and Remembrance. I don’t remember what I said, but I do remember that I stayed up all night reading to finish one of them. That is a high compliment. When I’m tired, I’m tired and usually nothing will keep me from hitting the pillow.

I had to send the letter in care of the publisher. I assume he received it, but I never got a response.

Fast forward to now. What a change thanks to email. Since most writers seem to have website that allow you to send an email, it’s a snap to contact them. Or contact me, in the case of my website.

Since I only have the two crochet mysteries out and the YA mystery, I am relatively new to hearing from readers. The emails have mostly been fun. Someone sent me a picture of an amazing crochet bedspread she’d made that looked like a quilt. Someone else sent an email insisting you couldn’t crochet with string (something from Hooked on Murder).

Lots of people emailed just to say they liked one or both of the books – always nice to hear. A few of the email writers seemed to believe that my characters are real – those were a little spooky. I mentioned a crochet diet book in Hooked on Murder and someone emailed me saying she’d been looking everywhere for a copy and wanted to know where it was available – I had to tell her it existed only in my imagination.

The best email story involves someone who lives in my area. She’d been inspired by the books to take up crochet again and wanted to know if I knew any groups she could join. I sent her the details on the one I go to. Actually I haven’t been to the group since before the holidays thanks to my long bout with a flu bug and a hair cut appointment. But several days later I got an email from the same woman thanking me. She’d joined the group and seemed very happy with the people in it. It will be fun to meet her when I finally make it to a Thursday meeting.

I suppose someday I may not be able to answer each email personally, but for now I do, always thanking people for taking the time to email me. It’s easier to do than what I went through with Herman Wouk, but it still takes some effort.

Dead Men Don't Crochet

Tuesday was the official release date of Dead Men Don’t Crochet. It turns out that bookstores don’t like to do author events in December - that is unless you’re a superstar which I’m not.

But drop ins to sign stock or okay, so that is what I plan to do while I’m in icy Chicago.

57th Street Books was my first stop and they were expecting me. I’ve mentioned this bookstore before. It’s located in the basement of an apartment building and I set some of the action in my YA mystery Blue Schwartz and Nefertiti’s Necklace there. I also wrote an article about it for the Another Great American Bookstore feature in Byline Magazine.

These days 57th Street Books has a whole new identity going. Not only is it my favorite bookstore, but the Obama family’s as well. Actually my whole neighborhood is going through a flurry of excitement. There have been lots of Nobel Prize winners around here and well known writers like Saul Bellows, Sara Paretsky and the woman who wrote the Mrs. Pickerall Goes to Mars series. I can’t remember her name, but she lived in our old building. And my high school French teacher wrote the children’s classic Mr. Popper’s Penguins. But having a President- Elect seems to have turned a special spotlight on Hyde Park.

Laura Prail brought out a stacks of Hooked on Murder, Dead Men Don’t Crochet and Blue Schwartz and Nefertiti’s Necklace for me to sign. While I signed I asked her about the Obama effect on the bookstore. Of course, business was up and she said some people just came in wanting to buy a book from the store the President-Elect shops in. I thought it was kind of cool that without even knowing he was doing it, Obama was helping authors.

When all the books were signed, Laura showed me the poster of my bookcover hanging on the wall. She said she was going to make a display of my books below it. All I could think was wow. And as an afterthought I wondered if Michelle likes cozy mysteries.

Finding Kindred Spirits

I was so busy reading about Hugh Jackman being the sexiest man alive in People Magazine I lost track of time and all of a sudden I remembered it was Friday night and time to write my blog. I usually have a topic in mind, but this week my mind is blank.

While I was trying to think of something, I went to the Ravelry.com site. I’ve been meaning to do it for awhile and since I was basically stalling, it seemed like the perfect time. It has around 150,000 members who like yarn arts. I found out about it by chance when they started a discussion group about Hooked on Murder and one of the people in the group emailed me and told me about it.

You have to be a member of Ravelry.com to take part in a discussion group and at least at that time there was a waiting list. I finally moved up the line and became a member. It was very cool to go to the discussion group and read the posts. It also felt a little odd to have people talking about my characters and which guy they preferred for Molly. Some people gave casting suggestions in case it ever became a movie. It was fun to see how they pictured my characters. I never would have thought of Meryl Streep for CeeCee Collins.

Tonight when I went to Ravelry.com, I looked at some of the other groups. There are zillions of them from all over the world - and even one dedicated to my little corner of the San Fernando Valley.

Another group is run by the Crochet Liberation Front. They gave me an jokey award for Hooked on Murder. Something about setting your picot free. Knitters have lots and lots of novels and mysteries. Crocheters only have me and Bendy Carter. I decided to join the discussion group and left an introduction.

Now I just hope I can find my way back to the groups I just joined.

Real Versus Imaginary

When I turned in the manuscript for Hooked on Murder my editor asked me if there was a bookstore in Tarzana that readers might think was the one in the book. I told her not to worry. There are two country clubs in Tarzana and it is where Brittany Spears came to shave her head, but there are no bookstores.

The other day a woman sent me an email and asked if I was going to post of photo of the charity afghan that appears in Hooked on Murder. I was sorry to disappoint her, but the afghan like the bookstore only exist in my imagination.

I began to think about Molly’s Tarzana versus the real deal. The street names are the same, but all the businesses are factitious. I took an adorable building I saw in Carmel and mentally moved it to Tarzana to become the Cottage Shoppe where lots of the action in Dead Men Don’t Crochet takes place. I do know exactly where it would be and am always a little disappointed when I see the lackluster building that is really in that spot.

I love the café and cupcake place I created and only wish they really existed. I’d be a good customer for sure.

The other day my son and I went for a walk in the nearby mountains. We always park at the end of a residential street and then walk into the Santa Monica Mountain Conservancy. Just before the street dead ends there is a driveway that hugs the curve of the mountain. In my Tarzana that driveway leads to the house where the murder in By Hook or Crook takes place. I have spent so much time imagining that house I expect to see it when I look down the long road. But there in no old two-story Spanish style house with a red tiled roof. The actual house is barely visible and not even on the same side of the driveway. And yet, in my mind I can see the dark wood floors and huge pots of mother-in-law tongue plants, the stairway to the second floor, and the bedroom with the victim sprawled in her bed.

I might change the house, but I would never touch the view we get from our walk. I couldn’t possibly better that in my imagination. Picture a valley ringed by mountains turning purple and gold as the sun slips behind them. Streets like red and white ribbons of light that cut through the areas of puff ball trees. All across the valley twinkling lights are coming on. Houses on the ridge below us, look like miniatures as does the car on the street in front of them.

I know the view well enough to know the tiny spot of blinding white lights belongs to the parking structure at Topanga Mall. And all the way across the valley and part way up the mountains on the other side, there is a line of orangish lights. They belong to the park in Porter Ranch where you get the same view I’m seeing but in reverse.

Behind us the dirt road and hillside melt into the low light and we hear the eerie cries of coyotes thinking about dinner. Time to go home.

Serendipity

Friday afternoon I took the copy edit of By Hook or Crook to FedEx and let out a sigh of relief. The manuscript would get to my editor right on time. Afterwards I was trying to decide which Trader Joe’s to go to. Should I pick the closest, but possibly get stuck in after school traffic, or go to the further one which has lots and lots of parking and no school buses involved?

The far away one won.

While I was wandering the store, I saw a familiar face. A woman who used to take indoor cycling with me and who I hadn’t seen for a long time. We said hello and shared a few gym comments and then went on shopping.

We were in the produce department and my only excuse is that as a vegetarian I get very excited about heirloom tomatoes and bags with three different colored potatoes. It was only when I passed her again that my vegetable induced brain fog cleared and I remembered. Pam is a celebrant. In case you don’t know what that means – she presides over funerals. Maybe presides is the wrong word. Maybe handles funerals is a better word. The point is she makes the service very personal. No template where you just fill in the names and dates. She had told me about it during our shared cycling classes. I liked the title celebrant and it stuck with me. When I wrote a funeral scene in Hooked on Murder I mentioned the family had gotten the A list celebrant, while actually picturing Pam. But by then Pam wasn’t coming to the gym anymore, so I never got a chance to tell her. Until today.

When I passed her in front of the dairy case, I told her about a celebrant being in the book and gave her a bookmark from the supply I conveniently always have in my purse. She was surprised and happy with the news. I realized she didn’t even know I was a writer. That’s the thing about the gym – we’re all in tee shirts and stretching pants and barely know each others names let alone what anybody does outside of the gym. She gave me her card and said she’d like to write something about my book for a newsletter she writes for. We’re going to keep in touch.

If I’d gone to the other Trader Joe’s none of that would have happened.

Changes

Sometimes it’s good to break out of habit and do things differently. For Hooked on Murder, Dead Men Don’t Crochet and By Hook or Crook, my pattern of working has been pretty much the same. I would drink my morning coffee and handwrite on a yellow legal pad. Then sometime later I would type what I’d written into my computer.

It seemed to always take longer to type in what I’d written and I would end up continuing with the yellow pads, while trying to catch up with putting everything into the computer. It was easy to get the yellow sheets mixed up and there was the issue of reading my handwriting.

So, as I began my fourth book for now titled Murder and the Marshmallow Stitch, I thought I would cut out a step. No more yellow pads. I’d just go write to typing it in the computer. Sure that it would be faster, I tried working that way for a month. Usually I wait until I finish the first draft to read what I have, but this time, I started reading after completing three chapters.

I’m glad I didn’t wait. It was obvious when I read the fourth time I’d stopped in mid sentence and started the beginning over again that going right to the computer just wasn’t working. Oddly enough, it wasn’t faster either. When I work on the yellow pads, my pen can’t seem to move fast enough. Not so when it was my fingers on the keyboard.

So, this morning, I pulled out my pile of yellow pads and found a nice pen and started handwriting from where I’d left off typing.

So maybe it was good to try something different, but the old way worked better.

I had different experience with a crochet project I just started. I want to make a pair of wrist warmers. I happen to have very long arms and sleeves never cover my wrists, so aside from being cute, they seem useful. Generally crochet starts with a row of chain stitches, but this pattern mixes the row of chain stitches with the first row of double crochets. In essence you do the foundation chain stitches and the first row at the same time. They are called extended stitches and though I’ve seen them a few times before, it seems to be a new idea. I mentioned them to the leader of my crochet group and she had never heard of them.

At first the directions looked confusing. But as I did the first row, all of a sudden I understood what I was doing and it made perfect sense and was much easer than making the chains stitches and then doing the first row. Now I’m curious to see if I can change other patterns into using these extended stitches.

This time the new way might just change how I crochet from now on. I guess it’s good to have an open mind.

Food for Thought

My family’s favorite part of the crochet mysteries are the recipes. They are my official tasters and love their job. They love it so much that both my husband and son are urging me to put in more than one recipe per book.

In all fairness, I used to cook a lot, and I guess they miss it. Okay, I don’t guess, I know they miss it because I’m always hearing about what I used to make. But back to the recipes in the books.

Hooked on Murder (which I found out just went into a second printing) features Helen’s Pound Cake. Helen was my mother and the pound cake was her all occasion favorite to make. My mother always made a big deal out of birthdays, and she liked to make cakes for people who normally wouldn’t have had a birthday cake.

I followed in her footsteps and the pound cake became a regular in my baking repertoire. Even so, I wanted to bake it again when I was adding the recipe to the book. I was including a recipe for butter cream icing and planned to ice the cake when it was cool. But my husband and son were so excited about an actual home made cake in the house, pieces of it started disappearing before it stopped steaming. By the time it was cool enough to ice, there was a little over a slice left. I had to make the full amount of icing to check how it turned out, but there is only so much butter cream icing you can put on one piece of cake. So, I trashed the rest. I’m still hearing about that. I didn’t think there was much you could do with a bowl of icing, but they are still tossing ideas out about what they could have done with it.

I included a recipe for cheesecake cupcakes in the Dead Men Don’t Crochet. I don’t have quite the same emotional connection with that recipe. It was one I came up with a long time ago, long before cupcakes were such an in item. I made several batches of them when I was checking the recipe. The recipe made eighteen of them and with the buttery graham cracker crust and the cream cheese top, they were rich and delicious. They lasted a little longer than the pound cake.

The third book now called By Hook or By Crook has a recipe for California Noodle Pudding. You can eat it hot or cold, as a side dish or a main course for breakfast. It has fruit and nuts and a little bit of sugar and vanilla, so it could almost be a dessert. It was my standard pot luck entry and so good I’d find myself saying mmmm when I ate it. This is another reason I don’t cook that much anymore. I like my own creations too much.

When I was in Chicago, I spent time going through my mother’s recipe file. I found all kinds of good stuff like a chocolate cake made with mash potatoes, and another made with yeast. Then there was one she called the Truant Officers Carrot Cake. I’m guessing that since my mother worked in the office of an elementary school, that’s who she got the recipe from. But I decided to go with one of my mother’s party creations. Nobody liked to give a party more than my mother. She always said she’d be planning her next party in the midst of her current one.

Since we basically had no money, my mother always made everything and generally something inexpensive. My parents had lots of brunch parties with waffle. For evening events, she came up with a sweet and a savory variation of appetizer puffs. I’m going to use the recipes for both in the fourth book. After she baked the small puffs, she’d fill some with crab salad and the others with homemade custard and a dollop of whipped cream. Just reading over the recipe reminded me of her standing in the kitchen, stirring the puff batter in a saucepan (you have to heat some of the ingredients). She would say they were so easy to make and then worry they weren’t going to turn out. My mother always worried that whatever she cooked wasn’t going to turn out.

Of course, everything always did.

Viva Las Vegas

I am going to Las Vegas on Sunday. The outward reason is a convention for our family business. But I have my own personal mission.

Over the years I’ve watched Vegas change from the days when my husband was William Morris personal appearance agent and I’d tag along when he’d go to cover acts like The Letterman, The Carpenters, and Charo among others. The Strip had lots of open spaces and was sleepy compared with now. The big deal in those days was the coconut cake at the Riviera Hotel’s coffee shop.

No more.

The hotels are like theme parks with things like an indoor rainforest, shopping streets with ceilings that look like the sky, a lake with a water show and a fragrant conservatory that has it plantings changed every couple of months.

We always used to fly and I’d scoff at people that drove, thinking it was a long drive through a ruthless desert. Until we decided to drive once. This is why it is always good to keep an open mind. It turned out I loved the drive and we never went back to flying.

The ride goes by quickly and it has become a fun family trip. It even became the inspiration for a short story I wrote that appeared in Woman’s World magazine. The very coolest thing about it, is that when I fly back from Chicago and the plane passes Vegas it follows along the road we drive on. I always fly back at night and I can see the 15 from the plane. The car headlights are like a faint line through the darkness. I can pick out the giant thermometer at Baker and the huge conglomeration of fast food places are in Barstow. I can even pick out the line of cars looping around and coming down the Cajon pass.

You don’t usually think of Las Vegas and crochet in the same sentence, but for me there is a special connection.

Several years ago when we went to this same convention something happened to me that totally turned my life around. This is where my mission comes in.

Holly Golightly went to Tiffany’s to feel good. For me it is going to FAO Schwartz. I want to go back there and wander through the second floor and all the art kits and think about how when I walked through there a few years ago I had no idea my life was about to change big time.

It all hinged on a little blue suitcase with a banner across it that said Granny Squares. I have always loved granny squares, but had no idea how to make them. I had taught myself how to single crochet enough to make a hat, but that was it. Granny squares, with their open spaces and the way they seemed to go around rather than across, mystified me. But with a kid’s kit, I thought I’d be able to conquer them.

I bought the little blue suitcase with great excitement. But I didn’t open it until I was back from the trip. I didn’t want to mess up the yarn it came with, so I tried following the directions with some yarn I had around. The first one I tried turned out to be lopsided as I had missed a corner somewhere. The next one I made turned out to have all four corners, but since it was all one color and my stitches were loopy and all over the place, it was hard to recognize the design. I had to hold it at a distance to see that I really had made a granny square. After that I used the kit and got more yarn. I kept making granny squares over and over until I didn’t need directions, until I realized there were variations on the pattern and I came up with my own.

I had fallen in love with crochet and now that I could make a granny square, all things seemed possible. And then a light bulb went off in my head. Hadn’t my agent Jessica suggested I write a cozy mystery? Why not mix the mystery with the crochet? If nothing else I knew I would learn how to crochet more things because it would all be research.

The story has a happy ending. I did learn how to crochet and the book, HOOKED ON MURDER, turned into a six book series.

So, while all the people are pulling levers on slot machines and roasting themselves by the pool, I will be making my way to the Forum Shops in Caesar’s Palace. I’ll go past the giant horse that marks the entrance of the toy store and ride the escalator to where it all began and think about how great life is.

I hope the store is still there.

Blocked No More

What is my blog going to be about this week? The blinking curser moves on the blank screen and I watch with my blank mind. Whenever I feel so-called writers block, there are two ways out. They both start with E, and are sort of complimentary and opposite at the same time.

What are they? Eating and exercise.

Since I’m in Chicago, eating means a short trip across the street to a neighborhood restaurant. I have my notebook and pen. Sure enough, as soon as I order, the doors in my mind open up and ideas begin to tumble out. My french toast comes and I balance my notebook on my knees and write between bites. I’m not a syrup person. The ball of butter melts and slides over the triangles of grilled bread and I know the other E will come in handy to take care of all those calories when I finish.

This restaurant is filled with memories as is everything else in my old neighborhood. This particular spot used to be a different restaurant where I waited tables when I was in college. Random thoughts and memories pour out of my pen. Though I have lived far longer in Los Angeles than in Hyde Park, between growing up here and maintaining a connection, it still feels like home.

The french toast is gone in no time. If I were in L.A., I’d head for the gym for the exercise part of the unblocking, but here I just hit the streets. No car, all feet. There are choices about where to walk. I could go to the beach and walk along the jogging- bicycle path that leads toward downtown. I could go to the Museum of Science and Industry and walk around inside and see cool things like a giant heart and hatching baby chicks. Instead I head along 57th Street toward the University of Chicago campus.

As usual there is lots of action on the street. Is it my imagination or is there a higher level of excitement in the air. It’s not just my old neighborhood, but Barack Obama’s current one. Though I think he’s off somewhere else just now. When I look in the window of the Medici bakery, the counter staff are wearing shirts that say Obama Eats Here.

He’s not the only famous name connected with this piece of real estate. When I was a kid the bakery and the Thai restaurant next to it were Steinway’s drugstore. It had a small cafeteria and was where we went for cokes after school. There’s an oft repeated story connected with that cafeteria. It seems that one day a group of men were huddled in one of the booths, talking and scribbling on napkins. Apparently, they had been sitting there too long and the manager threw them out.

Who were they? How about Enrico Fermi and his colleagues. And their napkin scribbles were the atomic bomb.

Their lab was a few blocks away tucked under the athletic field stands. The stands and field are gone, replaced by a library.

It is quiet inside the confines of the campus. The students aren’t back yet. I stop at Botany Pond. And sit on the arched bridge that was a gift of some graduating class. Another spot loaded with memories. I used to bring my fox terrier here when I was a kid. He loved to go wading in the water. Much later, I brought my son here when he was small and he fell in. It’s only about a foot deep, so he was more embarrassed than in danger. My YA mystery BLUE SCHWARTZ AND NERFERITI’S NECKLACE is set in Hyde Park and has several scenes at this lovely little pond.

I pass through the heart of the campus and exit onto 58th Street. The Oriental Institute is open so I stop in. A lot of Blue Schwartz takes places in this museum and I remember stopping by and checking out the exhibits when getting the book published was still just a hope. I have spent so much time imagining Blue and all the action that goes on in this small museum that even now when I look around, I half expect to see her sneaking through a door.

On the way back, I swing by 57th Street Books. As you can see by the photo, it is located in the basement of an apartment building, but don’t let that fool you. Even though the windows offer a view of people legs as they go by, the inside is inviting and goes for rooms and rooms. Okay, I admit it, I checked the mystery section for HOOKED ON MURDER. A copy was sticking out as if someone had just looked at it. And I went in the kid’s section and made sure they had a copy of BLUE SCHWARTZ. Of course, I didn’t leave empty handed. I really did need another crochet book. This one even had a pattern for crocheted sushi. How can you pass that up?

By now ideas for all sorts of things beyond this blog were floating around in my head. Between the notes I had and all the ideas, I couldn’t wait to get home to the blank screen of my computer so I could fill it up. The double Es always work.

Me and My CAL

This weekend marks the end of summer. Maybe it’s not the official end of summer, but the mental end. Though to me September always feels like a beginning. After the languid days of July and August, everything seems to start up again.

Some people think spring is full of promise. For me it’s the fall. I think of crisp days and changing leaves. That’s really a throwback to growing up in Chicago. In L.A., September is actually the hottest month and instead of looking for changing leaves, I’m still planting flowers.

I’m having a hard time getting a flow going on this blog entry. One of my cats, a huge black and white one named Rocky, keeps pestering me and knocking things around. Any second I expect him to come over the back of my chair and start hugging me. Yes, he does really hug me. He puts his front paws around my neck and purrs in my ear. He prefers it when my hair is loose. He likes to stick his paws in my hair and flip it around. He’s an unusual cat, at least compared to the other cats we’ve had. We adopted him along with his “sister” last March. He’s seven, she’s ten, so their already pretty set in their ways.

This isn’t supposed to be about my cats or my dog who was sick last week, but is now recovered. Or the blind dog that showed up in my driveway. Luckily, she had a collar with a phone number on it. The point I was on my way to was that I did start something. I joined a CAL. What’s a CAL, you ask? I didn’t know either the first time I saw the letters. Eventually I figured out it means Crochet Along. It seems like it should really be CA then, but I guess CAL looks better. Even knowing what the letters stood for, I still wasn’t sure what it was.

I noticed a group that meets in a library back east had done a Crochet Along with HOOKED ON MURDER. In that case, it appears the members all used the instructions for a granny square wash cloth I included in the book. Then they posted some of the final projects. I was pretty cool to see what they had made and know it came from my head.

The Crochet Along I joined is online through the Lions Brand yarn site. They showed a photo of the Crochet Along project which is a lovely afghan made up of squares. The whole thing is done in one color, but the stitches in the squares vary. I liked the idea of squares. They are portable and when you finish one you have a sense of accomplishment. Since I’m going to Chicago on Wednesday and like to crochet on the plane, the afghan squares seemed perfect.

They asked that you introduced yourself by leaving a posting. I left a posting the other day and the number next to it was something like 167. Now there are over a thousand postings of potential CALers. I read a lot of them. It turns out that many of them were already altering the kind of yarn and don’t plan to use the Fisherman’s Wool that I spent the afternoon looking for. Since it’s my first CAL, I didn’t know that you didn’t have to follow the rules or apparently the pattern either as some of the posters were going to change that, too.

Actually, there don’t seem to be any rules for the Lions Brand CAL. We all more or less make the same thing and then at the end there’s a chance to post a photo. During the CAL, there’s a chance to aks questions. I’m not sure with over a thousand people how that’s going to work. But it should be interesting. Many of the people who joined seemed to think it would give them the incentive to finish something. I guess I’m not the only one with a room full of unfinished projects. Uh oh, the cat is sitting behind me and looks like he’s getting ready to jump.

As a last thought - I will post a photo of whatever I have done of the afghan at the end of the CAL. I just hope it is more than one square.

In My Own Backyard

The other morning I had an experience that with a few changes could have easily been in HOOKED ON MURDER. Somehow the action always seems to show up where ever Molly is - even in her own backyard.

There I was in my night gown, drinking my morning coffee when I heard this loud noise. At first I thought it was the replacement instant hot water thing we recently had put in. When it goes through whatever it goes through it sounds kind of like a plane overhead. But this noise sounded different and definitely like it was coming from outside. When I went out into the yard and looked up, a helicopter was hovering directly above me. I mean if they had dropped something out of it, it would have hit me on the head. I think the helicopter situation in Southern California is different than other places. They are all over the place here. The police use them, all the news stations have them. Big Army ones fly over occasionally. When there’s a forest fire, large red ones ferry huge containers of water.

The one above me wasn’t a police helicopter. They always seem to circle and make a thwacking sound. This one was staying in one place and making a loud constant drone. The way it was hovering made me pretty sure it was a TV news one. I’ve seen them before, hanging like dragon flies when there was the end of a police car chase or a bank robbery in the area.

So there was obviously some news story happening nearby. I rushed inside and looked out the front window, expecting to see maybe a SWAT team moving down the street or at least a bunch of police cruisers. The street was quiet. Even the landscape workers across the street weren’t there.

I tried going back to my coffee, but the noise made it impossible to ignore the helicopter and I went back outside and stared up at it again. It was in the exact same spot. With a thought that whatever was going on might be live on TV, I turned on the small kitchen set and started flipping through the stations. That TV isn’t connected to anything and relies on an old rabbit ears antenna for reception so the lower channels were all fuzz, but I could tell by the sound it wasn’t any breaking news. I kept moving up through the channels and then suddenly when I got to the Fox station, there in the corner was a notation saying something like live from Sky Fox.

There was a shot of a backyard and some woman in a red dress talking on the phone. Who knew Jillian Reynolds, the co host of Good Day L.A., apparently is one of my neighbors and that she had just come back from a vacation in Cabo and the show decided to make a surprise visit via the camera on the helicopter.

So there I was listening to the helicopter over my head and watching what it was seeing on my TV. Maybe it’s just me, but it seemed kind of interesting strange. It seemed like the kind of thing that would happen to Molly, only if it had happened to her there would be more to the story.

Molly would put down her crocheting and figured out which house it was and probably showed up there in time to find a body floating in the pool or at least ended up on camera.

Me? I just finished my coffee and thought I have something to put in my blog.

My Mother's Daughter

It’s official. I have become my mother. I’m not saying it’s a bad thing. No, I am developing one of my mother’s best traits. She could strike up a conversation anywhere with anybody. You could have dropped her on Mars and she would have been friends with those Martians in no time. She met Florence who became a life long friend on a street corner.

The downside was my father was always worrying when she went out on an errand and never came back – until he learned to look outside. Sure enough it would turn out my mother had run into somebody and lost track of time as they stood on the street talking.

For years I never shared her ability to strike up a conversation with anyone. I was the wallflower who couldn’t think of anything to say.

WAS is the operative word. A few days ago I was in Michael’s picking up some more yarn for the crocheted Cuddle Blanket in DEATH AND DOILIES. I often pass other shoppers, but it always pretty much been a ships passing in the night sort of thing. But this time it was different. A woman came down the aisle and joined me looking at the baby soft yarn. She glanced at the skein I was holding and the next thing I knew she was telling me that her daughter who lived in Hong Kong had one birth child, but had chosen to adopt a sibling. She was a knitter and wanted to make a blanket for the new addition. Her daughter was adamant it not be a gender specific color.

She asked about the Baby Cloud yarn I was holding and then showed me a creamy yellow baby soft yarn and wanted my opinion. Together we picked out an off white to go with it – she wanted to make a blanket with two strands of yarn.

Then I was telling her about the crochet and knit group I belong to and inviting her to join. She took down the details and I remembered I had some bookmark for HOOKED ON MURDER in my purse and gave her one.

It turned out she only read mysteries and was just now looking for something new to read. The fact that my book take place in Tarzana and we were standing in Tarzana made her that much more interested.

As I walked to the front to pay for my yarn, I knew my mother was smiling from wherever she is. I finally got her ease of conversation.

I hope this new found ability is here to stay. I am going to be on a radio show again and this time for more than five minutes. It’s a show called A Touch of Grey ( www.atouchofgrey.com) and is syndicated on 50 stations including WABC 77 in New York (Saturday nights between 10:00 pm and 11:00 pm) and KRLA 870 in Los Angeles (Sundays 12:00 noon to 1:00 pm). The taping is next Thursday and I am going to be talking about how a few years ago my life went from not being close to my dreams to taking a right turn on the road to everything I ever wanted.

What about you? Do you see your mother’s traits in yourself?

Handmade versus Store-Bought

I belong to a knit and crochet group that meets once a week. Our leader Paula always reads something from a book of knitting thoughts. Most of them are appropriate for crochet too, except maybe when the author commented on how wrong crochet was – but that’s another story.

A few weeks ago, Paula read a piece about why people bother spending hours and hours making something when they could just go buy the same scarf or afghan at the store.

It made me think about it. There is definitely something magic about watching a ball of yarn turn into some usable item. But it’s more than that. There is something about a handmade item that a store bought one can never measure up to even if it is more perfect than the slightly crooked edge of the handmade version.

I think when you make something, you put something extra in it. Call if love, your vibrations, or your feelings – the item carries something of you with it. Why else would my agent Jessica Faust tell me she likes to use the pot holders her grandmother made even though they are old and stained. Why else would Karen write a post to my last week’s blog and mention the crocheted items she has from her grandmother and how she wants to learn to crochet so she can leave things for her grand kids. It isn’t the what the items are, it’s about who made them.

I read a post on the Crochet Partners list about a woman who had lost someone close and the people in her office wanted to do something for her and so they got together and crocheted a blanket. She kept it on her chair at work and wrapped it around herself and took it home and did the same. It was as if the feelings, the caring, and the time the makers had put into it had all became part of the blanket and it helped the woman through a terribly painful time. Just buying a blanket no matter how lovely would never have done the same.

In my crochet series, the Tarzana Hookers are always making something for charity. In HOOKED ON MURDER they all make squares that are joined into an afghan for an auction to raise money for a pet charity. In DEAD MEN DON’T CROCHET they make shawls they call Hugs of Comfort for women at a shelter. In DEATH AND DOILIES they make book marks for a library sale and blankets for traumatized children. As I wrote about their efforts, I realized how much more meaning there is to donating something that has been handmade.

Obviously it doesn’t have to be crocheted to have meaning. Anything handmade is the same. It is all about putting something of yourself into the making. My mother didn’t knit or crochet. Her only craft work was a few needlepoint pieces she had turned into pillows. And every time I look at them, I think of her. My husband treasures the toy dog his mother made even if it’s head is not completely attached anymore.

And there is a gift for the makers as well. What could be more satisfying than knowing you’ve created something that is going to mean so much to someone else? Somewhere a preemie is going to be cuddled by a pink hat with a pom pom you made. A friend’s spirits are warmed by the scarf you made just for her in her favorite shade of purple. Or your grandchild naps peacefully under the sunny yellow coverlet you made.

Handmade things always come from the heart.