Labor Day Biking and Grilling

We had wanted to go on a bike ride on Sunday, but it just didn't work out so we postponed and went on Labor Day instead. We were originally going to go up to Stinson Beach to hike on Labor day, but I had been looking forward to this bike ride for a while, so we decided we would do that instead and wait to do Stinson Beach another weekend. I was also worried we would spend most of the day in Labor Day traffic and didn't want to have that ruin our time off. This was another bike route from the Bay Area Bike Rides Deck from Chronicle Books. This ride was from card number 13: Iron Horse Trail. The trail is actually pretty long, but this route took us from the Pleasant Hill Bart, down to the Museum of the San Ramon Valley and back up. The trail itself is pretty nice and it is also flat which I really like. It was a very, very hot day for biking, but it was still fun. We brought stuff to drink, but still ended up stopping at a Safeway to grab a few more drinks.

When we got to the end of the route, we saw there was a little flea market type event going on. There was also a board game store, which Ian checked out. I was actually going to get a rhinestone necklace (or Ian was going to get it for me); we waited forever for the lady to pay attention to us, but she chose, instead, to gab with the lady not buying anything so we ended up leaving since we didn't want to stand around in the hot sun forever waiting for her to look at us.

After we finished our very long ride, we headed home and Ian started up the grill we had gotten the day we went to Six Flags. He grilled us up some burgers and I boiled a few corn on the cob and we ate them with some coleslaw on the side. We even sat outside in our yard and ate. It was nice to get lots of fresh air.

Even after a long weekend with lots of time in the sun, it looks like I managed to not get sunburned. While we were biking, I kept stopping to put on more sun screen just in case. My skin certainly shows it got the sun, but I have yet to feel any burns, so I think I made it!

I mentioned a job interview at SFGlobe in a past post and I actually made it past the interview and get to do the training. For the position, they are bringing people in and having them do 2 weeks of training and then they will decide who to keep and who to let go. Unfortunately, I will still be in Chicago the day they want to start training, so everyone they bring in will have a day head start, but I made sure to let them know during the interview so I wouldn't surprise them with it later. Luckily, they are going to try to get information to me before I come in so I can, hopefully, be a little caught up before showing up on everyone else's second day. I am going to try to prepare before going by doing test posts and titles on my own and keeping an eye on everything going through the site and Facebook page. Guess we'll just have to see how it goes.

Six Flags - Visit 3

Today was my third visit to 6 Flags this summer. My first visit was for Ian's birthday and while we were getting tickets, we saw it would be a pretty nice deal to get a Thrill Pass (like a season pass except ends earlier in the year than a season pass and doesn't have all the fancy extras) instead of just a one day pass. This would enable us to come back more this year and make sure we saw and experienced everything we wanted to at the park. I can't remember now when exactly the second visit was, but that visit was pretty awesome because the part was actually relatively deserted, which we thought was weird for a Saturday in July. Today was actually pretty deserted as well.

We went on Medusa, the Sky Screamer, V2, Boomerang, Scat-A-Bout, Bumper Cars and saw the Tiger show at the Temple of Odin. We tried to go on Roar, the wooden roller caster, but it was shut down when we first went over to it and had a long line the second time. I hadn't seen the tiger show since we went to 6 Flags on our one year anniversary, so it was fun to see again.

We learned from our first trip there a couple years ago, that if you plan on drinking anything while at the park, the best deal is to get the reusable souvenir cups. The day you buy it you can refill it over and over that day and then you can bring it back throughout that season and refill it for less than drinks at the park.

Also, you can actually set these to the side on the rides instead of being made to pay to rent a locker to put it in which they basically make you do for anything you have at most of the rides. I love seeing the animals while we are there, so we also went to a show at Odin's Temple of the Tiger, like I mentioned, and checked out the Dolphins and Sea Lions. I love the dolphins. They are so sweet looking. This one here, they said, is 50 years old. Checking out the Sea Lions was fun too, but it was a feeding station so you could pay to feed them. So the poor things just swam around staring at us waiting for us to throw them some fish.

We headed out around 2 PM after we felt like we had seen enough for the day. It tends to be a lot of sun. Then just a stop for eating and a little shopping, then back home to relax. Yet again I have managed to NOT get a sunburn. I hope this continues. I really hate them and it would suck to have a sunburn for the cruise. I'll take a tan though. That would be nice.

More Reading Material - Children's Books

I went back to the library yesterday to drop off some of my due books and picked up a few more. I decided to grab a few by Jack Prelutsky and Shel Silverstein since I want to write more like them.

Jack Pretulsky: My Parents Think I'm Sleeping and My Dog May Be a Genius
Shel Silverstein: Where the Sidewalk Ends and Falling Up

I didn't want to deprive everyone of their books so I just checked out a couple of each. Though, there were quite a few with Jack's name on them. I know I have read him before, but I don't think I realized how much he has written. It is going to be fun to read through these poems again. I know I remember some of Shel's and I hope They are in these books. I was never good at remember where I saw each poem. I remember the Boa Constrictor one but haven't come across it yet.

Well, less writing and more reading now.

Side note: I remember Jack Prelutsky most for being on the kid's tv show: Arthur and reading "Jellyfish Stew".

Job Interview and Outdoors

I had a job interview today at SF Globe. I'm not sure it went very well. I think I presented myself well, but when it came down to do some work on the spot vocally, I froze up a bit. It would be an interesting job. I'll have to wait and see if anything comes of it. My upcoming short trip to Chicago could be a deciding factor, though, because the day I get back is the day they would want the new people (person?) to start training.

Random house I think looks cute.

As I was walking back, I took some pictures because it is just so beautiful outside. It is California after all and the weather has been pretty nice. This area is also just plain pretty too. Below are just two other shots I took on the way home. It is funny, there is this one house on this block I walk by that has all these tall palm trees along two sides of it (the sides by the road) and there are not any other trees this tall anywhere nearby. They must have put them up special or something. The other image is just this swing that is sitting in this little island area between two cul de sacs. There is also a bench. It is a cute little area. I'm not great at using my iPhone to take pictures. I'm hoping if I keep using it to take photos for my blog posts I'll get better. Hopefully. I get kind of embarrassed when I take photos with my phone, so I guess I should just get over that. Today, I did get over my fear of looking at books in the kids section of the library and actually checked some out. Not sure it counts, I guess, because I wrote down the numbers and ran over and grabbed them. So I didn't hang out there for very long. I'll talk about them when I've had a chance to look at them.

I start a lot of sentences with "I". Feeling a little self-centered. Maybe I should talk in third person.


Palm trees are tall
I like swings and this is a cute one

Reading and Writing

Image from Chronicle Email

Was busy for a bit, but I'm back to write again. I'm never sure what to write about, but since it is for myself, I guess it shouldn't matter. I thought I would write about some books I have been reading (and wanting to read). Since leaving my job I have been on the hunt for an editorial position. It's difficult. There are a few places I really, really want to work, but there are a lot of people applying and I spent the last three years doing community management which doesn't quite bump me to the top of the list. Anyway, I went to a talk at the Chronicle Books store last month and I found it really interesting. The two individuals from Chronicle that came to talk were Children's Publishing Editor Melissa Manlove and Children's Publishing Designer Ryan Hayes. I know I want to write, but I've never really known what I want to write. I never even considered children's books because I just didn't think of it. I used to write poetry in the past, but I fell out of it after college. And now that I look at children's books, a lot of it is fun poetry. After listening to the talk, it really made me want to get into writing and, specifically, writing for children's books. I have a few ideas I want to work with, but I feel I need to get them ironed out before I can even start writing them. To help get me started, I started looking into books on writing and books on writing for children's books.

Image from Amazon

I wanted to start at the beginning, so I went to the writing section of the library and found Grammar Girl's Quick and Dirty Tips for Better Writing by Mignon Fogarty. It was a really good refresher of the basics and had some good lists of other books and people to check out. After finishing that up, I decided to get more specific and found How to Write a Children's Book and Get It Published by Barbara Seuling. Another great book with helpful information and more names and more books to check out. It was a little old, but still had helpful information that is still relevant to children's book writing. It gave me a better idea of how children's books are broken up and how and where to focus. My plan is go get into writing picture books. If only I could do art too, that would be pretty awesome. I can't remember if I was able to finish this one, but I would love to get my own copy sometime. I think I've only made it through Chapter 9 so far and would like to read it all. Though, at the end of the book it talks more about submitting your manuscript and I know I'm still a ways off on that.

I've also been pursuing 88 Money-Making Writing Jobs by Robert Bly and How to Write Short Stories that Sell by Louise Boggess. You can see in the image there are more books, but I haven't gotten a chance to read them yet, so I have nothing to say on them. I got some other books from the library, but have certainly bitten off more than I can chew so I'm just working through what I can while I have all this free time on my hands. Which will hopefully be cut short as soon as I can get an editorial position.

I have also been reading Heat Wave by Richard Castle. I love the show and after picking up some of these books at the library I was just checking out the "What's New" section and saw some Richard Castle books. I didn't know any were actually published so I just had to check it out. I decided to skip Derrick Storm and skip right to Nikki Heat. The book was a little hard for me to get into at first, but I think as more has developed I've gotten more into it. Not done yet, but I'm hoping it is good so I can try more in the series. Guess it is back to reading for now!

First Instructable Ever: Plastic Canvas Yarn Daffodils

I still have the first project I ever posted to Instructables: Plastic Canvas Yarn Daffodils. I posted it on March 3rd, 2011. I was always unhappy with my pictures and how the flowers didn't really stay on the stems well, so I thought I would fix them up quick and take another picture of them. I wanted to share it here.

They aren't the prettiest things I've ever made, but I'm pretty proud of them. They were made, originally, so I could enter the Lion Brand: Build with Yarn Contest. I remember when I entered there were not that many entries, so I was psyched because I thought I had good chances at getting something, but then they extended the deadline so they could get more entries and my ugly little daffodils never stood a chance.

The first time I used plastic canvas for crafting was in Middle School. Summer School in Middle School involved picking fun classes (like jewelry making, board games, stained glass, etc) and one involved working with yarn and plastic canvas. I only remember a few things I made, which were two little bookmarks and a ladybug. I know I made more than that, but that's all that is left in my memories. I do remember enjoying making them and that the number one rule the teacher had was no wet yarn; meaning you were not supposed to lick your yarn to get it to go through the eye of the needle easier.


Nobody else liked summer school, but I thought it was fun to be able to learn so many things. While going there, I learned how to cross stitch, how to do stained glass and how to work with plastic canvas. Fun times :)

Make sure to check out the Instructable if you have any interest at all in making these cute little daffodils!

Latest Tatting Project

Well, I called this blog Needle Crafting Corner, so I suppose I should share some needlecrafts.

I haven't tatted much in the last couple years. Not sure what got me down, but I have been trying to get back on the horse and get to it. I would like to have a new piece to enter into The Thread Corner Tatting Show 'n Tell Contest. I entered a couple years ago, but it is a popularity contest and I didn't get enough votes. The same person won across multiple categories :( I will concede defeat to a better project, but not to popularity. But, I digress.

My latest project was suggested by my friend Sarah who wanted a needle tatted lanyard. I checked on Etsy to get an idea of what has been done and was kind of bored with the designs. I have been experimenting but I am worried about durability. It has to be strong and be able to handle wear and tear of being swung around, put in and taken out of pockets and it needs to be strong enough to actually hold the keys. I'm still working on the durability part, but I'm concentrating on design right now. I think if I add layers I can fix the durability part, so I'm trying to come up with some design. Right now I am experimenting with split rings and am planning to go back and add in chains to create layered flowers.

I just use random colors when I experiment. Usually whatever I see I have most of at the time, so however it ends up I was thinking of doing the base green and then the layers of the "flower petals" two different similar colors, like red and pink or blue and purple. Whatever, it is to be decided when something is actually done with the design.

Hopefully I'll have something more to show with this project next week :)

Tata!