It’s Quiltin’ Time! My “H” Quilt

The end of the year is coming so quickly, and I almost don’t have enough blogging days to cover all the topics that I want to talk about! That’s a wonderful way to close out the year. One of my 2018 resolutions was to try out quilting as a hobby. Well, I love it, and I’ve completed more projects than I can write about here, but I simply have to include a favorite every now and then.

My “H” Quilt

My last big quilt of the year is what I fondly call the “H” Quilt. One of the characters in my latest novella has a grandmother who created a quilt with the letter H as the predominant pattern. I was so inspired by it, I decided to make a quilt just the way I imagined! Admittedly, I’m sure that Mrs. Hanley’s quilt is leagues and bounds more beautiful, especially with the quillting part, but I am so proud of imagining a design and finding a way to make that thought into not only something tanglible, but also useful!

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Multicolored “H” quilt designed, pieced, & quilted by Atina Atwood.

I love the vibrant colors, and the alternating pattern of lights to darks certainly gives the quilt a festive look. I didn’t use any sort of fancy quilting technique during the process (I finished this one up in one day); I also haven’t even started binding it. Too many end-of-the-year deadlines are taking priority at the moment, but I’ll get to it in a few days.

Inspirational fabric makes the backing of this quilt as much fun as the front. What feels better than warm love and little bit of TLC at the same time? This was a fun project, and I look forward to making more quilts in the coming year. What are you looking forward to?

Sending Love and Light to all of you.

©Atina Atwood 2018 Exploring Love and Life, One Word At A Time.™

– Atina Atwood is a southern girl who moved from Europe to the West Coast. A former university professor in Germany and California, Atina stepped away from Academia to focus on her miracle child, life, love, food, quilting, and of course, Romance. Follow her on Twitter, Pinterest, Instagram, and Facebook for more.

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Motivated Monday: Go with Confidence

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“Go confidently in the direction of your dreams.” —Henry David Thoreau

Sending Love and Light to all of you.

©Atina Atwood 2018 Exploring Love and Life, One Word At A Time.™

– Atina Atwood is a southern girl who moved from Europe to the West Coast. A former university professor in Germany and California, Atina stepped away from Academia to focus on her miracle child, life, love, food, quilting, and of course, Romance. Follow her on Twitter, Pinterest, Instagram, and Facebook for more.

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Thursday’s Romantic Thought: Kiss Often

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Sending Love and Light to all of you.

©Atina Atwood 2018 Exploring Love and Life, One Word At A Time.™

– Atina Atwood is a southern girl who moved from Europe to the West Coast. A former university professor in Germany and California, Atina stepped away from Academia to focus on her miracle child, life, love, food, quilting, and of course, Romance. Follow her on Twitter, Pinterest, Instagram, and Facebook for more.

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NaNoWriMo – How Was It for You?

Now that we’re rapidly segueing from a (hopefully) pleasant November to a fast-paced December, it’s the perfect time to start reflecting on the things that were awesome about this year, and well, maybe a few things that weren’t as awesome as we may have hoped.

There were two new creative outlets that I wanted to try this year: One was quilting, and I’m still excited to say that the bug has bitten me and I’m officially an unashamed quilter. I’ve been able to work on so many projects, it’s been a real eyeopener. I’ve also had the opportunity to meet some really lovely ladies who are definitely on my Holiday and  Christmas card list this year. As a matter of fact, I’m excited to share one of my more recent projects with you next week.

The second creative outlet that I tried for the first time this year was the NaNoWriMo. For those of you who may have missed previous posts, this is a fun competition where your goal is to write a novel (or the equivalent of 50,000 words or more) within the month of November.

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Pros and Cons of NaNoWriMo

Firstly, I’m proud to say that I accomplished that goal, and I was sure to do it before Thanksgiving, because well, turkey. There was no way that I was going to roll from the dinner table to my desk and be able to produce a coherent thought, so I preemptively tossed thousands of words on the screen while I still had my mental faculties about me.

The manuscript it terribly raw, but because I’m a planter, there is plenty that can be salvaged from it. I found a portion of this experience to be a bit of a pro, because I was able to share my word count progress as often as I wished. However, my primary purpose of participating was to get to know more writers in my area (SoCal), and of course, connect with amazing writers online.

On a social aspect, I wanted to feel more interaction with other writers, and I feel as though that was a bit of bust. There isn’t really any fault here, but I do consider it to be a con. Writing is a private experience for most of us, most of the time, and trying to socialize a private act is not always going to end in the result that we initially thought that we’d have. If you need a hard example of this, just Google “his and her toilets”. Nice idea; poor execution.

Don’t get me wrong – in theory, there are plenty of opportunities to connect with others, both online and in person. I’m happy to have met more folks on Twitter who also LOVE to write. That’s an affirmative win for me. I’m going to take a wait and see attitude about this and slowly but surely look into getting to know more writers after this November and holiday frenzy are over.

Aim for Another Win Next Year?

Ultimately, I have to see if I want to participate in the NaNoWriMo again next year. I like the idea of supporting and encouraging other writers, and to me, it’s definitely not about getting all of the numbers of words down. Will I aim to win again next year? Only time will tell.

How was your experience with NaNoWriMo? Did you win? Share your thoughts in the comments below.

Sending Love and Light to all of you.

©Atina Atwood 2018 Exploring Love and Life, One Word At A Time.™

– Atina Atwood is a southern girl who moved from Europe to the West Coast. A former university professor in Germany and California, Atina stepped away from Academia to focus on her miracle child, life, love, food, quilting, and of course, Romance. Follow her on Twitter, Pinterest, Instagram, and Facebook for more.

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Motivated Monday: Look on the Bright Side

Sending Love and Light to all of you.

©Atina Atwood 2018 Exploring Love and Life, One Word At A Time.™

– Atina Atwood is a southern girl who moved from Europe to the West Coast. A former university professor in Germany and California, Atina stepped away from Academia to focus on her miracle child, life, love, food, quilting, and of course, Romance. Follow her on Twitter, Pinterest, Instagram, and Facebook for more.

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Thursdays-Romantic-Thought: Love & Be Loved

Thursdays-Romantic-Thought-love-and-be-loved.png“There is only one happiness in this life, to love and be loved.” – George Sand

Sending Love and Light to all of you.

©Atina Atwood 2018 Exploring Love and Life, One Word At A Time.™

– Atina Atwood is a southern girl who moved from Europe to the West Coast. A former university professor in Germany and California, Atina stepped away from Academia to focus on her miracle child, life, love, food, quilting, and of course, Romance. Follow her on Twitter, Pinterest, Instagram, and Facebook for more.

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Riley’s Epiphany. A Short Story

I hope that you’ve had a fantastic November. I haven’t shared any writing tidbits in a while, and as I’m finishing up this manuscript for Book 2 in my YA sweet romance series, I thought that I would improvise the first scene from another potential story. Enjoy!

Riley’s Epiphany

Riley saw her, and he knew that she was his.

It wasn’t about possession or dominance; it was the bone-deep confirmation that an integral part of him – a part that he didn’t even know was missing – was suddenly standing right in front of him. Never had he seen a smile so radiant with a row of perfectly straight, white teeth that were slightly too large for her mouth. Even her body couldn’t contain the potency of that smile, he thought with a half-grin. Her lips were full, their perpetual pout sensual and playful at the same time. His eyes, greedy and eager to take all of her in, were drawn to those moistened lips, broad and slightly flushed as she bit the lower one to contain her mirth.

The sight of her easygoing, positive nature made an unfamiliar heat unfurl in the center of his belly. The warmth gave his courage sustenance that he otherwise never would have had. Detmernined steps were fuled by a confidence that Riley would normally never possess. What would he say to her? What should he say to her – “Hi there, I’m Ri, and I just want you to know that you’re my future wife”? The absurdity of the thought made him smile.

His smile must have caught her attention because suddenly, she was walking towards him – no,  it was an all out squeal and skip-run combination. His grin grew wider – could she feel the connection between them, too? 

Arms outstretched, he stood, knees bent, his body braced in anticipation of her approach.  She ran, smiling, now laughing – her pure joy sparkling like the myriad particles in a sunbeam – right into the arms of his best friend.

In the back of his throat, Riley tasted the bitter bile of hate for the first time in his life.

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Sending Love and Light to all of you.

©Atina Atwood 2018 Exploring Love and Life, One Word At A Time.™

– Atina Atwood is a southern girl who moved from Europe to the West Coast. A former university professor in Germany and California, Atina stepped away from Academia to focus on her miracle child, life, love, food, quilting, and of course, Romance. Follow her on Twitter, Pinterest, Instagram, and Facebook for more.

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Be Kind to Yourself

Be Kind to Others – And Yourself

In the spirit of #MotivatedMonday, I wanted to share an insightful reminder with you. While we’re all slaying at what we do (and if you’re working on the NaNoWriMo, I hope that you’re getting close to that 50k finish line), we still need to remember to take care of ourselves.

I spend a lot of time here trying to remind myself and others that there is still a lot of kindness in the world. It’s almost cliché to say that kindness starts with the individual, but is less often that we are reminded that the first person we should be kind to is ourselves. So this week, as we’re recovering from the initial onslaught of the 2018 holiday season, I want to remind us to be kind to ourselves. Be forgiving in nature (if at all possible). People and things try my patience every day, but if I’m kind to myself, I realize that I get over things more quickly.

I hope that you are kind to yourself this week – and throughout the hectic holiday season!

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Sending Love and Light to all of you.

©Atina Atwood 2018 Exploring Love and Life, One Word At A Time.™

– Atina Atwood is a southern girl who moved from Europe to the West Coast. A former university professor in Germany and California, Atina stepped away from Academia to focus on her miracle child, life, love, food, quilting, and of course, Romance. Follow her on Twitter, Pinterest, Instagram, and Facebook for more.

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Happy Thanksgiving! November Gratitude

#NovemberGratitude on Thanksgiving

By far, Thanksgiving is my absolute favorite holiday. Even when living in Europe, Thanksgiving has always been my jam. I have converted so many people from being skeptical about this American holiday (“Why do you make it a goal to overeat?”) to blatantly requesting an invitation to one of my Thanksgiving dinner parties. Trust this southern girl when I say that great food will make a believer out of anyone.

Sure it’s about family, friends, and amazing food. These days, it might even be about political arguments and exploding turkeys – but to me, Thanksgiving has always been about gratitude.

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In keeping with the #NovemberGratitude spirit, I know that this Thursday is one celebrated day that culminates all of the things that I want to be thinking about on a daily basis. I have friends – maybe not as many as I think that I would like to have (writing gets lonely, and my social media game needs professional help, lol) – but the friends that I do have are golden. I’ve always been a quality over quantity kind of person, and wow – my real friends are top of the line. I am so thankful for you.

My family is amazing, and for the rest of my life I will always think of my parents and uncle who would leave early in the morning on Thanksgiving day, only to return in the early afternoon. When I was very small, I never understood why they left, but as the years passed, I learned that they would go to a soup kitchen and help feed the homeless. This is the kind of stuff that highlights what Gratitude means to me. I’m so thankful to have had people in my life who have always led by example – including by knowing how to say “I’m sorry”. This is not an easy thing to accomplish!

Thank YOU!

Lastly, I am grateful for my followers! You have been supporting me, cheering me on, and are becoming my friends as we actually get to know each other. I know that I have a lot to learn about blogging and connecting, but I am so grateful for your patience, curiosity, and forgiving nature. Although you may not comment, I know that you are engaged, and you support my driving motivation to connect, explore, hope, and inspire the best way that I know how at this stage in my life. Have a wonderful Thanksgiving for those who celebrate, and let’s all keep up our #NovemberGratitude challenge!

Sending Love and Light to all of you.

©Atina Atwood 2018 Exploring Love and Life, One Word At A Time.™

– Atina Atwood is a southern girl who moved from Europe to the West Coast. A former university professor in Germany and California, Atina stepped away from Academia to focus on her miracle child, life, love, food, quilting, and of course, Romance. Follow her on Twitter, Pinterest, Instagram, and Facebook for more.

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Thursday’s Romantic Thought: Real Love is a Choice

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Sending Love and Light to all of you.

©Atina Atwood 2018 Exploring Love and Life, One Word At A Time.™

– Atina Atwood is a southern girl who moved from Europe to the West Coast. A former university professor in Germany and California, Atina stepped away from Academia to focus on her miracle child, life, love, food, quilting, and of course, Romance. Follow her on Twitter, Pinterest, Instagram, and Facebook for more.

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