Crocheting and Reading

Crocheting:

Well, it has been awhile since I checked in with my crocheting. I have been gearing up for NaNoWriMo, which incidentally starts in 8 days! Yikes!!! So, this will probably be my last post until December. I will be putting away my hooks and needles for pencils and pens. :)

I did start a new project in prep for NaNoWriMo. I figure I'll need a little relief from all of the writing, and what better way than to crochet an afghan. I'm using Bella Dia's vintage vertical stripe pattern. The pattern calls for a chain of 250, but from what I have been reading from other crocheters that is a bedspread size afghan. I only want a lapghan, so I chained 160. It will cover me from my waist to my feet. Perfect!

The picture below only shows my first few rows, but I really wanted to show the change in color. Again, I am going for a Cath Kidston colored throw. I am using this pattern as inspiration. My pattern will be striped with two rows of each color. The colors are:

light blue
snow white
yellow
snow white
sage green
snow white
red
snow white
light pink
snow white
repeat

So far I only have the two rows of light blue and one row of the snow white, but the first two rows are always the hardest. Now it is smooth sailing! I'm really liking the snow white colored white, which is Red Heart yarn. It isn't as bright as the regular white.

I'm looking forward to completing this lapghan by late winter or early spring, and destashing some yarn while I'm at it!

Reading:

In prep for NaNo next week I've been trying to get in as much research as possible, while finalizing my characters, settings, and plot ideas. It has been a very busy October!

I completed my plot board last weekend too.

This was a big deal. I'm so happy for my local NaNo writing group. They have put the fire under my bum that I needed to get this stuff done. I now have my rough outline of how my book will play out. Yipee!

Daphne enjoyed looking at it too. She kept rubbing up against it and knocking it on the floor, which is why it is now tacked to the wall. :)

I'm currently reading Cause of Death: A Writer's Guide to Death, Murder, and Forensic Medicine. Yes, I am writing a mystery. :) This is part of The Howdunit Series from Writer's Digest. If you are a mystery writer, this series is a must have. I own two of the books from the series (you can sort of see them on my writing bookshelf in the picture above): Deadly Doses: A Writer's Guide to Poisons, and Amateur Detectives:A Writer's Guide to How Private Citizens Solve Criminal Cases. I'm hoping to eventually get all of the books (I think there are 17 in all).

This book is a little gruesome, but very interesting. My book has a very high body count, so learning about the various methods of trying to save someone (and not saving someone) has been very helpful.

So, I'll be signing off until December. Hopefully when I post again I will have my 1st draft of my book completed, and some of my afghan too. :)

Linking to Yarn Along and WIP Wednesday.