ear Readers,

I apologize for my absence. Firstly, some good Stuff: the Haiku Kung Fu Champion is Cheri! Congrats to her, and thanks to all of you for playing.

Secondly, some very sad Stuff: I just returned from an eleven day surprise trip to San Diego. My sister, who was six and a half months pregnant, lost her baby in a mysterious way- her baby's little heart just randomly stopped beating. It was an emotional weekend, as my sister had to be induced into labor and deliver her baby.  Just heartbreaking. Apparently this happens more frequently than most people realize, and medically the doctors can't usually find a reason for it. The doctor said that occasionally there is something like a knot in the cord but usually, it's just this totally mysterious thing that happens, and they just don't have any answers for it. I was surprised to hear that.  It's just so sad, and seems so wrong and unfair. My sister was so happy to be pregnant and was so healthy, as was the baby. It makes no sense. We will all miss the chance to see little Sofia grow, and are hopeful that maybe her spirit will return when my sister is ready to try again. Any prayers for Sarah and her husband Tony will be appreciated. They need all the help they can get to make it through their grief and be ready to try again.

UPDATE: Almost exactly a year after my sister lost little Sofia, she and her husband were blessed with Adrien Victor Benelli. Isn't my nephew adorable?! Congrats to Sarah & Tony! 

Thirdly, some more sad and scary Stuff: Valena, a dear friend of mine gave birth to her baby girl, Olive, just a few days before my sister lost little Sofia, and little Olive is now fighting for her life. She was born full term, and thought to be totally healthy, when at the last minute just before Valena and hubby John were about to take her home, a nurse had a funny feeling and wanted to give Olive a quick ultrasound. Turns out she found bleeding in Olive's brain, and they discovered that she was having these strange invisible seizures. Olive stopped breathing in Valena's arms at one point, and has been in the NICU ever since. The doctors have found no reasons for any of this- Olive is otherwise healthy. They are hopeful for Olive's full recovery, but it has been pretty taxing on Valena and John, and on Monday, Olive's two week birthday, they just recieved word that Olive will need to have some sort of tube dealy put in her head to drain some of the fluid out. This is sad because Valena had been told that Olive was doing great and may be able to go home on Friday. Now she's about to get another round of MRI's CT scans and the like. I can't imagine how frustrating the waiting and wondering is for them. My heart just aches to think of it.

Valena & John and Baby Olive need all the prayers  they can get at the moment. They are the sweetest family, and have already had their share of medical hardships, as Valena has been battling Lupus since she was nineteen. Get strong, little Olive!

UPDATE: A year later, here is Valena & John's gorgeous little Olive: 
In my time away, I will also be writing as much as I can. It is a goal of mine to finish a manuscript this year and submit to/ get accepted by an agent or publisher before the year is out. I find that I spend more time messing about on this blog than I do writing, and that ratio needs to change if I am to accomplish this goal.

I appreciate you all, and thank you for sticking with me on this little journey so far. I'll be back soon, and if you should ever care to get in touch, just leave me a comment or send me an email at 88words (at) gmail.com. I will respond immediately.

Cheers, Hugs, and Happy Almost Spring!

his is my imaginary new outfit to wear swing dancing. I have been in the mood for some yellow, maybe because I'm tiring of the dreary days of winter. I thought something nautical would be cute with the sailor pants. I liked this tattoo-inspired necklace for a punch of color.  I wanted something fun for my hair, and this fascinator is cute, but not quite what I had in mind. Plus I'm not sure if my hair is quite long enough for this yet. How about them shooz?

he first time I ever heard Brian Regan was in my VW Beetle on the other side of the Golden Gate Bridge with my hubby, Nate. I was laughing so hard at this part, I failed to function as a safe driver and had to pull over on the side of the road and listen to the entire CD. The following excerpt is about the famous "I before e except after c" rule, and even after hearing this a thousand times - still hilarious. Warning: do not drink milk.

kay, so I'm not totally the huge fan of dorky t-shirts that say stuff on them, but these were pretty funny. I found them at Threadless in their new-ish Type Tee section. I could totally wear all of these with pride, and my birtdhay is coming up, so feel free. I wear a size small. But if they only have medium, that's fine.

This first one has a haiku on it (we know I love a good haiku!) and it says:

Haikus are easy

But sometimes they don't make sense

Refrigerator

hat you don't know about me is that I have sat on John Lennon's lap. It's a fact. When I was less than two, my hippy parents were at some outdoor restaurant in Ojai. As they sat to enjoy a hoobie-doobie meal consisting of freshly juiced weeds and organic whatnots, John & Yoko were seated nearby. The famous couple demanded to hold me, because I was so damned cute. Later on in life, I had this cat named Yoko that I used to carry around in a bag.

he Haikus are in and ready to be rated. One lucky winner will win this month's trophy- the smitten pendant.  Click here to vote, and please read the rules. Voting booth will stay open until Feb 28th!

Good luck to all who entered!

eriously, look at how they FLOAT on the wall! Whoever is behind LittleFishFurniture at Etsy is a genius.  I don't care what you say, there is not a cooler bookshelf in the universe than this upcycled smartness. There just can't be. When I buy my next house I will own at least one set. I love the Wordstruck shelf, and am so tempted to grab it now... AWESOME. It is hard to look at these and not say to myself, DAMN IT! Why didn't I think of that?

hen Valentine's Day rolls around, here's an amazing way to say "I love you." These handmade tiles by TileSmile make me want to do a wordy backsplash in my dream kitchen...in my dream house. (Though I'm not sure if "You're my woobie" would make the cut.) This is a small sampling of their love-themed tiles, but there are a whole slew of other wordtastic wall plates to drool over. And, I'm pretty sure she'll do custom tiles if you visit the shop! Which you should! Right now! Go!

ive years ago yesterday, I met my hubby at The Red Room in San Francisco. In a wiley scheme involving this

red hat named after yours truly and my friend Emily from Moe Sew Co. my husband arranged for this hat to arrive on time to celebrate. Someday I will tell my kids: 

 "Your mom was so amazing, they named a hat after her."  And then I'll probably tell them it's a magical hat that makes unicorns and fairies come to life, and makes money grow on trees.

very child needs a set of alphabet blocks. But what to do when you are molding that child into a Mad Scientist?

Enter xylocopa's ingenious Mad Scientist Alphabet Blocks!

Finally, you can rest assured that your little overthrower of the universe will not get his dirigibles confused with his goggles, will know how to coerce useless peasants into becoming his henchmen, and he will have the know-how to secretly build an ex-ray equipped freeze-ray gun with robotic tentacles and a laser. All in the safety of his underground lair.

A - Appendages
B - Bioengineering
C - Caffeine
D - Dirigible
E - Experiment
F - Freeze ray
G - Goggles
H - Henchmen
I - Invention
J - Jargon
K - Potassium
L - Laser
M - Maniacal
N - Nanotechnology
O - Organs
P - Peasants (with Pitchforks)
Q - Quantum physics
R - Robot
S - Self-experimentation
T - Tentacles
U - Underground Lair
V - Virus
W - Wrench
X - X-Ray
Y - You, the Mad Scientist of Tomorrow
Z - Zombies

ear Readers,

As soon as my juicy new typewriter ribbon arrives with my special "screw you" wax seal, I will be offering to you, my devoted readers, the option of hiring me to do your dirty work.

That's right, I will transcribe or even craft your special hate mail and hand type it onto a nice sheet of cream parchment paper, seal it in a lovely envelope with a fancy "screw you" seal, and send it anonymously (or not-up to you!) to the deserving recipient of your choice. 

On the flip side, I will also be offering a hand typed love letter service with optional "screw me" wax seal.  I'm also still on the lookout for the most perfect, romantic, vintagy stationery known to mankind. If you see it, let me know.

I'm really quite excited about this new service; I hope you will be, too. Look for it in my Etsy shop. Might take a couple weeks, sadly not in time for V-day. But neither love nor hate come around but once a year do they? And everyone loves to receive a good letter, no matter the date.

Yours Truly,

t's true. I am married to an artist. So you'd think that I could just snap my fingers and say, "Hey, hubby! Make me some playfully bookish art!" Not so. Despite his amazing talent, he does not produce on command. Darn it. Therefore, I went a-looking and I found some fun art shops on Etsy. Here are some playful wordy finds for your wall, artfully executed:

 

Reading is Cool by Studio Mela:

 

Love is in the Air by Carambatack

 

Candy, Backwards by Copper Inc.

 

Knowledge Speaks by vol.25

y handbag collection (the one in my dreams that is so vast it requires a walk-in closet of its own, right next to my shoe rooms) includes these fresh finds: 

I wish it was a self-teach Italian book, as I have been learning Italian, but since the pages are missing anyway to make room for my wallet, lip gloss and car keys, this will do. A lovely book purse by Etsy shop PrettyTheory. I adore this book bag for the amazing attention to detail and the quality craftsmanship. This is a beautiful, useful bag that is smart enough to give any outfit an instant IQ boost! 

For those of you who prefer fine lyrics and sweet song to curling up with a good book, I give you Groovebag's ultra super hip upcycled record bag, made with vintage fabric and oodles of style. This particular Groovebag is a perfect birthday gift for someone turning forty this year! (I've still got a year to go, thank you. That's not my bag, baby!) Karen is not only the coolest Canadian EVER, and costume seamstress to TV shows and ballet productions, she makes some cool stuffs for you to deck out the inside of your Groovebag too. Check out the cassette tape zippy cases, upcycled album sleeve checkbook covers, and I heard a rumor she's working on a new design for a clutch made from 45's? (Correct me if I'm wrong, Lady K!) For the record, I adore Karen's clever bags, and have been coveting them for eons.  

Here's a buddy for Juniper! (Juniper is my new MacBook). Behold the Crow by Brokesy. I waded through the plethora of laptop sleeves available at Etsy, and this was by far my favorite. Especially when you toss in the cord pouch (sold separately, but designed to match). What I like best about this sleeve is that you can keep your MacBook in it while you type, while many of the other, fancier designs don't seem to offer this feature. Maybe it could use a sturdy handle for carrying, but the design just plain rocks. 

I love this clutch by UrbanHeirlooms, who was recently an Etsy featured seller. I've been diggin' her unique leather accessories for quite some time. I like the way she incorporates antique skeleton keys into her designs. Sassy!

 

Okay peeps! Time to bust out your Haiku chops and get to fightin'. Someone is about to become the first Haiku Kung Fu Champion, and the proud owner of a sassy new pendant featuring the word of the month: smitten. You know the drill: use smitten in a haiku and post it in your comment. Want official rules? Read them here.

In two weeks submissions will end and the haikus will be moved to the voting booth where you all will be able to rate them from one to five stars. The highest rated haiku will win, so long as I don't smell any foul play.... if so, I will choose the winner. In the case of a tie, there will be a showdown, you'll get to vote again, and then the champion will be crowned.

Hiiiiiiyyyyyy- KU!

P.S. If you flipped out over the Chuck Norris vs. Godzilla artwork, it's by Jeremy at Jkoob13. (Thanks Jeremy!) Now go get yourself a postcard and write a haiku on it. Let Chuck inspire you, or scare you into the Haiku Kung Fu Hall of Fame! Do it!  

oy has been featured a clever wordy treasury.  Hopefully this one will find its way to the front page for an hour of fame. Thanks CeeVeeArts!