About Me

My photo
K. L. Stewart's Dark Angels blog gives details into the characters, worlds, and inspirations related to all of the books in my Angels and Shadows series.

Friday, May 27, 2016

Cover Concept

I have been thinking about my cover for Angels & Hunters: book two of the Dark Angel Wars.  I've been playing around with different media and design programs.  These were designed on my phone.  Thoughts on these concepts?  Do you like the ideas or no?   Comments would be greatly appreciated.


Wednesday, May 25, 2016

If You Wish Upon A Dandelion

The warm sunny days that we have had in North Carolina this spring have brought out many beautiful flowers.  Of all the flowers in the world, I have to say that I'm the oddity that appreciates the dandelions.  I think they are so much more than the irritating weeds that so many people think are waging war on their lawns.  Dandelions have many uses (for more on this there are many articles and recipes), and are vital to bee populations, but even more so to me, they represent my childhood wishes.  How many of you remember playing outside on warm sunny days, blowing the dandelion seeds to make a wish? 
The flowers outside our store

Me and my seventeen month old daughter love going outside and picking dandelions.  I am teaching her about making wishes on them.  It is a tradition.  One that I am proud to uphold and that builds a bond between me and my daughter.  I believe children's wishes are much more than wishes.  They are dreams, and hope.  They are the wildest imaginings and emotion that a child can carry.

My daughter with her flowers
 Now, I know I'm not the traditional parent.  For those of you who don't know, my husband and I own a game shop.  So, I'm raising my children in a very busy and non-traditional environment.  However, we have back rooms away from the main store where the oldest can have television time and relaxation and the youngest can play with her toys and take naps.  We don't have a big yard at the store to play in but I do often walk to the park and let my youngest play and even if we don't go to the park, my youngest likes me to put her in the stroller and stroll around the parking lot.  We have a picnic table that she can sit on and she likes to sit outside and watch cars, birds, and trains.  We also pick some of the only flowers available to us, dandelions.  To her these are wishes and a bit of natural beauty in the city. 

So, knowing now how I feel about dandelions and wishes and how important they are to my child, you can imagine how upset I was when the town decided to spray the nastiest smelling weed killer all over her dandelions as well as my mother-in-law's rose bush, which sits outside of our store.

This is my mother-in-law's rosebush (notice the brown and yellow)  It is almost all dead today.



We couldn't go outside for three days because the smell was so atrocious (it literally burned my nostrils).  My daughter got sick, probably from inhaling the fumes when the door opened, and all of her beautiful yellow and green wishes got turned brown.  They are still there, mind you, still standing, but brown.
The dandelions after being sprayed.


So, not only did the city fail to do what they set out to do, but they destroyed something beautiful,
something that was special.  They destroyed my daughter's wishes.  So I'm writing this not only to rant, but to spread the dandelion love.  Be aware of what you are doing and your impact on the environment and other human beings.  If you're going to destroy something, first of all, make sure you really want it gone, and second of all, make sure that you do it the right way (if you really want to kill a dandelion, you have to pull it up by the root).  Please enjoy the following articles and recipes on dandelions as well as your spring and summer.


Tuesday, May 17, 2016

Another World's Ocean

Sitting at the bottom
of another world's ocean
Just rubbing my feet
through these grains of sand

When the sky clouds up
The waves toss loudly
Rolling with the thunder
Ignited with lightning energy

I can only marvel at it all
Wonder if I am seen
If I'm counted among the sand
If they know I watch their beach