Finally Friday Five . . . or so

It’s been a crazy since I last posted!

1. I had a birthday and got another year older—hate it when that happens.

2. It snowed here on Monday night, and the school decided to give the kiddos a snow day on Tuesday (which was good because it continued to snow throughout the day)! Yay!! We only got a few inches and it melted away quickly, but it was fun while it lasted.

3. We got some of the Christmas decorating done. I know I said it would take two days, but I forgot that I had to spend most of the day on Saturday getting things ready for Sunday’s trip to my parents’ house. We try to come together three times a year and the December meeting includes a Christmas Program. Normally we have the kids dress up and put on the Christmas pageant, but we weren’t going to have enough kids coming this year who would be willing to do it (curse that whole getting older and more mature thing). Since it was my year to be in charge of the program, I had to put something together. I ended up doing a Power Point presentation complete with videos, scripture readings, and music. It was kind of a pain, but turned out well. Anyway, the decorating didn’t get done. We do have the tree up, the lighted deer figures and lighted candy canes are hooked up to the light show box and put out on the lawn to blast the Christmas music and flash the lights and annoy the heck out of my neighbors (that’s what the Season is all about right?). I hope to get the other lights up and hooked into the box today and tomorrow (cause it might take me two days—not cause I have THAT many lights, but it’s cold outside and I don’t want to be out there too long).

4. I finished my final for my last college class last night! YAY!!! It was U.S. History 101 and I feel I did well on it—so hopefully I did!

5. We got our Elf on the Shelf and have been having so much fun with him! The kids named him Winter Tinsel. If you’re not familiar with this tradition, click on the link above and check it out! Here’s a picture of one of Winter Tinsel’s hiding places:

And this is how we found him this morning:

Too much fun!

6. Dawn Metcalf is having a contest in which you can win some fabulous reading material. Click the link to check out her Don’t Miss This If You Missed It Contest Giveaway.

Hope you all have a wonderful weekend!!

Write on.

Seizure The Day

K had a seizure on Monday (she hadn’t had one since sometime around Labor Day). She’s been home from school since then because of headaches. She was going to go back to school today, but at the doctor’s office yesterday, she had a temperature—so home again.

This post by Rachelle Gardner got me thinking about my priorities and how I “triage” not only my writing life, but my life in general. For me, my family/kids have always come first (though housework isn’t considered family—hee hee hee). I drop everything to take care of them.

This has never been an issue for me, but I can’t help wondering if there will be a day when it is. What happens if I have a deadline I need to make? Will I be able to drop it and let my family come first? I’d like to think I’d find a way to do both, but—especially in K’s case—I’m not sure it will be possible. It’s not that she needs my undivided attention after she has a seizure (she usually sleeps for several hours), but I can’t concentrate and feel the need to check on her every five minutes or so to make sure she’s not seizing again or having any problems.

Monday I tried to force myself to write, but I just couldn’t. I was able to write on Tuesday so I guess that made up for the lack of writing on Monday. Had K not stayed home on Tuesday, I wouldn’t have been able to do any writing because I volunteer at the kids’ school library all day Tuesday and on Thursday mornings. That would have put my only full writing day this week on Friday (the kids have half days today and tomorrow for teacher in-service). Were I on a deadline with a novel, this could pose a problem.

The thing is, in my “triage” I’m not sure I’ll ever be able to prioritize my writing above my kids/family. They will always come first. That doesn’t mean I’ll blow off a deadline to go on a field trip with the kids or something like that (depends on how important it is to the child in question), but the really important things—where they need me will always come first. If that makes me a bad writer, I’m okay with that. I believe in God and an afterlife where families can be together forever. My writing isn’t going to get me a place in the eternities, but the relationship with my family will.  I’d rather be a bad writer if it makes me a better mother.

Do you ever have days when no matter how much you want to write and have the means and time to write, you just can’t bring yourself to do it? If so, do you fight it and get some writing done anyway or do you just let it go? How do you triage your writing life/real life?

Write Triage on!

LiveJournal Tags: life,writing,bad days,family

Brrr . . . December!

It’s raining (trying to snow) and cold here today. I wanted to curl up in my bed and stay there, but the school thinks my kids need to attend, even on days like this. *sigh*

We bundled up and went off to school. I spent the first part of the morning helping out in the kids’ library (I’m now helping all day Tuesday and on Thursday mornings), and stopped at McDonald’s to get myself a large peppermint hot chocolate (I don’t drink coffee) on the way home. It’s still too hot to drink (you should have heard my taste buds scream when I tried to drink it), and I’m thinking of putting it in the freezer to cool down . . . but that means I’d have to get up from the laptop and move. #toolazytomove

After I finish blogging and checking my email, I’ll dive into working on the new picture book (the third one). Yay! I stopped working on this one to write up a Christmas one that was nagging at me (it obviously doesn’t have the Christmas spirit to be nagging like that).

Speaking (or writing) of Christmas, the kids have been bugging me to get out the decorations. I promised we would today, but since it’s raining, I’m hoping to postpone it. They’ll probably insist we do the tree even though we can’t put up the outside decorations (kids are smart like that), but I’d rather not mess with it today.

Between college assignments and writing new picture books for my agent (my agent!! SQUEE—uh-hem, sorry, I’m still excited about that), NaNo was a bust for me this year. I didn’t even get half way—barely a drop in the 50,000 word bucket—but I’m not too horribly upset about it. Maybe I can do it next year—we’ll see.

Brr—I stepped in a puddle when I was running into the house to get out of the rain (being the wicked witch of the west and all, I didn’t want to melt) so I had to take off my shoes and socks and now my feet are cold. I’ve got to get some more socks on. I think it’s time to bust out the fuzzy socks!! That means it’s REALLY winter—even though the calendar says it isn’t. Come on, who are you going to trust; the fuzzy socks or the calendar??!!

Cold weather like this always makes me want to get back into crocheting. I really don’t have the time for it, so I’ll have to resist the temptation. This chilly weather also makes me want soup, or chili, or stew (and the hot chocolate, of course). What do you like to do (keep it clean, people)/eat when it’s cold outside?

 

Write on.