Friday Five

1. Things have been crazy! I’ve done lots of revising on my MG (practically rewrote the whole thing). I’ve also developed a few new ideas.

2. The kids have been on spring break for the last two weeks(they go back on Monday). We’ve had fun, but I’m ready for them to go back.

3. I’ve started a new YA. I can’t believe how much I LOVE this story and characters. I’m having more fun writing it than I’ve ever had writing anything before. Hopefully the love lasts and the words will keep flowing.

4. I’ve been taking some classes from Joyce Sweeney (Valentine’s Day present from my awesome hubby). I’m enjoying the classes and am learning so much—but with everything going on, I’m falling behind in my homework. Oops. Good thing they’re flexible. I hope to get all caught up by the end of next week.

5. The day started out sunny and nice, but the wind picked up a few hours ago and blew in a storm. We’ve had the first few sprinkles of spring rain! Yay.

Hope you all have a great weekend! Oh, and I’ll be posting a contest here soon. Don’t miss it!

Write on.

Thursday Three

1. Kate Epstein rocks! I was extremely disappointed when I received a rejection from her for a MG project—but the blow was softened since she was no longer representing fiction (that meant the rejection wasn’t because of my manuscript). She told me about her editing services (check out her site here). Extremely affordable! I jumped at the chance. Her feedback has been awesome! It’s so worth the $$. She tailored the critique to my specific questions (mostly—why do I keep getting rejections?) and opened my eyes. A-Ma-Zing!

2. Instead of working on one of my new novel projects, I’ve been diving into revisions based on Kate’s feedback. It’s been a joy to transform my manuscript! I’ve asked Kate if she’d be interested in helping me whip my query letter and synopsis into shape—we’ll see what she says. (crossing my fingers)

3. It’s been hard to get the kids up and moving in the mornings. They missed one week of school when they were sick and another week after grandpa died so they got in the habit of sleeping in. Hopefully next week will be better (I can dream).

Hope everyone is enjoying a happy and productive Thursday!

Oh—and I’m looking forward to Super Bowl weekend! I don’t care who wins the actual game—I like the commercials and the fact that I don’t have to cook. Yay!

 

Write on!

Wednesday’s Word

Procrastination

I’m very good at it. For example, my Christmas decorations stayed up until last night. I kept saying, “We’ll take them down tomorrow.” And each day would come and go and the decorations remained. I tried to blame it on the snow that had frozen to ice and still covered some of the outside lights (the ones on the ground—yes, I had lights on the ground), but the reality was I just didn’t want to do it.  It was a pain trying to reclaim my lights from the icy clutches of winter, but with hubby’s help and several cups of hot water, we got it done. But I do feel so much better with the tree and all the decorations are packed away.

This got me thinking about other things I tend to procrastinate—like writing.

Yesterday after dropping my kids off at school, I came home, got K’s homework, went back to town, and took the homework to K (along with the kids’ lunches). After that, I came home again and took my little self out the door, through the back yard, and into my writing room. I even went so far as to open my computer and get it booted up. Once everything was running, I quickly checked my emails and dutifully opened Word.

And that’s as far as I got. I remembered J was sitting on the couch as I passed and she needed “encouragement” to do her online schooling. So I went back inside, told her to get started and come get me if she had any questions or needed help. I returned to my writing room, sat down, and logged into the online school to check her progress (and I needed to record attendance). Once there, I found she was missing some work. So I went back in the house and found her still sitting on the couch.

Yeah, I spent the morning making sure she was focused on her work and going through the concepts she hadn’t mastered. After overseeing her completion of quite a bit of work, we had lunch and I returned to my writing room. But did I write? No. I wasted valuable time surfing the web.

As I said in my first post of this new year, I plan to take 2013 one day at a time—and yesterday was not much of a writing day. I’m not sure how much I’ll get done today either. I have to oversee J’s science project—it involves dissecting a chicken wing and requires a sharp knife . . . and I’m a bit overprotective when it comes to my kids handling sharp objects.

Today J needs me (at least for a little while), but yesterday I realized there will always be a way to procrastinate. Not a huge revelation (I mean, I KNOW that already), but realizing I’m more prone to give in to the distraction than to force myself to focus on writing is a huge revelation—at least for me.

Face it, writing is hard work. Even the research, plotting, planning, etc. that sometimes comes before the writing is hard work. Okay, it’s not hard physical labor (though typing can wear out fingers/wrists/arms), but mentally and emotionally it takes its toll. No wonder we sometimes need a break.

I’m pleased with myself for identifying my tend to give in to distractions. Now that I know the problem, I plan to do something about it. There will still be days when I probably won’t get any writing done, but I believe I can eliminate many of those days by making the conscious choice NOT to give in to unnecessary distractions (that includes my kids unless they REALLY do need me).

I’m not setting a goal or making a resolution here—I still plan to take 2013 one day at a time—I’m just realizing a weakness in myself and deciding to work on strengthening that aspect of my character.

After all, I am a character in my own life, and I need to experience some growth by the end of my story too.

Before I go inside to help J this morning, I intend to either fill out at least five 3 x 5 index cards or come up with names for the characters in my YA SF.

What about you? Are you easily distracted and allow yourself to procrastinate?

And finally, if you chose one word for today, what would it be?

 

Write on.

Oh yeah, I have a blog.

Yeah, it’s been awhile. *waves to anyone who might still drop in to read*

So the holidays are over, and I survived. Whew! The kids went back to school today so I had time to finish a critique I was doing and jot down a few more ideas for the YA SF project I’m hoping to write. I’m still working on the new MG—but now I’ll probably bop back and forth between it and the YA. We’ll see.

Last night I sent my MG Fantasy off for a professional edit. I’m hoping the edit will help steer me in the right direction so I can get an offer instead of rejections. It’s going to cost a bit of money, but I really think it will be worth it in the end. It seems like I’ve hit a wall with it. I’ve gone as far as I can go with critiques and my own revisions, and I’m hoping a more professional eye will show me what’s wrong so I can fix it.

I didn’t set any New Year’s resolutions this year. I usually try to at least have a goal in mind and say I’m going to do better with keeping up with my blog or get in shape or whatever—but not this year. It seems I never reach the goals or succeed in that which I resolve so I’m not sure it helps me at all. Inevitably I look back on my resolutions/goals and realize I didn’t reach them and get all depressed and upset. It’s just not worth it. Besides, things were too hectic with the kids and travelling to relatives and everything. I didn’t even look back at my goals/resolutions for this year—heck, I’m not sure I even made any. And I don’t care if I did (so if you remember, don’t remind me). My plan for 2013 is to take it one day at a time and see where this year takes me. I’ll write when I can and not beat myself up when I can’t.

What about you? Do you set goals or resolutions? If so, how do you choose what to resolve/what goal to set? If not, why don’t you?

2013 on!

Monday’s Muse = I Got the Point—and It Hurts!

I stabbed myself in the hand yesterday. Yes, this takes amazing talent, I know. Let me explain my stupidity. A few months ago, I purchased one of those forever sharp knife sets. Yesterday I decided to open it. I took out all the knives, but still felt something in the box. I put my right hand under the opening so whatever was inside could fall into my open palm and not onto my glass stovetop. I tipped the box upside down and shook it a little to dislodge the object stuck inside. Out came the fillet knife--yeah, the real sharp, pointy one—and straight into my hand. OUCH!!

It came right back out again, so I’m not sure how far it actually went in, but it hurt and bled quite a bit. I imagine it wasn’t too far in since the stab wound is small (about 1/8”), but the pain begs to differ. At least it’s off on the fleshy part about an inch beneath my pinky finger and not in the center of my palm. For some reason, thinking this makes me feel better.

In my defense, all of the other knives in the box were also in their own individual boxes so I had no idea there was a box-less instrument of pain awaiting me. Also, there were orange juice drinking things in the box. So I really wasn’t expecting to be wounded by whatever would fall out of the box. Still, I should have at least looked inside before shaking the box over my hand. S-T-U-P-I-D.

So, I’m in pain and it radiates out from the wound to share the agony with my pinky finger and on down my wrist, but I refuse to let it win. And, after reading this Monday’s Muse worthy post from Dawn Metcalf, I’m inspired to hope I can use this pain in my writing someday (though I admit it wasn’t something that crossed my mind before reading the post—the only thing on my mind in relation to the incident was PAIN! Owie, owie, owie).

I’m still typing in spite of the aching (though a bit more slowly with lots of breaks). And I still graded the spelling papers for K’s class last night (that hurt much worse than typing—something about the way I needed to hold the pen, I guess). And today I’m going to (hopefully) finish up a critique I’ve been doing and then dive back into my own writing again.

So, how has your week before Christmas started? Hopefully not with any stabbing pain.

 

Write on!

Thursday Things

Here’s what I’ve been up to the last three days.

We hired someone to do the tape and texture on the walls. I had researched how to do it myself, but since I hadn’t ever done it, I decided it might not be the best idea for me to try. The professional we hired finished up on Saturday so I started working (you can see some of my work in the picture showing the textured wall.

Tuesday I painted the ceiling—it’s a very deep purple color.

On Wednesday I painted the walls.

They’re a lighter purple color—yes, my favorite color is purple.

Today I put down the floor. I used the brown paper floor method—except I didn’t use brown paper. I saw some awesome colored paper at Home Depot and couldn’t resist using it. Not only is it pretty, but I don’t have to stain the floor so I save some time.

These are the supplies I used. Elmer’s Glue-All and the pretty mauve paper. I mixed the glue with water (3 parts water to one part glue) then used a paintbrush to apply the glue mixture to the floor. I tore off pieces of paper and wadded them up. Then the crumpled up papers went into the glue and were spread out on the floor. I used the paintbrush to smooth it out (I overlapped the pieces) and apply a topcoat of glue.

And here’s the result of my day’s work:

Tomorrow I start adding the water-based polyurethane and once it’s all dry my floor will be finished. Then I’ll need to add the trim around the base of the walls and get the ceiling fan installed. Once that’s all done, I can start moving in my craft and writing stuff. YAY!!

Create on!

Friday’s Five

1. National Novel Writing Month is over (well, at midnight tonight). It was a complete bust for me this year. With all the family drama going on, I didn’t manage to get remotely close to 50,000 words. Oh well. I do have some writing done at least. Maybe next year.

2. Family drama—I’m tired of it. That is all.

3. The writing/craft room is ready for painting! The walls have been taped and textured by a professional. I decided it was beyond me even though I got an e-book and watched videos to learn how to do it. I’ll try my hand at taping and texturing on a less important project—like a closet that no one will ever see or something. I’m not sure when I’ll get around to getting the walls painted, but after the walls are painted, I’ll do the floor and then have the ceiling fan installed (not by me since I’d probably electrocute myself), and I’ll be all ready to move in! Yay. Okay—“move in” makes it sound like I’m planning to live there. I’m not. Though it may seem like it to my family. hee hee hee

4. I can’t believe tomorrow will be December! Holy mistletoe! Where did the time go? Christmas will be here in 25 short days. YIKES! The kids want to decorate the house tomorrow. I’m not ready to dig out the decorations. First of all, I have to plan these things. It’s not like I can just get the decorations and start throwing them around the house (even though the finished results may look like I did). No, my friends. This takes planning. I have to rearrange the entire living room to accommodate the tree—because it HAS to be in front of the window so it can be seen from the street. It’s like an unwritten law or something (well, it should be). And the couch is under the window right now—and I have no idea where I’ll move it. Last year, we took the couch completely out of the house (it was a different couch) and were couch-less for the holidays. I DON’T want that again. I like having somewhere to sit.

5. The kids made bows and arrows out of sticks from the hedges hubby cut. They even got bird feathers (ones the macaw and cockatiel had discarded) to tie on the arrows. The bows and arrows work surprisingly well. I made them swear NOT to shoot them at any living thing upon pain of me taking away and breaking their bows and arrows. They promised. I hope the threat of losing all their hard work is enough to make them keep their promise. And hopefully they’ll be to busy NOT shooting at living things to bug me about decorating the house tomorrow.

Hope you all have a great weekend!

Distractions on!

Thursday Things

1. Today is the start of National Novel Writing Month (aka NaNo or NaNoWriMo). I do plan to participate, but I’m not sure I’ll get much writing done today.

2. I have all three kids home today due to various illness. K finally got the sore throat and fever the other two had. JR has a sore throat and stomach ache (and he didn’t even eat a bunch of Halloween candy) and J has stomach ache and vomiting (she didn’t eat Halloween candy either). *sigh* For some reason, the kids always get sick when the weather changes.

3. J asked me about doing online schooling yesterday. She’s in 7th grade this year, but doesn’t like it much. We are looking into it and considering allowing her to enroll in online school. We’ll see.

4. I’m glad to see some of my east coast friends are getting back online after the hurricane/storm/mess. It’s also good to see some agents/agencies getting back online too.

5. And I read the news about the Penguin/Random House merger yesterday. There are those who don’t like it and those who do. I’m not sure what to think.

What are your thoughts on the merger?

Hope you have a great Thursday and an amazing start to a brand new month!!

Write on!

Four on Friday

1. The kids have been sick most of the week. This means I haven’t been able to do much writing wise. But two of the three went back to school today, and I’m out in my shed ready to get some work done (even though most of the day is gone).

2. My father-in-law is down in Scottsdale today to be seen by a specialist. For those who don’t know, he has bladder cancer. We aren’t sure what stage it is at this point, but they are talking about removing his bladder—hopefully we’ll know more after the appointment today.

3. I can’t believe it’s almost November! Crazy! It’s chilly here today with a slight wind blowing—which makes it feel colder than it probably is. Though it’s been cold in the mornings, the afternoons usually warm up, so this is quite a change. It always happens just in time for the kids to freeze while dressed in their Halloween costumes. Then it usually warms back up again for a bit. I was hopeful that it would stay warm this year, but I should have known better.

4. We don’t have any plans for this weekend—though we may go visit FIL if they keep him down there for surgery instead of having him come back at another time. We’ll see.

What about you? Any plans for this weekend? Whatever you do, I hope you enjoy every  minute of it!

Have a weekend full of awesome!

 

Write/or whatever on!

Tuesday Tidbits

1. I finished my revisions, came up with a new title, and sent off the full MG manuscript to the editor and the agent who requested it. Now I wait to hear back. I also queried a few other agents. Usually I’d be obsessively checking my inbox. But I’m not. Weird. I was all geared up to jump into the new MG novel (the one I started writing and then stopped to go back to work on revisions), but I’ve had sick kids since last Friday. I love my kids, but it’s so hard to get any writing done when they’re home—especially when they’re sick. I take the youngest to the doctor later this morning.

2. I have a headache today. Probably some of it is from lack of sleep, and the rest is because I’m trying to wear contacts again—and there’s trouble getting the right eye’s contact to stay in place. I may end up having to go for the hard lenses again (gas permeable). I was really hoping to wear soft lenses—stupid astigmatism.

3. Progress on the shed:

A friend of hubby’s came last Wednesday to help. Because of him, all the sheetrock is up! Hooray!!

And the “doggy door” has gone from this:

to this:

The door has gone from this:

to this:

As you can see, the motion sensor light is also installed (that little thing in the upper left corner of the outside door picture—hubby installed it himself).

So, there’s still the tape and texture to be done, walls to be painted, ceiling fan to be installed, and floors to be done. Lots of work, but it’s looking more and more like a real workplace! After I take JR to the doctor, I hope to hide away in this lovely space and get a bit of writing done today—if the kids will let me. If it’s still a bit chilly out there, I have this little heater to help keep me warm.

It may not look like much, but it does a great job of heating up this little space.

Hope you all have a Terrific Tuesday!

Write on!

Fixing-up Friday

As many of you know, we’ve been fixing up the shed in preparation to turn it into a craft/writing room for me. Yesterday was a glorious day for the electrician came and fixed the old wiring (it wasn’t right) and installed new outlets and a base for a ceiling fan/light set. YAY!!

Here are some before and after pictures:

Before and after light fixture (sorry about the light being on during the before shot):

As you can see, he moved the light over a bit so it’s more in the center of the room. He also installed a new switch system. One switch for the light, one for the fan, and one for the outside light (which he also set up—pictured later in post).

There were a total of two outlet boxes in the shed. One was in the corner by the door and the other was in the ceiling (yes, in the ceiling—it was to plug the light into because the light wasn’t wired—just a plug in). Before and after shots of the corner outlet area:

He left the corner outlet and put it on a circuit all its own so it can be used for the portable heating/cooling unit I’ll be using at first. Having it on its own circuit means I won’t have any dimming lights or blown circuits when I want to be cool/warm. He also installed a new outlet on the adjoining wall—because that’s where I plan to have my computer set-up.

The back wall has a built-in work bench area. I debated taking it out, but decided I’d leave it (though we’re going to improve it) so I can use it for my crafting. Before and after shots of the back wall.

He installed three outlet boxes so I’ll have plenty of power for my sewing machines, glue guns, blender, iron, etc. Yay crafts!! Right now I’ve got my laptop on it (as you can see) and am ready for some revisions (including bag of Snickers—thanks to Kimberley Griffiths-Little)!

Tomorrow is supposed to be the day for insulating and walls. We’ll see how it goes. I’m hoping all goes well and we can at least get the place insulated and the sheetrock up—maybe get the texturing done. But if the texturing doesn’t get done, I’m hoping the door will get fixed, and also the “doggy door” closed off.

Here’s the current door and doggy door areas:

The fixture set-up to the left of the door is for the outside motion sensor light (which will be installed at a later date). This is so I don’t kill myself when trying to go back to the house after a long day of writing/crafting (I’ve been out here writing even though the building isn’t complete and, let me tell you, trying to navigate in the dark isn’t fun). The doggy door is currently nailed shut by a board, but, as you can see, light and air still moves in around it (and it’s a bit chilly today—brrr—I’m wearing a jacket to keep warm).

So things are progressing! The floor will be completely redone after everything else is taken care of (including the painting). I hope the floor turns out as glorious as I’m imagining (I’m doing it myself—more on that later).

Now I’m going to eat Snickers and drink my water (the red bottle in the pictures) and get some revising going (hoping to finish today).

Write on!

Thoughts on Thursday

It’s been hard to think lately. It’s not that I can’t, but it seems like every time I have a quiet moment and start thinking, a song pops into my head. This usually doesn’t happen to me since I don’t listen to music.

And technically I don’t really listen to this song that pops into my head. It’s all the fault of my children. One daughter in particular, K, keeps playing this song over and over and over and . . . yeah you get the idea. So now this keeps popping into my head complete with the memory of the video that goes along with it—which I’ve seen only once and for some reason it’s burned into my brain forever.

I suppose there are worse songs that could be stuck in my head. And I’m not too proud to admit I thought it was hilarious when I first saw it. But I’m tired of it popping into my head when I’m trying to write or driving in the car or—heck, just all the time.

In the spirit of sharing the misery joy, I give you The Dramatic Song (complete with video) by Toby Turner (a.k.a. Tobuscus).

And if you want more of his songs (and these are less likely to be stuck in your head forever) you should watch his literalization (let’s pretend that’s a word) of movie trailers. J says he did one for the Hobbit movie trailer—I’ll have to watch it later.

And so, my friends, may you enjoy The Dramatic Song as it plays over and over and over in your head. Well, it probably won’t since you don’t have a child who plays it all the time. I’ve practically got the whole thing memorized. What a waste of good brain space. *sigh*

Write Think Tobuscus on.

Friday Flood

Well, it’s not quite flooding yet, but it has been raining all morning. This put a halt to the field trip to the county fair for which I was to chaperone (for K’s class). K and the rest of the class are pretty bummed about it—but I’m okay with not having to spend the day at the fair . . . I’m evil like that.

It’s not that I don’t love going to the fair—I really do. I mean, there are animals (those who know me understand I’m a huge animal lover) and booths with lots of fun food and crafts and projects that the kids did and events to watch. But I’m okay with staying home today.

Here’s why:

As some of you may know, I’m in the process of cleaning out the storage shed in my back yard so I can transform it into a special place for me to write and do my crafting. Yesterday was the day to get some cleaning out done. But before I could start hauling stuff out of the shed, I had to mow the lawn—cause the grass/weeds were up past my waist (I’m short, but still—waist high grass/weeds are too tall). I wasn’t able to mow the entire lawn because the inflatable water slide was in the way. So I had to inflate it, hose it down, and let it dry out so I could put it away. So I mowed the lawn around the water slide and went to open the back gate in order to haul stuff to the front—the location of the huge trash dumpster.

After I opened the gate, I realized I wouldn’t be able to get stuff out the gate because we’d set some junk by the gate so we’d remember to throw it out. So I had to move the junk pile to the huge trash dumpster first. Once I dragged stuff to the dumpster, I realized some of the larger things—like the old BBQ grill and broken swimming pool—would have to be taken apart if I still wanted to have room in the trash bin for more junk. So I started taking apart the grill. Then I decided I needed to get oldest son, E, out of bed to help me. Once I got him up and moving (no small feat), I decided to leave the taking apart of the larger items to hubby or I’d never get stuff out of the shed. So E and I started pulling stuff out of the shed.

The first thing we hauled out was the old inflatable water slide. It had some holes that I was going to repair but never got around to fixing. So into the dumpster it went (and took up most of the room—stupid water slide). We then hauled the plastic tubs full of old toys and books and keepsakes, etc. out of the shed and set them in the driveway. I went through a few of them and threw things out (don’t tell the kids). When hubby got home, he took apart the grill and started helping us load the plastic tubs into his truck.

I’d like to say we got the whole shed cleaned out and everything hauled to the storage room we rent, but, sadly, that’s not the case. We did get quite a bit of stuff out of there, but there’s still SOOO much more to do.

Anyway, all that was to explain why I’m tired today and not sad to stay home instead of having to chaperone a group of excited fifth graders at the county fair. Plus, unlike today, yesterday was bright and sunny—okay, down right HOT—and, being the idiot I am, I forgot to wear sunscreen and got sunburned. It hurts.

So, yeah, I’m evil and selfish and glad the field trip got cancelled. So there. *sticking tongue out*

Tomorrow will be another day of cleaning out the shed so “the guy” can come on Tuesday and tell us what we’ll need to do to transform the shed into a writing/crafting room.

And I’m excited for the writing/crafting room to be finished so I can have room to work on my secret craft projects—yes, I need more room than my kitchen table provides (will share pictures/info when the crafts are done). And it will also be nice to have somewhere quiet (and not so cramped to write). The little desk off to the side of my bedroom is not near enough room—and it gets noisy when everyone’s home . . . and the distractions of seeing laundry and stuff that needs done around the house really kills my creativity.

What “fun” things did you do this week? Have anything “fun” planned for this weekend?

Write/craft/clean on!

Tuesday Times

Things have been so crazy here (what else is new)! We’ve travelled every weekend for the last month to visit family and attend various family gatherings. I’m exhausted!

This weekend was the most exhausting yet. We visited my parents in Snowflake (AZ) for the corn harvest. We planted less this year, but harvested more. I’m not sure I’ve seen so much corn! Not only did we harvest it, but we also steamed it and cut it off the cob so we could freeze it. We started at 6:00 a.m. (which meant the kids and I had to get up at 4:00 a.m. so we could get there on time) and didn’t get finished until just after 4:00 p.m. After harvesting the corn (there was a truck bed full of it), my siblings and their children shucked it while another sister and I harvested the carrots (a wagon overflowing with them) and some watermelon (gigantic heavy things—or maybe it only felt like it because we were tired). I brought home a thirty-one pound watermelon (we’re going to cut into it tonight) and there were several others that were big like that.

So exhausting might not quite convey the level of tired we all are. Yesterday was spent recuperating. We had planned to travel to Flagstaff for the Coconino County Fair, but decided not to. We did go out to one of the local pizza places to hang out and eat lunch, but that was it.

Two of my kids are home today because they aren’t feeling well—likely a combination of exhaustion (they helped harvest and shuck the corn) and eating too much corn (we had some for dinner last night and the night before—on the cob). Corn tastes so much sweeter when you’ve grown and harvested it yourself—or maybe we just appreciate it more.

Anyway, today I’m hoping to get some writing done. I wasn’t able to write much last week at all between the sick kids and preparing to travel. But it’s a new week—and a new month—and I’m hoping to accomplish great things. Well, I should at least be able to get the research done that I need to for this new project.

So how was your Labor Day weekend? Did you do anything fun? What are you planning for the rest of this week?

Write on!

Words on Wednesday

1. I haven’t gotten much writing done the last couple of days. Mostly due to sickness. I caught a cold or some such virus from my adorable niece on Saturday. My brother and sister-in-law warned me their baby was sick, but I just couldn’t resist holding and cuddling and playing with her. And now I’m paying for it. But it was worth it. I don’t get to see them often and most of the time when I do she doesn’t want anything to do with me (cause I’m not around enough for her to know me). But this time she let me hold her and play with her and she held onto my fingers with her chubby little hands and let me “walk” her around the room. *sigh* good times.

2. Monday I spent cleaning out the storage facility we rent. We’ve been throwing stuff in there for years and it needed “organized” so we can throw more stuff in there. And it’s important to me that it gets done because it means I’ll have a writing space free of clutter (so I can concentrate better) and hopefully have fewer interruptions. More on that project to come.

3. I’ve been working on a new MG novel. I know, I know, I shouldn’t jump from one project to another, but this new idea is awesome (at least I think so), and I couldn’t wait to get started on it. The revisions I was working on will wait.

4. The best thing about this new project is I learned a new way to write from the awesomeness that is WriteOnCon! On Wednesday, the amazing Kimberley Griffiths-Little did a vlog about her 3x5 plotting method. I’d heard of it before, but didn’t fully comprehend it until I watched her vlog. And what a difference it has made! It took me a little less than two days to completely plot out my new novel on the 3x5 index cards. I have a stack of abut 41 scenes to write up, and it’s so much easier to work from the 3x5 cards than it is to flip through pages of notes in my spiral notebook (my old method of plotting) trying to find what scene/idea/bit of dialogue I want. Here’s a link to the vlog Kimberley did at the conference. And I’ll try to embed it below (if I can get it to work).

How do you plot your novels/stories?

Hope everyone is enjoying their Wednesday!

 

Write on.

Words on Wednesday

It’s K’s 11th birthday today. She got her presents yesterday since they came in the mail and she just couldn’t wait until today—she wanted to play with them and knew she’d have to go to school this morning and not have time. She wanted Perfect Petzzz; a Chihuahua and Porch Cat with Kittens. They are truly adorable and since they don’t need food or water—only the occasional “D” sized battery, they’re most welcome to stay. Unfortunately, the Chihuahua is having a bit of trouble “breathing” so I contacted the seller to see what we can do about it. I replaced the pooch’s battery, but it still isn’t working.

Here’s a link to the website for those not familiar with Perfect Petzzz (I wasn’t). If you don’t want to click over, these are basically molded animals with synthetic fur that have a motor mechanism inside that makes them “breathe”—the fur moves up and down near the back legs like real dogs and cats do when they’re sleeping. They are in fixed positions so there’s no moving them around, but at first glance, they do look real. K fooled E (who’s 19  now) for a little bit. He thought we’d gotten some cats and new dog.

Anyway, K is upset that the Chihuahua isn’t working, but she thought it just needed a new battery. She’ll find out when she comes home that the batteries I got this morning didn’t do the trick. *sigh* Hopefully it won’t upset her too much and “ruin” her birthday. She is my drama queen, after all, and this might be cause for a scene.

I managed to get quite a bit of writing done yesterday. This is awesome since I’m going to be crazy today with getting cupcakes to K’s class this afternoon and trying to get her cake and stuff done for after school today. Not sure I’ll get much writing done today. Tomorrow I should have the first part of the morning to write and then after I grade the spelling tests at K’s class I might get in another hour or so of writing before the kids get home. All in all, things aren’t going as well as I’d hoped on the daily writing front. Hopefully things will slow down next week.

Oh wait, next week is crazy too—it’s WriteOnCon!! I’m so excited about this (if you can’t tell by the exclamation points)!! I’ve loved being able to attend this conference each year. Being a poor writer with not much money to spare for conferences and the like, it’s great to be able to attend this online conference each year for FREE!! Yes, for FREE!! It still amazes me. There are always wonderful agents, editors, and authors at WriteOnCon, and there’s always more to be learned. This year, my very awesome, amazing friend Kimberley Griffiths Little will be one of the authors on faculty. The WriteOnCon theme this year is Back to Basics (and who doesn’t need to get back to basics now and then) and Kimberley will be demonstrating her 3x5 card plotting method. YAY!!

What are you doing on this lovely Wednesday? Are you planning to attend WriteOnCon next week?

Hope you all have a great Wednesday!

Write on!

What day is it?

So last week flew by so fast I almost missed it! Here we are already on Tuesday of this week and I feel like I’ve accomplished a grand total of nothing. In reality, I’ve been busy, just not writing.

Mostly I’ve been catching up after last week’s insanity. K had some trouble last week with possible seizures and was home for a few days. On Friday, I traveled to visit a friend who came from TX (she was visiting her mother in another town in AZ—thus the travel on my part to see her). It was great to see her and catch up and do a bit of shopping around the quaint little town of Cottonwood, AZ.

On Saturday we had the huge birthday bash for my four kids. Yes, one big birthday party for ALL of them. Their birthdays are in June, July, August, and July and are only a few weeks apart. Instead of having a birthday party for each one individually, I find it easier to have one big party for all of them. This year we decided to rent the local movie theater and watch Ice Age 4. Unfortunately, the theater called on Monday to tell me the movie was leaving on Wednesday and wouldn’t be available for the party on Saturday. So we did some scrambling to see if we could get everyone to come on Wednesday instead.

That wasn’t happening. We then decided to hold the party at one of the local pizza joints. They were gracious and wonderful and we were all set . . . until I contacted the movie theater to tell them we’d made other plans and they told me there had been a change and the movie WOULD be there for us to watch on Saturday. *sigh* Commence many family conferences and phone calls to family and friends—Anyway, we decided to stick with the pizza joint and had a marvelous party with about 60 or so people (family and the kids friends). It was fun, but exhausting. The friend who was visiting from TX wasn’t able to make the party, but she did stop by later that night to visit. *love her*

That was my hectic week . . .

This week hasn’t started out great either. Yesterday the kids stayed home due to various complaints of not feeling well. I’d hoped to dive into a new week of writing, but that didn’t happen. I did try, but the constant knocking on the door (I tried locking it after the first thousand interruptions) wasn’t conducive to getting much done. After about two hours, I gave up and opened the door. The kids came in and we sat on the bed. They played their iPods and I played my iPad. We all played the same game.

It’s a new time waster app we discovered on Saturday (thanks to one of E’s friends at the birthday party). It’s “Let’s Create: Pottery.” I know they have this game for other platforms (like 3DS and I think Wii), but this was the first time I’d ever heard of it. What a blast we’ve been having! It’s especially fun for me since I’ve been missing my real life pottery class. Let me tell you, it’s so much easier to make the pottery in the app than it is in the real world! And, since it’s all in the app, there’s no boxes of pottery to fill up my house. Though I’ve wished I could have a few of them in real life since I’ve liked some of the things I’ve made in the app.

Anyway, the kids are all off to school today and I’m planning to get some writing done right after I post this—and finish my breakfast. Speaking of food—I decided a couple of weeks ago to try to eat healthier in hopes of losing some weight (I need to lose about 25 pounds). I looked into a few “diet” programs, but they’re super expensive—well, for our budget. So instead, I’ve been doing my own thing. For starters, I’ve started eating.

Yeah, that may sound strange or even bad to some of you, but the truth is, I hardly ever eat breakfast and rarely eat lunch. I’m too busy writing or going to school or doing homework or the like. Not healthy habits! If I did eat anything, it was junk food as I sat at my computer (York peppermint patties—though I rationalize that it’s dark chocolate so it’s not “bad” for me—lol). So now I have a breakfast shake each morning and some sort of breakfast bar. I was eating either a granola bar or a Nutrigrain (strawberry) bar. Yesterday I discovered some new “healthier” options. They’re Kind bars.

This morning I’m eating a Kind Fruit & Nut bar of the Almond and Coconut variety. They’re all natural, gluten free (not that I have a problem with gluten) and don’t have any artificial garbage in them. The ingredients for the almond and coconut bars: Almonds, dried coconut, honey, non GMO glucose (whatever that is) puffed rice, chicory fiber, soy lecithin. I was worried they’d taste gross, but I was wrong. I haven’t tried any of the other Kind bars yet (though I purchased a Peanut Butter Dark Chocolate + Protein—which I’ll try as my snack later today), but the almond and coconut is delicious!!

Last week, I lost three pounds—but I think I gained it back after the pizza party and cake and all that on Saturday. I haven’t been brave enough to step on the scale yet. In addition to eating and eating a bit healthier (with the exception of Saturday), I’m walking during the day (instead of driving to get the mail I walk the block to the mail box and back—I also walk to meet the kids at the bus stop in the afternoons and walk home with them which is about a block away).

Even though it’s only been a couple of weeks, I’m feeling better (and have lost weight). And apparently this “diet” is doing something for my hair because last week I got so many compliments on my hair that it isn’t even funny. In fact, it’s kind of weird.

Anyway, tomorrow is K’s birthday so I’ll have to take some time out from writing to take cupcakes to her class (at 12:20) and on Thursday I have to go in at about 12:45 to grade spelling tests. This will be a weekly thing. I know, I know, I was trying to avoid volunteering this year, but how could I say no to something so simple? It will only take about an hour out of my day (have to grade two classrooms worth since K’s teacher teaches spelling/reading to another class—that teacher teaches K’s class math in trade).

So, how is your week shaping up? Are you planning to get a bunch of writing/stuff done or is your week like my last week and you’ll be so busy you won’t have time to think?

Write On!

Weekend Woes

Yesterday was J’s (oldest daughter) birthday. She became an official teenager (she turned 13). I thought the weekend would be a great one spent celebrating. Don’t get me wrong, we did have fun and celebrated J’s special day, but it wasn’t all fun and celebration.

Yesterday while hubby was using the steamer to cook his tamales, the stove caught on fire. Apparently some grease (from when he fried some tortillas for chips) had gotten on the burner or something. The fire was put out and no one was hurt, but my stove is burnt.

A few scorch marks on the stove don’t bother me, but when I was removing the stove-top heating elements to make sure the fire was out (I used potholders so I wouldn’t burn myself) I sort of pulled one out and think I ruined the wiring on it. Since it’s an electric stove and we don’t want another fire, we’re going to toss out the stove and get a new one today. In about an hour or so, hubby will call me and I’ll meet him at the appliance store to pick out a new oven.

It was an old stove that came with the house (we’ve lived in this house for eleven years and who knows how long the stove was here before we moved in) so I’m not broken up about having to replace it. Still, that means a day of not getting writing done because I’m moving out the old stove and cleaning (it’s amazing how much stuff gets under the stove) so the new one can be brought in (hopefully before dinnertime).

In addition to the oven fiasco, we discovered a leak under the kitchen sink. Hubby patched it up, but things were pretty wet so we’re still trying to dry them out (and trying to prevent mold). These things always seem to happen at once!

On the good news side of things, this is the first full week of school for the kids (they started last Wednesday)! I’m excited to see how it goes for them—and me. Those first few days of school, the teachers didn’t require much from the kids, but that will change this week. They’ll be sending homework home. Which means we’ll have to figure out how to get back into the routine of doing chores and homework. And I get to figure out if the old time schedule still works or if I need to make adjustments. I’m pretty sure I’ll have some adjusting to do since both of the younger kids will have to read 30 minutes each night instead of last year’s 20 minutes. It may not seem like much, but those extra 10 minutes end up being an extra 20 minutes for me since they read to me separately. *sigh*

Don’t get me wrong, I’m all for reading. I LOVE READING!! But it’s hard on all of us to schedule that much time and still fit in all the other homework and chores and hope there’s enough time left before dinner for the kids to get outside and have some play time. I’m not sure teachers realize what they’re doing to us when they make such assignments.

Another fun thing that happened this weekend: one of my sisters introduced me to a fun new time waster game on the iPad. It’s called Jurassic Park Builder. Yeah. Like I needed another time waster. As I write this, my iPad is sitting next to me on the desk so I can periodically check on it and collect the money from my dinosaurs. I’ve rationalized it by convincing myself it’s not a huge time waster because it only takes a minute or so to tap on all the dinosaurs and collect the money. Still, that’s a minute I could have spent writing, I suppose. Hopefully I’ll get bored with playing it soon and get that minute back.

How was your weekend? How do you plan to spend your Monday?

Play Write on!

Thursday Thoughts

The first day of school went great for the kids! With them gone, I enjoyed diving back into my old writing schedule. There were a few hours when I had to stop writing to take oldest son into town and get some lunch (yeah, I have one NOT in school at the moment—he graduated last year—but he’ll be taking some college classes . . . they start next month), but for the most part it was a productive swim in the writing waters.

Okay, to be honest, I was too scared and nervous about diving back into deep writing. I needed some time to splash around in the shallow end of the writing pool and reacquaint myself with the waters. So I dipped my toes into the MS with some revising and managed to clear the three chapter mark.

Today, I’m swimming into deeper waters with some writing of new chapters/scenes. Hopefully I won’t flail around in the waters, sink to the bottom, and drown. I don’t understand why I’m so nervous about swimming into the deep end. After all, I know how to swim. It shouldn’t be any trouble to dive into the deep and and just do it . . . but I’m struggling to work up the nerve.

And it’s not like I’m writing a completely new novel, I’m just rewriting an old one. The bare bones are there, I just have to flesh them out and clean up the messy ones.

Have any of you taken a break from writing? If so, how did/do you get back into the “swim” of things?

Write on?

Wednesday Words

It’s here! The kids are off to their first day of school. While I’m excited because it means I’ll be able to get back to a writing schedule/routine, I’m also a bit nervous. Not sure if it’s nerves for the kids and the new school year for them, or nerves for myself and my writing. I’m not sure why I should be nervous about diving back into a regular writing schedule, but I think I might be. This is the first time in a long time that I’ll have Monday, Tuesday, Thursday, and Friday for nothing but writing. I won’t be going back to school myself this semester, and (so far) I’m not signed up to do any volunteering at the school library. My days from about 9:00 until 3:00 are all mine for writing!

Of course, Wednesday isn’t in the list above because hubby is off on Wednesdays, and it’s hard to write when he’s home watching TV. But today, he had a meeting in Flagstaff so he’s gone too (won’t be home until after the kids are). I’m going to get some writing done today! It’s not that I haven’t been writing at all during the summer—I did a bit here and there when I could, but it was hard with kids home—but there’s a part of me that wonders if my lax summer habits will be easy to break (played lots of games during the summer). I’m hoping I’ll be able to get back into the swing of things (this blog post might be considered an effort to procrastinate, but I think it’s more of a “breaking the ice” type thing) right away and accomplish quite a bit of writing.

The first project I’ll be tackling is finishing up the rewrite of the MG I’ve been doing. Once finished with the rewrite, I’ll be revising it based on feedback from critique buddies. I’m setting a deadline and planning on having it all finished and revised and ready to send to my wonderful agent by the end of September.

What are your plans for this wonderful Wednesday?

Write on!