Tag: Life changes

Photo Friday

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Welcome to another Photo Friday!  Today’s post features those wild and crazy guys, Cricket and Seymour, when at least one of them was slightly less wild and/or crazy.

Seymour and Cricket, two peas in a pod

Taken in the hospital the day after Cricket was born (yes, the date stamp is wrong), this is easily my favorite picture of them so far.  It will probably always be one of my favorites.  Cricket looks so much like Seymour, and I love the look on Seymour’s face.  It says, “Mess with him, and you’ll be praying for the cops to haul you away by the time I’m done with you.”  It reminds me of the Facebook flair that says, “Someone who loves me is well-trained in the use of their weapon and accurate up to three hundred meters.”  We have a framed print of this picture sitting on our mantle.  I don’t think I’ll ever get tired of looking at it.  If I do, I’m sure that means that an even more precious photo has taken its place.

(c) 2012.  All rights reserved.

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One of those days…

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Yes, it was one of those days today.  Actually, it wasn’t really a bad day, but it started off looking like it was going to be one.  I woke up and discovered that Cricket had managed to unscrew the cap from a full tube of Desitin.  Evidently, he thought it would make a wonderful styling accessory because his hair was full of it.  I guess he also thought it would make great make-up, because his face was covered in it, too.  Naturally, it was all over his hands.  He got it in his bedding, on his feet, on his door.  It was a mess.

Of water torture and little men

Taking time…and kicking guilt in the keister

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I sat down to work on this post last night after a hectic couple of hours and ended up reading the news on msnbc.com instead.  Whoops.

Anyway, I read a fantastic post the other day on Kristen Lamb’s blog about taking time to rest and how there is a season to everything under the sun.  Yes, I know Ecclesiastes says the exact same thing, but Ms. Lamb said it in regards to writing by quoting the Byrds and the song “Turn, Turn, Turn.”  By the way, I love that song.  The melody is beautiful and would be playing in my head were it not for whatever is playing on the radio and distracting me (I know the song, I just can’t think of its name – “Angel Eyes” perhaps? – and I couldn’t tell you who sings it for the life of me).  The comparisons she draws between farming and writing are obvious, yet they’d never occurred to me before (despite having grown up in America’s breadbasket, where I still currently live).  Her words struck a particular chord with me as I’ve been dealing with quite a lot of guilt lately concerning a variety of tasks that seem to go undone despite my best intentions to accomplish them. To everything there is a season (turn, turn, turn)…

Scenes from home

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Apparently my kids need to be educated.  The following conversation took place this morning as we were about to walk out the door:

• M: Tom, why are you only wearing one glove?
•T: Because I lent the other one to RaShaun.
•M: Okay, well, either you need to wear both gloves or neither of them.  Michael Jackson couldn’t pull off the one-glove look and neither can you.
•T: Who’s Michael Jackson?
•R: Didn’t we look him up at your First Communion?
•M: *facepalm* No, that was Michael Jordan.  Different guy.  Do you know the song “Thriller?”
•T: No.
•M: *epic facepalm*

Clearly tonight’s soundtrack must feature Michael Jackson.  I’m not even all that wild about his music, but at least I know who he is.  And while I realize that for the course of their lives he hasn’t been the most popular singer, I still can’t believe they don’t know who he is.  It reminds me of another aspect of their education that is sadly lacking: the ability to alphabetize.

•M: Rachael, will you get out [random movie whose title I can’t recall]?
•R: It’s not here.
•M: Yes, it is.  All the movies are in alphabetical order; just look under [appropriate letter – I think it was L or M].
•R: It’s not here, I’m telling you.
•M: I know we have it. *pulls movie off of shelf*  See?  It’s right where I said it was!
•G: Hold on a minute.  Maybe they don’t know how to alphabetize.
•M: Do you kids know how to alphabetize?
•K: (in unison)No!
•M: *facepalm*

Evidently they don’t teach kids how to alphabetize things in school anymore.  This useful skill must have fallen by the wayside when they did away with media center as a class.  Now that everything is available online, who needs to know about the Dewey Decimal System or how to use a card catalog?  (Please to note the sarcasm.)  Alphabetizing is for the ancients, much like legible cursive or heck, even legible printing.  My kids’ inability to alphabetize was quickly remedied.  I’ve not tested it yet, but I do hope they were paying attention.  After all, stranger things have happened.

(c) 2012.  All rights reserved.

I’m versatile!

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That’s right, I’ve been nominated for the Versatile Blogger Award!  It’s actually the second time I’ve been nominated.  I kinda forgot about it the first time, though, which is weird because it was the first time in the nearly five years I’ve been blogging that I’d ever been nominated for an award like this.

Anyway, the lovely S.Z.W.ordsmith was kind enough to nominate me (thank you!) – evidently my poetry makes her smile.  That makes me smile, because I do so love to make others happy.  The rules say I have to say seven things about myself and nominate fifteen others for the award, so here goes! For deets and a list of good reads, follow me!

The writer’s identity

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Writing

My noon hour yesterday was much like many other noon hours at my day job.  I grabbed my computer, my wallet, and headed down the street to the local café-type establishment to quiet the beast inside (because yes, my stomach is a snarling, ferocious beast, foaming at the mouth as it waits, ever-impatient, for the victuals that will eventually slide into its gaping maw).  I took a seat, ordered my food, and withdrew my laptop from its handy-dandy carrying case to work on my story (and when that failed, to at least continue looking over one of five samples sent to me by a friend for some vicious red-penning).  As I was trying to solve a major plot problem (Ha!), a conversation caught my ear.  One of the waiters was discussing writing with the gal in the booth behind me.  He is a college student majoring in English; she is one of many people who have written a book, only to (likely) have it remain unseen by the masses, covered in dust, and taking up space in her home.  “But I sent it to so-and-so – he writes Christian books, you know – and he thought it was very good!” she proclaimed to half the bar, the waiter, and me.

Ignoring the woman, I asked the waiter what he enjoyed writing and what he wanted to do as a writer.  He was where my interest lay because he is at that point in his life where he still has the world at his fingertips and anything is possible.  Sure, anything is always possible, but at 28 with a husband and four kids, it’s not likely that I’ll be able to study abroad and learn French through immersion or spend a summer backpacking through Germany absorbing local culture anymore.  Anyway, he replied that he had wanted to be a novelist and he liked sci-fi, but that he’d been fighting depression and not writing as prolifically as he’d done before.  I mentioned that I’d just finished a fantasy novel and that my own depression had made me want to lock myself in my room to write.  Naturally, this piqued the woman’s interest, so she turned her curiosity away from the waiter and onto me.  “I’m sorry, what do you do?” Click here to find out!

This post is chock-full of books!

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Things that gave me a good laugh this morning:

All I want is a library full of books and a prince telling me to pick one*…

*Book, that is.  Not monks.

Also:

TC: Mommy, can we go outside to play?
Me: No, it’s all mucky and gross outside.
TP: Can we sit on the porch?
Me: No, you really don’t need to be out there.

Both give me their best pout.

Me: If you really want to go outside, one of you can get the diaper bag and the other can get my computer bag and you can take them out to the van for me.
TC & TP: Okay!

Oh, kids. 🙂

Speaking of kids, Cricket’s new favorite word is book.  If all we did all day long was read Clifford’s First Halloween, I think he’d be in heaven.  I, on the other hand, have grown quite tired of reading yet again about Clifford going trick-or-treating dressed as a ghost, getting a bath after eating a candy apple, and traipsing around a haunted house stuck in a glove.  But this, too, shall pass, and I know from experience that once these days are gone, I’ll miss them terribly.  Cricket’s a boy after my own heart.  I’ve got a couple of pictures from story time a few days ago that I’ve been meaning to post on Facebook, but I haven’t done it yet.  Maybe I’ll get to it over the weekend, if I’m not buried under a mountain of laundry.  *sigh*

In other book news, you can now pre-order White Mountain, Book 1 of the Darkling Chronicles by Sophie E. Tallis.  The book is set to come out in September from Safkhet Publishing.  I predict it’ll sell faster than hot chocolate in a blizzard. 🙂

Also, I think I might have fixed a major plot problem in The Lokana Chronicles.  Some more detail was needed in one place and hopefully I’ve fixed it now.  I’ve tried twice already; I hope the third time’s the charm.  But if it’s not, well, then I’ll just have to put my stubborn nature to good use and make it bend to my will.  The Great and Powerful Seymour will yet be pleased. 🙂  I say that only because I think his crit made a lot of sense and I’m determined to tackle the problem head-on.  As it says over at der Wendighaus, “Time to load the guns, brew the ink, and get to work because I am a writer and I am done fucking around.”

I think that’s about all I’ve got this gray Friday afternoon.  Have a happy weekend!

(c) 2012.  All rights reserved.

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Please, Mom? Just one more?

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My friend Tara wrote an awesome post today about her favorite childhood books after I mentioned something on Twitter about reading to my kids.  Cricket and Thumper had some lovely story time this morning while drinking their morning milk and it was so much fun.  Cricket is just beginning to get interested in books and Thumper…well, he likes to chew on them, same as his big brother. 🙂  This morning’s book of choice (and every other opportunity’s book of choice) was Clifford’s First Halloween by Norman Bridwell.  I loved the Clifford books growing up and I love the show on PBS, too.  Same with Arthur – that lovable little aardvark’s adventures with pals Binky, Muffy, and Francine entertained me through many a rainy afternoon growing up.  When I was a little older and living with my aunt, the show on PBS entertained my cousin, too.  (I, of course, was much too cool for Arthur by then – at 13, it was all about the soaps.   Eric Brady, you will forever melt my little fangirl heart.

Someday…

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I can’t sleep and it’s driving me bonkers. Also, the pen I’ve been using doesn’t glide very well; it makes my writing look stilted and amateur. The nib keeps digging into the paper, which I find quite annoying because I don’t think I press that hard. Grip, yes. But then I always grip pens hard, so that’s nothing new.

Hmm.

Well, I guess I should try to get some sleep now as it’s after midnight and I do have to work in the morning. *sigh* If only I could pack the kids off to daycare so I could stay home and write. But then, that’s the dream.

Someday…

(c) 2012. All rights reserved.