It is Time to Get Back to It

This blog has been severely neglected, but I am ready to jump back in. My days have been busy as I decided to enroll in college. I am aiming for a Photography degree and an A.S. in Child Development. My days have been filled with kids, class, and homework.

On the writing front, I attempted and WON NanoWriMo this year! I have not completed the first draft of this novel, but I am very close, I'd say I'm about 80% through the story. This story has me very excited. It has challenged me, but I have enjoyed writing it.

Time to get back to my homework, but I hope you will follow me as I rediscover my love of writing. I hope to start my Teaser Tuesday posts again, those were my favorites.

A New Start

I have decided, now is the time to take myself seriously. I have dreams and wishes, yet, they all seem to be put on the back burner. No one and no thing puts them there, aside from myself. I don't give myself the confidence or support I need to do what I want; to be a person my family and I can be proud of; to stand out instead of blend in or fade away.

I am a wife and a mother, that is only one part of me, the only part that stays on the frontline in my life. I love to tell stories, through writing and photography. Starting now, I will be re-defining who I am, because where I take my life is up to me.

It's Tuesday... Where's the Teaser?

I have been hard at work trying to finish my first draft so that I am able to completely focus all my energy on finishing NaNoWriMo this November. I am very close to making my goal. Unfortunately, I will not have any teasers that are from the new writing as it may give too much away and it is all hand written in a notebook rather than on my computer.

Today's teaser comes from Chapter 10:

**Snipped**

Teaser Tuesday

I have not done a Teaser in such a long time. I hadn't written anything new in such a long time, but now that I have some progress in my WIP, I decided to share some of my new writing. This is an unedited first draft piece from Chapter 11.

**Snipped**

A Little Progress

I have finished two more chapters of my current work in progress, Serenity. I have an ultimate goal now set for this novel. I am aiming to finish the first draft by October 1. I want to participate in NaNoWriMo and actually stand some kind of a chance. Writing this story and attempting to write another story simultaniously did not work out too well for me at all. My head was too wrapped up in my first story. This year, my first story will be complete. Come October, I will begin looking at the fifty other ideas I have floating around, do some character profiles, some plotting, some outlining, and I should be able to choose one of my new ideas for November.

Cross your fingers for me that I may be able to accomplish this goal. Hopefully, the writing spike will equal a blog post spike.

Let me know what you think of my new blog look. I fought with Blogger for 2 hours last night trying to get it just right. Still not perfect for my tastes, but close enough.

Until I post again, thank you for following :)

Out of my funk?

I believe I may finally be out of my funk. I hope I can start getting a better writing time, but the last couple of months found me feeling a bit... ill. We will be welcoming a new addition to our family. That's right, I was not 100% because we have a beautiful surprise coming to us, due January 1, 2011.

That is all I have to write right now as we have cleaning to do.

Only in This House...

I have decided, what better way to write than to write randoms in my blog; thus incorporating my life and writing into one tidy little box. Although, my life is far from tidy, what with four kids (only two are my own) running around all day. We enjoy ourselves and that is what makes this chaotic life, absolutely beautiful. There are times that it is complete insanity and all the kids are fighting and yelling. Then there are times when everyone is getting along and all that can be seen are smiles and all that can be heard is the sweet sound of giggles and gut-busting laughter. We play our music too loud and dance around with the shades drawn up, not caring if a passerby stops to watch -- or laugh. The TV may be turned on with cartoons showing constantly, but the kids seldom watch for more than a few minutes at a time before imaginations are in full swing. Not one child notices when I switch off the TV, and if one does notice, there is rarely a tantrum and play is continued.

Only in this house, could window washing consist of princess dresses, baby wipes and giggles. Only in this house, could four children have so much fun wiping down windows and woodwork for twenty minutes without so much as a frusterated yelp. Only in this house...

<3 This life is Crazy....

This life is Beautiful...

This life, is Mine.  <3

No Postings

Well, my apparant lack of writing in Serenity has filtered into my poor blog. I am so sorry to all of you who check my blog and have found nothing new. I am horrible, but life has gotten away with me. Apparently, the days are getting shorter because I seem to be running out of hours in my day.

An update on my progress in Serenity, or lack of progress... I am still stuck, but I am working at getting unstuck. I have printed all of my current progress and I am reading through, hoping to get a feel for where I want the story to go. I do have a basic outline, but the next two chapters are a little difficult to shape into what I need them to be.

I will be updating the blog a little more frequently than once a month, but for today, I need to get back to my sick little boy.

Insanity Bug

Today, I post not as a writer, but as a woman sitting in the midst of crazy children, too many toys, about 5 loads of laundry that needto be sorted and put away, three loads that need to be washed, and a less than perfectly clean house. My carpets need vacuuming, but that has to wait as our vacuum broke last week and we cannot afford a new one until our taxes hit our bank account.

Speaking of taxes, everything just happened to occur at the perfect time this year. We have tabs due on both vehicles, though that happens this time every year. We need new tires on one of our vehicles. The batteries in all three of our telephone handsets decided to quite functioning properly last week and now we are lucky to make it through the entire day with a charged phone. I am so grateful that we will have the funds to fix all of these things right away.

Life is chaotic, unorganized, and fun... and oh, how I love it!

Thoughtful Thursday

I have decided that I will not set any writing goals for myself. Yeah, do want to write at least 30 minutes everyday, but Serenity comes out better when I'm not setting a time to finish a certain part. Plus, with kids, I prefer to delegate my time for them and when I have something I need to write, I will. Yeah, a story won't write itself, but it won't come out very well if I try to rush it along. So, I will now set my new goal for Serenity. I will write the story when it needs to be written, not when I need it written.

There you have it, my reasonable goal. :D

Teaser Tuesday

This is from Chapter 9. It is very rough, so please forgive if it isn't fantastic.

*Snipped. Thank you for the comments!*

Let Me Grow Up

Looking through my binder of poetry is a little depressing.  Some of the stuff I had written is not pleasant.  It is not all dark and dreadful, just sad.  Also, I varied between being afraid of any type of punctuation, where there is not much at all, to being in love with punctuation and seeing it splattered all over the piece.  I will type all of my flashback work exactly as it is in the binder.  Most of what is written is the first draft.  I felt that if a piece of my poetry was edited, it would loose something in the process.

This poem is from 2001.

Let Me Grow Up

I am eighteen years old
The decisions I make are my own
The life I am living is mine
I am legally able to be an adult
So why do you still act as if I were a child
I do not choose to hurt you,
To lead you astray
I do not make my choices
So that I may forget you or avoid you
I choose to grow out
Out of the skin that has become so tight
The skin of a child I never was
I choose to grow away
Away from the memories that haunt my childhood
Away from the unfair demands of an older adult
I choose to grow apart
Apart from the lies I've been living through
Apart from a love that I've never been given
I choose to grow down
The truth is,
I've been grown up for so long
I cannot remember growing up
I've been grown up for so long
Because of reasons you would not understand
So, now I choose to grow up
Why won't you let me?

Wordle Word Cloud

So, out of boredom, I decided to place what I have completed of my first draft into http://www.wordle.net/ and it generated a word cloud.  I most definitely had an issue in the first few chapters with over describing eye movement... a lot of that junk will be cut out in my first full edit sweep.  My character names are HUGE, meaning I've used them the most in my manuscript.  I will be looking into ways to cut down the name usage.  Besides the overdescription of eye/ head movement, and overusing names, I think the word usage is pretty balanced thus far.

Quotable Thursday

Here are a few quotes in my WIP that I like.

He kissed her with a sudden fierceness and overwhelming passion.

A ghost of a smile twitched at the edges of his mouth.

I'm Writing a Novel... RT Wednesday

So, I'm jumping in a little late, but I am posting.

Question of the day is: What's everyone's reaction when they find out you're writing a book?

I haven't told many people that I'm not actually close to.  I post status updates on Facebook that are writing related and people who are interested are the people who respond.  I've gotten generally good responses from people.  Usually it is the actually genuine "Good for you."  I also have people opening up conversations for me with the excited, "She's a writer."  I usually blush and smile.   I love having a base of people who are supportive of my choice to write.

The only thing I get from people that seems difficult to answer is the, "What's it about?"  I wish I could answer that at this time, but I really can't just yet.  I have the first 9.5 chapters complete and an outline.  I don't know how the final two chapters are going to play out, but they will get there when I do.  I don't think I will be able to properly answer that question until the first draft is complete. 

I hope to keep people interested once the story is complete and I begin even more stories that burn in my mind.  Right now, though, my train of thought has fizzled and is telling me I must go to bed.  Goodnight and thank you for reading.

Tuesday Teaser 01/12/10

Yet another Tuesday where my teaser is from an earlier chapter. This snip is from Chapter 5. Seryn, Xander, and Clay are walking to Esterial, attempting to race the darkness to get to Esterial (an old church) before creatures that thrive in the darkness can get to them.

**Snipped** Thank you for all the comments.

Monday Mayhem

Mondays, I hope to blog about my goals for my WIP during the course of the current week and keep everyone updated on my progress from the week before.

My goals for writing this week are:

• Write at least 30 minutes every day at naptime
• Write at least 30 minutes every night after the kids are in bed
• Finish Chapter 10

Currently, I have completed writing chapter nine of Serenity. I am anxious to get chapters ten through thirteen written so I can start with all the reveals. Chapter fourteen is where everything begins to unravel.

Serenity word count 01/11/10: 20,319

I would state a word count goal, but it would not work well for my writing style. I have found that I need to take this story one chapter at a time. Hopefully, I can have my first draft completed by the end of February.

Keep checking in for more updates.

Blogging Schedule

I am going to attempt a blogging schedule. Please do not throw anything at me if I fail to keep up with it everyday. I will try my hardest to keep to this schedule, but my kids and family come first. Here is a general breakdown of what I intend to post on given days.

• Mondays will be titled Monday Mayhem. I intend to post writing updates and goals. I will update my progress from the prior week and post new goals and a word count.
• Tuesdays are Teasers. As I have been doing, I will post a snip from my current WIP. Each week I post a new teaser, the teaser from the following week will be removed.
• Wednesdays, I will follow along on a roadtrip. YA Highway posts a writing/reading related question on their blog. I hope to be able to start following along and add some interesting content to my blog.
• Thursdays will be Quotable. I will post a quote or two from my current WIP. That may be all that is in my post that day. I may add more, but don't expect it.
• Fridays I will Flashback. I will be sharing some of my old writing. I don't know how long it will be posted, so enjoy it while it is up.

There you have it, my intended blog schedule.

Flashback Friday

I decided to do something new on here to try to put more on my blog than just the teasers. Every Friday (that I can remember to do this) I will post something that I wrote when I was much younger. I have a rather large 3 ring binder of poetry. This could get embarassing as it is not all that great, but I think it would be fun to see and share how I used to write.

A poem from 1999

Without You
~Sometimes, the loss of a loved one is so great, we cannot go on.~

He tries to sleep
But he cannot bear
The pain and suffering
Of not having her there.
He sits by his window,
His tears falling like rain
His only company
Is his grieving pain.
"I cannot live without you."
He told her last night
He didn't know why he had said it
He just thought it felt right.
A lonely tear
Streamed down his face
As he thought
Of their last embrace.
Memories of last night
Spun throught the air
He cried as he thought,
"I should have been there!"
If only he were
She would have escaped her fate
And tonight would have been
Their first anniversary date.
She left last night
He wanted to follow
He felt it coming,
His heart felt hollow.
She crossed the street
He was out the door
He dropped to his knees
She fell to the floor
He could only scream
As the driver kept going
His heart stopped beating
As her blood started flowing
"If only I had left one minute before...
She would be with me today."
He came too late
And the man got away
His eyes filled with tears
When he saw her body on the ground
He screamed for help
But nobody was around.
She was slowly slipping away
He held her close to his heart
"I can't live without you,
I can't bear us apart."
He softly kissed her lips
As she took her last breath
She uttered these words,
"I'll love you forever, even past death."
The memories faded
He lay in his bed
He whispered into the night
"Why did you leave me, my love, my friend?"
He felt her by his side, he whispered,
"I can't live without you, it just isn't right."
She nodded her head
As love bade his eternal goodnight.

There you have it, my first flashback Friday :)

Tuesday Teaser

This is an older snippet. I think it is from Chapter 7.

**Snipped. Thank you for all the comments. :)**