Family Life: Happy Thanksgiving

Happy Thanksgiving

The last few days have been quite busy. Wednesday was my 48th birthday. Father came home early and cooked a lovely lamb dinner. Father and James gave me Mary Poppins Movie, The Mary Poppins Companion book (which James picked out all by himself) and Father gave me the new Mercedes Lackey book. He really does know me. He saw it in the store and he said "that the one to get her." I had not mentioned I wanted the book, and I guess all the Mercedes Lackey books in my bookshelves stirred a memory. I was quite surprised. My parents gave me a very generous check and my sister gave me Scarlet by Lawhead and Self Editing for Fiction Writers.

I got myself in trouble as soon as I started to read Self Editing. I began editing my words as worked on "floating on the surface. " I slowed down to think about the structure, instead of the story. Slapped myself across the face a few times and reminded myself "NO EDITING. YET!" Things flowed a little better. The story is coming along and I have given myself the goal to finish it by November 30th. Then I will go back edit, flesh out the story some more and polish it up. Father wants me to submit it to at least three publishers and even if I get a reject letter, I would have accomplished writing a novel.

So, back to Wednesday night. Father stayed up late brining the turkey. I forgot to buy some bottled water and he spent the majority of time filtering water through the brita which took up a lot of time. The turkey turned out to be delicious. We had a quiet thanksgiving with just the three of us. I was able to work on my book, James played on the computer doing flight simulator and John finally finished his office. He threw out a lot of old equipment that had been gathering dust in the garage and cleaned up his office. It's usefull now, instead of being a catchall. Yeah!

Father's brother and his family came by for a visit Friday night. A fun time was had by all and we enjoyed getting together.

This weekend we will be working on putting up the christmas lights, I will be working on my story some more, planning next weeks lessons, and working on my class work.


Excerpt from Floating on the Surface

“Shall we say Grace?” he said reaching for her hand. She held his hand and bowed her head as he said a prayer over the food “Lord, thank you for this food and may it nourish our bodies, help Samantha feel better and give us both strength. Amen” Benjamin started to eat and Samantha just had to ask a question because she was dying of curiosity.

She looked at him “With as much” she stopped feeling herself blushing again, “um, passion as you seem to have for” she hesitated because she was going to say me but decide to be safe “for life, how on earth did you ever think of becoming a priest? I can just imagine the poor ladies in the congregation having to go to confession weekly because they would be lusting after you in mass.”

Benjamin cracked up laughing and Samantha started to eat, trying to ignore the butterflies in her stomach. “Oh, this is delicious” she said after taking a bite. Benjamin agreed and they concentrated on eating. After a few minutes Benjamin spoke “So, you really think the ladies would have been lusting after me in the pulpit?”

Samantha had just taken a drink and nearly spit out the soda all over the table. She started coughing and he patted her on the back. When she had recovered, she looked at him incredulous “Have you not looked in a mirror lately?”

“Yes, but..” He looked truly perplexed and she couldn’t help but smile."