Sunday Salon: Life in the household

Honey Bee

I guess you could say life has been busy as bees for us this summer. The past two months have passed in a flash and can't believe it's August already.  We are downsizing and have been busy cleaning out our garage and purging all the stuff that we haven't used in several years.   I'm almost at the point to start getting rid of all the old books  **gasp**  stored in the garage and those in my shelves that I'll never read again.  Shocking, I know.  If there is anything I hoard, it's books.  Note, I said almost. Give me a few more days and we'll see if the feeling passes.  **grin**.

In the midst of purging and decluttering, Hubby finally gave up his 1971 Cadillac which has been sitting in the driveway for several years.  He'd been dreaming of he and James working on the engine together, but James isn't technically or mechanically inclined.  He's rather write or draw and play video games. 

We've repainted and redecorated James room (turned it into a teenage room) and I'm waiting for cooler days to tackle the hallway, bathroom and living room. 

Our days have also been taken up with taking James to speech, occupational and physical therapy.  All on different days, of course.  Which has lead us to doing multiple errands while we are out, so we've been spending lots of time running around as well.

In the midst of all that, I've been taking an online creative writing course which is helping me get back into the writing mode after a long dry spell.  I've not been in the mood for reading new books and have just been rereading older books in my library by Nora Roberts, Patricia Briggs and Laurel K. Hamilton, among others. 

And now that it's August, it's time to start working on 8th grade lesson plans. The good news is we already received all his curriculum, so now just need to sit my butt down and start figuring out his schedule. Fun, fun, fun.



So what has your summer been like?

Happy Father's Day

Me and My Dad

James and John

Happy Fathers day to the special dads in my life!

Happy Mother's Day!

Happy mother's day!  Since I became a mother, I've learned that a mother's love is unconditional (or should be)  When my son was little, we used to read Lisa McCourt's I Love You Stinky Face and it's one book I never could get rid of.  The binding is taped together now because of how often we read it and to this day the sentiment in the story has stuck with us. Even though my son is now 13, he still ends the day with 'Mom, I love you no matter what.'   

Yesterday we went to Marshall Gold Discovery Park and explored, learning more about the gold rush and visiting the spot where James Marshall first discovered gold.  

 James Marshall learning about James Marshall

Happy Mother's Day!

Car versus Tree Limb

It's been incredibly windy the past couple days.  I was in the kitchen yesterday morning when heard a tremendous bang.  Walked outside to discover the birch tree had attacked my car.

It could have been worse and gone through the windshield or completely through the hood. Fortunately, even though my car is 16 years old, it still in really good shape and have comprehensive coverage.  Though it doesn't look so bad, the repair will cost $1000.   So my insurance company will be taking care of the damage (minus the deductible of course) and I get the fun of driving a rental car for three days while the body shop does the repairs. Thank you USAA - I love you!

Cha cha cha changes

New and improved doesn't always mean better.   I've been ignoring Google's little messages up until now about the loss of reader and igoogle because simply haven't  had the time to deal with it. No that's not true. I didn't want to take the time because I knew it would take time, lots of it.   As we all know, when it comes the computer, it takes time.  I've also been contemplating a new laptop but that's a whole other story.  Have been researching and reading and checking out what other folks have been saying about all the choices out there.

I personally hate, err dislike Google's Chrome. It's a very simple but important reason - I can't make changes on blogger through Chrome.  Believe me, I've tried. Which is odd since blogger and Chrome are both Google products.  And if I can't update my blogs, well.  Nuff said.  So Firefox remains my number one browser, and I love Adblock plus which between Norton Security and it, pretty much wipes out all ads everywhere.  Imagine my surprise when I went onto facebook using my nook and saw all the ads in the sidebar.  So nice to know what I haven't been missing. 

I've gone exploring and checked out NetVibes which was snazzy but way too slow to load.  Protopage just rubbed me the wrong way. I've fallen in like with Ustart.org and after playing with it a while, think it will make a good replacement for igoogle. Have taken the plunge and set it up as my home page.  

As far as the reader goes, I discovered Feedly who has stepped up to the plate to take over and seamlessly clone google reader and make the transition very smooth.  I'm getting used to it, but debating whether I'll just go back to old fashioned method of keeping the blogs I follow in my sidebar and clicking over from there.  Have already weaned myself from google reader and rarely look at it these days so won't be much of a loss.  

 When we are no longer able to change a situation, we are challenged to change ourselves.  ~Victor Frankl

Wednesday Wonderings - Poetry

Waterdrop by Zen

I had one of those I get it moments today.  I've never been one for reading poetry.  I've tried my hand at it, mainly as cryptic clues for a couple of my stories. Fun to do.  I'm willing to read for a class and analyze, but reading for fun and enjoyment, not so much.  So when I came across the section on Poetry in Echoing Silence: Thomas Merton on the Vocation of Writing, I almost skipped it.  But then the thought crossed my brain and I forget where I heard it how as writers we should expose ourselves to all kinds of writing, genres, styles in an effort to learn more about the craft.  So decided to power through and this particular essay rang a bell with me.  You get as much out of poetry as you put it into it.  A surface reading will only garner a surface understanding unless you take the time to think about the words. You get out of it, what you put into it.

The Psalms are poems, and poems have a meaning---although the poet has no obligation to make his meaning immediately clear to anyone who does not want to make an effort to discover it.  But to say that poems have meaning is not to say that they must necessarily convey practical information or an explicit message.  In poetry, words are charged with meaning in a far different way than are the words in a piece of scientific prose.  The words of a poem are not merely the signs of concepts: they are also rich in affective and spiritual associations. 

The poet uses words not merely to make declarations, statements of fact.  That is usually the last thing that concerns him.  He seeks above all to put words together in such a way that they exercise a mysterious and vital reactivity among themselves, and so release their secret content of associations to produce in the reader an experience that enriches the depths of his spirit in a manner quite unique.  A good poem induces an experience that could not be produced by any other combination of words.  It is therefore an entity that stands by itself, graced with an individuality that marks it off from every other work of art.  Like all great works of art, true poems seem to live by a life entirely their own.

What we must seek in a poem is therefore not an accidental reference to something outside itself: we must seek this inner principle of individuality and of life which is its soul, or 'form.'  What the poem actually 'means' can only be summed up in the whole content of poetic experience which it is capable of producing in the reader.  This total poetic experience is what the poet is trying to communicate to the rest of the world (excerpted from Literary Essays "Poetry, Symbolism, and Typology, 1953) pg 84-85 

 Merton's writing is full of these gems and I'm currently on the chapter about other writers. He seems to have had a great fondness for Boris Pasternak and his writings and it's making me want to move Dr. Zhivago up in the stack and see if I appreciate his writing as much as Merton did.   Back to my literary wanderings. 

Sunday Salon: Life, love and happiness

Books, Books, Books: I finished reading Michael Crichton's Pirate Latitudes this weekend.  Have enjoyed  many of his books over the years including the Andromeda Strain and  Congo among others. I have yet to read Micro which was published posthumously in 2011 and finished by Richard Preston, author of The Hot Zone.  Coincidentally a friend recently recommended Hot Zone which is a true tale of a biological outbreak.  Considering that I read Sick last week, which was a fictional tale of biological terrorism and could very well happen, decided to add it to my wishlist.  Then I listened to NPR's Science Friday Book Club discussing The Andromeda Strain, and who was their guest speaker - Richard Preston - talking about Crichton's writing. Synchronicity wise, I think the universe is telling me to read Preston's book.  The audiocast is interesting so grab a cup of coffee or tea and sit back and listen. It's about 25 minutes long. 

Publisher's Weekly is talking about the 10 Most Anticipated Book Adaptations for 2013 which includes Mark Helprin's Winter's Tale which I have in my stacks.  The cast includes Russell Crowe, Will Smith, Colin Farrell, and Jennifer Connelly which guarantees it's going to be an extraordinary movie (I hope).  The book has been calling my name more and more lately saying read me, read me now.  

Instead of reading James Rollin's chunkster Black Order, I took a side trip and read a short novel by Karen Kingsbury called The Bridge, a poignant love story surrounding a flooded out 4 decades old bookstore that had been Charlie Barton's dream and the life blood of the community. It's been years since I've read anything by Kingsbury and this was a great reintroduction to her writing and I'll be reading more of her stories in the future.  Then I jumped into the young adult dystopian world of Birthmarked by Caragh O'Brien which of course is the first is a series and ended in such a way, I just have to read the rest of the series.  

Writing, writing, writing:  Craft wise, I am enjoying the heck out of the exercises in the Write - Brain workbook which is really helping my creativity. The exercise this morning involved what four textures came to mind when you think of a slinky and four textures when you think of a scarf. Then use those words in a story that begins with ---  Late night city streets were the perfect backdrop for....    Try it and see what you come up with. I'll be polishing up my story and thinking of posting it sometime this week.  

Still working my way through Writer's Journey and reading through the Stages of the Journey.  Slowly reading Echoing Silence: Thomas Merton on the vocation of writing which is compiled of essays from a variety of his books.  It is quite dense with lots of food for thought and his philosophical meanderings so only reading a few pages a day. It's also making me want to read his other books:  New Seeds of Contemplation (which I have and is waiting in the wings), The Asian Journal,  Literary Essays, and The Way of Chuang Tzu.  This may just turn into a life long study of Thomas Merton.   

Eyes in the Ashes has been on my mind as I read Writer's Journey and had some great ideas about changes to make, but I've yet to crack the notebook and reread the draft.  I'm in more of a right brained, creative, stream of conscious mode right now and guess I'm just not quite ready to get back into a left brain mode. Soon though....  Goal wise I'm going to keep plugging away.

Nobody trips over mountains.  It is the small pebble that causes you to stumble.  Pass all the pebbles in your path and you will find you have crossed the mountain.  ~Author Unknown

James and I have watched all the Star Wars movies (several times) and now we are going to delve into the books. He is into all things Star Wars these days and his Aunt K and Uncle G bought him the Star Wars: Prequel Trilogy written by Terry Brooks, R.A. Salvatore and Mathew Stover.  I thought it would be fun to read it together so diving in.  

Hubby received a wonderfully positive review of his latest micro amplifier which I was quite happy to see with all the hard work he has put into designing and building it. Nice to see him getting some kudos for a change.  

Have a great week and I hope it is filled with positive energy and lots of accomplishments, whether they are big or small.  

Sunday Salon

I've been a part of Cherry Adair's Street Team for a few months and received a nice surprise in the mail yesterday. She sent everyone a beautiful coffee cup which I christened this morning with Earl Grey Tea.  I have enjoyed reading all her books and a couple years back won a stay at her guest house through Brenda Novak's Diabetes Auction.  Which is coming up again in May so be sure to mark it on your calendar.  It's been one of those weeks that it feels like nothing much is getting accomplished so receiving the cup made my day.

Reading wise, it's been great - I read three dusty books:  Sick by Brett Battles which was about an evil scientist unleashing a nasty virus in order to wipe out the majority of the world's population. Very scary thought and entirely possible.  Young Adult murder mystery Across the Universe by Beth Revis about a young girl frozen cryogenically with her parents and a group of people to populate a new planet and wakes 300 years later still on the ship. Plus a short but very dense fictional/  philosophical book  called Genesis by Bernard Beckett about a young woman  who wants to get into The Academy being questioned by 3 examiners.  Plus two ebooks - Widow's Web by Jennifer Estep (#7 in her Elemental Assassin paranormal romance) and the first book in the Black Knight series by Julie Walker Hell on Wheels.  No, I didn't watch any TV the past week.

What's on the nightstand for this week:  A Trial of Fallen Angels by James Kimmel and a chunkster by James Rollins - Black Order. 

I didn't get any writing or editing done and really have no excuse.  I let regular life interfere so my aim is to get up a few minutes earlier, take advantage of James study time and use it more wisely.  My goals remain the same for this week

1)  WIP: Review draft of Eyes in the Ashes, re-evaluate and detail what needs to be done. Have partial 3rd edit completed.
2)  Craft Study:  Read Chapter 2 while completing chapter 1 exercises of The Writer's Journey and apply them to main characters of Eyes.  
3)  ROW80 participants - visit all the two's.
4)  Morning pages:  continue with Jesus calling and Write Brain workbook.
5) Adding in exercise goals since my knee has recovered and aim to do the treadmill for at least 30 minutes 4 times this week.  I'll have to build back up to an hour again since taken so long a break from it. 

Over on 52 books, it's week 4 and highlighting book #5 in Susan Wise Bauer's Well Educated Mind -  Charles Dicken's Oliver Twist.  Since his birthday is February 7th, I'm declaring February Read a Dicken's month and will shoot for reading Oliver Twist again.  I failed last year and hope to be more successful this year. 

Off to plan lessons for this week.  Happy Reading! 

 

Sunday Salon: Finding the groove

Life:  Whether you are right about the weather or writing about the weather, change is hard.  We eased back into lessons this past week with a minimum of fuss. However, we are still working out the kinks on timing and James desire to do everything on his own and when it's time for a supervisory review.   I told him to look at it like a job - he can either stop at a certain reasonable time every day for his supervisor (me)  to review his work or we can stipulate Friday as review day.  We tried the latter this week and it leaves a bit to be desired as we were a bit cranky at the end of the long week.  He's a teenager - nuff said.   How many more years to go?  Concentrating on my one word - Grace.

ROW80: Writing and reading wise,  spending my mornings getting into a study, reading, and writing mode.  The goal is to write daily - whether it's journaling, blogging or working on wip.  I wrote everyday except for one day this week.  I'm loving the Write Brain workbook and had a lot of fun with the exercise Far Far Away in which you think of a person who really bugs or annoys you, and then think of a place you'd like to send this person.  Then -mentally--send them there.   With that in mind. start with - The post card arrived......   (Just a hint, an unhappy acquaintance who is not happy unless they have something to complain about).  Did I accomplish all my goals this week. Alas not since life happens so carrying goal over to this week:

1)  WIP: Review draft of Eyes in the Ashes, re-evaluate and detail what needs to be done. Have partial 3rd edit completed.
2)  Craft Study:  Complete chapter 1 exercises of The Writer's Journey and apply them to main characters of Eyes.
3)  ROW80 participants - visit all the two's.
4)  Morning pages:  continue with Jesus calling and Write Brain workbook.

Reading:  This week I finished Around the World with Auntie Mame by Patrick Dennis which was mediocre  and the first book in The No 1 Ladies Detective Agency series by Alexander McCall Smith which was quite interesting.  I'll be posting my reviews Monday and Friday.  I'm still reading Echoing Silence: Thomas Merton on the Vocation of Writing and Brett Battles Sick about an evil scientist and a nasty population killing virus. Pulling down from the dusty shelf to read Across the Universe by Beth Revis and Genesis by Bernard Beckett.  Seems I'm doing the A to Z challenge after all.

52 BOOKS: It's book week 3 already and highlighting Pierre Berton, Canadian non fiction author who died in 2004.  Check out the video of his life which is quite informative.

Came across a really neat challenge by Gina at Book Dragon's lair which will begin in April and run for two years: Monthly Mix up Mania in which you read a book for each letter for each month of the year.  Sounds like fun. 

What are you reading this week? 

New Year, New Round of 80 Words!

Jan 7th is the start of ROW80 for 2013 and long story short for those who aren't familiar with A Round of Words in 80 Days.  It is the brain child of author Kait Nolan which is a goal setting writing challenge which runs in 4 rounds, each 80 days. The purpose is to set goals which are measurable and if you need to change them because it just isn't working. 

Last year, I kind of fell off the wagon with my goals and happy to have a fresh start. I already mentioned my goals for the year here and now I'm ready to start breaking them down into manageable weekly objectives.

My goal is to write daily even when I'm not actively working on a first draft so not going with a specific word count for this week.   Doing a modified morning pages / journaling  utilizing Sarah Young's Jesus Calling and exercises from The Write Brain Workbook by Bonnie Neubauer.   The first is thought provoking and the latter has been fun as I'm enjoying the creative writing exercises.

Took a break from my WIP Eyes in the Ashes for a while so will be rereading in it's entirety and make notes on what needs to be done.

Finished reading Chapter one of The Writer's Journey by Christopher Vogler this morning and will be working on the questions on page 97 - Questioning the Journey and applying them to my main character in Eyes. 

Will determine a blog schedule, whether going to go with 3 or 4 set days, post it in my sidebar and stick to it. 

I'm going to try a rotating schedule with visiting fellow rowers similar to Kait's method for the sponsors.  This week I'll visit all the ones, next week two's,  and blah, blah, blah.  Connecting with everyone is an important part of the whole process and last year when everything sort of fell by the wayside for the last two rounds, I really missed the camaraderie.  

I can't keep up with checking in and commenting on everyone's posts twice a week, so will be doing a ROW post on Sundays, Wednesday's will check in on facebook page,  but I will be visiting  and comment throughout the week.   

Fresh start, fresh group so be sure to stop by and say hi to everyone here

Sunday Salon: Grace

 

Above all the grace and the gifts that Christ gives to his beloved 

is that of overcoming self.  ~ Francis of Assisi

Last year I stumbled across One Word and OneWord365 and then throughout the year kept coming across writers and bloggers talking about their one word.  Kind of thought it interesting, but hokey at the time. The concept of focusing and working on embracing one word the whole year.   I couldn't even fathom narrowing the things I needed to focus on in life down to one word.  But the more I thought about it, the more it made sense.  After all, I had decided to write deliberately the last two years, then this year changed it to writing mindfully.   I thought about going with patience but you know what happens when you pray for patience. God starts throwing all this stuff at you to prove you already had the patience to begin with. 

I finally narrowed it down to grace.  What is Grace?   Grace is kindness. Grace is empathy. Grace is unconditional love. Grace is so many things.  I realized that I needed to work on having Grace - with myself, with James, with hubby.   You see I handle things in a certain way.  Whenever there is a problem, you figure out how to handle it, discuss it and then let it go.  Letting it go is the important part of this scenario. I don't like holding on to things.  Lesson learned, let's forget it and move on.  I've gotten quite good at that over the years.  And it seems the things I dislike the most, God likes to put in my path.  Both my guys - they are wired exactly the same. They never forget a thing, like to analyze stuff, plus they are very verbal  They have a need to talk about it and talk about it and rehash and discuss until they work it out - eventually.  James is now 13 and along with becoming a teenage is all the angst and emotions and uproar that goes along with it.  

Remember that old commercial way back when "Calgone take me away."   Sorry, doesn't work here.  I can't change them or their temperament,  it's how they are.  I can however, change me and how I respond.  Grace will be the key this year.  For myself, my guys and those in our lives.     

Happy New Year!    

2013 Writing Mindfully

Josephine Wall Painting the Dawn

Last year, my year of writing deliberately fell apart and I lost that sense of wonder, sense of joy for writing. I've given it quite a bit of thought to why this was so and decided that 2013 will be the year of Writing Mindfully. I will embrace the ebb and flow of my creativity and let my imagination take flight. I will study and contemplate, write and explore, find the joy in creating and editing, and not limit myself.

My goals for 2013

To help with writing mindfully, I will be using Bonnie Neubauer's The Write Brain Workbook: 366 Exercises to liberate your writing to exercise my writing muscles. 

Instead of a daily quota for my novel writing word count, I'm going to follow James Scott Bell's advice and establish a weekly word count of 3500 words. Since I hand write everything, on average I usually end up writing 2 full pages at one sitting which is approximately 1000.   Invariably I only end up writing 4 or 5 days out of the week so having a weekly word count makes much more sense.

Continuing my personal pursuit of  my DYI MFA,I plan on reading and studying the following books:

The Writer's Journey: Mythic Structure for Writers by Christoper Vogler
Character, Emotion and Viewpoint by Nancy Kress
Plot and Structure by James Scott Bell
Art of War for Writers by James Scott Bell
Echoing Silence:  Thomas Merton on the Vocation of Writing by Thomas Merton

Along with reading The Writer's Journey, I plan on taking Mythic Structures courses offered online through Writer's Village University  and probably will take the F2K creative writing course again. 


Continue to develop and complete the first draft of Green Cross utilizing K.M. Weiland's suggestions in Outlining Your Novel.


Finish editing and polishing Eye in the Ashes and send out for beta reading.

I'm joining A Round of Words in 80 Days again in order to help me establish daily and weekly goals and have some accountability. However, I can't keep up with a blog check in twice a week so going to bring back WIP Wednesday for all things writing here on My Two Blessings.