Author: Joely

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NaNoWriMo 2013 Day 4

Saturday morning, the two youngest monsters had their first non-Upward (more competitive) basketball game.  Ugh, to say it didn’t go well is an understatement.  We ended up spending at least an hour at the court later in the day practicing a few things just the four of us.  Then I took Princess and Littlest to my favorite coffee shop, Classic Rock, and we worked.

Two cappuccinos and about an hour and a half later, I had 1380 words.  Not bad considering I had two kids with me, but short of my daily goal.  I didn’t sweat it since I’d broken 2K the day before.

But then Sunday was almost a total bust.  I had the “I don’t wannas” and wasted away my day.  I knew I had Monday off, but I still had to get kids up for school.  Middle in particular wanted to get up at 5:30 am the next day, so I couldn’t stay up late.  I ended up scratching out a couple of hundred words but they weren’t good and it wasn’t pretty.

Monday morning I had to take Princess to school (late start on Mondays) and ran by Wal-Mart to pick up a few things. So I was late getting started and again, it wasn’t looking good.  I just couldn’t make myself focus.  I’d write 10 mins or so and then find myself looking up, wondering random things, opening up a web browser only to forget what I was going to go look at.

I made myself go down into my office.  I started up my aromatherapy diffuser, turned on my little space heater, put on my most inspiring NatureScapes music (drums and crows), and set a timer.  15 mins only.  I couldn’t do anything but write for 15 mins.  Then I stopped and got up, walked around, filled my water glass, etc.  Then another timer.  After I finally broke 1K for the day, I did a little exercise, ate lunch, and then met my friend Diana Castle in the Coyote Con chat rooms to do some more sprints.  Then I met Raelyn Barclay over her lunch (in Vegas, how cool!) via text and we did another sprint.  By then, I had several thousand words and it was time for me to pick up Princess from school (band practice).

I got one more later “sprint” in just me with the TV going in the background, to bring the day’s count to 4526 and my NaNo total to 8362.

If I can get another nice chunk of words today, I’ll be thrilled.  I need to check in at work and the kids are home today (voting day).  I also have to take Princess back to school today for All District tryouts.  Hopefully I can still get my words in!

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NaNoWriMo 2013 Day 1

I love to take Nov. 1st off when it’s a weekday so I can stay up until midnight 10/31 and hit the ground running!  Unfortunately this year I was so tired that by the time midnight rolled around I could hardly string two words together.  I did manage 576 but then called it a night.  The words were slow going and it was going to be after 1 AM before I got enough to call it quits, and I had to get the monsters up for school this morning (wakeup call at 6 AM).

Once I got everyone off to work and school, I had a lazy few hours.  It was nice to sit and drink coffee in silence while dinking around with email, Twitter, and TV.  At least I didn’t turn on Netflix (my ultimate time sink) but I enjoyed watching Ancient Aliens.  Finally about 9 or so I turned off the TV, shut down internet, and got to work.

It was still slow.  I’d write a bit and pause, check my word count.  300 words.  Sigh.  But I did finally break 1K and stopped for lunch.

This year, I’m going to try and walk every day, weather permitting.  KoKo needs the work (long story, I’ll try to write up a blog post later) and I don’t want to totally chain myself to the computer.  I’ve been stressed out lately and I need the exercise!  So I walked around the neighborhood a little over 30 mins with the pup and came back just in time to write another 30 mins or so before the first two monsters got home from school (early day out on Friday).  That brought my total to 2025 words for the day.

I ended up taking the rest of the night off.  I’m mentally still a little out of the game so I don’t want to strain too hard yet.  I was hoping for 5K but I’ll take what I got and hope for the best tomorrow.

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NaNoWriMo

The best laid plans…

I allowed 9 days of vacation in November, concentrating on the beginning of the month to get as many words in as possible early, and then the entire week of Thanksgiving (since we host the family).  I was so excited to FINALLY have some time off…

Then I received word that a crucial person at the Evil Day Job for my current project gave her notice.  Her last days in the office are next Monday and Tuesday… when I’ll be out.  So I halfway committed to logging in at least a little those days to maximize the time I have left with her.  Not too bad though – I could still write in the mornings.

Then this week I got notice that they need me to travel to St. Paul home office for training.  The week of Nov. 18th.

Sigh.  I’m going to lose the entire week.

I can say I’m going to write that week, but I know how it’ll go.  I’ll be up super early (I’m not used to having to dress and put on makeup for work since I work from home) and I’ll be out late catching up with friends.  I won’t even have my lunch to write because I’ll be doing lunch with friends.  I’ll also be half brain dead because I’ll be frantically preparing training materials (I’m giving part of the training and I don’t have time to prepare the training until after a crucial milestone testing file for my project is done by 11/15).

Oh not to mention my story is only halfway plotted in my head (I was going to push hard to finish the PNR).

I am still going to try.  I love NaNoWriMo.  But it’s not going to be the perfect/fun month I was expecting.  What about you – are you joining the insanity this year?

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Crafty Planner

I mentioned a post or two ago that I was working on something creative to kind of get back in the swing of things.  Raelyn talked about a cool planner here that I also ordered.  Overall, I was happy with the scheduling and planning capabilities, but the general “beauty” of the planner was… utilitarian.  Not gorgeous or inspiring.

But I was inspired by Lynn Viehl’s post about recycling a magazine into a journal.  Why couldn’t I do something like that with this planner, plus make it a bit sturdier at the same time?

I just happened to have a lot of cool macabre fabric on hand.  I selected the browns/creams with skulls and ravens.  I also had a piece of cotton quilt batting left over from a few years ago when I made Christmas ornaments.

planner1Of course, I had the cardboard “wrapper” box that the planner had been shipped in.  I only had to trim it a little to make it work as a “binder”.

I can’t sew much at all, but this project was made easy with Aleene’s tacky glue.  I wrapped the cardboard in cotton batting and then basically wrapped the whole thing in fabric like a present.

planner2 I positioned the fabric to make an interesting design on the front. The skeletal hands and “Spells” really speak to me. 🙂

I was going to completely cover the inside with fabric too, but when I looked at it wrapped around like this, I liked the natural look of the cotton batting as contrast.  Besides, the planner sits on top of it, covering it all anyway.  So I saved myself trying to figure out how to make the inside look nice without having raveling edges to worry about.

planner3The next step was to glue some ribbons inside.  I positioned thin ribbons on either sleeve to hold the front and back pages of the planner in place.  I glued them in two different sessions to make sure they didn’t get stuck accidentally in a position I didn’t want.  I also had a piece of thick black ribbon leftover from my RT costume that made a striking bookmark.

planner4The front and back pages of the planner aren’t really sturdy enough to hold it in place and it kept slipping a bit.  So I took another length of thinner ribbon and ran it through the spiral of the planner, then around the outside of the binder.  I tacked the top and bottom down with glue to hold it in place and tied a big bow on the spine.

planner7I was pretty pleased with how it was looking!  Only the pages inside were still a little boring.  I wanted something really pretty and creative to inspire me on the inside too.

Lo and behold, I found the perfect paper on the clearance shelf at Michael’s.  I mean, look at those skulls and ravens!  The only thing that could have been better was if there were some red pages too.  But the antique-looking purple is still nice and worked well with the grunge theme.  I used the glue pen that came with my Smash journal (that I still haven’t done anything with) to glue most of the papers into place.

planner5

planner6I had to cut down the large scrapbook paper to fit inside the 8.5×11 planner, but I repurposed the side I cut off on the opposite page anyway.  It makes some of the pages kind of thick, but that’s okay.  So far, I only added paper to the front and the leading pages for Oct. and Nov.  I figured my mood may change around Christmas and I might want some different papers around the holiday.

This purple paper is coated in some kind of glitter and the Smash glue pen didn’t work well.  So I switched to Aleene’s glue just to get that side decorative paper glued on top to match the opposite side.  (I didn’t want the runnier glue to bead up and wrinkle the paper.)

I’ve had a lot of fun with it and have definitely been inspired to try and make more crafty things for Story.  I certainly have enough cool paper on hand to try a few more things!

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Battling the Bulge, Round 399

Okay, maybe not exactly that many rounds/attempts, but this is an endless battle I wage.  Since RT in May, I’ve had a super hard time getting back to consistent WW tracking.  I’d start out well and track through lunch, but then fall off the tracks at dinner.  Or I’d totally forget to track for a few days at all.  Stop and start.  It’s annoying and unfortunate, because if I’m not tracking… I’m gaining.

Then I don’t want to know how bad it really is.  I’m an avoider.  Which doesn’t help the issue either.

Plus my knee has been giving me trouble off and on this year.  It’s never completely recovered from getting hyperextended, though most days it’s feeling better now.  I need to get it stronger…by exercising!

Stress at the Evil Day Job has been off the charts all year.  If it’s not a project deadline, it’s dealing with support calls or new bosses.  I’m a stress eater (chips, popcorn, pizza because I’m working late), so that’s been something that really hurt me this year.

But where I’ve failed 398 other times (or more), this time, I stopped the slide.

How?  As I lost, I got rid of ALL of my clothes that no longer fit.  So when my favorite looser jeans got uncomfortably tight…I had no choice but to suck it up, step on the scale and get busy doing what I know I need to do.  I didn’t have any “fat” pants to pull out of the drawer and I sure as hell wasn’t going to go buy something new in a larger size.

The damage:  30 lbs.  *dies*  Normal people do not lose and gain 30 lbs in a year. They just don’t.  It’s going to take me forever to lose again.  I don’t know why I can’t get it together every day, all year, and keep it off.  It scares me that even if I get to goal, it’ll be a constant struggle to STAY there.

But on the bright side, I’ve stopped the slide THIS TIME. I’ve put together 2 solid weeks of tracking.  I’m concentrating on whole foods and eating sensibly.  So while it might take a while to undo the damage, I’m not damaging my metabolism or heath by going on some crazy crash plan that I can’t stick with.

(That Man’s doing a weight loss challenge at work, and his current diet is an apple, two plums, and a salad for dinner with about 500 calories of bottled dressing.  Yeah.)

Slow and steady and healthy.  I know what I need to do.  I just have to do it.

The battle continues.

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Bag ‘Em, Bob

Daddy Bob B–my Dad, aka Papa From Mexico because when the girls were babies he temporarily lived in Mexico for two years for a job and they STILL call him “Papa from Mexico”–works at a cattle auction barn.  For “fun”, don’t you know, because he’s retired.  I mean, nothing says fun like having a bull that weighs a ton chasing you around the barn.

But Dad is smart.  He keeps the cows from getting too close with his trusty tool.  It’s basically a long stick with a plastic bag on the end.  He doesn’t have to whack the cow with the stick.  All he has to do is rattle that bag on the end and the cow usually heads off in the opposite direction.

Now working at a cattle auction is pretty dangerous, both for the handlers and the cattle themselves.  A mean bull crashed into a gate and broke his neck.  Another cow broke her leg and was put down.  I had no idea what happened to these animals when they’re accidentally killed or seriously injured like this.  Not until Dad picked up a newly dead cow and drove it to the processing plant.

He’s taken several cows to the plant over the years and it’s become a sort of joke.  Here comes a mean cow.  The other guys shout, “Bag ’em, Bob!”  Half expecting the cow to whirl around and crash into another gate to become hamburger.  Sounds like a sure-fire way to fill up that freezer, right?

Kidding, kidding!  But the other day, another 600-700 lb young cow suffered a fatal accident and they called Dad.  He was out and about, swung by to pick it up, and took it directly to the processing plant.  Then sweet man that he is, he brought the whole thing down to us as our early Christmas present.  Several hundred pounds of fresh, young, grass-fed beef.  My small box freezer is more than half-full of hamburger, and our upright freezer from Grandma at the Lake is full of roasts and steaks.

It’s such a blessing to know I don’t even have to THINK about buying any meat for the winter other than a chicken here and there.  Plus it’s “homegrown” beef.  I don’t have to wonder what it was fed or how it was handled.  Dad’s been going to this small processor for years and they’re actually related distantly.

So a HUGE thank you to my Dad.  I can’t wait to start making chili and watching That Man try to eat all those steaks!

Bag ’em, Bob!

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General Update

Some days I’m barely treading water, but I’m holding in there.

The Evil Day Job is still slamming me, but hopefully these last two weeks of October will be a little quieter, and then I’m done with major support for quite some time.  Of course I’m now behind on a new project because of all this, so the stress won’t go down — it’ll just shift to something else.  I’m really getting burned out, but I have a lot of scheduled vacation in Nov — assuming I actually TAKE it.  I plan to.  It’s just hard when project commitments have been made.  I have to find a way to get it done and still take my time off.

Coyote Con’s still going strong.  Well, strong isn’t quite the word.  Attendance is really down this year.  If you have ideas for getting bodies in the chatrooms please let me know, either here, on the Coyote Con site, or email me.  If I don’t figure out how to get more attendees, I’ll have to discontinue the con.  It’s just too expensive in both time and money to continue.

Some of the problem is my own scheduling.  I should have started preparation, notification, and marketing much earlier than I did.  It’s just hard to plan it out on top of everything else I’m doing.  But Raelyn and I are already talking about coming up with a better plan of attack throughout the year instead of rushing right before Oct to figure things out.

With all this going on, I’ve not been writing.  I just don’t have the mental strength right now.  However, I’m trying to do a few creative things to kind of get my excitement back.  More to come on that front.

AND… I have final copies of Lord Regret’s Price on hand!  If you’d be interested in reviewing, please drop me a note with your desired format.

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Second Weekend of Coyote Con

It’s a full weekend ahead on all fronts.

Personal/Family wise, we had Homecoming tonight, I have to logon bright and early tomorrow morning for the Evil Day Job for a major software conversion (my piece is thankfully small but 5-6 AM on a Saturday is still damn early), and then Princess has a local band contest all day.  Since it’s local, that means my niece will also be marching, so Grandma’s coming to town to see it.  That means visiting and sitting on benches at least a couple of hours tomorrow waiting for the girls to perform.  Then probably a huge family dinner (thankfully OUT so I don’t have to cook).

That means I don’t yet know which Coyote Con panels I personally will be able to attend tomorrow.  Since my evening is also possibly compromised, we decided to hold off until next weekend for the Live Movie Slam of The Immortals.

I hope YOUR weekend isn’t so busy!  Here’s tomorrow’s schedule.  I hope to see you there!