Category: The Blog

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Golden Release Giveaway

Celebrating Golden’s release from Carina Press tomorrow, I’m giving away this gorgeous tote from HautTotes (edited to note:  the size will be the larger full-size tote not the mini)!

To Enter:  comment on this post and tell me your favorite Asian movie.  Red Cliff?  Curse of the Golden Flower?  Legend of the Black Scorpion?  Or simply throw your name in the hat.  Anyone on the planet can enter — I’ll ship internationally.  I do not retain your name or address after the giveaway is over.

Optional:  for more chances to win, review or rate Golden on any online site (Amazon, GoodReads, your blog, etc.) and send me the link.  Each link will gain another entry in the giveaway.

This giveaway will remain open until midnight (CST) Sept. 10th.  If I’m unable to contact the winner after 48 hours, I’ll pick another name.

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Middle Monster Becomes a Mama

Last weekend, Middle Monster found a huge gorgeous moth in the back yard with damaged wings.  I’m pretty sure it was this Polyphemus Moth — freaking big enough to creep her out when it hopped around.  But she couldn’t leave the poor thing outside to get eaten, so she scooped it up in a plastic bowl (at least it wasn’t my good Tupperware this time). 

She put lots of grass and flowers and leaves in the bowl, determined to “feed” and “water” it.  The next morning, she came in and told me the butterfly was “pooping” in the bowl.

Ummm, do butterflies poop?  Anyway, this moth was not pooping.  In fact, it was laying eggs.  Absolutely thrilled, Middle started moving the tiny eggs into another plastic container for safe keeping.  Before Mama Moth died, she laid at least 20 or so eggs, and I’m pretty sure Middle found each and every one of them.

We had a somber burial for the poor damaged moth.

All this week, Middle rushed home from school to check her eggs.  Now I had no idea if the things would actually hatch or not, especially with all her handling and moving.  I also had no idea how long they’d actually take to hatch.  But when she came screaming into the house tonight after school, I knew the miracle had happened.

Middle Monster is now the proud mama of three tiny little caterpillars.  They’re about 1 cm long.  She immediately went racing about the yard gathering every green leaf she could find (it’s been very dry and hot this summer, so not as easy as you’d think) to “feed” her babies.

If they all hatch, I’m going to encourage her to release most of them.  I have no idea if we can feed and grow a caterpillar into a moth, but she’s determined to try!  What a nice little science experiment, too.

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RBW Week 8

Romance Biggest Winner

I’m still up nearly 2 pounds from my low weight, although I am heading back in the right direction this week with a .24% loss. 

It’s incredibly frustrating.  In the past, this kind of “unfair” gain would have derailed me.  If I’m dieting and following my plan, I “deserve” a loss.  Right?

Wrong.  Well, yeah, sure, I’d love a loss.  But a woman’s body can be just as fickle as the scale.  I’m eating the right things and making good choices, but there’s more I could be doing.  I need to return to my exercise program.  Excuses, like getting the monsters back to school, making up some time during the day for work (because I have to pick Princess up everyday since we don’t have bus service this year) instead of working out, Revision Xibalba instead of working out…

I have to make exercise a priority or it won’t happen.  So that is my number one goal this week:  return to exercise in some shape or form.  Find the time, plan the time, and do it.

I can’t allow lack of progress on the scale to derail me.  Someone said on the WW forums the other day:  Just because you trip on one step doesn’t mean you throw yourself headlong down the stairs.  I’m only going to succeed long term if I learn how to deal with these scale droughts.  It’s just a number.  A meaningless number.  If I’m eating healthy and moving my body, then I just have to be patient.

A new food I’ve eaten this week is a quick and easy sort of “peach crumble” that’s really healthy.  Peaches are in full season here and readily available.  I dice up a nice peach or two (if they’re small) in a bowl (no need to peel unless you don’t like the skin), sprinkle with a little Splenda and cinnamon (or nutmeg), and microwave for about 60 seconds.  If I need to get a healthy oil in to meet the WW guidelines, I add a little coconut oil to the warm fruit.  Then I sprinkle old-fashioned oats on top (1/4 c = 2 pts), stir, and optionally heat a few more seconds.   It’s not quite as decadent as real peach crumble but it’s very good, warm and sweet and fruity.

Aside:  WW doesn’t really count coconut oil for the healthy guideline – the oil should be pourable.  But coconut oil is my go-to miracle cure for all sorts of things.  It’s anti-microbal and anti-viral!  (When I got a painful split in the corner of my mouth, I tried everything to heal it and it just got worse and worse.  Started putting coconut oil on it twice a day and it healed in a few days.)  Plus it tastes great and is very, very satisfying.  I decided to count it for myself as a healthy oil but I only use it at most once a day.  Really more like 2-3 times a week.

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Good News Monday

Revision Xibalba for THE BLOODGATE WARRIOR is DONE!!

I struggled to find time over the weekend to write the one new scene with a family dinner and then laundry and errands yesterday.  Plus a few things still nagged at me that weren’t quite right, so I did another read-thru and tweaked a few plot elements.  Finally, I made my way to the next-to-last scene that I needed to add, but it was 10:30 p.m. last night.  With monsters going to school and the Evil Day Job, I just couldn’t stay up.

So I got up Dark & Early this morning and finished that new scene.  I only needed a couple of hundred words to finish it, and then smoothed that last scene to make sense. 

Whew, I’m exhausted yet very happy with how this story came out.  It’s a nice meaty (almost) 42K smoldering romp steeped in Maya mythology and Guatemalan history, including a pyramid sacrifice hot enough to hopefully sear off a few eyebrows.

I already contacted a few people who expressed interest in beta reading this story, but if you’re interested and didn’t get an email from me this morning, drop me a note.

Do you have any good news to share today?

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Cross Stitch SAL Update

Okay, so this was supposed to be a “Wed WIP” but Wed got away from me.  I forgot that I had to actually…you know…TAKE PICTURES to make this post.  Then I couldn’t find the iron.

So here’s the 35-ct Mermaid Blue linen and light blue mystery mini spool from HDF:

It’s hard to tell in these photos, but there’s a lovely mix of soft blue and even a hint of light green in the silk thread.  (Pictures were taken on my iPhone.)

To make sure the dark material wouldn’t drive me nuts, I decided to try a small Ink Circles freebie:

Here’s Part 1 of the Mystery SAL completed!

 

And here’s a wider shot so you can see more of the fabric. I decided not to try and finish all the border yet to avoid making mistakes that I’ll have to frog later.

 

 

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RBW Week 7

Romance Biggest Winner

So much for hitting the big 5-0. 

Ugh, my first gain, -.97%.  No, it wasn’t “deserved” either.  I’ve eaten within my Weight Watchers points every single day, even though I had a few Doritos (a serving, carefully counted and allotted) and two tiny cheesecake bites over the weekend.  My PMS cravings were killing me, but I stayed in my daily point range.

It sucks to be UP when I’ve been on plan all week, but my body has a mind of its own.  I can only do what I can do, and the scale has been up for two days in a row.  I know next week will be better.  I’m doing all the right things.  Eventually it’ll show on the scale.

Last night I made what’s quickly becoming a family favorite:  Lasagna from the WW Just 5 cookbook.  I use at least 90% lean ground beef, lots of organic Bertoli pasta sauce (our favorite), fat free or part skim ricotta (depending on what I can find), fat free cottage cheese, and part-skim mozarella.  I also use the old-style “boil” lasagna noodles.  Maybe it’s all in my head, but they seem to cook up so much better (and taste better) than the no-boil kind, so they’re worth a little extra time.

I had a 5-lb pack of 90% lean ground beef in the fridge from our Sam’s Club run this weekend, so I browned up the entire pack.  I made two dishes of lasagna, one for dinner and a smaller one for lunches and leftovers, while the rest of the hamburger browned in my iron skillet for tacos tonight.

Kid approved and deliciously slim!

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Good News Monday

The BEST news:  the monsters are headed back to school today!!  Of course, they don’t think this is such great news….

I also finished edits to Vicki (YOURS TO TAKE) this weekend and got them shipped back to my editor.  Wheeee!

I finished a ton of prep work for back to school, including organizing my generic “bill box” catch all of school papers, tests, homework, bills, to-be-filled items, etc. into a small hanging file basket.  Each kid has two folders, one for immediate work and the other for reference (the class handbook, master spelling lists, etc.)  I also prepped my erase-board calendar with PE and library days, weekly spelling tests, etc.  Then I scrambled an 18-ct pack of eggs while That Man fried up a huge pack of bacon and we made a pile of breakfast burritos to stick in the freezer.  (Breakfast is really hard each day because they get tired of their choices after a day or two.)

I loaded two more sci-fi or exotic themed website banners this weekend featuring a “blue painted lady.” 

I ordered RTCs for Golden using Soleil’s gorgeous artwork!  I can’t wait to start mailing them out.

This week, my to-do list is pretty steep.  I have a ton of blog posts and prepwork to finish for Golden’s release at the end of the month.  Plus I’d like to get started on The Bloodgate Warrior edits.  Not to mention new words on the zombie category and Phantom.  If I don’t get these projects going, Vicki will be pretty lonely on the 2012 schedule…

What’s your good news?

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iStitch Mystery SAL

I’m going to be starting a new cross stitch project shortly, and because it’s something new for me, I thought I’d share my progress here every week or so.

SAL = Stitch A Long.  In this case, it’s a mystery SAL – we’ve only been given a glimpse of what the finished project will look like.  There are 8 pieces, and we don’t get the NEXT piece until we finish the current one and send a picture to the designer.  Currently, there are 125 people signed up to participate, and we’ll all be stitching at the same time.  Pretty cool, huh?

What’s even more cool: each project will look very different, depending on fabric and choice of colors. I was thinking about my project tonight, and it both amused and irritated me.  It’s so reflective of my writing journey and personal struggles.

First, I want to do something different, that no one else will do.  Even though we’re all doing the same pattern.

I went through all my stash, reviewing my linen and silks, looking for unusual elements that interested me.  I found a large piece of Mermaid Blue 35 ct. linen I bought from HDF last year.  I love the subtle mottling, but it’s soooo dark.  If you’ve never worked on dark linen before, it can be really hard to find the threads.  Accidentally get off by one thread, and it can look really terrible.

But the designer’s piece is stitched in a nice blue silk, so I kept coming back to the Mermaid Blue linen — sort of an “opposite” idea with blue as the main background.  I have a mystery spool of soft light blue silk that would look gorgeous against the darker linen. It’d definitely be a challenge, and Lord knows I loooove a good challenge.  Sigh.

The first part of the pattern doesn’t come out until Sat. so I decided to do a little test stitching on that dark linen first to make sure I wouldn’t end up pulling my hair out.  I have a little freebie from Ink Circles that I ought to be able to finish in a day or two, and I’m using the mystery spool to make sure it stands out well on the dark linen.  So far, it looks nice like I hoped, but it is difficult to skip around too much — I just can’t see the threads.  These old eyes just aren’t what they used to be. 

I’ll wait until I get the first part of the pattern on Sat. and decide.  If there are lots of skips that I’m going to have to count very carefully, I’ll probably go back to my second choice, some nice Cream 40ct. linen with Paua Abalone silk from HDF.

I’m tentatively planning on posting about my stitching progress on Wednesday, similar to Nicole’s WiP Weds.

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RBW Week 6

Romance Biggest Winner

So far for this challenge, I’ve lost a total of 10.4 pounds, which puts my average loss at 2 pounds per week.  A little higher than my WW average (since Jan) of 1.3 pounds per week.  Pneumonia in July is all I can say.  I don’t expect these numbers going forward!

I am, however, at 41% of my goal I set for the whole six months.  Awesome!  Every pound going forward will be a challenge, so I’m glad I have a headstart.  (My goal is to lose just slightly over 1 lb/week.)

Food wise, I’m still pretty boring.  e.g. I haven’t tried any new recipes since last week.  I’m eating nonfat Greek yogurt daily to get as many probiotics as possible to counteract the heavy-duty antibiotics I’ve been on, and they’re doing their job.  With fresh peaches/nectarines in season…and a little Kashi Go Lean Almond Crunch (only 1/2 c. because it’s expensive in points, 1 c = 5 pts) sprinkled on top, YUM!  And a great source of protein too.

My oldest has been informally doing WW with me (as her doctor recommended), and one of the easiest things she does to keep her weight going down is to take her lunch to school everyday.  Even with all the new healthy guidelines they keep pushing down our throats, if she eats the school lunch, she’s guaranteed to slowly start gaining again.  Since school starts next week, I invested in some nicer cold lunch boxes for all three monsters so they can all take their lunch if they want.  (Middle is VERY picky about her sandwich and believes it “tastes bad” if it’s even the slightest bit warmer than ice cold.  She typically will only take PBJ as a result.  I hope these new “PackIt” bags work!)

Any ideas for interesting healthy kid lunches?  Because the whole sandwich thing gets old pretty fast…