Science Fiction Mommy

Kiddie Crafts - Jack and the Beanstalk

2012-02-12T13:07:00.091-07:00

We continued with our fairy tale theme by next introducing Jack and the Beanstalk. Once again we used several book versions, the Fairie Tale Theatre movie, and crafts. Zaxxon now likes to stomp around saying Fee Fi Fo Fum!

On day one, we made a beanstalk in our hallway

The next day we added to--and finished--the mural. We started by tracing Zaxxon on a big piece of paper to make a giant.

Coloring the giant. He also wanted to make it anatomically correct. I informed him that he couldn't see his own parts under his clothes, and the giant was wearing clothes too. Ah, kids.

Next we laced the golden harp. He even laced them in the right order (with a bit of prompting.)

After that we cut out the magic beans. (Yes, we should've done them before the beanstalk. Oh well.)

You can see the two he cut out aren't as close to the lines, but look how good of a job he did!

We then made a bag of gold. I was amazed at how many mural elements he wanted to make. This one I put together on the fly, since I'd had no plans to make a money bag.

We also made a hen by tracing his hand, and cut out golden eggs for it, but I didn't get any pictures of that. Then we made Jack, so he could be climbing the beanstalk. Zaxxon drew this one all by himself. (Apparently Jack is a robot.)

Then we made the giant's castle. I love how he's looking at the picture to see what his drawing is missing.

Lastly, Zaxxon traced the name "Jack."

And then we put everything on the wall. Whew! What a day! I was truly amazed at how much he wanted to do in one day (I'd figured the mural would have been a several-day project.)

I formally introduced the letter "J" after Jack and the Beanstalk. This time I turned all the pictures upside down after they were cut out and challenged him to find them.

We only did one other "J" craft, a jellyfish. First we put paint and star confetti in a clear sandwich bag, sealed it up, and smushed it together.

Then we added streamers to the bottom for tentacles.

Ta da! Jellyfish. He wanted to play with it, but after he started getting rough I called an end to that. The paint probably won't dry inside the sealed bag, and I DON'T want paint all over the house.

We made baked applesauce for the heck of it, because we found a recipe in his Highlights High Five magazine. This was the first time we used his new "safe" knife (my mother-in-law got it for him, it's very similar to a pumpkin carving knife.)

He's a good kitchen helper, although he usually wants to work three times as fast as I do. And taste everything. We had to wash his hands three times in order to get through this.

In typical Zaxxon fashion, he said he liked it after the first taste, but a few bites later said he didn't. Oh well, more for me! It was quite scrumptious. And I saved his in case he has a change of heart later.

Revising with comments

2012-02-08T23:44:00.000-07:00

The revisions of my novel are progressing, albeit progressing slowly. I'm discovering that the often-very-short writing time I have each day makes novel revisions difficult. With such a big piece of work, there's more story to get back in the mode of, and just reminding myself of the atmosphere surrounding a necessary change can take up nearly all of my time. I finished with all of the edits I can make in a short, jump-in jump-out fashion, and that left me wondering what to do next.

Finally, I decided that the only way I was going to maintain the thread of the story for the remaining revisions was to go through the novel from beginning to end again. In order to keep track of what needs to be done as I go, I utilized the Comments feature in Word, converting my to-do list into comments placed approximately where they will need to go. Now I can (hopefully) make one big sweep and fix nearly everything as I go. If there's anything I think I'll need to do later, I'll be sure to leave a comment again so I can find it easily.

This big process ought to start tomorrow, unless I feel the need to tackle part of my monthly story goal first. I wish I could say it will happen fast, but I know it won't. I imagine I may get only get through one or two pages on some of the slower days. But if I manage to fix everything as I go through, it'll be ready for critiques from others by the time I'm done.

How about you? I've never edited a novel before--how do you usually tackle taking on such a large piece of work?

We got walloped!

2012-02-04T17:40:00.001-07:00

12 1/2 inches when I went out to shovel on Friday.

18 inches by Saturday morning.

You know, when it's this heavy, it ought to be good packing snow by default. It really should. Yesterday it didn't pack at all. Today after the sun came out, it did a little, but not really enough. At least it was still fun to play in, and today was warmer than yesterday, so Zaxxon lasted longer.

However, it was so deep that simply shoveling a path through it made for fun houses and channels. I spent a while trying to build a "house," and hubby trumped me simply by digging a path to the composter.

Kiddie Crafts - The Three Little Pigs

2012-02-04T13:06:00.116-07:00

A few months ago, I decided I wanted to start introducing Zaxxon to classic fairy tales. We'd only read a few, but since they're so central to our society's background I wanted him to be familiar with them. Hubby helped this endeavor along by giving me the complete set of Fairie Tale Theatre videos for Christmas. Inspired by this gift, I checked out a copy of The Three Little Pigs from the library, found another version of the story in an anthology we have, and scoured the internet for crafts ideas.

Man, there are some good crafts out there. I intend to keep doing fairy tales, if only for the ease of the projects. Lots of homeschool websites have whole units based around them, so there was much less prep work for me, and a wealth of activities to choose from.

Zaxxon also really seemed to enjoy the story, though the wolf worried him. We played three little pigs A. LOT. You could really see and hear him working something out in his head. For now, Big Bad Wolves have supplanted lions as his fear of choice (he used to randomly run into the room calling "a lion's coming!" and we would all have to cower and hide. Now it's "Big Bad Wolf coming!")

Zaxxon also showed a nice moment of fraternity. I asked him if Kal'El were to have his house blown down by the big bad wolf, would he allow Kal'El to come hide in his house. He said yes, and then immediately had to go find his brother and help him escape from the house of sticks (his crib) in order to take refuge in the house of bricks (a big cardboard box they've been playing with for months.)

I was actually surprised by some of the versions of the story. What I remember is the first two pigs being foolish in their choice of building materials but always escaping to the third pigs house, where they defeat the wolf together. Many versions have the first two pigs being eaten, and then the wolf tries to trick the third pig into leaving his house a few times before climbing down the chimney. Funny how many variations there are.

This was a matching game I found online. There are three pigs on the paper, and cards with the three houses. You're supposed to match the house to the pig. Zaxxon had no trouble with this--he was done before I'd even found the glue.

I cut out all the pieces necessary to make three pigs out of paper. After the matching game I pulled them out, but after attaching the heads Zaxxon insisted he wanted to do this craft with Dada.

So we had to wait until evening to put the pigs together.

The next day we went outside to scavenge for materials to build pig houses with. Straw (dead grass raked up from the lawn,)

sticks (random twigs from the yard,)

and bricks. These weren't in the yard, I cut popsicle sticks into small pieces and colored them red the night before. I put the glue in straight lines, but he lined the bricks up all on his own.

Lastly, we made a wolf out of a paper towel tube. This is another one I just printed from online. I love it when crafts are that easy to prepare!

My grandmother's birthday was coming up, so I had Zaxxon make her a card. I wrote "Nana" on the paper, and he managed to trace it!

Continuing from the pig theme, I formally introduced the letter "P." Coloring the "P" pictures with the new markers he got for Christmas

Cutting them out. He's getting a lot better at scissors. I gave him a strip of pictures and asked him to cut between the pictures, and he did a really good job. He even held the scissors the right way.

Making a pillow. This is another one we started during the day, but he insisted he wanted to finish with Dada.

Stuffing the pillow

More "P" crafts, making a pirate

We also made a catapult (for the pirate to fire)

We made one more "P" craft--a penguin with Zaxxon's hands for the wings. We recently set up stools at our breakfast bar, which we've never done before. Zaxxon loves eating up here, and wanted to do his crafts up here too.

Happy Blogiversary

2012-02-01T12:52:00.000-07:00

Two years ago today, I launched Science Fiction Mommy. I didn't really know what I was getting myself into, to be honest. A small part of me hoped that I would quickly garner a large following and, with Google AdSense and Amazon Associates, I'd start making some income off of it. Well, that didn't happen so I'm glad I didn't have too many hopes pinned on that eventuality. But my real goal had been to connect with other writers and hold myself accountable when it came to my writing. The first of those I've done, though on a small scale. I always want to network more, but it tends to be toward the bottom of my priority list. The second is where Science Fiction Mommy has helped me the most. Thanks in part to the blog, I've been writing daily for more than a year now, and keeping up with submissions. The community I've discovered has also helped me remain motivated. Thank you everyone!

It's been an interesting two years, and life will continue to amaze me.

January Stat Check

2012-01-31T23:49:00.001-07:00

During the month of January, I wrote/edited on all 31 days
I made final edits on an older story, edited my novel, and wrote the first draft of a new story
I made 9 submissions
I received 6 rejections
I decided that one market was never going to respond
I took between 0 and 5 days to resub a story after a rejection
I have 11 stories currently in slush pile circulation
I made 8 blog posts (including this one)
I took no days off

Analysis:
January was a really good month. I felt very productive. Rejections were flying and I got everything back out, I subbed two new stories (though one technically belonged to December,) I did some good novel edits, and I got a new story written. I've been very busy this month. I could still vastly improve my time management, but I'm feeling on top of things again. I'm looking forward to a similar February!

Three Stories Every Month

2012-01-28T18:33:00.000-07:00

I got a good start on submitting a story every month, making my January submission on the 8th. However, it didn't occur to me until that moment what a rigorous schedule making one new submission each month is going to be.

My normal process works something like this: I write a story, taking as few or many days as the story requires. Then I let it sit for at least a month, giving myself some much-needed distance so I can more easily spot problems. I reread the story, make any revisions I feel are necessary, and then offer it to readers for critiques. After receiving those back (this can take 4-5 weeks if I'm using Critters) I make any more necessary revisions and then submit. Occasionally I will do serious revisions and then do another round of critiques before submitting.) What this whole process boils down to is that I need a minimum of two months to work on a story. What this also means is that if I'm to keep my goal of one new submission every month, I'll need to be working on three stories each month: one to write, one to revise and offer for critiques, and one to revise after critiques and submit.

Whew! That's going to be a lot of work. Fortunately, I have a backlog of things that are nearly ready for submission, but I've already started on writing new stuff s that I'll have something to submit come April.

The biggest issue with this realization is that I'll need to start working a little faster. It's very important that I continue to revise the novel, so I can't spend three quarters of the month concentrating on stories instead. I've got my work cut out for me this year!

On a related note, I've decided to replace one of my 12 stories this year with a children's book. It's an idea I recently came up with while my son was sick, and I think it could work really well. Which means more learning this year too, mainly about how to write a picture book. Whee!

How about you? How do you handle balancing multiple projects?

Bad Luck

2012-01-20T23:44:00.000-07:00

As you all know (I'm sure it's obvious from the title of my blog,) I primarily write science fiction. However, I have not limited myself to this exclusively. I have a mystery piece, a historical fiction piece, a zombie story, and a few mainstream stories in circulation. I am also certain that I will write more deviations as time goes on.

Despite the fact that I like these stories-which-are-not-sci-fi, I dislike submitting them. I am most familiar with the science fiction markets--of which there are quite a few--and I always feel out of my depth when trying to find a home for something else. Some other genres like historical and, surprisingly, mystery, have fewer dedicated markets, meaning it's easy to run out of places to submit them (places that pay, anyway.) I'm not sure which is worse, running out of markets quick or the random stabbing-out-in-the-dark submitting I do for my mainstream pieces. There are just SO MANY general/mainstream/literary markets, and I'm not going to extensively read all of them to find homes for my few related pieces. Suffice it to say, whenever one of my not-sci-fi stories comes back to me I give an internal groan before searching for markets.

I've had particularly bad luck with my historical fiction story. I've been submitting it since April 2009 but it has only been to five markets. The first gave a plain old rejection, the second said they liked it (but not enough to publish it,) and the third and fourth never responded.

Yep, two markets in a row gave me nothing but silence. The first of these had it for about five months (2 longer than Duotrope's average) before I started querying. After my queries went unanswered for a few weeks I gave it up and moved on. The next market seemed promising and paid relatively well so I submitted there. They claimed they would respond within a few months, but Duotrope put their average in the hundreds of days. I forgot about that one for a while and focused on other things.

Eventually, though, I realized that they were taking f-o-r-e-v-e-r. In addition, they had been "temporarily closed to submissions" for an insane length of time too (but not when I submitted--I know they were open when I submitted.) Slowly the number of pending responses on Duotrope whittled down to two, and eventually, just me. I queried them several times, to several places, and got nothing but stony silence. Today I finally gave it up and resubmitted.

Certainly, other writers would have done this sooner. If I had a greater amount of time to focus on writing-related activities, I might have given up sooner too. The website is still active though, and they had a very slow response time anyway--so since this story has so few decent markets, I kept holding out hope.

I bring this up only because I realized, while getting this story ready to be resubbed, that between the two non-responsive markets, this story hasn't actually been considered by anyone since April of 2010. That's almost two years ago. How'd I end up with two sluggish, non-responsive markets in a row?

Well, this is (unfortunately) part of the writing industry. Dust it off and send it back out. That's exactly what I did.

Have you ever had something out for a long time only to have it be ignored? How long have you let things linger for?

(I apologize if this post is disordered: I can't get the theme song for Mickey Mouse Clubhouse and Hot Dog, Hot Dog, Hot Diggity Dog, both written for Disney by They Might Be Giants, out of my head--thanks to a certain three-year-old who wanted to listen to them fifty times today. It's hard to write anything with those earworms in my head.)

The End of Lazy Revisions

2012-01-18T23:54:00.001-07:00

Back around Christmas, I finished entering all the hand-written edits I made during the first readthrough of my novel. I celebrated having hit this milestone, but it was also somewhat sobering. To be honest, I'd gotten into the habit of lazily looking at the hard copy, making mostly-simple text or wording changes, and looking for the next one. It was actually a handy way to be writing during the holidays, when there was much business and chaos on all fronts--writing didn't have to add much stress of its own.

But now, well... now I can't be lazy anymore. There are still a ton of things left to do with the novel (some that I recently noticed, some that are part of a huge to-do list that I made back when I wrote the first draft) not to mention all the stories I plan to write this year. And none of them are as easy as making changes that were mostly already done, just not in the document. In some ways that's frightening, as I still don't have a huge amount of time to myself without depriving myself of sleep. In other ways though, it's rekindling my enthusiasm for my writing. Being more active in my creating, even if it is the often-less-active revising stage, is just more fun (just like writing a story actively versus passively is more engaging for the reader. Who knew?) I've been spending more time writing, which means less time for other things (blogging for instance. Or sorting through the digital mountain of photos I took on Christmas.) It's been great, and (mostly) a lot of fun, although I've been feeling more pressed for time than I did before Christmas. But then, when something takes, something else has to give.

Have you ever fallen into lazy writing ruts? Do they help you recharge your batteries or pull you away from the more important parts of the craft?

I hate inventing technology

2012-01-10T18:49:00.001-07:00

I suppose that may sound weird for a science fiction writer, but it's true. Sometimes, anyway. I don't always hate inventing technology. Sometimes I come up with a really neat idea for a piece of technology and I just run with it (sometimes things I wish I had the ability to invent,) but when it comes to populating a story with environmentally-appropriate gizmos, I'm often at a bit of a loss.

This is particularly a problem because much of what I write takes place in the near future. Technology (computers, tablets, e-readers, phones, etc) evolve SOOO frequently that I have a hard time finding a balance between what's familiar and what's realistic. Thirty years from now, will we even still use the word "computer?" As a more generic term it'll probably still be around, but the specific types we have: desktop, PC, MAC, laptop, notebook, netbook, tablet... They'll probably all be long gone. By that token, I could make up any word I like for the gizmos my characters use, but if I use terms that nobody has ever heard of I then have to explain them. Explaining that a Dooziedoo is a computer 1,000 times more powerful than anything we have today but it fits under your fingernail would be a complete infodump, taking the reader out of the story--at least if it's meant to just be background information that is only mentioned once or twice. (Actually, fingernail computers could be fun. But I wasn't planning on doing that...) If I use more familiar terms the reader will be able to breeze past it easier, but it might make my society look old-fashioned. I try to take logical leaps on where technology will go next, but thirty years ago, could anyone have guessed at the variety of gadgets we have today?

In some respects, writing technology that will exist a long way off in the future is easier than the things just coming around the bend. The farther out we go, the less familiar we expect everything to be so we can just make everything up. In the near future a lot of things will be the same, while others will be different.

Okay, so I don't always hate making up technology, but last night I decided I didn't like the name I'd used for a handheld computer in my novel, and it took me forever to come up with something better. In fact, I'm still not sure I like what I came up with, but it will have to do for now.

How about you? How do you handle advancing the future?

Kid Crafts - Christmas One More Time

2012-01-06T16:37:00.001-07:00

Yes, it's more than a week after Christmas, but as we've not done any other crafts since then, and I didn't feel like blogging about it over the holidays...

We started crafts on Sunday, by decorating the cookies we baked. My parents were over, and it soon became a family event.

(It also took much longer than I expected, and I went through an entire bag of powdered sugar...)

Zaxxon did a terrific job of keeping his hands out of his mouth--we didn't have to wash his hands once after we started!

The Pampered Chef frosting thingies worked out great for little hands, too. (I've had them for months, but this is the first time I've let him use them.)

On Monday, we started work on some train fridge magnets for Zaxxon to give to family. We got one finished, at any rate, and knew how the rest would go together. (Zaxxon LOVED the finished product and wanted to play with it all night. Good thing it came in a package of 12 so we had more than we needed!)

On Tuesday we finished making the trains. Zaxxon lasted longer than I had expected him to. He helped me with the big red piece on every one, and then made it through four whole magnets before starting to play. I sent him downstairs to watch Frosty the Snowman while I continued, and then he helped me finish up when the show was over.

We also made popsicle stick trees. For the first time, I managed to get him to color something rather than just draw a line and/or scribble on it! (We'll see if that ability can translate to pictures next time.)

I also let him use white glue (not a stick) by himself for the first time to decorate the tree.

The next day he stamped some wrapping paper for the magnets. You can see the spots where he turned the ink pads over to stamp them directly too.

We used the foam scraps from the magnets to decorate a Christmas tree. I hid the pieces throughout the living room and sent him out to find them. He liked this so much, we had to make a wreath to decorate too.

Here I had him stringing beads on a pipe cleaner to make a candy cane. He actually lasted for half the length of the pipe cleaner and only deviated from the red-white-red-white pattern once. He did a lot more than I had anticipated.

Pretending to eat the finished product

We worked on some more candy canes the following day, some with larger beads. He really seemed to like this project and requested more, even after he was obviously getting tired of it.

I had thought we were done with Christmas crafts, but on Christmas eve day hubby cut a bunch of paper into squares, gathered scissors, pinking shears, and craft punches together, and showed Zaxxon how to make paper snowflakes.

He seemed very happy that he'd come up with and orchestrated a craft all on his own. It was cute. I love my husband!

2011 Recap/2012 Goals

2012-01-02T17:53:00.000-07:00

2011 doesn't feel like a year in which I did very much when it comes to writing. There were a few notable landmarks along the way, certainly, but not much that really propelled my career forward. Here they are in no particular order:

I finished the first draft of my first novel--although since the bulk of that was written in 2010 it isn't much of a 2011 accomplishment.
I had a baby! (Nothing to do with writing, but it was a big event!)
Apart from my maternity leave, I wrote or edited on every day of the year. This is definitely a good one, although I must admit that many days have only met a bare minimum requirement--still, it's something.
Hubby and I wrote a screenplay together which feels pretty solid, and I'm hoping something might come of that in the next year.
I received an Honorable Mention from the Writers of the Future contest for my story Child of the Sun.
The most exciting thing to happen was receiving a copy of an anthology with my published story, Night Terrors, inside--and although that was wonderful, it came from a story I sold in 2010.

Some other elements of 2011 look less jolly:

The other story I sold in 2010, Pandora's Time, never made it into book form as the press fell apart, and that story is back amongst the slush piles.
I made no new sales in 2011, so I still have only one credit.
I began getting my children's Christmas book ready to submit, only to completely ignore it come Kal'El's arrival.
From mid-May until November I made only one submission, meaning that many of my stories didn't have any chance of publication because no one was considering them
Although I worked on eight different short stories in some form or another, only two of them got finished and added to my canon of submissions

Some raw numbers:

Days on which I wrote: 322 (all year minus 43 days during my maternity leave)
Submissions: 25
Rejections: 20
Markets that never responded: 2
Critiques: 15

I had a good year in 2011, but in 2012 I want to step up my writing. Kal'El has been around for long enough that we have a semblance of order in our lives. The boys nap at the same time provided I wake up early enough in the morning to make sure Kal'El doesn't sleep late (you'd think this wouldn't be a problem but sometimes it is--and I'm usually so tired that if he doesn't wake me up, I want to sleep in a bit.) I've discovered Google Reader, which greatly speeds up my blog browsing, and I've found a schedule that (mostly) works for writing and internet browsing. I want to use that time wisely, and take solid steps toward making more sales. I seem to work better when I have deadlines, so I will incorporate some of them into my year. To that end, my goals for 2012 are:

Get the children's Christmas book submitted to publishers/agents. I want to get this started soon. I don't really know much about publication schedules yet, but I do know that if there is any hope of it being available by Christmas 2012 the process needs to start soon. So my deadline is to begin submitting by the end of February.
Get my novel edited and offered up for critiques. This is the one for which I'm not setting a deadline because I really have no idea how long it will take. Much of it takes place near Kennedy Space Center and I will have the opportunity to visit this summer, so even if everything else is done by then I will probably make some tweaks once I've seen the layouts and the surrounding town. Summer seems like a decent target, though I'm leaving this one open.
I want to see more progress on stories this year, so my last goal is to get one new story submitted every month. This can be an old story that just needs a little push, one that needs revising, or something completely new, but by next year I want to say that I made 12 new story submissions. Actually, I want to say I made 13, because I sent a new one yesterday--but I had hoped to get that done on Dec 31 so I'm not counting it as January's story.

I hope that this last goal, in addition to giving me much-needed deadlines, will also keep me from growing bored while editing my novel. I don't know yet if I'll need to make a schedule (novel on weekdays and stories on weekends) or if I can just move as I feel motivated, but by switching between topics I hope to keep things fresh.

There are two more things that would be nice to see happen, but I'm not going to plan on them until I see how things pull together. The first is, if I get my novel edited early enough, I'd like to start writing another one. The second is I would like to start shopping the screenplay around and see if we can garner some interest. I'll have to see when hubby wanted to get that done too, since he knows more about that business than I do and we have to work together on that.

So that's what I'm aiming for, and I hope to do better at these goals than I did 2011's. How about you? Are you happy with what you accomplished last year?

December Stat Check

2012-01-01T23:42:00.001-07:00

During the month of December, I wrote/edited on all 31 days.
Primarily I edited my novel, although I also worked on the first draft of a new story, read through and tweaked the screenplay hubby and I wrote together, and did final edits on an older story.
I made 3 submissions
I received 2 rejections
I took between 7 and 27 days to resub a story after receiving a rejection
I have 9 stories currently in slush pile circulation
I made 12 blog posts
I took no days off

Analysis:
Editing was slow and somewhat boring this month. I have some plans for that, but I'll elaborate in my 2011 recap/2012 goals post (hopefully tomorrow.) My progress in all areas was nothing to shout about, but it was acceptable. Probably the biggest thing I accomplished was I think I've settled into something of a schedule that gives me more/better awake time in which to write. If I can keep that up, my progress ought to improve.

Goals for January are to get a new story into submission circulation, make good progress in editing the novel, blog more about writing-related things (instead of primarily my kids, cute as they are,) and to get stories resubbed within a week of receiving rejections. More on goals in my 2011/2012 post.

Happy 2012!

Christmas through the Eyes of a Child

2011-12-24T12:33:00.001-07:00

Three-year-olds don't have much (if any) memory of their previous Christmases, but they are capable of understanding much of what goes on, they get excited by all of the unusual activities, and their excitement is both infectious and heartening. (They're also easily overwhelmed, but we take that in stride as best we can.) For Christmas, I thought I'd share a few moments of Zaxxon enjoying the holiday, to remind myself to see Christmas through his eyes.

When I climbed up on the roof to put Christmas lights up (it's long been our tradition, except when I've been pregnant, for me to put them up and hubby to take them down) Zaxxon got really excited. He started stringing pieces of yarn all over the bushes to "help" me decorate. He also really wanted to get up on the roof. Had it just been me, the answer would have been a non-negotiable NO, but hubby had a better feeling that he'd be able to keep him safe and under control, so I let hubby bring him up. Can you say E-X-C-I-T-E-D?!!

I put up a few more lights on our bushes and trees, that same evening after dark. Right after I started, a front blew in and it was quite cold and windy, but that didn't stop Zaxxon from running outside to see what I was doing and "help" some more--even without shoes on. When you're three, excitement and novelty trump comfort--which is why we have parents to pull us back inside until we're properly clothed, I suppose.

When we announced we were going to put up our Christmas tree, Zaxxon got excited all over again. "With presents under (it)?" he wanted to know. Well, yes, later on, once we have presents to put under it. There's a tree in our house. How much more exciting can this time of year get?

He didn't have much patience for stringing garlands, but the way he bounced around the house after I called it quits belied how much fun he was having, regardless.

Seeing something awesome (probably a fire truck) at the holiday parade

Visiting Santa. Santa's actually a little scary for this age group. Zaxxon didn't want to sit on his lap, but he was willing to sit on mine--though first he wandered the room for a while, not wanting to get too close. We had to remind him that Santa needed to know what to bring him on Christmas.

And what infant could resist the fuzzy pom pom on the end of Santa's hat?

Zaxxon had a wonderful time decorating the tree. Even after we were finished (we did it in several installments) he kept telling us he wanted to decorate more. It has proved quite a temptation though--there are only a few ornaments we permit him to play with, and he's had trouble keeping his hands off.

Getting to decorate the cookies he helped bake. You're going to let me use frosting?!!! YUM!!!

Christmas lights are very exciting to a three-year-old. The whole night is lit up special.

We spent one night just driving around, looking at everybody's lights. We even stopped at a house near our old apartment, where they go completely nuts.

Even a chore like shoveling snow is fun when you're three.

As Christmas draws nearer, there's so much more anticipation. There are presents under the tree now, which are not to be unwrapped until Christmas. Zaxxon has been "playing" presents a lot, putting toys into an empty box or bag, closing it up, giving it to us and insisting we open it. We've done a lot of baking, present wrapping, looking at lights, story reading, and finding an elf who migrates around our house each day. We're eagerly awaiting the arrival of Santa, and of the special day spent with those we love. Santa comes tonight. Tomorrow, we enjoy the chaos. This will be the first Christmas Zaxxon is likely to remember long-term, and is Kal'El's first Christmas period. We will have fun. We will rejoice. We will probably drive one another just a little bit nuts. Life is good.

Wishing you all a very Merry Christmas!!!

Revising Drudgery

2011-12-21T16:57:00.000-07:00

I've been stuck in a bit of a rut these past few weeks when it comes to revising. When I did the first read through of my novel, I printed it up so I could make notes in the margins and I read it out loud while nursing Kal'El. That was a great way to get back into it after months of focusing on stories. None of my first edits were permanent (which is good because I've rejected some of them) and it also gave me a great way to combine working on my novel with doing something else.

Then I began actual revisions...or at least entering in the ones I made on paper during my first reading. I realized that I needed to work backwards because otherwise my page number references--and the entire landscape of the story--would change before I made it more than ten pages in, making it that much more difficult to find where I was supposed to be. So that's what I've been doing lately: entering revisions into my novel backwards. And I'm bored.

I think this is partly because I've already made these revisions so I'm not actively doing as much, but mostly because of the reverse order. I'm not getting a sense of the novel's plot as I spottily work through it in the wrong order, so I'm not even getting involved in my own story. As a result, I've been highly distractable and have stopped several times to work on short stories for a few days. I'm somewhat torn on whether I should be allowing myself to deviate. On the one hand, stories almost always flow best from me when the ideas are fresh, and many ideas are fresh right now. On the other, if I get too distracted from my novel, I may never finish it.

The good news is that I'm nearly done with my first pass edits. Soon I will be able to make more macro edits, do more research and add in several details that I glossed over on the first draft, and go through it in the right order again. Soon. And I'm hoping that will hold my attention much more readily, because I don't want working on this novel to be a chore.

I want to enjoy my work, the way I ~~sometimes~~ usually do, because it's the best work in the world.

Kid Crafts - Christmas again!

2011-12-18T11:58:00.066-07:00

We continued with Christmas crafts this week, though they were mainly on the fly with little or no planning on my part. I wanted to plan out crafts, but I just kept getting busy/distracted with other things.

The first thing I had him do was make a Santa hat. I cut the paper to shape, drew a line where I wanted him to glue the cotton balls, and set him to work. He did a great job of following my directions on this one.

He didn't know what he was making until we rolled it up after it had dried--and then he loved it.

We also made red and green playdough, to match the season. He's getting better at helping over a hot stove.

Playing with the new dough.

He said he was making me. Can't you see the resemblance? (I have hair, at any rate)

I got this idea from my friend Sela. Handprint reindeer.

Sela also gave me this idea: a marshmallow snowman.

Zaxxon insists it's Frosty. I thought we were done once it had three circles, but he wanted to continue for arms.

When I saw the idea on my friend's blog, I thought it would be a terrific way to get rid of stale marshmallows. Zaxxon didn't seem to mind that they were stale.

He also helped me make gingerbread dough. Flour everywhere, of course!

The next day he helped me bake the gingerbread, and some sugar cookies.

Though he was more interested in playing with the cookie cutters

He also decided he was going to wipe the table and wash some dishes. Like I'm going to say No to that! Even if I do have to do it over.

Linking up at Tot School. Who knows how crafty/willing to plan I'll be next week. Stay tuned!

This is starting to feel like a Mommy Fail

2011-12-16T18:32:00.003-07:00

I've come to realize that my satisfaction with parenting is directly related to how cooperative my children are at bedtime. Or more specifically, Zaxxon.

A few months ago, I was thinking of writing a post about whether or not the second baby was easier. Kal'El seemed to be. In fact, he seemed a lot easier--and in some respects, he is. He took to nursing much better than Zaxxon did, though I was experienced so that was probably at least half of the equation.

Experience certainly is a major variable in making the second baby seem easier. I've already seen most of what babies can throw at us and know how to respond: I recognize tired and hunger cues, I already know that neither he nor I will fall apart if we go out in public, and I remember the basics of infant development.

As I was putting all this together, I realized that there was another factor that was making Kal'El seem much easier to handle--Zaxxon had entered a very difficult stage, both developmentally and emotionally. This made Kal'El seem that much easier by comparison, because there is little babies can do to misbehave or test boundaries. Zaxxon seemed to wait until Kal'El had been around a few months before showing signs of jealously. I think it took him that long to realize, on a gut level, that Kal'El wasn't a temporary state of affairs. He was never terribly aggressive toward his brother, but he became very needy, always wanting me to focus my attention on HIM, and he also seemed to decide that cooperation with anything I asked was optional.

Bedtimes, in particular, became a huge struggle. I tried numerous tactics but quickly found myself hating that time of day. It didn't matter how good of a day we had, getting him into bed took forever and put both of us in a bad mood. Every time I tried to shift away from negativity and find a fun way to get ready for bed or a more gentle way to keep him in bed, it ceased working for one reason or another after only a day or two. Whoever said that children thrive on routine because they know what's coming knows nothing about my son--he operates best if I can come up with something creative and new every day. And I really don't feel that creative (which is scary, coming from a writer.)

However, before I could write this post two months ago, something clicked for Zaxxon. I don't know what it was, but I was grateful for it. Getting him to his bed still took a fair effort, but once he was there, he would stay put. He would still often come out for one trip to the bathroom, but there was no more coming out every two minutes with a fresh request or simply to try and interact with us a little more. No more of my trying to decide how many times to silently lead him back to his bed before taking toys from him as an incentive to stay put (and deciding whether I should break the silence to warn him before I did.) No more feeling the I-just-want-five-minutes-without-worrying-about-you rage building up every evening. It was heaven.

Unfortunately, it didn't last. For the last three nights, he's begun to push his boundaries at bedtime again. He's even shown signs that he'll make a good lawyer because he's looking for loopholes. I tell him that if he comes out again he'll lose most of his stuffed animals, so he doesn't come out or open his door. What he does do is knock (and then bang) on his door, trying to get me to open it for him. When I finally get fed up, worried that he's going to wake his brother, I amend the rule to say that if he's out of bed or making noise, he'll lose animals. He breaks the rule, and I take half his zoo away. Then he asks me to tuck him in (again) and I'm so frustrated with him that I just flip the covers over him. And then I feel bad.

I hate hating bedtime. I want to cherish all these stages of my children's lives. Zaxxon's at a very fun (if high-maintenance) age, and I want to enjoy it. But my sanity as a parent necessitates having time to myself, and if my last interaction with him every evening is filled with frustration or anger, that mars my whole experience--and probably his.

I know I need to just take a deep breath and work through this. Children are ever-changing, and sooner or later Kal'El will become independent enough to become difficult as well--and I'm sure he'll throw me curveballs that Zaxxon never thought of. I'm just sad (and frustrated) that a behavior we thought was gone is returning with a vengeance. Since it's been a few months since we've had to do anything, I need to make sure Zaxxon knows the rules before the lights are out and then stick to them without letting myself get worked up. And I need to make sure that anger doesn't interfere with displays of affection (like tucking him in.) I am the adult here, after all.

But sometimes, being the adult is hard.

This is how Zaxxon sees the world

2011-12-15T12:29:00.001-07:00

As I was getting ready to make play dough the other day, Zaxxon started playing with the camera. I was amused by many of his shots, and thought I'd share.

(I think I was wearing this same shirt the last time I let him take pictures)

(I like the way he captured the sky and trees on this one)

Kind of puts life in a different perspective, doesn't it?

The Mythbusters Investigate Santa

2011-12-14T15:06:00.001-07:00

In honor of the upcoming holiday, I will again share our Mythbusters Spoof, where the Mythbusters take on their most challenging myth yet: Santa Claus!

Also, my blog friend Charlie Holmberg posted this one on her blog, and I just had to share.
Vader, Did You Know?

Kid Crafts - Christmas!

2011-12-11T11:27:00.077-07:00

Our first order of business with Christmas crafts was to make things to put on the tree. We made a garland by stringing Cheerios and fruit rings on some yarn. Zaxxon was more interested in eating than working, so at regular intervals I told him he had to string a dozen pieces before he could snack anymore, and I did the bulk of it--but that's okay because it was a fun activity to do together (I just wonder whether the garland will survive, untasted, until Christmas.)

We also worked on a paper chain garland. I had him thread each piece of paper through the previous link, I applied glue, and then I told him to make the two edges of the paper kiss each other (this is how my mom taught him to help fold towels.) He did, complete with kissing noises. :) He lost patience with this one pretty quick, so we'll come back to it a few different days in order to make the chain long enough to reach around the tree.

We did more cereal garlands to even out the look of the tree. Once again I had to put limits on how much he could eat before he had to help me again, but we both had fun. I'm thinking I might let him fill his cereal bowl from the garlands after Christmas is over. Maybe. It depends on how icky I think the cereal looks by then. As long as it doesn't get wet, gnawed on, or dusty, it'll probably be okay.

Snowy sensory bin!!!

This is the first sensory bin I've made since Easter. Wow, 8 months ago. I strongly disliked the Easter one--the grass wasn't as fun to play with as I'd hoped, and it all stuck together, coming out in one giant clump which then shed all over the floor. And the other objects would immediately sink below the grass, making removing it necessary to find the rest of the items. Not good. I guess I've just been too lazy/preoccupied to put together another one until now.

This is fake snow we got from Denver's Holiday Food and Gift Festival. You put a teaspoon of the powder into a container, add approx. 2 ounces of water, and watch it grow. Unlike most sensory bins, I gave this one to him empty and we filled it together, one little cupful at a time.

I think I'll try to hide some winter/Christmas knicknacks in there after a few days, to change it up a little. I'll be playing with him a lot with this one--I love running my fingers through this stuff. The only difficult thing about this bin is that the snow can make a huge mess fast.

I've told him I'm going to be extremely strict about the "it must stay in the bin" rule. He tested me after about 20 minutes of playing with it, and away it went. And he screamed for a bit. I'm hoping he'll learn not to press this boundary much, because the bin is just too much fun.

We made the chain garland longer on Friday, so it stretches around the tree. That's it for our crafts this week. I'm hoping to do more of our usual sort of crafts, though still Christmas themed, over the next two weeks.

I'm sure Tot School has tons of holiday themed crafts this week!

The Plight of a Stranger

2011-12-09T10:28:00.003-07:00

A few weeks back I saw a blog on my mom's computer. She told me the author was adopting a baby and hadn't posted in a week, so Mom assumed the baby had arrived. Being that babies are in the forefront of my mind these days (go figure) and that the site came with my mom's recommendation, I copied down the address to look up later.

The bustle of Thanksgiving got in my way, so I didn't check again until the weekend after Thanksgiving. And when I did, it broke my heart.

The author and her husband had arranged to adopt a baby girl at birth, but the day after she was born a father came out of the woodwork, wanting to claim custody. They had the baby for eight days before the DNA test came back confirming the relation, so they had to surrender the baby. There are a lot of details in the post that I won't relate here, but suffice it to say that it made me cry.

A lot.

My initial reaction was to think how cruel it was for the father to let a couple get emotionally involved with his daughter--letting them believe that she would be their daughter and loving her already--only to take her away. It would have been far gentler and much less of a loss if he'd declared his intentions before the baby's arrival. Before they had a chance to hold her in their arms and fall in love with her. Perhaps it's just the fact that I have a baby right now, but I hurt for them.

When I summarized this for my husband he, being a father himself and liking to think well of fathers, pointed out that hopefully this means the baby will be in a loving home. After all, if he didn't want a baby, what better way to be absolved of all responsibility--no one would ever come after him for child support or anything else. So hopefully that means that the baby will at least be wanted and loved.

The more I think about it, the more I also realize that the guy might not have intended to hurt anybody. I'm aware of the emotional involvement of adopting from the various parenting resources I've consulted in the past three years--but if he'd never put any thought into adoption he might not have any idea of how much of an emotional roller coaster it can be for hopeful parents. He might not have been callous at all--just oblivious. We can hope, and hope that he's being a good father.

All this introspection isn't necessarily worthy of a blog post by me, but the thing is, I haven't been able to get this out of my head. We hear bad news all the time in our society--it's on the news every day. We note some things more than others, but since we get so inundated with it, and since there's so much of it, we tend to dismiss bad news as our minds move on to other things. But this woman's plight has been in the forefront of my mind for almost two weeks now.

Could it just be that having my own children (and a vivid imagination) makes this speak more truly to me? This isn't the first time the story of a newborn baby has gripped me. The Safe Haven laws, in particular, grip my mind and my imagination.

*As a side note, in case saying this does someone a service someday, the Safe Haven laws make it legal to give up a newborn infant anonymously and without fear of prosecution provided the infant is unharmed and given to the proper authorities. Laws vary in the maximum age of the child and suitable locations, but hospitals are pretty much standard--and every state has a Safe Haven law.*

Or is there another reason I can't get this failed adoption out of my mind? Is it the impact of how beautifully she wrote her sad story? (It is beautiful and full of grace rather than anger.) Is there some other connection the universe has in store for me, that I have yet to realize? Perhaps it's all three, but whatever it is, my mind has worried at it to nearly the point of obsession.

The only thing I can sanely do when something like this grips my mind is focus the energy into my writing. This, combined with a few other elements that have been floating around in my head for months, may be the ingredients necessary to save a story I wrote several months ago but set aside because it was a great premise with no real plot. I've worked on it for a few days, anyway, and it already feels more promising than it did before. I also began one other story inspired by this, but it may never see the light of day or even get finished, depending on whether I can develop it into something more than raw feelings.

I never expected, when checking out this blog, that I would spend so much time and energy focused on the plight of a stranger--but it spoke to me, and perhaps it will speak to others, the more it is shared.

Posie Gets Cozy

Merry Early Christmas to Me

2011-12-07T17:29:00.002-07:00

I've been thinking a lot lately about how I'd like my work to be more portable. My laptop's battery isn't worth much--not to mention the hooks holding it on broke so it slips off easily--so it's basically a desktop computer these days. That's fine most of the time (even though the basement is freezing,) but there are plenty of times that I wish I could bring word processors with me on the go.

Tablets are all the rage these days, but I know I'll never be a tablet person. You can't type anywhere near fast enough on those things even if you could manage to hit the right part of the screen every time, and the keyboards you can hook into them aren't very good, in my opinion. Yes, tablets will never be the tool of choice for writers--at least not without DRASTIC improvements to design. That doesn't stop me from having a tablet, but only because my father has decided that they are his new hobby--he buys them broken, voids their warranties by taking them apart and moving parts from one to the next, and puts together a smaller number of working ones. Mine is one of his refurbishments.

I've been liking the idea of netbooks, though. I particularly like how small and light they are--perfect for taking with me while the boys go to storytime or lessons or something. I can sit and work while they have fun, and my computer won't weigh me down at all--not at 2.7 pounds!

Hubby liked this idea too, so we've been researching them. After we decided on ones we liked, we kept an eye out for sales. Unfortunately (or perhaps fortunately, since I don't like crowds, lines, or shopping) the Black Friday deals were all for models that didn't perform as well as we'd like. We did find one on sale, though, and so we decided to get them now. Our original plan had been to ask for gift cards for Christmas so we could buy our new toys, but now we'll need that in cash, to reimburse ourselves.

We didn't wait until Christmas to open them and start playing (can you blame us?) but we did open the boxes in front of the Christmas tree!

All He Wants for Christmas are his Two Front Teeth

2011-12-05T11:06:00.002-07:00

My baby is unhappy. My baby is in pain. A few nights ago he only slept for about 90 minutes before waking up and screaming. I'm not talking his normal "feed me" cry--he was shrieking fit to wake the dead. I hadn't even made it to bed yet, although I'd been headed in that direction. When I picked him up, he subsided to a pathetic-sounding whimper, obviously uncomfortable.

I tried to give him my fingers to chew on, but he didn't like that idea. I offered a teether from the fridge, but he wanted none of that. He wanted nothing to do with just rocking and lullabies either. Eventually I fed him again, even though it was less than three hours since he'd last eaten. That calmed him, although after every few sucks he would stop and whimper, so I knew it must hurt him just to suck. Poor little guy.

He fell asleep nursing, so I tried to transfer him back to his crib. Unfortunately, I still hadn't made it into my own bed before he was shrieking again. I couldn't give him any tylenol because I'd given it to him right before bed and four hours hadn't passed yet--and drug overdoses are something you don't want to mess with in infants. I couldn't pack him into his carseat and drive him around the block a few times because the temperature was in the teens and the roads were treacherous. At that point I decided just to bring him into bed with me, which I haven't done in a few months.

But even that didn't help as much as I'd hoped. I started out with us both on our sides, his back to my tummy, trying to cuddle him like a teddy bear. He shrieked and wiggled. I offered him a pacifier. He screamed and arched his back. I tried to latch him again (against my better judgment because I don't want him to associate food with comfort, but I was getting desperate) but he still wiggled and cried. Hubby's only thought, apart from the options I'd already exhausted, was the old-wives rum-on-the-gums trick, but I wasn't comfortable with that one (see the above overdoses comment.) Finally I just cuddled him, stroked his hair, and sang him lullabies. He shrieked his way through the first, got a little quieter during the second, and finally fell into an exhausted sleep by the end of the third.

I hate to see my little guy in so much pain, especially when even my cuddles aren't enough comfort. Fortunately, subsequent nights haven't been as bad, though the teeth have yet to emerge. Kal'El may want his two (or four) front teeth for Christmas but for my part, if he doesn't get them sooner, I may not make it.

Kid Crafts - Letter G and miscellaneous

2011-12-04T10:54:00.056-07:00

"Five Little Pumpkins sitting on a gate..." This is the only Halloween craft we did this year, due to long periods of inactivity again. We did this on the fly, on Halloween itself. Thankfully, it was easy to cut the shapes out and let him have at it. We pasted them to a paper gate when they were all "carved."

Hubby painted a pumpkin to look like the superhero (villain?) Rorschach, and Zaxxon was fascinated by this, so I showed him how to make his own inkblot pictures. He used eyedroppers to drop watered-down paint onto a paper...

...folded them over...

...and looked at the finished product. He sees butterflies.

After Halloween, we briefly got back into the alphabet by introducing the letter "G." He already knew this one because of Grammy, Grandpa, and Great Grandma, but now I've formally introduced it, along with a slew of other G words.

G is for Grapes. I don't quite remember where I originally saw this craft. It might have been Diapers to Diplomas. At any rate, he painted a cut-up egg carton purple, and we made it into a bunch of grapes.

He cut out the stem himself, and insisted on using his zigzag scissors for it.

G is for gorilla. I had it in my head that the letter G kind of looks like a squatting gorilla, so I tried to help Zaxxon recreate that. I did several things wrong--I should have altered the shape of the G somewhat, and reversed the gorilla body parts before printing them. Oh well, he still enjoyed it.

I've finally caught up on our backlog of crafts, therefore if we don't do any crafts this week, I won't have anything to report next weekend. (Perhaps that will encourage me--although Christmas activities are already encouraging me.) I'm linking up at tot school again.

November Stat Check and Six Months Old!

2011-12-01T23:27:00.001-07:00

During the month of November, I wrote on all 30 days!
I spent most of the month editing my novel, though I also wrote the beginnings of three new stories
I made 9 submissions
I received 3 rejections
I declined to have a story published in a token-paying anthology after the semi-pro contract fell through, and resubbed that story
I queried a market (twice) as to the status of a story they've had forever, though I've not heard back yet. In December, I shall have to decide how much longer to let them be silent before declaring them as non-responsive
I got caught up on submissions for the first time since mid-May (except for the fact that one came back two days ago, and isn't back out yet)
I have 8 stories currently in slush pile circulation (9 if you count the one that hopefully will be back out tomorrow)
I made 13 blog posts
I took no days off

Analysis
I had a very productive November. I'm very happy to have gotten caught up on submissions, and I'm also pretty caught up on blog posts, photos, and various other odds and ends. On the other hand, many of my writing days have only met a bare minimum of writing time. That's unfortunate, but at least I haven't stopped. There's only so much time in each day, and the boys like to use it all up. So do holidays.

My goals for December are to keep up with photos and blogs, continue editing the novel, and continue writing the new stories to see where they take me.

Oh, and sleep. Did I mention sleep? No? My goal is to get enough sleep again. Kal'El has ceased sleeping through the night, whether because of teething or hunger or fighting off a cold, I don't know. But it's been hard. However, news! He's exactly six months old today! How did that happen? Has he really been around for half a year?

Six months old means solid food, and solid foods might bring the promise of a return to nighttime restfulness. We can only hope. He'll have to take in a little more than he ate tonight, though.

The first bite.

Caught Up on Submissions!

2011-11-29T01:36:00.000-07:00

Well, I've done it. For the first time since Kal'El's birth (to be honest, for the first time since a few weeks before his birth) I have all of my ready-to-submit stories out to markets. It took me nearly six months, but I'm finally back on track!

There are, of course, a few caveats to this feat. One of my stories has been sitting with a market for well over a year, and I need to figure out what's going on there. I sent one query through an online form about two weeks ago and have heard nothing, so I'll need to look for other ways to query. If they're still holding it as a possibility that's all to the good, but I'd like to know (and I really REALLY hope this one wasn't lost as it would really stink to not have done anything with it for a year for no reason.) I also have another story that is ready for me to format and start submitting but I just haven't gotten around to yet, plus two more that probably don't need more than another readthrough and possibly a tweak or two before they're ready, so I ought to get on those--though realistically that probably won't happen until a few Christmas projects are done. But I just feel good to have submitted everything back out that should have been submitted (possibly numerous times) months ago.

Let the rejection letters roll! (With hopefully an acceptance or two thrown in!!! That is the name of the game, after all.)

Kiddie Crafts - HAPPY THANKSGIVING!

2011-11-27T11:15:00.101-07:00

I took advantage of the doting attention of my parents two weekends before Thanksgiving and prepared a bevy of Thanksgiving crafts to do with Zaxxon. I wanted him to learn the basic story behind the holiday as well as having fun and doing turkey stuff.

First we made a turkey out of his hands and feet. I got the idea here. He likes smacking crafts with the palm of his hand to make sure the glue sticks.

Attaching the eyes.

Zaxxon had already thrown two five-minute-long fits just before we did this craft, first when he realized he'd left his pumpkin sticker at the credit union and the second when he noticed his snowman stamp was rubbing off his hand--not to mention I knew he had a cough and a runny nose, and had gone to bed late the previous night, so I figured we'd be lucky to get through one project on this day. However, to my surprise he wanted more, so we moved on to a Thankful Turkey.

We started by reading this book, Count Your Blessings by Patricia Reeder Eubank. We've had this book for a while. It's a nice little lesson: Cuddlebear wants to know what Thanksgiving means, and his Mama tells him it means "thank you." She then helps him realize that he has much more than presents to be thankful for.

Next we glued together the body of a turkey and I asked Zaxxon to name things he was thankful for. I wrote them on turkey feathers and then we taped them to the turkey (meaning he got bored and wanted me to attach most of them).

He named pretty much every family member, and then came up with a few more things as I reminded him of what Cuddlebear was thankful for.

I liked the hand and foot turkey so much, I thought it would be a fun one to keep as a Thanksgiving decoration. I thought doing it every year might be fun too, in order to keep track of the boys' growth. So I made one for Kal'El too.

After the turkeys, I taught him the story of the first Thanksgiving. After coloring and cutting-out, we did this craft in the hallway. As I told him the story, I gave him the picture corresponding to what I was talking about and had him tape it to a big map of the United States (with the exception of the Mayflower, which I had him put in the water.) I think he liked moving into the hallway--it was different at any rate.

I've seen my sister-in-law look wistfully at our craft wall from time to time. I know she wants to do this sort of thing with her own kids, with the only problem being that they don't exist yet. I can't give her children, but I can loan her mine from time to time.

On this particular day I knew she was coming over and asked Zaxxon if he wanted to do a craft with his aunt. He was so excited he wanted to do it right away (even though he hadn't eaten breakfast yet--not to mention the fact that his aunt hadn't even arrived either!)

She helped him make a pilgrim hat and Indian headband. Now he's ready for the feast!

I'd been thinking that the autumn leaves would make good turkey feathers, and were even the right colors. So the next thing we did was to trim some leaves off one of our bushes, and Zaxxon glued them to a turkey as feathers (he was helping it get warm.)

After it was done, we ironed it between layers of waxed paper so hopefully the leaves will remain yellow and red. (I forgot to put a dish towel down first--and I'd wondered why the iron was smoking!)

Last year at around this time, we started attending storytime at our local library. During the Thanksgiving session, the librarian broke out a felt board activity where each child helped put a feather on the turkey. Zaxxon immediately joined in, despite the fact that he wasn't used to the librarian or crowds of children. It was this library activity that made me realize he was ready to start doing crafts. Here he is with the very first crafts he completed (he was so little!!!)

This year, the librarian did the same activity. Zaxxon was capable of listening for his feather color this year, and he really enjoyed it again. So I brought it home with us. It involves a song (sung to the tune of Frere Jacques)

Turkey feathers, turkey feathers

Brightly colored, brightly colored

Who has a (fill in the color) one? Who has a ___ one?

Bring it now, bring it now

The children (who had been handed a different colored felt feather before it began) were supposed to wait until their color was called and then put the feather on the turkey.

At home, I modified it slightly. I "hid" feathers around our living room, and then sang "Can you find the ___ ones, bring them now." His eyes really lit up when we started this activity, and he loved running around the room looking for the feathers. Then, once again, he helped the turkey get warm by gluing the feathers on.

He's so much bigger this year!

Lastly, we colored and stapled together a book called "Pilgrim, Pilgrim, what do you see?" I found it online here. He wasn't particularly interested in coloring much, but he liked making a book, and the finished product.

With all this preparation, along with some library books and a few other songs, I think Zaxxon was well prepared for Thanksgiving. This was a lot of fun, and I'm looking forward to Christmas.

I'm linking up with Tot School again. Check them out for great ideas for little kids (I'm sure there will be lots of holiday ideas this week.)

Happy Third Birthday Zaxxon!

2011-11-23T17:00:00.040-07:00

Zaxxon has been three for a month now--I think it is high time I post some pictures to celebrate.

This year's theme was Toy Story. I didn't do anything as involved as last year's favors and cakes. The cupcakes still match the theme--they're the Toy Story aliens--but I didn't have to cut them to shape this time.

After a bit of free play, the kids played a couple of Toy Story games. Pin the sheriff badge on Woody

And a Mr. Potato Head felt board. I put this one together myself, based on the idea that kids LOVE the felt boards at library story time, so I was pretty sure they'd be eager to participate. I was excited that the kids are old enough to play a few party games this year.

We served up lunch and then CAKE!

He's a neater eater than last year, but still made a bit of a mess

The party favors were shaped like Buzz Lightyear's spaceship. These boxes were tinier than we'd expected from the picture, but they at least fit everything.

So we now have a three-year-old in the house. It's been a fun age so far, however I do think he's more stubborn than he was at two. His tantrums are worse, but he's also growing so much as a person and learning to communicate so much better. His imagination continues to expand as well.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY SON!!!

Kiddie Crafts - Shapes and Other Odds and Ends

2011-11-20T11:08:00.000-07:00

Time for more of the crafts Zaxxon and I have done! These took place in September and October.

Hubby had a big birthday in September, so I had Zaxxon help me prepare. Making wrapping paper by stamping shapes in paint.

Lacing a "Happy Birthday Dada" banner

We then took a pretty long break, and got back into the swing of things with a project "D is for drum."

Zaxxon is really good with colors, counting, and many letters, but I discovered that he was a bit shaky on shapes. Therefore, we did a few shape projects. First, sorting shapes

Creating a scene out of shapes

Cutting shapes out (also good scissors practice--he's getting really good at doing it by himself)

Tracing shapes. I've only just begun seeing whether he can imitate things like this.

Making play dough with a friend. We did both black and orange for Halloween, which turned out to be not so great of an idea. The black pigment was so strong, it quickly overwhelmed the orange while the children were playing with them. Oh well, I know better for next time.

Another longish break, and then Zaxxon's third birthday was approaching! I tried to help him understand the seasons and the year by making this season wheel.

This was an impromptu project. We checked this book out from the library, The Line Up Book by Marisabina Russo, in which a little boy named Sam makes a line of toys from his room to the kitchen.

We read it several times, and then decided to make our own line.

I might possibly catch up with our crafts after another post or two. That would feel good!

I'm linking up at Tot School. Check them out for craft and schooling ideas for young children!

Funny... I Write Better When I'm Rested

2011-11-17T17:36:00.001-07:00

Kal'El has been sick for the last week. Well, technically both boys have runny noses and a cough, but Zaxxon has taken it in stride. For Kal'El, though, it's his first major illness and he has been UP. ALL. NIGHT.

Okay, so I exaggerate. But the first few nights, it took me 90 minutes to settle him AFTER the 30-40 required to feed him. This is from a kid who's been sleeping through the night for more than a month now. We got a little relief after putting the humidifier in his room and putting him to sleep in the chair from his swing, to keep his head elevated. However, he was still waking up in the night. One night in particular, he started fussing before I even went to bed, so I was really lacking sleep that time.

Through all this, I've continued to write. However, if I don't get some good time with both boys napping at the same time, writing tends to be the last thing I do before bed. And when I'm already running on empty, that means doing it while exhausted.

There have been a few nights when I've kind of cheated--just entering a few pages of mindless revisions before seeking my bed. It's not really doing much writing, but at least it's something. I diverted my attention to a new story instead of revising my novel on a few of the sick days because I think it's easier to work on something new. Even if what I wrote turns out to need serious revision, it's better than trying to revise (i.e. make my novel better) and only making it worse.

The good news is, the colds seem to be on the wane. Kal'El is currently napping--in his crib again--and seems to be handling it okay. He took a short nap earlier today in his crib and didn't wake up super congested, plus he FINALLY SLEPT THROUGH THE NIGHT again last night, so I'm hoping he's feeling better. Me, I should post this and take advantage of the time to write. While I'm feeling awake.

Catching Up on Kiddie Crafts

2011-11-13T10:59:00.002-07:00

Zaxxon and I have been doing crafts again (infrequently, some weeks have a lot and then we skip some altogether) since early August, but I'm only just now getting caught up on photos and trying to get back in the swing of blogging. So here's the lowdown on the crafts we've been doing.

We started back up with the letter "A" (we haven't been doing them in order.) He knew this one already, but I'm trying to "officially" introduce each letter, because I want to make a big book for him out of the posters we make. Here, he's coloring the "A" pictures.

A is for Alligator! We spent a day making an alligator out of a paper towel tube...

...(complete with pinking-shear cut teeth)...

...an alligator bag out of fabric...

...and we turned an "A" on its side and made it into an alligator head. My mom, who used to teach preschool, liked this one and wished she could have had the chance to use it herself.

We then continued the "A" theme with "A is for apples." We pasted together the parts to make a whole and an eaten apple. I thought it was funny that he didn't want to put the worm in the apple. It had to be far away.

He even managed to draw an "A" all on his own!

We also made apples out of a cut-up egg carton. (We snacked on apples after we made all these crafts, too)

We were preparing to go on an airplane ride around this time, so we talked about airplanes a lot. I made him some paper ones, and he painted some wooden airplanes too.

I attempted to incorporate more movement into the next letter we introduced, "D." After he colored the pictures and helped me cut them out, I spread them on the floor and asked him to bring them to me. It kept him busy, though he didn't want to listen and bring the picture I asked for.

D is for Dinosaur! We made one out of a paper plate.

He also got to dissolve capsules and watch sponge dinosaurs expand. These were a bit of a disappointment, as they were much smaller than I had hoped for, and they also took longer than his attention span allowed.

He loved the end result, though.

Next was "D is for Dog"

And for "Dice." This was hard for him to put together, so I had to help with a lot of it.

D is for Dump Truck! I cut up an egg carton for Zaxxon, he decorated it, and then I taped the dump truck together.

That's about a month of crafts from our household. There are more to catch up on, but I'll save those for another post. (This one is long enough already.)

I'm linking this up with Tot School. Check them out if you'd like more ideas for crafts to do with young kids!

A Difficult Decision

2011-11-10T12:34:00.000-07:00

A few days ago I sent the email (felt more like the last nail in the coffin) to the editor of A Glitch in the Continuum, thanking him for his efforts in finding a new home for the book but declining to have my story included. I put a lot of thought into this decision, but ultimately it just wasn't a deal I was comfortable with.

This was a very hard moment for me. After drafting my email, I asked my husband to see how it sounded. Up until that moment I'd intended to read it to him, but I suddenly realized that if I voiced the thoughts out loud, I would cry. So he read it himself, and I cried anyway.

I know this sort of thing happens all the time in the publishing world, but it makes me sad that it happened so early on in my career--only my second acceptance. I suppose there are people who have it happen to their first sale, and that's sad too.

This in no way changes my convictions toward professional authorship, it just sets me back a little. It takes me so long to get stories resubbed these days (two boys take up a lot more time than one) that it's a little depressing to have to start over with one that was accepted. I can only hope that it's previous rapid acceptance means it's good enough for others to want it as well.

Giving a Camera to a Three-Year-Old

2011-11-10T11:51:00.000-07:00

I let Zaxxon take pictures with my camera for the first time yesterday. This shot would've been great if he'd left the flash up.

And this one would've been great if he hadn't cut Kal'El's eyes off

Oh well, not bad for a first-timer! (We got lots of shots of the floor, too.)

MileHiCon

2011-11-08T13:38:00.000-07:00

As you may remember from my previous post, Hubby and I went to MileHiCon a few weeks ago to celebrate having met there ten years ago. MileHiCon is a scifi/fantasy/horror convention held in Denver every year. It's primarily a literary convention, so you'll see a lot more authors and a lot fewer film panels than at other conventions. I've been attending, off and on, since I was twelve.

I used to attend just for entertainment value, but in recent years I've been far more interested in panels that might help my writing. This year, we went to some panels on the Future of the Short Story, Writing Believable Combat, and Writing Well With Others.

Joseph Paul Haines, Molly Tanzer, James Van Pelt, Eric James Stone,

and Cynthia Felice in the Future of the Short Story.

We also attended a panel on the best sci-fi short stories published prior to 1980. As always, they suggested way more than I have time to read (or even remember, although Connie Willis was nice enough to make handouts of her suggestions.)

James Van Pelt, Gardner Dozois (Editor Guest of Honor and editor of Asimov's Science Fiction

from 1984 to 2004,) Van Aaron Hughes (local winner of the Writers of the Future contest,)

John E. Stith, and Connie Willis.

Historically, MileHiCon has had its best programming on Saturday (at least in my opinion,) but this year there were several things I'm sorry I missed on Friday and Sunday--including an hour with Gardner Dozois. I really would like to have heard more from such an esteemed editor.

Author Guest of Honor Glen Cook, along with several of his books. My father is a huge fan,

so Mr. Cook graciously helped me figure out a Christmas gift.

We had a fun time, and it was nice to feel connected to the world of sci-fi and fandom again for a while. We had to take Kal'El with us due to his refusal to take a bottle, and he was as good as gold. Apart from nursing and sleeping through some of the panels, he was very well-behaved and just played in our laps for the rest of the time. Lots of people commented on how good of a baby he was--and he was quite generous with smiles as well. I think he gave several people their baby fix for the week or month.

Our Future Trekkie posing with a Klingon.

We hadn't been to MileHiCon in a few years (especially since Zaxxon's birth, because it's the same weekend as his birthday) and I now realize that I miss it. Perhaps in another year or two I'll plan Zaxxon's party the weekend earlier, book a room, and attend the whole convention again. There are always so many good ideas and bits of advice to pick up.

Happy Anniversary again honey!

Quack, Peep, and Chirp

2011-11-05T20:22:00.002-06:00

We've already had two big snowstorms this year (ironically on the past two Wednesdays, with warm weather the preceding Monday and cooler weather the preceding Tuesday) and I'm loving the fact that Zaxxon is old enough to appreciate playing in the snow. We didn't get enough of it last year to do much playing, and the year before that I would bundle him up only to have him start fussing long before I was ready to go in (you can read that to mean before I'd finished shoveling.) But this year he LOVES it. Most of our snow sculpting is still done by me, but he helps and enjoys running around, falling in the snow, and eating it.

I seriously doubt anyone reading the blog will recognize these characters (unless our librarian stops by again) but they come from a kids' show called "Peep and the Big Wide World." Peep (the yellow one) is a chick, Chirp (the red one) is a bird, and Quack (the blue one), if you can believe it, is a duck. The show basically encourages scientific exploration for kids. I think it's kind of bizarre, but Zaxxon loves it. In fact, he loves them so much that I'm already considering them for next year's Halloween costumes (if he still likes them by then, of course.)

So I made them out of snow. They're pretty easy, considering they're balls (or in Quack's case, an oval.) What do you think?

Cheap Security or the Uncertain Promise of Something Greater?

2011-11-03T23:41:00.002-06:00

Well, I've heard the definitive word on A Glitch in the Continuum. And I don't know what I'm going to do.

Basically, what it boils down to is this: I've been offered a quarter of the money I originally agreed to, plus a PDF copy of the book. If I choose to buy a real copy, I can get it for 40% off the cover price. So when you factor in the fact that yes, I would like a copy of the book my work appears in, I'd only be making a few bucks. Token payment.

With the exception of a few pieces of flash that quickly ran out of markets, I never submit to token markets. Semi-pro is my minimum. So if Pandora's Time had never been contracted, I wouldn't even have blinked at a market with these terms. But the fact of the matter is, it's already been accepted to Glitch. If I don't expend any more energy on this piece, it can have a home in this anthology.

But on the other hand, I placed this story at the third market I submitted it to. Normally I apply a top-down approach to my submissions: I submit to pro paying markets first, and then start working through the semi-pros when I exhaust the pro options. Pandora's Time, however, only went to one pro market. The other two were both time-travel-themed anthologies, both of which were semi-pro payment, because I thought my odds of success were better in an anthology that fit my story's theme. And it worked, it was accepted to the second anthology.

Not only that, it was basically accepted with honors. What I mean by that is, after getting the acceptance, I stopped by the Twisted Library forums to say thanks and see how things were going. Once there, I was flattered to learn that Pandora's Time was one of three stories that were accepted hands-down. It took several more weeks (possibly longer, I don't remember the timeline) for the editor to finish sorting through the rest of the submissions. So I know it was good enough, at least for that editor, to make it right away. That gives me hope that it could fare well at other markets--particularly since there are several pro-paying markets it's never been to.

I like Pandora's Time, and I think it's one of my stronger pieces. The Twisted Library even helped me figure out which ending was the best (I'd had trouble figuring out which of many endings to use at first) and I think it's now stronger than it was when I submitted it to Asimov's.

I don't really like the idea of giving my story to a press for so little money and not even getting a bound copy of the book in return. But there's still the fact that, well...it's already been accepted. Saying 'yes' to this new press would be a solid, guaranteed credit. Saying 'no' and resubmitting it could get me more money in the long run, but on the other hand, it could just doom Pandora's Time to sit in slush pile limbo for several years. As my husband put it, I can either say "No, I'm a professional writer and I deserve to get paid for my work and I will hold out for that," or I can say "Yes, I guess I'll give it away for almost free in order to get another credit and hopefully gain a little more exposure and clout." This would never have been an issue if these were the original terms, because again, I never would have submitted to it. But this is how my dilemma now stands.

I'm not asking anyone to tell me what to do, but I am curious what you all would do if placed in the same situation. Which do you think is more important?

A Writer's Dilemma - How would YOU do it?

2011-11-02T22:57:00.000-06:00

After posting yesterday about my abysmal failure to resub my stories, I sat down today, determined to get at least one of them back out. I chose a story, chose a market, and began the process of making sure I was following all of the editor's preferences in my submission. When I got to modifying my cover letter, I paused. For the last few months, my cover letter has stated that my fiction "will appear in 'A Glitch in the Continuum,'" but that statement is no longer true. I spent a good deal of time trying to decide what's the best way to say that I was supposed to have another credit but the deal fell through. I only have two credits so far, so each one counts!

(On that note, I've already heard from the editor of Glitch that another publisher is interested in taking the anthology, though at a reduced rate of pay. There are no details yet as to what publisher or what the rate of pay would be, so I still don't know if it's a deal I'm willing to accept. More on that when I know.)

At any rate, I wound up saying "I was supposed to appear in "A Glitch in the Continuum" as well, but the press ran out of money." I'm still not sure if that's the best way to put it, but I really needed to get at least one submission done.

What do you all think? How would you include something like this in your cover letters?

October Stat Check

2011-11-01T23:11:00.002-06:00

During the month of October, I wrote (or edited) on all 31 days
I spent the entire month editing my novel
I made 0 submissions - FAIL!
I received 1 rejection
I learned that one of my sales wasn't getting published, though since then I've heard a tentative possibility, but it would involve a letter sum of money--no details yet
I have 2 stories currently in slush pile circulation
I made 8 blog posts
I took no days off

Analysis:
Writing/editing was okay, though many days only met a bare minimum of my personal requirement. It was a busy month, what with Zaxxon's third birthday and making Halloween costumes. Oh, and speaking of costumes, here's a pic of us in our coordinated Family of Crayola Crayons costumes:

Annnyywaaaay...
When it comes to submissions, this month was an EPIC FAIL! If I recall, my goal last month was to get them all resubbed in the first week. Well, I didn't do a single sub all month. Bad, bad, bad. Hopefully now that Halloween is over and a good deal of the work involved in finishing the other half of our garage is complete, I can get things subbed before the next wave of holiday craziness. Hopefully. Because my stories don't get sold by sitting on my computer, gathering virtual dust.

Here's to a slightly-more-productive November!

Happy Halloween!

2011-10-31T17:09:00.002-06:00

(Please tell me it passingly resembles Thomas the Train.)

I don't have any good costume pics yet, we'll take those before (or after) trick-or-treating tonight. But here are a few from carving/decorating pumpkins!

Zaxxon painting a pumpkin

Sticking pipe cleaners into another. I really like the way this one turned out.

Zaxxon "helping" me pull the guts out.

Hubby painting a Rorschach mask

Kal'El helping me pose with Thomas

I didn't take this pic of all of them until a few days later. Thomas looks appropriately ghoulish.

Happy Halloween!

Sad Day for My Writing

2011-10-26T23:04:00.002-06:00

I received an email this morning informing me that the Library of the Living Dead (the parent of Library of Science Fiction Press) is having financial difficulties. They're putting all anthologies on hold for at least six months, and most are being cancelled entirely. As it turns out, A Glitch in the Continuum, which was to hold my story Pandora's Time, didn't make the cut.

:(

The editor, Wayne Goodchild, has asked our permission to shop the anthology around for a month or so and see if another publisher would be willing to pick it up. All the work (including formatting and cover art) is already done, so it seems possible that someone else might want an easy book to produce--but I don't know how that aspect of publishing works so I don't know how likely it is.

I've given my permission--I'd really like to see this anthology see the light of day, and on top of that, it takes me so long to get stories resubbed these days that it would probably be a month before I got it back out anyway. The one thing I worry about, though, is how much payment I might receive. It was contracted with The Library for $0.01 per word, but another press might not want to pay that much. At this pay rate it's considered "semi-pro;" "pro" payment for stories is $0.05 per word or more. Semi-pro is usually the minimum I sub to, unless a piece completely runs out of options. Money IS supposed to flow towards the writer, after all. I guess I've got to do some serious thinking about what minimum payment I'd be willing to receive.

Well, I can always duck out until I sign another contract. I'm pretty proud of Pandora's Time and think it would have a fair shot elsewhere. I'd like to see the antho stay together, but I also don't want to sell myself short.

This is very sad. Only my second sale (though I have yet to be paid, and won't anymore) has fallen through. I hope the book as a whole can find another home, but if not it's back to the slush...

*sigh*

The Man in the Dress

2011-10-22T09:35:00.007-06:00

Across the room, I saw a tall man in a white dress, a jean jacket, and a long blonde wig. Men in dresses are not something I was foreign to by any means—between my old theatre hobby and work (not to mention watching Monty Python), I know several men who will wear them for fun or profit—but it happens infrequently enough to draw my attention. I didn’t focus on him for long, however, for the next episode of Red Dwarf was starting, and I was eager to watch one of my favorite shows.

It’s fun to watch Red Dwarf with a crowd like this, where everyone appreciates kooky British Sci-Fi. The crowd was eccentric—the man in the dress wasn’t the most unusually dressed person I'd seen: there was a woman running around painted completely blue, and a man who looked like some sort of elaborate devil character. Plus, there’s the outlandish look some of these people have on a regular basis: the look that they spend all their time between their TVs and their computers (and don’t necessarily take time out to shower.)

This is what happens when you take several thousand science fiction, fantasy, and horror fans and allow them to take over a hotel for the weekend. Ever since my dad started taking me to MileHiCon when I was twelve, I’ve always wondered what the regular hotel guests must think—that they’ve landed on another planet, probably. I’ve always enjoyed the atmosphere—this is the sort of place where you can be as silly as you want, and no one will look at you askance. In fact, they’ll probably play along!

When the show ended, I made my way toward the exit of the crowded room. As I moved through the throng, someone asked me if I was familiar with the story of Red Dwarf. I turned and found myself facing the man in the dress. I told him yes, I was familiar with the show, and he asked me if I could fill him in on what had happened: he hadn’t watched it in a while and he wanted to know what he’d missed. I launched into a description of the various quirks of the plot, which, according to the nature of the show, were as bizarre as they were entertaining. We weren’t talking for long when the next show started, and we were booted out of the room.

Our discussion of Red Dwarf led in other directions, and I found myself talking to this man in the dress and wig for over an hour. I learned that his clothing was not his normal attire, but that he had participated in the convention’s costume contest. I confessed that I didn’t recognize the costume, and he informed me that he was Buffy The Vampire Slayer. This also explained his friends, who were wandering around behind him, dressed as ghouls.

We learned that we were both fans of Star Trek: The Next Generation. We agreed on many of the good qualities of the show, and lamented the same mistakes. He had a great sense of humor, and our personalities fit hand in hand.

I found I enjoyed this man’s company. As we spoke, we discovered a mutual interest in many things, including the performing arts. I told him of my ambitions to attend a drama school in England, and he seemed quite impressed. He told me of his production company, One Eyed Pictures, and of the comedic sketches he produced. Considering their similarity to Monty Python, it was no surprise that I’d met him in the British Sci-Fi room. He asked if I would like to perform in one of his projects, and we exchanged phone numbers.

We spoke on the phone once or twice, but it took three months, a screen test, and one film-shoot before he asked me out. He was determined that “I’m a director” wasn’t going to be a line; however, this determination only lasted as far as the day we shot his film—he called me that evening to ask me out.

Twenty-one months after seeing the man in the dress across a dark room, I looked at him again across a park. He wasn't in a dress that time: I was. He wore a tux, and we were surrounded by loved ones. It wasn't his clothing that struck me; it was the radiant smile he wore that matched my own.

The events of that fateful October day took place exactly ten years ago this weekend. To our knowledge, it was the first, last, and only time MileHiCon had a British Sci-Fi room. To complete the picture, our first son, Zaxxon, was born three years ago this weekend. Due to the fact that our second son, Kal'El, refuses to take a bottle, we are unable to spend the entire weekend at the convention, sans children. However, we are spending most of our Saturday there, carting the smaller, easier-to-manage child with us as we go from panel to panel, enjoying the experience and the memories.

Happy Anniversary Honey!!! I LOVE YOU!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

A Year of Writing!!!!!

2011-10-20T16:03:00.038-06:00

For years, I've wanted to get into the habit of writing Every Day. I've known that I need that kind of structure and self-discipline to keep myself motivated and working. And for years, it didn't happen. I would get excited about a project and would write regularly for a while, but then I would hit a sticky spot in a piece or I would finish a draft, my enthusiasm would curb, and the next thing I knew months would pass without my writing anything. I would chide myself, but not do anything about it.

Then early last September, something happened. I'm not really sure what made me keep it up, but I started writing daily while working on the first draft of my novel. And unlike in the past, the streak lasted more than two weeks. As it passed one month, I thought it would be fun to keep track of it on this blog, to show everyone how long I'd gone. The next few months passed and I didn't stop. Then the number on my sidebar became a matter of pride. I didn't want to stop writing and have to reset the thing to zero. So I kept going.

Some days have been great and extremely productive. Others have been tiny, with me forcing myself to reach a minimum few hundred words or 15-20 minutes of revisions to make sure I did something. But I haven't taken a day off. Not a single one. And today, I reached the year mark. 365 days of writing!

Now technically I haven't done 365 days straight. If I had, this post would have appeared in September. But something happened during that time, as you likely know: I had a baby. And I didn't think it was fair to reset the counter when all jobs worth anything allow for maternity leave--so I decided mine would allow for a leave too. I gave myself a break and am now back on the horse, albeit I often have to deprive myself of sleep to get anything done (crazy boys won't always nap at the same time!)

So now I've done it. A whole year. And I still don't want to reset the counter. Realistically I know I can't keep this up for the rest of my life, but for now I intend to keep going strong. Hopefully, even after I do miss a day or a week, the self-discipline I've developed will help me get started right away again. We'll see if I can't write another of these posts next year!

Reflections on Finishing the First Readthrough of my Novel

2011-10-15T23:11:00.000-06:00

Wow. I just finished reading a 186 page novel--and it's the one that I wrote.

The best thing is that I enjoyed reading it. It's been nine months or so since I put it aside, so much of it wasn't readily familiar (though, of course, I still remembered the main plot points.) I liked seeing little bits of my life and experiences that I'd forgotten I'd put in there. You never know, when you're friends with a writer, what little details they'll latch onto and include in their next piece. :)

I did find a few big problems to fix, and TONS of small fixes. I'm wordy in first drafts, and I'm fully aware of this fact. I allow myself to be wordy so I can just get the first draft on the page, and I figure that's what editing is for. I made a lot of corrections on the paper manuscript I printed out and read to my infant son while he was nursing, and now I'm faced with the job of putting them all in the document. I think I'll have to work backwards too--otherwise the page numbers and reference points will all get messed up after just a few chapters.

My biggest fix is that I invented a new piece of technology about a third of the way into the story, and it really ought to be mentioned earlier--several times. But that's what comes from writing on the fly instead of outlining. However, despite problems like that, I think that writing on the fly worked well for me. I may try to outline my next novel, just to see which technique I like better, but I have a feeling that I will prefer to ditch the outline method.

The problem I now face is figuring out how to make time for writing again. For the last month it's been easy: read/edit the novel while nursing the baby. Now that that part's done, I'll need to figure out stretches of time where I can sit in front of a computer again--not easy since Zaxxon is attempting to give up naptime and doesn't like to respect the rules of "Quiet Time." But I'll work something out.

I wrote a novel!

More Kid Sci-Fi Books!

2011-10-08T17:34:00.001-06:00

I was surprised to see that it was more than a year ago when I last posted about fun sci-fi books for kids. I believe we've read some others in the mean time, but I can't remember specifics.

At any rate, in our latest cycle of library books were these two picture books:

Another Day in the Milky Way by David Milgrim, and Hush, Little Alien by Daniel Kirk. Both were very fun, and my son enjoyed them.

Another Day in the Milky Way is the story of a boy who wakes up on the wrong planet (which happens to him every now and then) and he doesn't remember how to get back. He has to navigate through much weirdness in order to find his way home. Zaxxon liked the absurb pictures, especially the three-headed mother.

Hush, Little Alien is very sweet and fun. The Papa alien finds all sorts of things to amuse his son, and it fits perfectly into the familiar tune. For any kid who enjoys silliness embedded into the familiar, this is a must.

I love that Zaxxon has a much longer attention span now. He loves books and going to storytime at the library. We check out a dozen every three weeks, and we read several each day. I'm a little sad that he's about to outgrow the toddler storytime because I'll miss the librarian, but I know he ought to enjoy the preschool one, too. In fact, it's time to start taking him to both, so we can both get to know the new librarian before we have to completely make the switch. Books rule!

I finally found them!

2011-10-04T18:33:00.001-06:00

When I was a kid, I remember using safety scissors. They were plastic with a thin metal blade embedded in the plastic. In fact, they're they only type of scissors I remember using before moving on to "adult" scissors. So when I started doing crafts with Zaxxon and building up our craft supplies, I went out looking for the same type of scissors.

I came up blank. Not at Kmart. Not at Target. Not at King Soopers. Not at Michaels. The only scissors I could find looked like miniature adult ones: plastic handles, metal blades. The only concession to safety seemed to be rounded tips. I bought a pair but we didn't use them much. Zaxxon closed them with such force, and I always had to hold whatever he was cutting, that I was afraid he was going to slam them down on my fingers. I couldn't image why they would stop making such a useful product.

Well, I finally found the scissors I wanted. I wasn't looking for them at the time, and they were in a very unlikely place: IKEA.

Yes, an IKEA recently opened in Colorado. I'd been to one before, in Georgia, and my general feeling was that they had good, cheap stuff but I didn't really get all the hype. And I still don't. But my Almost-Sister-In-Law (that feels easier than saying my husband's brother's girlfriend) really wanted to go during opening weekend, and my Sister-in-law and Mother-in-law wanted to join her, so of course I had to go too. I knew I'd feel left out if I didn't. So we all went opening weekend. It wasn't as bad as I'd imagined. The only long wait was in the cafeteria (I'd heard stories of four-hour waits when other IKEAs opened) and we had fun. I bought several things even though I hadn't had anything in mind when I went (ah, impulse shopping.)

Of course, when I found the very scissors I'd been searching for for months in their children's section, I had to get them. They came in a two-pack: regular scissors and pinking shears. I like them much better, and Zaxxon has already used them several times. He even helped me clip coupons!

September Stat Check

2011-10-01T23:45:00.000-06:00

During the month of September, I wrote (or edited) on all 30 days!
I finished up revisions on a short story and began the monstrous task of editing my novel
I made 1 submission
I received 0 rejections
I still haven't caught up on resubmitting all the stories that got rejected during maternity leave (boo)
I have 3 stories currently in slush pile circulation, though I should have 8, soon-to-be 9 after I get a few more opinions
I made 4 blog posts (oh well)
I took no days off

Analysis:
It's still very hard to get much writing done--especially as Zaxxon has started giving up naps and it's hard to keep him in his room for quiet time. I have managed, though, even if it's only a brief time right before bed--and even if it's at the expense of sleep. It's gotten a bit easier to do something every day since I started editing my novel, because I combine this with my reading/nursing time (see yesterday's post.) That has actually freed up a little time each day, and I've managed to get caught up with organizing my photos (go me.)

I still don't spend as much time in the blog world as I'd like--I miss the social time--but there just isn't that much time in the day yet. Perhaps after Kal'El starts sleeping through the night.

The thing I really need to do is get my stories resubmitted. Nobody's going to purchase them if nobody's considering them, after all. So that is my main goal for October. Heck, that's my goal for the first week in October. And then I can turn to bigger things (like Halloween and planning a 3rd birthday party.) Ah, life goes on.

Nursing is Good For Writers

2011-09-30T23:14:00.001-06:00

Yes, nursing a baby is good for a writer. And I'm not talking about my son. I'm not going to wax eloquent on how good nursing is for a baby's brain or claim that he'll be a writer someday. Nursing is good for me--for my writing.

Don't get me wrong, nursing is very time-consuming, and that's hard when one also has a toddler to keep track of. When Zaxxon was a baby I preferred to take him to the rocking chair in his bedroom for nursing. It was quiet and comfortable, and perfect for a mommy who still felt really uncertain of the whole process (not to mention in pain for many more weeks than the experts said I should.) With Kal'El, I haven't had that luxury (so it's a good thing that I already know what I'm doing this time.) I've nursed him all over the house whilst trying to keep Zaxxon entertained. BUT... whenever somebody else is occupying the toddler, and always for the last feeding before bedtime, I still like to sit in the rocking chair, which is now in the living room. And of course, I have a good book with me.
And that is the point I'm making. Since nursing takes up so much time, and it's mainly just sitting still and letting the baby do his thing, I've gotten a lot of reading done. I read out loud, too. I figure it's good for my son to hear my voice, and it helps him to hear the language.

I use the time to read stuff I've always wanted to read but haven't had time for: an anthology of stories written by my old professor, the first James Bond novel, a short Connie Willis book, the rest of the stories in Doomology (yes, it took me this long), The Time Machine, The Island of Dr. Moreau, and The Invisible Man. Reading classics (and not-so-classics) is always a good thing for a writer, because the more you read, the more you expand your horizons, and the more you grow.

There are a whole bunch of other books in our library--including titles by Jules Verne and Isaac Asimov--that are on my list, although they've been put aside for now. This is because I've replaced reading them with reading the first draft of my novel to Kal'El. I've never read my work out loud this early in the editing process before, but it's not as painful as I feared it might be.

No matter how busy we are, slowing down and sitting with a good book can be beneficial, and nursing has helped me do this regularly again.

Science Fiction Mommy is on Facebook

2011-09-26T18:15:00.001-06:00

Well, I've done it. I created a Facebook page for myself. I have a personal one, but now I have an "Author" page that people can "Like" if they so choose. So if you're interested in getting writing updates to your facebook, or want to connect/network in that way, please check it out.

http://www.facebook.com/sciencefictionmommy
(There's also a "like" button on my left sidebar now.)

There's been a lot going on and little time to post. I hope to get a few more updates on the blog soon!

So far, so good

2011-09-15T20:43:00.001-06:00

Well, here we are, fifteen days into September, and I've written everyday so far. Not much every day, but it's happening. It's taken me this long (plus a few times in August) to edit a 5,000 word story, so I'm not breaking any records, but it feels good to have this one done. I'll probably try it out on a few family readers, just to see if they notice anything else, but I think it's mostly ready to go.

I've been feeling enthused to start editing my novel, so that's what I'm going to begin next. I printed it out today, so I don't have to be glued to the computer in order to give it my first read-through, and it's a beast. 186 single spaced pages (double-sided, of course. And note to self: print the even pages first next time, that way they'll be in order after the odds finish printing instead of having to turn each page over. Ai.) I plan to read through it quickly the first time and see how it feels and what it needs, and then start making notes in the margins. And then the heavy-duty work can begin.

Whee!

Maternity Leave Stat Check

2011-09-01T23:16:00.000-06:00

As I had hoped, my maternity leave was not completely barren of writing activities, though they did slow down considerably. Here's how I did:

During my maternity leave, I wrote on 49 days--not bad, slightly more than half. Many were very small, but at least I did something!
Hubby and I finished the first draft of our animated screenplay, I made grammatical edits of said screenplay, and I began editing one of my short stories.
I made 0 submission
I received 4 rejections, and I suspect one submission was never received
I have 8 stories that should be in slush pile circulation, but only 3 are currently out (most likely 2, if my above suspicion is correct)
I made 9 blog posts (in 3 months, whee)

Analysis:
It was definitely good to take time off for the birth of my son. I couldn't even think about writing for the first two weeks. It was nice to be working on a joint project too, because it was a nice, slow way of easing back into it. I was glad to have given myself an excuse to not feel guilty about not writing... or submitting... or anything.

I'm sure things are going to remain slow. It's going to be a lot of work to get all my pieces back out in addition to finding time to write/edit. Today was a perfect example, what with the baby crying and the toddler pushing every boundary he knows, but I did manage to spend a few minutes doing edits on a story. It's one I'm really happy with, so I have high hopes for it. Here goes!

My New Workspace

2011-08-31T18:17:00.001-06:00

Yes, having a second baby meant I got booted out of my old office. Hubby and I used to have separate work spaces, which was nice because hubby sometimes works on film editing and that can be noisy. However, we no longer have room for separate work spaces, so I have moved downstairs into our combined office.

Hubby used to have a very old Mac at this desk, but it was time to let it move on. Most of the toys on the shelf are still his, as are the tapes. It's been kind of fun getting everything reorganized, but it's also been nice that I've been able to do it at a leisurely pace. The saddest thing is that this isn't going to be very comfortable in the winter since the basement gets really cold. *sigh* The things we do for our children. I'll just have to drink lots of tea.

Maternity leave ends tomorrow! And this is where the magic will happen.

Holy Crap, My Maternity Leave is Almost Over!!!

2011-08-28T14:25:00.000-06:00

Yes indeed, Kal'El is nearly three months old, and that is when I decided my maternity leave would end. It's hard to believe he's been around for that long already--but on the other hand, he's so much a part of our family that it also seems longer.
So now is the moment of truth. Will I be able to start writing every day again? I don't rightly know. I hope so, though I fully expect many of those days will only meet the bare minimum of that requirement. If I manage to keep it up at all. But 267 days, plus the 40 or 50 I've managed to add to that during my leave, would be a shame to have to reset. So hopefully I will succeed in getting back into the daily groove.

I get the most done on the days I can get both boys down for a nap at the same time. That doesn't always happen though, because Kal'El still doesn't nap at the same time every day and Zaxxon often refuses to sleep--though I still insist on a two-hour "quiet time" period on the days I can't wear him out enough. It's been a growing struggle to keep him in his room during that time. I'm thinking of getting this product, which is a clock that glows green when it's okay for a child to get up. He seems to like it when I set a kitchen timer for him, so I have high hopes that the clock would be a success. Back to the original subject of this paragraph, on days when I can't get anything done at naptime I suppose I'll just have to nurse Kal'El at the keyboard after Zaxxon is in bed. It wouldn't be a long writing session, but it would be something (if I can keep myself from checking my email and facebook, that is.)

I'm also hoping to start blogging a little more frequently again. I've found that I miss it, and the socializing that results. Kids are time consuming, but they're here for the next 18 years or more, so I'll just need to work better at getting writing into my schedule around them.

I'm a Bad English Major

2011-08-09T19:12:00.001-06:00

Hello all, as I make another attempt to swim out of the baby whirlpool.

The good writing news is that hubby and I finished the first draft of our animated screenplay a few weeks ago and I've been busy editing it for grammar and readability. We need to cut about 15 pages from it, and that will come next, but I want to get it edited first. And that brings me to why I'm a bad English major (not to mention the "and" at the beginning of this sentence.)

Hubby was the scribe for this project, so I sat next to him giving my input about what should come next while he did all the typing. I've been correcting the verb tense a lot because he has a tendency to use the wrong one. And I don't even know the name for the verb tense he's overusing. Bad English major. Bad.

(Well, I am a literature major so I avoided taking all the grammar classes.)

He keeps using phrases like "Eileen is writing her blog," "Frank is walking through the town," and "Zaxxon is destroying Mama's peace and quiet," when "Eileen writes her blog," "Frank walks through town," and "Zaxxon destroys Mama's peace and quiet," are more direct. This isn't technically passive voice: "Hubby is lectured on grammar by Eileen" is passive where "Eileen lectures Hubby on grammar" is active, but it's still a less active way to write. I'm trying to remember the proper usage of this tense he uses so much. I believe an action that continues through the scene would be one time to use it, ("Picard walks up to the cabin where Kirk is chopping wood") but I confess I don't know the actual rule. Any grammar fiends out there care to correct me?

On another note, here's another cute picture of my kiddos. Yesterday, Zaxxon wanted to wear his brown overalls and a red shirt and wanted Kal'El to wear the same. So that's how I dressed them. :)

Kiddie Crafts - Preparing for Baby

2011-08-02T18:33:00.001-06:00

Well, as you might expect, I haven't really done any crafts with Zaxxon since Kal'El's birth. But I thought I'd get caught up on blogging the ones we did prior to his birth, because it also involves how we prepared for baby.

We started out introducing the letter B, and as he colored in the pictures he wore his blanket as a cape.

We did a few non-baby crafts, including putting googly eyes and fluffy tummies on a bunny and a bear (one of which then got used for the cover of a birthday card for his Ama (my mom.))

Then we did a "Helping Baby" matching activity. I found clip art for six different babies crying for different reasons (some were a bit of a stretch, but in those cases I simply told him why I thought the baby was crying) and he had to match a way to help the baby to take care of the various needs (a bottle for the hungry baby, a crib for the tired one, etc.) He did fairly well, without too much prompting.

Then we got to work on a project that I'm still completing (oops.) I had Zaxxon paint three picture frames, and I'm currently pasting the words "Big Brother," "Little Brother," and "Brothers" on them. I plan to put a photo of the two of them in each frame. The "Big Brother" one will go in Zaxxon's room, the "Little Brother" one in Kal'El's room, and the "Brothers" one somewhere in the living room or hallway. I wanted Zaxxon to get a feeling that he was helping us prepare for the baby too, and have something special to have in each of their rooms that he created.

Lastly, we laced a banner reading "Welcome Baby," but I did it differently this time. I read an article in Parents about helping boys achieve in school because the recent trend in early academics favors girls. One fact (other than the fact that I need to find a play-based preschool for my sons) is that boys have higher levels of dopamine in

their brains, which "helps direct both body motion and the flow of information within the brain." It said that "movement improves boys' working memory...so fidgeting and wiggling around may actually help boys learn." Then I remembered how Zaxxon had gotten restless during our last few lacing projects, so instead of putting the letters on the table in front of him, I

mixed them up and set them across the room. Then I told him to run across and bring me the letters I asked for before lacing them. I led him to the letters he wasn't familiar with by telling him what color they were. He seemed to really enjoy the project, and although I haven't done any more structured crafts since this one, I intend to find other ways to incorporate movement into more of his projects.

We also read a LOT of books on getting a new baby and becoming a big brother, and I took Zaxxon to the store and had him pick out a gift to give to the baby. The baby also gave Zaxxon a gift on the day he came home from the hospital.

I'm happy to report that Zaxxon is doing quite well with adjusting to the new one in our lives. He reached tantrums a little easier the first few weeks, but he's moved away from that already and is very gentle and helpful with the little one. Whether this was because of all of our planning or just a result of his personality, I can't say, but I'm quite happy about it.

I'm linking this up at Tot School, and hopefully will get into the swing of things to do this regularly again soon.

I Need Direct Brain-to-Blog Technology

2011-07-16T17:37:00.000-06:00

I really haven't been meaning to neglect this blog for so long. Is anybody still paying attention? I keep starting blog entries in my head but not finding the time to get down to my office and type them. So if I could just interface my brain with the blog, I could get entries made more regularly! Wait, what was that? Am I thinking that invasive technology that would access the brain is a good idea? WHAT HAS HAVING A SECOND BABY DONE TO ME?????

I guess I'll just make a quick update. First for an adorable baby photo, because my baby is adorable. This is one of the first smiles I've caught with the camera.

And one of the brothers.

And for a writing update. All has not been quiet on that front, though it has been slow. Hubby wanted to get back to work on the screenplay we're working on together, which has been an easy way to get back into it since he's the scribe--I just sit there, read over his shoulder, and say things I think ought to be in it. We're getting close to finished with the first draft of that. I've also started work on revising one of my stories. I had 20 critiques from Critters that I hadn't read yet, and I worked through them last week. I'm now rereading the story and thinking about which bits of advice I want to take. I'm hoping to finish that one within a week or two, though my time is limited. I have not been keeping up with submissions, however, so I've got a pile of stories that need to go back out as soon as I can make the time to research their next destinations.

Life has been crawling back towards normal around here. Kal'El is a good sleeper and is already going about 7 hours between feedings at night, so I can get 5 1/2 and sometimes even 6 hours of sleep at a stretch, depending on how quickly he falls asleep after eating. He's also a very good eater--he's already over 11 pounds and has jumped from the 10th percentile at birth to somewhere over the 50th now. I won't know exact numbers until his 2 month checkup next month.

Zaxxon has been adapting really well also. He was easier to upset at first, but he seems to have accepted Kal'El into the family without a hitch. He likes to show toys to his brother (we'll see how that goes once Kal'El is old enough to actually take them) and he sometimes helps with fetching and disposing during diaper changes and other times. We're still not very good at getting out of the house during the day (and getting to kid-friendly destinations like the playground) but we're working on it.

Well, that's all from me for right now. Sorry I haven't been visiting anybody else's blogs lately, but I'll pay you all visits again eventually.

Zaxxon and Kal'El

2011-06-14T17:02:00.001-06:00

As you've probably noticed, I've decided to refrain from using my children's names on this blog. I figure there's plenty of time before they decide they want to create online identities for themselves and I'd rather not advertise too much personal information in case any creeps happen by my blog. HOWEVER, now that I have two boys I can't just keep saying "my son" anymore. It'd be confusing keeping track of which son I'm referring to, so I decided I needed something a little more distinct. To that end, I will now be using my sons' "It Names" to identify them. (Their It Names are the names we called them in utero before we knew whether they were boys or girls.)

So now I would like to introduce:

Zaxxon

My older son, who is currently 2 1/2 and the one you've been hearing about since this blog began. The name Zaxxon came from a friend of my husband's, who "suggested" it as a name for our baby. We thought it was fun and used it before he was born. We later found out it's the name of a boss in some video game.

Kal'El

My husband kept (I think he was half-serious) pushing for the name "Kal" if we had another boy in order to name him after Superman. I, of course, was not okay with that. So then hubby decided he would call the baby "Kal'El" in the womb, since he knew he wasn't going to persuade me to actually use the name.

So there you have it. This is how I will differentiate between them from now on, and still keep their actual identities private.

Maternity Leave

2011-06-13T18:30:00.000-06:00

Well, I've finally frozen the "Days Without Not Writing" counter. My son was born when I'd done 267 days straight, so that's where I'll pick up again.

Maternity leave was definitely a good idea--we're far from having any consistency in our days yet. I'm dreading hubby's return to work, even though he'll only be doing half days at first, because I'll have to get both kids up and fed in the morning. Nights haven't been too bad (mostly,) but trying to get everything done early enough to feed my older son breakfast is a little daunting. But we'll get through it. I'm already quite a bit more relaxed about this baby than my first.

Okay, that's all. Just wanted to let you know where the pause in writing stands.

A Glitch in the Continuum Cover!

2011-06-09T23:51:00.000-06:00

In the chaos following having my second son, it took me over a week to get my contract for A Glitch in the Continuum signed and returned (oops.) But it's in now, and I'm looking forward to receiving this next book. In case you've forgotten (it's been a while,) Glitch will contain my story Pandora's Time. I also recently received the cover art for the book, so here it is!

All rights will return to me if they don't get it published within two years, but I'm not expecting it to take nearly that long. It'll probably be a few more months.

It's a Boy!!!

2011-06-01T22:28:00.000-06:00

I would like to introduce my son, born on Wednesday, June 1, 2011 at 11:17am!

I thought I was going into labor on Monday night (only got about 2 hours of sleep, then contractions kept me awake) however it abruptly stopped at about 10:00am. So then last night it started up again, but more intense. Around 5:00am I considered calling the doctor but the contractions suddenly fell in intensity and I thought I might be able to sleep between them (quite a feat considering they were about 7 minutes apart--hey, I was tired) so I opted to do that instead. Then I wasn't sure whether labor would continue or stop again in the morning, so hubby took off for work as usual. I called the doc a little later, and she told me to go to the hospital, so hubby logged all of 10 minutes at work today (oops.) By the time we left the house (we had to take the toddler with us since my parents are farther away and hadn't arrived yet) I was seriously concerned about whether we'd have time to get there as the contractions were starting to change again (not a good thing, considering I was attempting a vbac.) I seriously scared my poor son with my displays of pain. I tried to reassure him that it was just part of having a baby and having a baby hurts, and he promptly went around repeating "Mama baby owie" for the rest of the morning. At any rate, my parents arrived shortly after us to take him off our hands, and the new baby arrived within about 30 minutes as I was already fully dilated.

So it's been quite an eventful day and I'm quite tired, but I wanted to post and share!

Maternity Leave

2011-05-25T23:07:00.000-06:00

All right, so possible complications keep cropping up and then fading, but it's looking increasingly likely that this baby will need to arrive sooner rather than later. As such, I thought I would outline the guidelines I'm giving myself for a maternity leave.

On the day I go into labor, the counter on my right sidebar will freeze (though I may not actually make that happen until several days/weeks after.) I don't feel like it should reset to zero for something as big as having a baby.
For the first three months of the baby's life, I will not require myself to write. This doesn't mean I won't write--if I feel the desire and have/make the time, I certainly won't stop myself--but I'm not going to feel bad if nothing happens. I will make this an actual three months, not 90 days. The final day will be my child's 3 month birthday.
I will attempt to keep stories in submission circulation, but I won't beat myself up if that doesn't happen either.
Any days on which I actually do some writing will get added to the counter (either progressively or at the end of my leave, depending on how I feel.) For example, if I freeze the counter at 275 days and I write on 20 days during my leave, it will start up again at 295 days.
Once my three months are up, I will turn the counter back on. If, at that time, I fail to do at least something every day, it will reset to zero.
I reserve the right to extend the period of my leave as the end approaches if I feel it is necessary, but if so I will make that decision before it is over, not after failing to write for a week. I'm hoping the personal integrity that has kept me going these last eight months will bring me back without an extension though.

So there you go, my own personal maternity leave schedule. We'll see how it goes.

Baby Black Hole

2011-05-23T23:18:00.002-06:00

Well, as you can see on the left sidebar, we have less than three weeks remaining before my due date and thoughts of BABY are taking over. My 30th birthday passed without much of a ripple because I've been so focused on preparing for our expanding family--well, that and I haven't told anybody anything that I want. I probably am hard to shop for. There just isn't that much that I want--apart from collecting dragons and books, I don't really like accumulating too much stuff, and nobody in my family can give me a successful VBAC or convince a publisher to buy my book--or even provide me with the time to edit the book first. I know, I'm a pain that way. Anyway, I've been so distracted I haven't even put much thought into mortality or youth versus aging or any of the things big milestone birthdays are notorious for making people ponder. I've just been too preoccupied.

I am very much in Full-On Nesting Mode. I know this because my writing output has dwindled to just working on the screenplay with hubby--no writing, rewriting, or editing of my own work during naptime or at night--and the voice inside my head that usually screams at me for being unproductive has been strangely silent. I've all but forgotten about my goals to get at least two more stories submitted before baby's birth, and yet I don't feel bothered by that. Mommy instincts are taking over my life.

There's been another reason for my lack of writing and online activity lately--at least for the last week. My blood pressure has started going up which, considering that I got full-blown preeclampsia with my son and they had to deliver him two weeks early, could be problematic. So I've been told to rest and put my feet up as much as possible. Now, when you remember that I stay home with my active two-year-old during the day, this means that my only real chances to do so are during his naps and after he goes to bed--which is traditionally when I sit at my desk and write. I've spent much of this time in my recliner instead, which means I haven't been at my computer much. Writing, email, this blog, facebook--even reading Critters critiques--have all fallen on the backburner. On the other hand, I've caught up on a huge stack of Parents magazines I thought I would never get through.

I have, however, decided that enough is enough. I have a laptop and wifi, so there's no reason I can't keep up with writing from the recliner. It's not comfortable for as long, but my lack of productivity ought to end--or at least be reduced.

My relationship with "enforced rest" is tenuous at best anyway. I very much resented it when I was pregnant with my son, particularly since I still had a lot to do when they told me to take it easy. I was not a very cooperative patient that time. But mostly I resented the loss of control having a doctor tell me to reduce activity--and having my body stop behaving itself--implied. I like to be in control.

I'm doing a lot better this time, partly because I don't want a repeat of what happened to my body last time and partly because there's a lot less to do. And because this child is properly Head Down, which means my stress level is a lot less. I'm still running errands but trying to limit their duration (no across-town marathons to see how many stops we can make in one day) and I'm still working on nesting, but in shorter bursts interspersed with periods of vegetating my my chair. I'm also doing my utmost to keep my sodium intake low--and boy, unless you've tried it, you have no idea how difficult it is. There's salt in EVERYTHING!!! After I get home from the hospital, I intend to celebrate with a big plate of nachos!

The combination of low sodium, a million glasses of water a day, and multiple rest periods throughout the day hasn't brought my blood pressure down to normal, but it's remained only slightly elevated so my hopes are high that I won't be asked to restrict activity even more--or to deliver the baby early. I've got another appointment tomorrow, and we'll see then whether they concur.

So that's what I've been up to for the past two weeks. I hope my writing buddies won't cease stopping by when I say that this blog will probably take a major turn towards all things baby-and-child-related for a while. If and when I have things to say on writing, along with occasional updates on what little I manage to get done (I intend to take a maternity leave from writing, and I'll detail what my "rules" for it are in another post soon--hopefully) then I will still post about such matters. But the fact is that babies are time-consuming and all-encompassing, so that's probably most of what you'll be getting.

I hope my next absence won't be as long. Best of luck in your own endeavors!

Critters and Rewrites and Screenplays, Oh My

2011-05-11T17:55:00.003-06:00

I've got another story going out to Critters today--bang, bang, bang, they're really piling up on each other. I'm nowhere near finished reading the critiques I got last time (the stopped trickling in just last week.) I got 21 critiques for the last story. I knew it felt rough but wasn't sure why, and so far people have agreed with my "rough" assessment. I have, at least, gotten a few good assessments to help me see what needs work. And it definitely needs work. This one will require another major rewrite.

The one going out today I'm pretty excited about. I like the premise and the story as it stands, so I'm hoping people will mainly provide simple ways to make it better. Even if I determine, based on critiques, that it needs a lot of work, I'll probably work on this one before beginning a major rewrite of the previous one, just because I'm a lot more enthused about it and would like to get it submitted before baby's arrival. We're at a month as of yesterday, so I'm really starting to feel the crunch.

Hubby and I are continuing to make good headway on our screenplay, which is also good considering the time crunch we're now under. That, analyzing critiques, and revising have comprised the bulk of my writing projects these days. What's a little frightening is the fact that I haven't really come up with many new story ideas recently. I did a fast spate of new stories shortly after finishing the novel, but haven't had any "wow, that's an awesome idea" thoughts in a while. I guess, perhaps, that means it's time to start the first rewrite of the novel, where I can let story ideas pile up again.

Actually, I did have one story idea. It wasn't so much a new idea as a new thought on something that I'd been mulling over for a while, and I stupidly didn't write it down. I distinctly remember being in the dark bathroom getting ready for bed, thinking "huh, that's a neat idea, I'm sure I'll remember it tomorrow," and doing nothing about it that night. And now nothing. Ppbth. Lesson learned. Never, EVER put off writing the idea down. (Usually I do, but for some reason....) Alas.

Writing Retreat

2011-05-08T23:44:00.003-06:00

Every spring, we take a vacation up to our timeshare in Avon (just west of Vail.) For hubby and I, it has become a writing retreat. We don't get as much done as in years' past, but we still utilize naptime and enjoy the creative time free from distractions.

Unfortunately, this year we were pretty idle by necessity instead of by choice. The day before we left, I came down with a cold. The first two days of our trip were pretty run-of-the-mill cold-wise, and we managed short walks and a trip to the playground. The third day I woke up feeling better, but then the virus decided to move into my lungs. This is not uncommon, by any means. I have asthma, and colds frequently start bothering my lungs during the latter half of their duration. This time, however, it got pretty bad. I didn't feel like the usual dose of my inhaler was restoring proper lung capacity and that, coupled with congestion that got so bad I could hardly swallow because no air pressure could be released through my nose, and I was pretty miserable. That night I got almost no sleep: I just tossed and turned while trying to breath and trying not to worry about how bad I felt, how tired I would be the next day, and whether the baby was getting enough oxygen.

The next day I called my OB, party because I was worried about my breathing and partly because I wanted to know what drugs I could take to alleviate my symptoms. As I'd feared, the doctor was worried about whether the baby was getting enough oxygen (especially since I was at high altitude and the air is already thinner) so she sent me to the local Urgent Care. There, they diagnosed me with bronchitis.

As you can probably imagine, this meant we didn't get to do much else on our vacation. We drove to places we would normally walk to and didn't go out much until later in the week, when the drugs I was taking finally made me feel human again. It was disappointing not to feel well on vacation, but it was, at least, nice that we hadn't planned much big stuff anyway. At least we weren't trying to go theme-park-hopping in Orlando or anything. Doubly so, as our son came down with the cold as well and his fever even spiked to 101.8 once. And now that we're home, hubby is coming down with it. Ick. I really hope this is the last illness any of us gets before baby arrives. And that nobody gets sick during baby's first few months--illnesses during that young, tiny, fragile time are pretty scary.

On the plus side, though, hubby and I made a lot of progress on our collaborative screenplay during the week, and we each made some progress on our own projects, too. I got one more story out into circulation, which brings my submitted story total to 8. We didn't lose our vacation, we just had to take it really light.

"Zoom Zoom" Bed!!!

2011-05-03T23:48:00.004-06:00

We made our son a racecar bed for his Big Boy Bed!

This was a long, involved project that took almost a month. At first we were going to buy a toddler racecar bed, but when we saw how much they cost, we figured that if we were going to spend that much, we ought to get a bed that will last past age 4. We didn't really like the designs on the prefabricated racecar beds though, but we did like the result of

this set of woodworking plans. We wouldn't have been able to do it totally on our own, but that's what dads are for! Day 1 was spent at my parents' house starting to get the pieces cut using my dad's vast array of tools.

Of course, our son got to participate a little.

We fought with an old band saw of my grandfather's for a while, but the blade kept coming off. Dad thinks something might have been wrong with the tension settings. It wasn't big enough for the large pieces anyway, so once we decided to forget it and just use the saber saw, we were able to get moving.

Day 1 turned out to be a lot more cutting (of paper,) tracing, and transferring than we (well, maybe just I) had anticipated, but Dad volunteered to keep cutting the pieces through the week and bring them to our house. Whilst I was busy doing a lot of tracing and transferring (for which my back was not happy with me) hubby got busy sanding the pieces we had already done.

My parents, as promised, continued to work on cutting the wood. They even got the band saw working (with the addition of a new blade and more adjustments.) Mom even took a hand at it!

After they delivered the wood, hubby and I spent many evenings in the garage sanding, sanding, sanding. Our son even "helped" a little! Mostly, though, he just played in my car like he did when we were putting up cabinets. ...which was all to the good, because it provided him with a sound barrier. He refused to wear earplugs for more than 30 seconds.

I also constructed the bed's wheels, because that's what the bed sits on, and we figured (at Dad's suggestion) that they would be easier to sand as one piece--that way their circular surface would be uniform.

Then we had a party! A Bed Construction party, to be exact. My parents, hubby's parents, and hubby's sister joined us. We finished up the sanding of the pieces that had just arrived...

...and got busy constructing the darn thing!

Our son, once again, helped out a bit. It was nice to have so many people around, too. Once the sanding was done, there wasn't room around the bed for more than 4 people (2 at times) so everybody else got to ~~watch~~ play with the boy.

Looks like a car!

Making the bookshelf headboard--the car's spoiler.

Pretty cool!

We found the plans to be pretty easy to follow, and Dad said he found only one measurement to be a tiny bit off. We also had a difference of opinion about the air scoop (the pieces that stick out just in front of the rear wheels) but either way of constructing them would've worked, and we're very happy with the result.

We primed throughout the week and then let our son help with the paint the next weekend. He didn't last very long, though--I think he didn't like not being allowed to dip the paintbrush in the can by himself (we had to cut him off after he dipped it all the way down to his hand) or being told where to paint. So mostly it was hubby and I while he ran around the

driveway or rode his trike around (getting the occasional paint footprint on the cement.)

After the second coat it was just detail work!

We've decided to add two design embellishments (neither of which is complete yet.) The first is a gas cap. I painted the spot where gas goes in, and we're going to paint a small (maybe 3"x4") rectangle of wood the same color as the car and attach it with hinges.

The second is headlights. I went by a local bike shop, Campus Cycles, to see whether they carried loose white and yellow reflectors that I could use for headlights. To my surprise, they pulled out a big bin full of reflectors (some loose, some still in bags) and told me I could have as many as I wanted! (Can't beat that price!)

I grabbed a few, though we have yet to attach them.

Our son helped to carry it inside.

We waited until a Friday to set it up in his room, figuring that at least hubby didn't have to work the next day if our son had a rough night. Turns out we needn't have worried. He got very excited as we moved it into his room and set it up. We had to completely rearrange his room, but that didn't seem to bother him.

We were a little surprised at how much space the mattress had--we had expected it to fit more snugly--but once the bedding was in place it filled up most of the space.

After putting him to bed (with the reminder that he had to stay in bed until he fell asleep and slept through the night, and that he had to stay in his room until we came to get him the next morning) he was very quiet for about three minutes, and then he started babbling to himself, which he does before falling asleep every night. He fell asleep in about the normal amount of time, too. In fact, he hasn't woken up crying or freaked out about it at all, for either naps or bedtime, and we've had him in it for a little more than a week now.

Are we cool parents, or what?

April Stat Check

2011-05-01T18:04:00.000-06:00

During the month of April, I wrote on all 30 days!
I made some readability revisions to my Christmas story, made first or second revisions on three other stories, and wrote the first 25 pages of an animated screenplay with hubby
I made 1 submission
I received 1 rejection
It took me 17 days to resubmit a story after receiving a rejection (boo)
I submitted two stories to Critters
I critiqued 13 stories for Critters (and got an MPC!)
I received Critters critiques for one story, and am halfway through a week of getting them for a second story
I have 7 stories currently in slush pile circulation
I made 11 blog posts
I took no days off

Analysis
This was a pretty good month. I occasionally felt that revisions took longer than they ought to have, and due to garden/yard and child obligations I didn't always get as early of a start as I would have liked, but I'm mostly satisfied with my progress. The only thing is I need to not let myself wait so long when it comes to resubmissions--after all, nobody's going to buy a story that isn't submitted anywhere! Of course, part of why I didn't get the story resubmitted (and why I didn't get as much writing/revising done as I would have liked, not to mention why I was sleep-deprived for much of April) was because I was frantically working on critiques. I learned that I'm unlikely to work towards an MPC again unless I find myself under another major deadline (which the baby is providing this time.) Otherwise it just isn't necessary, most of the time, to get stories critiqued that quickly. Even if I get another backlog, I could most likely allow critiques to filter in while I work on a novel.

For May, my goal is to get another three (or more) stories into submission circulation. I'm facing my final productive month before baby arrives, and I'd like to tie up as many story "loose ends" as I can before then. I intend to give myself a maternity leave of sorts, though I may try to read and start revising my novel during that time, but after that I have no idea what will happen. I want as much of my material out in the world as I can get before life dramatically changes again.

I have had it with my depressed immune system!!!

2011-04-29T23:46:00.001-06:00

Okay, so babies are parasites.

I'm not saying this in any derogatory way, but the fact is that a baby is a parasite in its mother's body. As such, the mother's body depresses her immune system so as not to attack this loveable parasite. And I'm thinking this has got to be partially responsible for the sheer number of colds I've contracted since Christmas.

Sure, my son has been sick a lot, and he usually gives his colds to me, but generally I'm a pretty healthy person. And lately I've been trying really hard to keep him healthy--especially making sure we remember to wash our hands the instant we return from any outing, etc. Well, this time he didn't even get sick. Just me. And I'm so tired of filling up every trash can in the house with kleenex. I think I'm ready to have this baby so my immune system can go back to normal. And so my hip joints will stop feeling like they're about to fall apart on me. And so I can walk without waddling. And stand up without hefting myself. And tie my shoes the normal way again....

*sigh* 6 more weeks. And the baby needs them. We do too, to finish the nursery, make a few purchases, and agree on names (hee hee.) Just six more weeks.

In other news, I finished revising the last story I got critiques from Critters for. It was a bit of a challenge since it's a piece of flash fiction (1,000 words or less) and people wanted more details/characterization. I had two words to spare when I started, so I had to figure out what could get cut in order to add tidbits here and there. (I didn't add much, figuring keeping the character generic would help show that he could be anybody, but I did clarify a few things. Besides, it's flash!) But in the end, I wound up with 14 words to spare! Still not quite sure how that happened, but hey, I'll take it!

Using my MPC

2011-04-27T23:33:00.000-06:00

And just like that, I've got another story out to the Critters community. (I only just finished reading the other ones two days ago!) Then I'll have another one out in two more weeks--I'll be on the revising fasttrack for the next month, I guess. That's all to the good--I'd like to increase my output before baby comes and drags me to a screeching halt.

This story is much longer than last week's, at 6500 words. As before, I think I'll wait until they all filter in before reading them. That way I can get them all read in a few days and not think too hard about one critique, only to find it was in the minority.

In other news, hubby and I have been working on a screenplay for an animated movie together. After he gets home we spend approximately a half-hour each night down in "our" office (I've officially moved all my stuff out of the new baby's room and our computers now get to cohabitate) getting it written down. Hubby is the "scribe"--he knows all the formatting stuff, after all--and we talk scenes, dialogue, and action over and get them in the document. Things are going well, so far.

April Kiddie Crafts - E is for Easter

2011-04-24T11:07:00.002-06:00

And a Happy Easter to all!

We've finally been unpacking our family photos, so I put our crafts on a different wall this month. I still put a few up high, but he's started requesting they be lower. I've agreed, though I do often have to remind him not to remove them from the wall. Here's the new craft wall.

My son kept wanting to play with his icky, dried-out play doh at the beginning of April, so I finally decided to make some new stuff. (Bleah! The cut-out shapes were nearly permanent, it was so unworkable!)

I made him several Easter colors while he played with the yucky stuff one last time, and then I traded them out for him. Much nicer!

I introduced him to the letter "E" in preparation for Easter, but also because there were some other "E" projects I wanted to do. I got this first idea from this blog. We read the book Green Eggs and Ham while eating these green eggs. Now, my son is allergic to real eggs, so we couldn't make a green egg breakfast. What I did was melt white chocolate chips and place dollops of it on waxed paper, and then had my son place green m&ms in the middle for the yolks. He resisted this project at first, but then had a blast and requested Green Eggs and Ham for a bedtime story for several days--and "green eggs" for dessert for, well, he still asks for them, even though they're all gone!

Next we did "E" is for "eyes and ears." I made the face with hair, a nose, and mouth, and had him attach the rest. I thought he did a great job of getting the placement of them.

I got the idea for this next project from my friend Sela. We used a balloon and gray paint to paint an elephant, with the idea that the balloon would leave a wrinkled pattern resembling elephant skin. It sort of worked (though the wrinkles flattened out as it dried.)

After that, we plunged into Easter crafts. I found this bunny online, which is made entirely of hearts. My son decided to swap the ears and feet, though, so it looks a little strange.

Since Valentine's Day, we've been lacing a garland to hang across our breakfast bar. For Easter, I cut out eggs and bunnies for him to lace.

Then we decorated a giant Easter egg by putting tape across it, painting it, and then removing the tape.

I also found this idea online and hadn't decided whether I wanted to use it for Easter or save it for the letter N, but after we read an Easter book () in which a bunny gives up his basket for a robin to use as a nest, my son declared he wanted to make a nest. So we did, using strips of paper and watered-down glue. Messy!

I decided we would decorate another giant egg, this time painting bubble wrap and pressing the egg onto it to get little colored circles. My son liked this so much, we put paint on all the extra eggs and bunnies left over from our garland, too.

Then I helped him make a bunny ear headband (he loved the stapler once again.)

And then, borrowing once again from my friend Sela (I love that my son is old enough to do some projects from her archives) we made sheep from a handprint, cotton balls, and googly eyes.

The last craft we did before Easter was to take some letters I cut from one of his extra paintings and make a garland saying "Happy Easter," which is on our door to welcome our guests.

We also did a new Easter themed sensory bin.

It's essentially a large Easter basket. Easter grass, a small basket, eggs, porcupine balls, tiny chicks and bunny erasers. He loved hunting for the erasers. I discovered that four bags of Easter grass was far too much. It's been so long since I actually purchased any, I didn't realize it expanded so much!

Next week we're going to do the letter "B," which will lead us into lots of baby projects to help our son get used to the idea of a baby coming. Seven weeks and counting!!

Once again I'm linking up at Tot School.

I Did It!!!

2011-04-20T23:40:00.000-06:00

Well, by sacrificing sleep, a great deal of online socializing, and a multitude of other things, I managed to read and critique ten stories for Critters this past week. I earned myself an MPC (Most Productive Critter) award! I now have a jump-to-the-head-of-the-queue-free pass, which I intend to use next week in order to get two more stories critiqued before baby arrives, instead of just one. (If baby refuses to come out on its own and I have to have a repeat c-section then I could get a third, but I doubt I'd be paying much attention to them as they'd be due two days before the c-section would happen.)

Doing all these critiques has another bonus too. You have to do approximately three critiques out of every four weeks in order to have stories critiqued by others, and I now have about 8 extra critiques--meaning I could not participate for 8 weeks before my ratio would dip below 100%. If I keep up with one per week up until baby's arrival, these critiques could get me well into the maternity leave I intend to take for myself. What I'm hoping to do is get a few more stories into the queue and then I'll just let the critiques filter in after baby is born. Then I'll have feedback waiting for me once I feel ready to tackle a rewrite!

If you're wondering what I look like these days, here is the most recent baby bump photo of me:

Yup, I feel ready to pop, but I still have 7 1/2 more weeks to go. Yeesh. But I do need those weeks, things aren't ready yet!

The data feeding my theories regarding how many Critters critiques one will get was further complicated this week. The story I submitted was only 1,000 words long, which only counts for half credit for critiques. I'd wondered whether that would mean I would get fewer of them--because people would rather read something a little longer and get full credit for it--or if the short length would mean a larger number of critiques because it's a faster read.

Well, as the week started out, it seemed that my second guess would be the correct one. I got 10 critiques on Wednesday and Thursday of last week alone. "Wow," I thought. "It'll take me forever to get through all of these!" But then I stopped getting them. After a few days I even opened up my manuscript on the website to make sure it still loaded okay. Finally, yesterday and today I got four more critiques for a total of 14. My theory on this is that other people like myself, who were trying to get MPCs, were reading the really short stories first because they're easier to cram a few into one day. Then the rest of them might have been people looking for something short to read at the last minute to make sure they get something done. Or I could just be looking for patterns where there are none. Who knows.

Of course, because I was so busy critiquing others this week, I haven't read a single one of the critiques sent to me yet. But I will soon.

Mostly, though, I'm looking forward to getting myself an earlier bedtime again. Sleep never looked so good.

I guess I'm not that kind of blogger

2011-04-16T16:06:00.001-06:00

I learned some interesting things last week during the Ultimate Blog Party, both about myself and the world of blogging. One of the most interesting to me is the fact that some people hoard followers like many people I've encountered hoard Facebook friends.

It seems like there's a big competition to get as many followers as possible, regardless of whether said followers actually read your blog. I got quite a few comments from people who were blog hopping saying nothing but "hi from the UBP, I'm your newest follower, I'd appreciate a follow back." Some of these people aren't even following (or if they are, they did it in some way that's invisible to me--is there a way to know if someone subscribed to one of your feeds in a way other than Google Friend Connect?) One person really did follow but removed herself a day later after I made a return trip to her blog but didn't follow her. Well, I have a confession to make: Google Friend Connect means nothing to me. I used it a little at the beginning, but I didn't really like the layout. Now if I build up a rapport with other writer-bloggers (meaning we both make several visits to each other) I'll eventually add them to my "Fellow Writers" blogroll, which best helps me keep track of when they post something new. The other blogs I check regularly I just have bookmarks to. If I start reading a larger number of non-writing-related blogs I might eventually have to start using some sort of feed burner, but I haven't felt the need so far. I joined some blogs just for giveaways a while back, and to be honest, I don't even know what I'm supposedly "following" anymore. Which, I suppose, means I could follow people just as a favor, but mostly I don't see a point. This isn't to say I don't like connecting with people, and if people joined my blog out of a genuine interest they are MORE than welcome here. But I just find it interesting how followers and following blogs seems to be a status symbol for many out in the blogging community.

Now, I guess some people with really commercial blogs might want those followers for something to do with sponsors and money, but that's also not me. Don't get me wrong, I would love for this blog to start earning me revenue--I did sign up for Google AdSense, after all, not that anybody ever clicks on my ads. At the rate I'm going, I'll get a $100 check once every 6 years or so. (Yowza, I'm rich!) I also signed up for Amazon Associates at the beginning and that probably had a better shot of earning me income considering that 1) my blog is book related and 2) I have plenty of friends and family who would have gotten to Amazon through me when they needed to buy stuff. However, Colorado passed some weird tax law not long after I signed up, causing Amazon to drop all Colorado Associates. Since that time I've decided that while it would be nice to make money from my blog, I'm not going to put the time and effort required into getting it to that point, because frankly, I'd rather be writing.

This has mainly made me stop and think about what I'm blogging for. And the biggest benefit I've received from blogging is that it helps me hold myself accountable with my writing. Scroll back up to the top of the page, if you would, and take a look at the very first item in my right sidebar. The blue number with the pale green background. Yup, that's the number of consecutive days that I've spent writing fiction in some form or another. Some days I've written thousands of words, many others it was all I could do to write 150 or 200 sleep-deprived words before dragging myself off to bed; some days it's just editing and rewriting, and yet other times it's research, but it's always directly related to a piece of fiction.

I long wanted to get into the habit of writing every day, but years went by without my pulling together the self-discipline to do so. But then something happened last year around about September: I was really enthused about the novel I was working on and I wanted to work on it every day. After I hit 30 consecutive days, I thought it would be fun to put a counter on my blog to keep track of how long I could go without stopping, kind of like the "Days Without Accident" counters at construction sites. And as more time went by, I found I really didn't want that thing to reset to zero. And I still don't. Telling the world (even this tiny corner of it) what kind of progress I'm making has been a great motivator for me, and has really helped me become a more disciplined--and therefore more productive and better--writer. Some days are better than others, of course, but I've managed not to stop. And that has been a tremendous accomplishment.

Connecting with people has been a great benefit as well. It's nice to get encouragement from others, whether it's a "congratulations" when I accomplish something or a "you can do it" when I express frustration. And I don't blog exclusively about writing. It goes back and forth, but I try to maintain about a 50/50 ratio between writing-related posts and posts about my wonderful son (or life in general.) I enjoy posting about things my son has done and the projects we do together. Being a stay-at-home-parent can be isolating (especially in my neighborhood, which we unfortunately failed to move out of) so I like being able to show my son off, share both proud and frustrating parenting moments, and connect with others on that score.

Since I've noticed that I'm different from most of the bloggers at the UBP, will I do it again next year? Probably. But I'll likely limit myself to looking for other writers and returning the visits of those who came to visit me. Although in another year or two, I hope to have a prize to give away that would interest other parents (the blog hosting the party is called 5 Minutes for MOM, after all): I'm hoping that soon hubby and I can get our children's Christmas book published, and a children's book would be something that would draw parental interest. (Only one person answered my question and said in her comment that she would like to win a scifi anthology, and that person also happens to be a real-world friend of mine.)

In conclusion, if you became a follower from the Ultimate Blog Party, please don't think I don't appreciate you. If you're actually reading this it means you came back for another look, something I suspect the follower-hoarders don't do. I will be trying to keep up with many of the people I connected with through the party, though I will likely be sporatic because, as I said before, writing takes priority in my limited free time. But please don't get offended if I don't follow your blog--that's just not the way I read blogs.

I Won a Prize!

2011-04-15T17:04:00.001-06:00

So I was a little disappointed in the way the prizes worked for the Ultimate Blog Party this year. They had a prize form to fill out on the 5 Minutes for Mom site, and I'm sure it was much easier for them than last year's process (where they randomly chose winners from the thousands of comments and then had to check out the person's blog to see which prizes they preferred to win.) However, I was upset that they required at Twitter identity in order to enter. I've had no desire to join Twitter as of yet, but there was no way around it, so I didn't enter. Bummer, since I won a prize last year.

However, some of the blogs I visited in my whirlwind week had giveaways of their own, and I won one of them!

I won a giveaway from Christie over at Average Moms Wear Capes. I got to choose a necklace from her etsy shop, and this is the one I've requested:

Pretty cool! Thank you Christie!

Plunging Back into Critters

2011-04-13T17:31:00.000-06:00

My flash story, "Disconnect," went out to Critters today. This one snuck up on me. It had been so far down the list on the 13th that I thought for sure it would get bumped to the 20th--so I was surprised to get an email saying my story might get held unless I got caught up on my critiques. And then I wasn't sure whether I got my critiques in early enough (I did my last one in the wee hours of the morning last night.) But I was pleased to see that I still made the cut--barely. My critiques were obviously received early enough, but I was still perilously close to getting bumped to next week: I'm the last one on the list!

This is the first time I've sent a piece of flash fiction through Critters, and it'll be interesting to see how many critiques I receive. In the past I've noticed that shorter pieces tend to get more responses, but if a story is under 2,000 words it only receives half credit--so it will be interesting to see whether people avoid it in favor of something that will get them full credit.

This, too, is the week I'm going to try for a Most Productive Critter award to get a free Jump-To-The-Head-Of-The-Queue pass. I've just sat down at my computer and am going through the list of options to read this week, and I've noticed that it seems to be very high on the Fantasy side. I don't want to read chapters out of a novel (since I don't foresee myself keeping up with the whole thing) nor do I want the time commitment of agreeing to read someone's entire novel right now, so I've got 16 options remaining. 8 of them are fantasy, 6 are scifi, and 2 are horror. Okay, so I guess it's not as big of a gap as it seemed like, but I had considered trying to get an MPC last week, and that week seemed to lean towards fantasy also. I wonder if that's common? I've never compared the numbers before.

Well, time to get critiquing!

I'm Wordy

2011-04-09T23:53:00.001-06:00

I've know this about myself for some time, but I tend to be very wordy. I always overwrite first drafts. I've come to accept this, and just let myself ramble when initially writing. That's what editing is for, after all!

The amount of overwriting I do tends to go up when I'm having difficulty with a section. I guess if I'm having trouble writing, I'll say too much just to feel like I've said something. But sometimes that can mean that a 200 word passage will get cut down to 125 words when I go back to it. That's a lot of extraneous wordage!

I recently did first edits of the four stories I penned right after finishing my novel, and one of them in particular required a lot of trimming. Here's an excerpt:

First draft:
"I grabbed both my wands, my time machine, my emergency bag, and my emergency stash of food and then peered out my window. There were a few cars across the street with people sitting in them. They could be watching my building, though I hadn't been paying attention before so I didn't know how long they'd been there. I decided another distraction was in order; just to make sure I could safely get away." (74 words)

Second draft:
"I grabbed both my wands, my time machine, and my emergency bag and fodder stash before peering out the window. There were a few cars across the street with people in them. I hadn't been paying attention earlier so I didn't know how long they'd been there. Another distraction was in order." (52 words)

That's a reduction of almost a third, and I think the second one flows much better.

I'm not sure why I tell things too blatantly the first time around, but I've learned that my writing goes faster when I just let myself do it and don't self-edit right away. If I try to write things succinctly the first time around, I might not get more than a paragraph or two written in the course of a difficult day because I'll be too busy trying to make it sound right. And that can really disrupt the flow of a story.

Do other people do this? What's your process like?

Our Solution

2011-04-05T22:18:00.001-06:00

A few weeks ago, our washing machine ceased to drain and spin. I'd been thinking it took too long to drain for some time now--possibly for its entire life (~18 months) but it's hard to say for sure since this is the sort of thing you don't write down until much later. In retrospect, it was probably only a few months. At any rate, I was really upset that our washer went kaput when it was so young--but past the end of the warranty.

Hubby, on the other hand, consulted our good friend Google and found some promising leads--promising in that it was user-maintenance, so we could attempt it without spending money on a service call.

It turned out that one of our son's Halloween socks (missing since, you guessed it, Halloween) had somehow gotten sucked into the drain pump. Don't ask me how; I really can't fathom it. I mean, the drain holes in that washer (and all washers, really) are TINY! However, it happened, and has been acting as a filter to catch lots of gunk for the past five months. I don't know whether it just got forced into a completely blocked position recently or if it just happened to catch enough dirt now to complete the clog, but this was the cause of the machine's failure to drain (and consequently, spin.)

I was glad we were able to do this work ourselves, although it was a PAIN!!! It took 3 1/2 hours (not including the time to disconnect/reconnect the water supply hoses, move it in and out of position, etc.) The most time consuming and obnoxious part was getting the black drain hose in and out of the machine. The clamps holding it in place were darn-near impossible to work with. Now don't get me wrong--I'm very glad they're tight and keep water from spilling all over our floor--but a really tight clamp holding a flexible rubber pipe to a small surface area is hard to manipulate. Getting it off took several minutes, but getting it back on took close to a half hour--with sore arms and small nicks from the rough metal edges of the machine to show for it. Hubby says this makes us officially parents--not only have we done home-repair work, but it's home repair work directly linked to our child. Without him, we wouldn't have needed to do this. (And he didn't even do anything!)

Despite the fact that I can't figure out how the sock got through those tiny holes, Hubby and I now faced a dilemma. We're going to have tiny socks in our lives for a long time still to come. So how do we keep ourselves from having to repeat this adventure?

Our solution: the sock bag.

This bag is a reusable mesh produce bag sold at King Soopers. We had five already, and decided that buying another 3-pack was in order. Each child now gets a bag to hold their socks in the wash. This way they can't get sucked into the ether, plus they won't get lost in larger pieces of clothing.

(Betcha didn't know the washing machine really CAN eat those socks that go missing!)

Late March Kiddie Crafts

2011-04-03T15:51:00.028-06:00

We're going to have to rethink our craft wall soon, as we've been unpacking all the personal effects we hid when we staged our house, and this wall used to be (and will again soon be) a family photo wall. I'm not sure whether we'll just put his crafts lower (more on his level), try to rearrange the photos, or perhaps just use a smaller space on the other side of the hallway. Probably the latter (I don't trust that the more tactile pieces will stay mounted if he can reach them,) but we'll see. Here's the current state of our craft wall.

After St. Patrick's Day, I introduced my son to the letter "L." I also let him get some cutting practice in using the scraps from that day, since obviously he won't get any better (or safer) without practice. Here he is with the confetti he made.

After that we took some shredded red paper that had come as packing material and put a mane on a lion, because "L" is for "lion."

We also did "L" is for "Ladybug." I had to do most of the pasting to get the shape right, but he happily attached the pom poms. (I was going to make it red, but he wanted it to be orange. I guess it's closer to the color found in nature this way!)

"L" is for "Lollipop." (He learned to say Lollipop while doing our "L" poster, so I decided to make some big ones out of paper.

This same week, I did a pH and nutrient test on my garden. After it was complete, I decided to clean the tubes out rather than toss them, because there's a strange allure to tiny tubes. My instinct was right. I'd been planning to save them for a future sensory bin or to use as a bath toy, but my son witnessed me washing them and immediately appropriated them for his own purposes. He played with them for quite a long time.

We've got a lot of birthdays in our family starting in late March and running through mid-May, so interspersed throughout the other crafts we started making birthday cards. Many I can't show as certain recipients haven't gotten them and might get a spoiler, but these have already been delivered.

After letting my son paint the inside of the cards, I used him as a paintbrush for his Grammy (hubby's mom) and Great Grandma (hubby's grandma)'s cards. Great Grandma loves butterflies, and Grammy loves dragonflies, so we attempted to create said creatures out of painted footprints.

After all that, I thought it was only fitting to let him do some more painting himself.

We also helped him sign the cards and traced his hand on the back.

The last "L" project was "L is for lacing," in which he laced a big letter L. He seemed to enjoy it, though he wanted us to take turns, too.

Once again, I'm linking this post to Tot School, where you can see what other parents are doing with their little ones.

March Stat Check

2011-04-01T16:50:00.001-06:00

During the month of March, I wrote on all 31 days!
I spent 2/3 of the month rewriting an older story, made minor revisions on three of the newer stories I've written, and started revising a fourth
I made 3 submissions
I received 2 rejections
I declared one market dead and allowed the story sitting with them to move on
I got every story back out the day I received a rejection (that's a first for me!)
I reactivated my Critters account, submitted two stories to the queue, and made 1 critique
I have 7 stories currently in slush pile circulation
I made 13 blog posts
I took no days off

Analysis
March started slow, partly because we've been working feverishly on our house (see this post for details) and partly because I didn't know where the story would take me. But once I finally figured it out, I was able to pick up the pace quite a bit. My biggest achievement from March was the fact that I managed to get every story back out into the world the same day I received word that a market didn't want it--or in the case of one of them, the day I decided that I wasn't going to hear from the market.

In April I hope to do more revisions/rewrites, seriously figure out the submission process for my children's Christmas book, start writing an animated film script with hubby, and get a Most Productive Critter (MPC) credit for Critters.

Hubby and I have been outlining our script for the last month, so that ought to go relatively smoothly--we just have to figure out when we'll write, who will be the scribe, and whether we'll both be in the room for all writing or if we'll pass it back and forth.

I'd like to get an MPC because I'd really like to get a handful more stories into submission circulation before the baby arrives, but with a cycle of every 4 to 5 weeks on Critters, I'd only be able to get critiques for two before D-day. My goal is to see whether I can do 10 critiques in a week (without stopping the daily writing) and if I can, perhaps I'll do it a few times. That way I'll be able to get my stories back sooner (especially since some of them feel pretty close) and get my critique ratio high enough that I can ignore it for a little while and still get critiques back (which will allow me to let them trickle in after baby's arrival and help me jump back into my stories after my self-imposed maternity leave.) The only question is, can I cram 10 critiques into my schedule? We shall see.

The Ultimate Blog Party

2011-03-31T22:39:00.000-06:00

Welcome to Science Fiction Mommy! I'm excited that it's time for another Ultimate Blog Party. Last year I even won a prize! Click here to see my post from when it arrived.

My name is Eileen Rhoadarmer, and I am a science fiction author and stay-at-home-mom. My son is almost two-and-a-half, and I have a second baby due in June. The second baby scares me a little, even though I'm excited. I'm an only child, so I don't even have a child's perspective on navigating a family with multiple children. Hubby is the oldest of three, but they have large age gaps between them so he's never experienced kids this close in age. There are a lot of things I'm worried about, like sleep schedules and nursing. My son took FOREVER to nurse every day, and I don't know what I'll do with him while nursing if the new baby wants to take as long.

My son and I.

I don't have any intention of homeschooling my children, but I do a lot of crafts with my son in order to give us stuff to do during the day. He won't get to start preschool until he's nearly four (he has an October birthday) and kindergarten until he's nearly six, so I also feel like I'd be wasting a perfect window of opportunity if I didn't encourage the natural learning he's already doing. I still intend to send him to school--preschool, if we can afford it, kindergarten if not. (My mom teaches pre-K for the YMCA, and has informed me several times that he's going to be bored/have nothing new to learn in preschool, so I guess I sort of am homeschooling him.) Anyway, if that sort of thing interests you, you can click on the kid crafts label to see some of the stuff we've done. We started with Christmas and have been going somewhat steadily since.

Since last year, I have gone from a wannabe author to published--I sold two short stories in the last year; both to anthologies. The first, Doomology: The Dawning of Disasters, which holds my story "Night Terrors," is now available from Amazon and Barnes and Noble. As you might guess, Doomology contains stories about disasters and apocalyptic events; both small scale and massive, man-made and natural, and everything in between. Check out the links if you're interested in seeing the book.

The second anthology, A Glitch in the Continuum, which will hold my story "Pandora's Time," is forthcoming sometime later this year. I'll be posting here (a lot!) when it's available. (I thought about doing a giveaway of Doomology for the UBP but I wasn't sure how many parent bloggers would be interested in entering--if you'd like to win a scifi anthology, put that in your comment. I'll think about it for next year based on what kind of responses I get.)

I do my writing during naptime and/or after everybody else goes to bed, and I finished the first draft of my first novel in January! I'll work on editing it sometime later this year and then... we'll see how long things take.

If you're here for the party, please comment and share your links. I can't wait to get to know some great new people!

Back on the Critter

2011-03-30T16:25:00.001-06:00

Well, I've finally done it. I reset my counter to zero and finally started offering critiques on Critters again. I did my first one yesterday--a short one, to ease back into it.

I have a handful of stories (many freshly written) that I'd like to get opinions on before the baby is born. With only 11 weeks left (Yikes!!! Is that all???) I really only have time to get two stories critiqued at the normal pace. I'm seriously considering trying to get a Most Productive Critter award (or two, or...) in order to give myself a boost to the head of the queue. How would I get one, you might ask? I'd have to do 10 critiques in the course of a week. I'm not entirely sure if that's doable for me, but I think if I stick to shorter stories I *might* be able to. I have yet to decide whether I'll be attempting it this week or next (Critters' weeks run Wed-Wed) but the experiment ought to begin soon. Plus, the boost in number of critiques I've done will keep me active for a little while after baby's arrival, meaning I could let some critiques filter in while I'm in baby-chaos mode and simply not worry about them until life regains a schedule. But I would like to get as many stories as possible out into the world before D-day because I'll probably be motivated to resubmit stories that come back to me during that early time, but I doubt I'll be putting together anything new--especially since I intend to give myself a maternity leave.

But anyway, I've taken the first step.

Big House Projects

2011-03-28T16:57:00.001-06:00

Hubby and I (sometimes with the help of family) have been doing some serious improvements to our house lately. This is partly because we took it off the market after nearly a year and decided that if we're staying here, we need to fix a few things. It is also partly nesting, because we need better storage to rearrange everything to make room for the baby.

Therefore, we've done two big projects so far: we built a linen closet in our basement bathroom and we installed a bunch of cabinets in half of our garage.

The linen closet took us from January 16 to March 15, all told. Our house tragically lacked a linen closet and we've just been using space in the spare bedroom/my office's closet all this time. However, my office is becoming a nursery, so that storage is going away. Here are "before" and "after" shots of the bathroom.

As you can see in the "before" shot, there was a very narrow gap between the shower and the wall. Our original plan was just to build some shelves to fit in that gap, but then we realized that factoring in for the thickness of the materials, any such shelves would only hold one rolled-up towel. So we asked my dad for his advice. The cabinet door

you can see in the "before" picture just opened up access to the water shutoff valve, but there was a lot of wasted space there. So Dad said "why don't we just take out this wall and build a real closet?" We looked at each other, a little shocked because we hadn't planned to do any major renovations, and then asked "are you volunteering?"

Fortunately, Dad enjoys this kind of project, so we all set to work. Many weekends of my parents visiting (Mom graciously kept our son out of our hair--or at least from hurting himself on the power tools) plus many evenings of hubby and I by ourselves, and we took out the existing wall...

...framed the new ones...

...drywalled, mudded, sanded...

...installed shelves, caulked...

...and painted. Then we had an open closet for about a month before we figured out how we were going to do the doors.

We finally decided to create the look of a frame door by attaching trim to a piece of particle board.

The doors then came together over two days.

For good measure, we also added an over-the-toilet cabinet for even more storage. Tada! Basement bathroom has a "DONE" stamp!

Our garage took us from February 20 to March 13. I didn't get a very good "before" shot--so this tight one will have to do.

We started by building a cabinet to hold extra kitchen gadgets (most of which have been in storage for a while.) It was originally going to be a second pantry, but we couldn't decide on safe foods to keep in the garage so we moved the food to other cabinets and put all the gadgets here.

Then we got busy on the side wall. First my dad came over to help us install an electrical outlet before we closed off access to the studs. (Well, okay, technically we helped him, not the other way around.)

Then we insulated...

...and drywalled, figuring that we'd never be able to get behind our new cabinets to do that at a later time. Many thanks to hubby's parents who helped us out with the drywalling.

Then I built a two-shelf thingy to hold our recycling bins, allowing us to stack them on top of each other and save space.

Next came another large cabinet to hold paint, automotive stuff, large yard tools, and other miscellaneous items we have stored in the garage.

One of the harder things about putting any cabinets in the garage, though, was getting them lofted over the foundation. The garage's foundation forms a concrete lip above floor level that goes around the entire perimeter of the garage. This makes it impossible for any item to sit flat on the garage floor and be flush against the wall at the same time. So while

hubby built the bulk of the various cabinets, I was busy building risers for them to sit on--not the easiest thing when you consider that the garage floor slopes away from the house and the foundation I'm setting the back of the riser on is level. I'm rather proud of my (limited) carpentry work on all of these.

After the big cabinet, we got busy on my garden center. My garden stuff used to be housed on two open shelves, but over the years this got really messy. Now I have two lower cabinets and three upper cabinets, plus a pegboard and a workbench area to keep everything organized.

A few other miscellaneous things hung on the wall, and half of our garage is complete. Now, two weeks later, I still smile every time I go into the garage. It makes me want to finish the other half of the garage, which is still 2x4s and siding. However, the other half isn't a priority right now. Getting the kiddo into a big boy bed so we can reuse the crib (which requires building his bed,) moving my office down into hubby's office in the basement, and getting the baby's room set up in my old office are all our immediate priorities. I'm sure I will be posting about them as they happen. But for now, we're proud of our work and wanted to share.

The Ultimate Blog Party is Coming

2011-03-25T22:38:00.001-06:00

Last year, I discovered the Ultimate Blog Party hosted by 5 Minutes For Mom, which proved to be a great resource for networking with other parenting bloggers, so this year I plan to participate again. Click on the button to browse the site and see how to join up for yourself. Not only is it a good opportunity to network, but there are hundreds of prizes you can win by participating. Last year I even won one of the prizes! Click here to see my post from last year from when my tea arrived.