I am so sad right now. We didn't get to see my parents after all, or introduce Blake to my family. Our car broke down halfway there. It's now at a repair shop far from home, while we are home, thanks to a nice tow truck owner who drove all 5 of us home in his large pick-up truck...but we're home with no car. (We're trying to rent one, which has proved very difficult on a Sunday, but looks like it will be possible with help.)
I feel almost a biological need to show off my new baby, and I'm soooo sad his grandparents can't meet him! My mother has already said we live too far for her to come very soon, and she also doesn't want us to visit her because she's not up to having us over. The baby was also supposed to meet my great-uncle, step-grandmother, uncle, and some teenage cousins. What a lousy day. (Though at least Blake has been sleeping peacefully in his carseat almost all day...5 hours so far, except for one 15-minute feeding while we were stranded!)
Sunday, March 25, 2007
Saturday, March 24, 2007
Parents
I've heard from people online that I am quoted in the new (April 2007) issue of Parents magazine, though I subscribe and still haven't gotten mine or seen it yet! Someone in one of my writing groups had asked if she could include my story in an article about toddlers making messes, so the quote should refer to the time my middle son got into the peanut buttter at 15 months old (pictures here).
My current adorable baby is 2 months old today and my parents should finally get to meet him tomorrow, when we go to a family gathering halfway between our homes to celebrate my great-uncle's 92nd (or 93rd?) birthday. My mom has been too ill to do anything since my baby was born, so this will be her first big trip out. She still doesn't feel up to a long visit, but can at least meet her new grandson!
My current adorable baby is 2 months old today and my parents should finally get to meet him tomorrow, when we go to a family gathering halfway between our homes to celebrate my great-uncle's 92nd (or 93rd?) birthday. My mom has been too ill to do anything since my baby was born, so this will be her first big trip out. She still doesn't feel up to a long visit, but can at least meet her new grandson!
Thursday, March 22, 2007
Thoughts for a Thursday
I've gotten caught up in all the talk on various blogs and boards about "hooks" in writing & pitching novels, but the fact is, I don't need to worry about selling a novel right now. I need to worry about writing a novel right now. And rewriting one. And none of the talk about hooks is really going to change what I'm writing. These are the stories I have to tell right now. Obviously I want to make them as compelling as possible, but I'm unlikely to change the basic storylines. (And very unlikely to add, say, mutant reptilian zombies from outer space to punch them up a bit.) So, I just need to stop worrying and start writing!
I'm grateful to Megan McCafferty for writing in the 2007 Children's Writers and Illustrators Market that it's okay to write what you're passionate about instead of what seems marketable but that you have no interest in. Even if the book you want to write is yet another teen angst book. (Here's hoping publishers agree.)
And, on the topic of selling books, I think I may submit a picture book manuscript. It's been a long time since I've submitted anything, and PBs are particularly hard because most agents don't represent them, yet most publishers don't accept unagented manuscripts. But I realized I have two manuscripts sitting around that seem done to me, and I might as well get at least one of them out there. They aren't stories with a main character and a real plot, which seems to be what editors want from PBs these days, and one is pretty quiet. That's why I've been slow to submit them, but I still like the manuscripts, so might as well try. I also have a PB manuscript that I love, but it's nowhere near done (requires a complete overhaul) and I don't think I have the brainpower for that one right now!
Also, I'm so happy to have a new digital camera and even happier to have something like this to use it on:
I'm grateful to Megan McCafferty for writing in the 2007 Children's Writers and Illustrators Market that it's okay to write what you're passionate about instead of what seems marketable but that you have no interest in. Even if the book you want to write is yet another teen angst book. (Here's hoping publishers agree.)
And, on the topic of selling books, I think I may submit a picture book manuscript. It's been a long time since I've submitted anything, and PBs are particularly hard because most agents don't represent them, yet most publishers don't accept unagented manuscripts. But I realized I have two manuscripts sitting around that seem done to me, and I might as well get at least one of them out there. They aren't stories with a main character and a real plot, which seems to be what editors want from PBs these days, and one is pretty quiet. That's why I've been slow to submit them, but I still like the manuscripts, so might as well try. I also have a PB manuscript that I love, but it's nowhere near done (requires a complete overhaul) and I don't think I have the brainpower for that one right now!
Also, I'm so happy to have a new digital camera and even happier to have something like this to use it on:
Saturday, March 17, 2007
It's easy being green...
Last night, my enterprising 8-year-old designed a new, improved leprechaun trap for 2007, since the 2006 version hadn't worked. He made an elaborate diagram, and then he and his 6-year-old brother worked together to make the trap.
A trail of fake gold coins would lure the leprechaun up the Lego stairs to the top of an overturned moving box, where more gold coins waited. But in front of the coins on top of the box was a trap door, covered by tissue paper, so the leprechaun would fall in when he tried to walk across. My son was concerned that the leprechaun could hack his way out if he happened to have an ax, so he wanted to fortify the sides with wood, but settled for heavy books.
The result--a message from the leprechaun, spelled out in fake coins: HA HA.
A trail of fake gold coins would lure the leprechaun up the Lego stairs to the top of an overturned moving box, where more gold coins waited. But in front of the coins on top of the box was a trap door, covered by tissue paper, so the leprechaun would fall in when he tried to walk across. My son was concerned that the leprechaun could hack his way out if he happened to have an ax, so he wanted to fortify the sides with wood, but settled for heavy books.
The result--a message from the leprechaun, spelled out in fake coins: HA HA.
It appeared that the leprechaun had used a computer mouse he found around our house as a rope to hoist himself out of the box & get away. But he left behind treasures anyway, some gold-wrapped chocolate coins and some Spree candy in green bags. Also a leprechaun-themed rubber ducky with a note: "Hee Hee. You can't catch a real leprechaun, and you can't have my real gold! Better luck next year!"
The kids were a bit astounded that the leprechaun left them chocolate coins in bags with the "Coins of the World" label on them. "It has a tag on it!" they said about one of the bags. "He got that at a candy store!" They wondered how a leprechaun could shop at a store. "Wouldn't they notice he was a leprechaun?" they asked. My 6-year-old then figured out how he could have gotten the candy, which makes perfect sense for the high-tech leprechaun who used a mouse cord as a rope. "Maybe he bought it on eBay," he said.
For breakfast today, it was Lucky Charms, of course, and later we had our annual green dinner (lunch in this case). Our special guest was the cutest leprechaun in the world! Oh, wait, that's just my baby. ;-)
And after lunch, the 6-year-old lost his first tooth...that was lucky! We expect to go to the park pretty soon to look for four-leaf clovers--one year we found quite a few! HAPPY ST. PATRICK'S DAY TO YOU ALL!
Thursday, March 15, 2007
Small world after all
A couple of days ago, I happened to read a blog post from Jennifer Barnes (again), writing from England, about a new YA novel coming out that day, Prom Dates from Hell by Rosemary Clement-Moore. The author's name struck me as sounding familiar somehow. I realized I'd known a Rosemary Clement when I was growing up. Turns out, it's her! We did children's theatre together years ago. She was actually in the Musical Theatre class I had just mentioned in my blog the previous day! I realized if she hadn't kept the Clement in her name, I could have read her book and never even realized the author was someone I knew. Anyway, I plan to get the book as soon as I can, and I'm still amazed that I found out from someone in England that someone I knew growing up in Texas is now a YA author.
Wednesday, March 14, 2007
More plot thoughts
A couple of posts ago, I mentioned that some writer friends and I were having trouble with our largely emotion-based, rather than action-based, plots. This week, Arthur A. Levine/Scholastic editor Cheryl Klein wrote a great blog post dealing with this very thing. Her responses in the comments give even more insights. (Boiling it down...try to include both kinds of plot.)
Last night, I caught the end of the movie Ghost World, which I'd seen before, on TV. The existence of that movie proves to me that you don't have to have much of a plot...and particularly not an action-based one...but then, you probably won't rack up huge sales figures, either. These days, it seems to be all about the plot, or the hook, so I think I'd better try some plottier stuff before I go too quiet or artsy! Anyway, Ghost World is an interesting movie for me, as the main character, Enid, is very much like Lydia, the main character in my YA Chasing Monday, while the subject matter--facing life after high school when you don't have a plan--is pretty much the theme of my YA Can't Beet It, though Ghost World is much darker and, I'm afraid, more stylish than either of my novels. Can't Beet It is a humor novel with a basically happy ending. Chasing Monday is a more typical high school story, and at least aiming for happiness at the end.
Ghost World, I realized, has sort of the same ending as the movie The Graduate, despite having little in common with it other than an originally aimless main character who just graduated. The Graduate, which we had to dissect endlessly in a college film class, was driven by the actions of the character Ben, who was literally going after (even speedily, racing his car down the freeway) what he'd decided he wanted. Enid is never sure what she wants and doesn't do much at all. In Ghost World, unlike The Graduate, what really happens at the end is open to different interpretations, yet the endings are very similar on a surface level. Interesting.
Last night, I caught the end of the movie Ghost World, which I'd seen before, on TV. The existence of that movie proves to me that you don't have to have much of a plot...and particularly not an action-based one...but then, you probably won't rack up huge sales figures, either. These days, it seems to be all about the plot, or the hook, so I think I'd better try some plottier stuff before I go too quiet or artsy! Anyway, Ghost World is an interesting movie for me, as the main character, Enid, is very much like Lydia, the main character in my YA Chasing Monday, while the subject matter--facing life after high school when you don't have a plan--is pretty much the theme of my YA Can't Beet It, though Ghost World is much darker and, I'm afraid, more stylish than either of my novels. Can't Beet It is a humor novel with a basically happy ending. Chasing Monday is a more typical high school story, and at least aiming for happiness at the end.
Ghost World, I realized, has sort of the same ending as the movie The Graduate, despite having little in common with it other than an originally aimless main character who just graduated. The Graduate, which we had to dissect endlessly in a college film class, was driven by the actions of the character Ben, who was literally going after (even speedily, racing his car down the freeway) what he'd decided he wanted. Enid is never sure what she wants and doesn't do much at all. In Ghost World, unlike The Graduate, what really happens at the end is open to different interpretations, yet the endings are very similar on a surface level. Interesting.
Monday, March 12, 2007
Britcoms & multiple writers
I was amused this weekend to see Jennifer Barnes' blog post about being in England, pining for her American TV shows, while I'm here in the States, where I've never watched any of the shows she mentioned, and instead have been watching British shows all week! We watched some Extras (okay, so it's half-American, sort of), and Series VII of Red Dwarf (again), and we just rented Season One of A Bit of Fry and Laurie, which we also saw years ago. But my favorite this week has been Spaced, a rather brilliant (though often crude) sitcom from the folks behind the movie Shaun of the Dead. It apparently hasn't been released on Region 1 DVDs for some reason (I guess the video store made their own copy with a multi-region DVD player or something)...very annoying as I'd love to see the DVD extras, which this version didn't have. Anyway, it's clever and sometimes surreal, which makes it right up my alley, and one of the lead characters is a frustrated writer, though she doesn't get around to much writing.
At one point in the show, the writer character, Daisy, is working in a nightmarish job at a nacho restaurant with a power-crazed boss. She finally tells the boss off, saying she doesn't belong there, cleaning the kitchen. She's a creative person, not a mopper...she's a writer. The evil boss proceeds to tell her that all the hapless employees are writers. She motions to several of them, in turn. One writes haikus, one writes scripts, and one particularly skittish employee had a short story published once, a few years back. But there they all are in this horrible nacho sweatshop. I found it hilarious, scary, and sad, all at once! Now, I have a YA manuscript about a humiliating fast food job, and I've also written a story about a taco restaurant (in the desert...), but I hope there's more hope for my writing than those fictional writers had! I did work as a technical writer where it seemed like more than half my co-workers were also frustrated creative writers (creative writers in waiting?), but at least we were writing, and our bosses weren't insane. ;-) Um, but I am about to have some nacho chips & queso. Hmm.
My husband noticed that the British shows we've watched tend to have 2-person writing teams, often writers who have collaborated on a number of projects. We also saw an interview with John Cleese in which he said that Monty Python had two 2-person writing teams with different tastes in sketches. Off the top of our heads, we couldn't think of many similar writing teams in the U.S. Which got me to wondering...have any of you out there collaborated with other writers? I think it would take just the right person and I'm still not sure I could do it. Maybe for skits, but seems like it would be harder to collaborate on something long. Once in a Musical Theatre class, my class wrote a short show together, which worked out pretty well, but that's about my only experience with it. I tried to write skits with some friends in college, but most of our writing sessions degenerated into just hanging out (which basically led to my first date with my husband!), and when my writer friends from high school tried to improvise our way into a writing collaboration, it just changed our writing club into an improv club. I have long thought it might be interesting to co-write something with my husband, but I'm not sure what it would be. I assumed it would be non-fiction, probably not a children's book--more like humor or a collection of interesting facts--though we've talked about working together on my chapter book series idea. But I imagine him contributing mostly ideas, and research, and funny lines here and there, with me doing most of the actual writing. I'm sure we'd drive each other crazy, but I usually drive him crazy asking for feedback on my writing, anyway!
At one point in the show, the writer character, Daisy, is working in a nightmarish job at a nacho restaurant with a power-crazed boss. She finally tells the boss off, saying she doesn't belong there, cleaning the kitchen. She's a creative person, not a mopper...she's a writer. The evil boss proceeds to tell her that all the hapless employees are writers. She motions to several of them, in turn. One writes haikus, one writes scripts, and one particularly skittish employee had a short story published once, a few years back. But there they all are in this horrible nacho sweatshop. I found it hilarious, scary, and sad, all at once! Now, I have a YA manuscript about a humiliating fast food job, and I've also written a story about a taco restaurant (in the desert...), but I hope there's more hope for my writing than those fictional writers had! I did work as a technical writer where it seemed like more than half my co-workers were also frustrated creative writers (creative writers in waiting?), but at least we were writing, and our bosses weren't insane. ;-) Um, but I am about to have some nacho chips & queso. Hmm.
My husband noticed that the British shows we've watched tend to have 2-person writing teams, often writers who have collaborated on a number of projects. We also saw an interview with John Cleese in which he said that Monty Python had two 2-person writing teams with different tastes in sketches. Off the top of our heads, we couldn't think of many similar writing teams in the U.S. Which got me to wondering...have any of you out there collaborated with other writers? I think it would take just the right person and I'm still not sure I could do it. Maybe for skits, but seems like it would be harder to collaborate on something long. Once in a Musical Theatre class, my class wrote a short show together, which worked out pretty well, but that's about my only experience with it. I tried to write skits with some friends in college, but most of our writing sessions degenerated into just hanging out (which basically led to my first date with my husband!), and when my writer friends from high school tried to improvise our way into a writing collaboration, it just changed our writing club into an improv club. I have long thought it might be interesting to co-write something with my husband, but I'm not sure what it would be. I assumed it would be non-fiction, probably not a children's book--more like humor or a collection of interesting facts--though we've talked about working together on my chapter book series idea. But I imagine him contributing mostly ideas, and research, and funny lines here and there, with me doing most of the actual writing. I'm sure we'd drive each other crazy, but I usually drive him crazy asking for feedback on my writing, anyway!
Saturday, March 03, 2007
Plot and hooks
A writer friend called me this week to say she'd come across a copy of my YA manuscript, which she'd misplaced after I gave it to her for critique a couple of years ago, and had just spent about an hour reading and thinking about it (!). I had included some of the comments I'd gotten about it from other critiquers, and she said the comments I was getting were very similar to comments she and another friend of ours have gotten from editors and agents. And they all boil down to the fact that we can write, but we're not great in the plot department. We get bogged down in feelings instead of showing action, and not enough really happens.
So, she and the other friend dissected some well-plotted books and came up with a basic plot outline, almost a formula--pretty much the basic stuff, such as a problem, obstacles, etc. They plan to apply this outline to their books, to see if they can make their plots flow better, and she invited me to try it, too. I can see how it would fit a simple story, with one main problem and a linear narrative, but I'm not sure how it would fit complex YA stuff, with multiple storylines and problems, or sub-plots, and also not sure how it would accommodate flashbacks or other such deviations. But it probably would fit my midgrade stuff, and definitely the chapter books I want to write, so I ought to give it a serious go, as I really am plot-challenged! Though sometimes, when I outline a story and know exactly where it's going, it's harder for me to actually write it, because the voice isn't necessarily there and it sounds like a forced trip from point A to point B, and/or it feels like I've already written it when I know what's going to happen at each step.
I'm not hot on the whole plot-driven thing, in any case. I do think my novels should have plots, and I know that is their main problem, but the "hook" critiques I saw at an agent's blog yesterday just depressed me. I rarely write stuff with clear "hooks," and that's not really what I read for, either. It's not just what the story is about that draws me in, but the characters, the language, the way the story is told, etc. It's whether it's a world I want to spend time in, or a character I want to spend time with. The concept may get me to open the book, but it's what I see on the page that determines whether I'm going to read the book. I also wince at the idea that every book needs a wildly different plot hook than every other book before it--people don't even know what to do with stories that are too different. Half the movies in Hollywood have predictable plots we've all seen a hundred times, but they keep getting made and people keep buying tickets. If someone likes one kind of story, they usually want more that are like it. That's why series books are popular, or romance novels, or whatever. Not that I want to write stuff that's been done to death--I doubt I'm running that risk with my novel about beets, anyway--but I don't think every novel needs a stunningly new conflict, or extremely high stakes. Maybe it just needs an interesting take on a time-honored concept.
So, I'm grumpy about the hook idea. I'm hoping to sell my books based on the writing, not the concepts, because a concept is worthless to me without good writing to back it up. 20 writers can start with the same interesting concept and come out with 20 exceedingly different novels, and I'm sure not all would end up compelling! But some writers could take a quiet, everyday concept and come up with a brilliant novel about it. On the other hand...I'm probably just protesting too much because plot isn't my strong suit!
So, she and the other friend dissected some well-plotted books and came up with a basic plot outline, almost a formula--pretty much the basic stuff, such as a problem, obstacles, etc. They plan to apply this outline to their books, to see if they can make their plots flow better, and she invited me to try it, too. I can see how it would fit a simple story, with one main problem and a linear narrative, but I'm not sure how it would fit complex YA stuff, with multiple storylines and problems, or sub-plots, and also not sure how it would accommodate flashbacks or other such deviations. But it probably would fit my midgrade stuff, and definitely the chapter books I want to write, so I ought to give it a serious go, as I really am plot-challenged! Though sometimes, when I outline a story and know exactly where it's going, it's harder for me to actually write it, because the voice isn't necessarily there and it sounds like a forced trip from point A to point B, and/or it feels like I've already written it when I know what's going to happen at each step.
I'm not hot on the whole plot-driven thing, in any case. I do think my novels should have plots, and I know that is their main problem, but the "hook" critiques I saw at an agent's blog yesterday just depressed me. I rarely write stuff with clear "hooks," and that's not really what I read for, either. It's not just what the story is about that draws me in, but the characters, the language, the way the story is told, etc. It's whether it's a world I want to spend time in, or a character I want to spend time with. The concept may get me to open the book, but it's what I see on the page that determines whether I'm going to read the book. I also wince at the idea that every book needs a wildly different plot hook than every other book before it--people don't even know what to do with stories that are too different. Half the movies in Hollywood have predictable plots we've all seen a hundred times, but they keep getting made and people keep buying tickets. If someone likes one kind of story, they usually want more that are like it. That's why series books are popular, or romance novels, or whatever. Not that I want to write stuff that's been done to death--I doubt I'm running that risk with my novel about beets, anyway--but I don't think every novel needs a stunningly new conflict, or extremely high stakes. Maybe it just needs an interesting take on a time-honored concept.
So, I'm grumpy about the hook idea. I'm hoping to sell my books based on the writing, not the concepts, because a concept is worthless to me without good writing to back it up. 20 writers can start with the same interesting concept and come out with 20 exceedingly different novels, and I'm sure not all would end up compelling! But some writers could take a quiet, everyday concept and come up with a brilliant novel about it. On the other hand...I'm probably just protesting too much because plot isn't my strong suit!
Friday, March 02, 2007
Answers to my Friend Test
Answers to my friend test from Wednesday's post:
1. My drink of choice is Dr Pepper. I drink a lot of it. (Though years ago, I drank Coke almost exclusively. I then stopped drinking Coke at all for a long time, and now I can stand it again, but I'm really a Pepper!)
2. I have 1 sibling, a brother 8 years younger.
3. I would never want to be on American Idol (can't sing), Survivor (too hard & you have to wear skimpy clothes!), or Trading Spaces (I have no decorating instincts, & the show usually does horrible things to people's houses). But I've always kind of wanted to do sketch comedy, so out of the choices I listed, I'd pick MAD TV--but nearly any comedy show would do. (What I'd really love to be on is the old Carol Burnett show!)
4. I have fiction manuscripts about bubble gum, beets, and slushies, but not popcorn. I have also written about tacos. (But popcorn is my favorite snack, & my first job was at a movie theater popcorn stand.)
5. I have had 2 rabbits, a duck (for about a week, as a child), and a guinea pig, but I have never had a cat.
6. As a child, I was the only girl I knew who didn't aim to be a veterinarian. I did say I wanted to be a garbage collector, though! (I also wanted to be a writer and actress, but garbage collector was right up there.) It's my 16-year-old cousin who wants to be a meteorologist.
7. I never took a class in knitting. I tried to sign up for one once, but it was full, so I'm still handicraft-challenged. I took cartooning and ice skating classes as a kid, and actually took Mayan hieroglyphics as an elective in college, which turned out to be a bad choice. I figured none of the students would know anything about it coming in, but I was probably the only non-anthropology major in there, and everyone else knew and cared much more about the subject than I did, so I had trouble keeping up!
8. I have a college degree in Radio-TV-Film. Why, I'm not sure. ;-)
9. I have won musical electronic drumsticks--basically a toy--from a Coke promotion, and a glowing martini glass, as well as a martini shaker, from an online contest a few years back. I won 32 lbs. of Tootsie Rolls (144 jumbo-sized ones) from a prize drawing on the University of Texas campus during a Texas Independence Day festival (22 years ago today, I believe), and had to lug the whole big, awkward box of them across campus to my dorm, which I barely managed. I'd been trying to win an old vinyl record, but oops, I got the grand prize! I did make lots of new "friends" in my dorm after that, but the friendships dried up when the girls started blaming my candy for making them gain weight! I have never won a $50.00 red velvet cake, by the way, but I've been entering to win one from womansday.com!
10. My husband's name is Mark.
Thursday, March 01, 2007
Musings
Nobody had any comments about the bad hair photos of myself I linked to in my "harrowing hair tales" post yesterday?! Methinks no one must have read the post!
A couple of nights ago, I read back over the 7,000+ words of my unfinished National Novel Writing Month manuscript from last fall, hoping it would turn out to be good, and I'd feel spurred on to get back to it. No such luck! If anything, I found it depressing that there were a few, mostly buried gems of ideas or characters lost in a story I don't think is good enough to finish. Also, I had set the story in Sarasota, Florida, where we lived last year. It was the first story I ever tried to write that was set in a real, identifiable place, and for that alone I found it noteworthy--I wanted to write it as a tribute to somewhere I might soon forget. Unfortunately, it seems I have already forgotten Sarasota! I started the manuscript just 1 month after moving away. Now, 4 months after that, even the landmarks I wrote about in the story had largely slipped my mind, and I realized I could never finish it with the same realistic descriptions now, from here, as out of touch as I am with that area already. Very strange. How quickly we forget!
On a brighter note, I also looked back over some sample intro paragraphs I'd written for a chapter book series I'd like to write. And I liked them! What the novel manuscript lacked most of all was voice, and the chapter book idea seems to have it. What it doesn't have is plots, or even definite characters...I still haven't decided if the characters are humans or animals! So I don't feel ready to start it right now. But I do think it's worth batting around, while my kids are still at chapter book age so I'm familiar with the genre. I'm thinking I should probably finish one of my YA novels first, though, if only because I'd prefer to make a name for myself in midgrade or YA first, since they are my first loves. But if I figure out a plot for one of the chapter books (I have titles in mind, oddly, but not specific plots), I may start writing it and see what happens.
I'm also not sure which YA I'd want to work on--one I have a full draft for, which needs massive revisions I've been putting off, or one I only have partially written, which has given me fits for years. All of the characters deserve to have their stories told, so I'm not sure who should win! And then I begin to doubt that any of their stories is really interesting enough to tell. I've been reading the novel "hooks" some other writers are posting in their blogs, and I know my novels don't really have hooks. When one of them had a first chapter critique at a conference some years ago, the editor critiquing it said it was fine as far as it went, but it needed "more." More what, I asked? She couldn't say. Just "more." I'm still mulling over that! For ages I thought she meant deeper themes, or more going on in the plot, and I even tried to add in some edgier stuff that another editor then told me didn't fit. But now I'm thinking maybe it just needs to be more vivid, more sensory, more tangible--areas I often struggle with--so it pulls the reader more deeply into the world of the story. Hmm. Part of me wants to work on that, and the other part of me thinks I should write the chapter books because they have simple storylines by necessity, and won't require so much of that elusive "more"! (Not that I think they'd be "easy" to write--just that they might be an easier fit for my natural writing style.)
Now go laugh at my hair pics!
A couple of nights ago, I read back over the 7,000+ words of my unfinished National Novel Writing Month manuscript from last fall, hoping it would turn out to be good, and I'd feel spurred on to get back to it. No such luck! If anything, I found it depressing that there were a few, mostly buried gems of ideas or characters lost in a story I don't think is good enough to finish. Also, I had set the story in Sarasota, Florida, where we lived last year. It was the first story I ever tried to write that was set in a real, identifiable place, and for that alone I found it noteworthy--I wanted to write it as a tribute to somewhere I might soon forget. Unfortunately, it seems I have already forgotten Sarasota! I started the manuscript just 1 month after moving away. Now, 4 months after that, even the landmarks I wrote about in the story had largely slipped my mind, and I realized I could never finish it with the same realistic descriptions now, from here, as out of touch as I am with that area already. Very strange. How quickly we forget!
On a brighter note, I also looked back over some sample intro paragraphs I'd written for a chapter book series I'd like to write. And I liked them! What the novel manuscript lacked most of all was voice, and the chapter book idea seems to have it. What it doesn't have is plots, or even definite characters...I still haven't decided if the characters are humans or animals! So I don't feel ready to start it right now. But I do think it's worth batting around, while my kids are still at chapter book age so I'm familiar with the genre. I'm thinking I should probably finish one of my YA novels first, though, if only because I'd prefer to make a name for myself in midgrade or YA first, since they are my first loves. But if I figure out a plot for one of the chapter books (I have titles in mind, oddly, but not specific plots), I may start writing it and see what happens.
I'm also not sure which YA I'd want to work on--one I have a full draft for, which needs massive revisions I've been putting off, or one I only have partially written, which has given me fits for years. All of the characters deserve to have their stories told, so I'm not sure who should win! And then I begin to doubt that any of their stories is really interesting enough to tell. I've been reading the novel "hooks" some other writers are posting in their blogs, and I know my novels don't really have hooks. When one of them had a first chapter critique at a conference some years ago, the editor critiquing it said it was fine as far as it went, but it needed "more." More what, I asked? She couldn't say. Just "more." I'm still mulling over that! For ages I thought she meant deeper themes, or more going on in the plot, and I even tried to add in some edgier stuff that another editor then told me didn't fit. But now I'm thinking maybe it just needs to be more vivid, more sensory, more tangible--areas I often struggle with--so it pulls the reader more deeply into the world of the story. Hmm. Part of me wants to work on that, and the other part of me thinks I should write the chapter books because they have simple storylines by necessity, and won't require so much of that elusive "more"! (Not that I think they'd be "easy" to write--just that they might be an easier fit for my natural writing style.)
Now go laugh at my hair pics!
Wednesday, February 28, 2007
Harrowing hair tales
Look what I got in the mail from the lovely Laura Bowers recently:
It's a handy (pun intended) emery board advertising her forthcoming YA novel, Beauty Shop for Rent. (I even used it to file my nails within moments after opening the envelope, since I really needed to do so at the time, though I only used the plain side!) Very nifty.
Laura is also having a contest right now to win a galley copy of her book. See her blog for details. Two of the ways to enter are to share a bad salon experience, or a photo of a bad hairstyle you've had. You can get another entry by posting a link to her contest on your blog. I'm going for broke by doing ALL of these things. I've suffered enough from bad hair to deserve a few entries! ;-)
I've had many bad salon experiences over the years, but one stands out as the worst because it was bad in several shudder-worthy ways. I was in 9th grade, which was still in junior high instead of high school in my town. My hair was flat and limp and wouldn't hold a curl--or more importantly in 1980, couldn't be shaped into properly feathered bangs. Obviously, something had to be done. My grandmother decided to help me out by getting me my first perm--a body wave just to help my hair hold curls. For some reason, even though she usually didn't mind paying for quality and this was a very vulnerable age in my life, she took me to get the perm at a small, hole-in-the-wall sort of beauty college. Here the horrors begain. First, my student hairdresser, Lawanda, was smoking while doing my hair, dropping ashes on me as she worked! Second, she didn't cover my clothes well, and spilled some sort of perm fluid on my favorite t-shirt, leaving a big white stain where the color was apparently bleached out of my shirt. But worst of all...she left the perm solution on too long, and burned a section of hair off the top of my scalp. I'm not sure how big the burned spot was now--maybe the size of a nickel or quarter--but it might as well have been the size of a silver dollar when I was in 9th grade!
As the hair grew in, it stuck straight up, which was very obvious. My solution to this was to keep cutting that section of hair back to crewcut length every time it grew to a quarter or half an inch. I did that for months of the school year. Finally, I decided I had to let it grow out sometime, and so I did. It probably grew to an inch high standing straight up, before it finally started laying flat like the rest of my hair. Meanwhile, throughout that time, a couple of guys at school called me "Mohawk"! At the end of the year, when one of them signed my yearbook, he drew a picture of a man with a Mohawk, and I was so mortified I actually colored the rest of the man's hair in later, so no one would see that in there & figure out what he was referring to. (And I just found my yearbook and scanned it in here!) I never thought much about it after that, and if you'd asked me, I would have said it wasn't that traumatizing...at least, the guys who made fun of me were teasing me in a friendly way, rather than a malicious one. However, when preparing to write this up, I realized that in my YA novel draft, written more than 20 years later, one of the traumatic & formative experiences in the protagonist's past was dyeing her hair bright red in junior high and getting harassed and made fun of about it the rest of the year, with kids calling her Raggedy Ann and Painthead. I guess my "Mohawk" problem stuck with me longer than I thought! (But strangely, I continued getting perms for years after that, and even went to a beauty school for some later haircuts--and not all those experiences were trauma-free, either--but I never again got a perm at a beauty school, and only braved an upscale one for the haircuts!)
I don't have a photo of my mini-Mohawk look, but I still have quite a few bad hair pictures from my past. So, with a bit of humiliation, I present to you a small sampling of Alison's bad hair history. As I said in a humor piece I wrote once: "Bad hair--for some, it's just a phase. For me, it's a way of life!" (This was brought back home at Cynthia Leitich Smith's launch party for her book Tantalize this week, when my bangs were so horribly in my face I had to resort to pulling them back with a headband that made me feel 11 years old all night!) I guess I really need the help of Laura Bowers' protagonist!
Monday, February 26, 2007
A tantalizing weekend
Friday night I had the good fortune to attend a book launch party for Cynthia Leitich Smith's new YA novel, Tantalize. The soiree was hosted by Cynthia and her husband Greg Leitich Smith (who can sing in Italian, by the way) at their amazing 1920s house in the heart of Austin. It was altogether delicious, given the atmosphere, the food, and the company. Cynthia definitely knows how to throw a party. There was a lavish spread of food, there were door prizes related to her book and other local authors' books, and there were even wine servers outfitted in t-shirts from the book's fictional restaurant, Sanguini's. The house had a darkly festive atmosphere, inside and out (I'll have to remember their amusing tactic of blocking off off-limits rooms with crime scene tape!), the weather was perfect for going onto the porch, the house was filled with artsy and literary folks, such as fellow bloggers Jo Whittemore and Liz Garton Scanlon (and many, many books!), and the view could not have been more Austiny--ideal considering that Tantalize is set in Austin. Best of all, every guest received a free hardback copy of Tantalize! I had assumed the book might be for sale at the party. Then when I heard they were free, I expected a paperback advanced reading copy, at best. But we all got gorgeous, autographed hardcover books. It was my first night away from my baby (and my first time to have wine in almost a year!), and all in all was a lovely evening out. The baby...and my husband...even survived without me!
Saturday was the first lazy day we'd had in a while, with absolutely no commitments, so I took the opportunity to lie around reading Tantalize. I read the whole thing that day, despite its being more than 300 pages. I must admit I have never read a vampire or werewolf book before, so I don't know how it compares to others in the genre, but I enjoyed it and cared for the characters, and it certainly kept me reading. I found it suspenseful from beginning to end. And, as a regular YA reader, I loved the way the typical YA elements of the plot blended with the fantasy elements. Of course, living in the Austin area I also loved the Austin-centric nature of the plot (I laughed out loud about the "Bat Anti-Defamation League"), though living north of town, the South Congress area featured in the book is almost as foreign to me as San Antonio. Guess I'll have to go down there soon and see what's what! Cynthia is a talented writer and I'd recommend this book to anyone with an interest in YA or urban fantasy literature. I could definitely imagine it as a movie, also. Though I am wondering now if I should have really drunk the red wine at Cynthia's house! (I did leave the party with fangs, but only the fake ones I'd brought...I hope!)
Saturday was the first lazy day we'd had in a while, with absolutely no commitments, so I took the opportunity to lie around reading Tantalize. I read the whole thing that day, despite its being more than 300 pages. I must admit I have never read a vampire or werewolf book before, so I don't know how it compares to others in the genre, but I enjoyed it and cared for the characters, and it certainly kept me reading. I found it suspenseful from beginning to end. And, as a regular YA reader, I loved the way the typical YA elements of the plot blended with the fantasy elements. Of course, living in the Austin area I also loved the Austin-centric nature of the plot (I laughed out loud about the "Bat Anti-Defamation League"), though living north of town, the South Congress area featured in the book is almost as foreign to me as San Antonio. Guess I'll have to go down there soon and see what's what! Cynthia is a talented writer and I'd recommend this book to anyone with an interest in YA or urban fantasy literature. I could definitely imagine it as a movie, also. Though I am wondering now if I should have really drunk the red wine at Cynthia's house! (I did leave the party with fangs, but only the fake ones I'd brought...I hope!)
Wednesday, February 14, 2007
Happy Valentine's Day!
Happy Heart Day, everyone! For some reason, Valentine's Day always puts a smile on my face, even though it was rarely a romantic day for me when I was single, and even when I don't have plans for it, like today! I guess I have good memories of childhood Valentine treats, classroom parties & card exchanges, etc. It's a hassle to help my kids find valentine cards and address them all, but I still enjoy it somehow. Plus, I just like holidays. (And, I like the candy & flowers my husband gave me this morning!) But my husband actually had lunch with a friend today and we don't want to take 3 kids out to a nice dinner, so we don't have any big plans for the day. But we ordered delivery from Jason's Deli tonight, which is kind of romantic since we met there.
In other news...
- A week after my baby was born, I was diagnosed with late-onset pre-eclampsia, one symptom of which is very high blood pressure, and readmitted to the hospital for 2 nights. My blood pressure finally stabilized with some medication, but went back up into a nerve-wracking range a few days after I came home from the hospital. The dr told me to stay on the meds another 2 weeks & see how it goes. So far, so good--it seems to have stabilized again. I started being a little more active, after trying to rest a lot at first, and I think it really makes me feel better. (Not that I'm particularly active, but I've at least gone out to the store & stuff instead of just staying in resting.)
- My baby is 3 weeks old today! It goes so fast. At his 2-week checkup last week, all seemed well. He was finally back up to his birth weight (minus 1 oz.), & had grown an inch longer.
- Nothing in the world is sweeter than my baby. (Though lots of things are less messy! So far neither one of us can get through the day without at least 1 change of clothes, and usually 3 or 4 in his case!)
- My 6 & 8-year-olds had trouble getting into the original Star Wars movies enough to stay awake through one. Then, enter the Lego Star Wars 2 video game. Now, they are obsessed. They have watched the whole original trilogy now, plus the first movie of the new trilogy (and don't you think that nearly any episode of Star Trek is better than that movie?!). So, I decided to download & play for them Weird Al Yankovic's "Yoda" song. This may have been a mistake. It gets old to hear kids yelling "Yo, yo, yo, yo, Yoda!" all the time.
- My husband's dad & stepmother visited us last week from Colorado. It was a nice, laid-back visit.
- My mother has been sick for a few weeks so my parents haven't been able to meet my baby yet. I hope they can visit while he still looks mostly like a newborn! (Of course, my brother hasn't even met my 6-year-old yet, so who knows?!)
Saturday, January 27, 2007
My baby is here!
My third son, Blake, arrived on Wednesday, January 24th, after only 2 crazy hours of labor! My water broke at 7:20 am and we left for the hospital shortly before 8:00. Between rush hour traffic and rain, it took over an hour to get there. I checked into the hospital at 9:01 am, and Blake was born at 9:36! Click here to meet him! Last night was his first night home, and while I ended up sitting up holding him pretty much all night... (he consented to maybe 10 minutes in his bassinet), we are all doing well and really enjoying our newest and tiniest family member!
Sunday, January 21, 2007
3 weeks into the new year
A couple of months ago, I paid $5 to enter a WritersWeekly.com contest to write a short story in 24 hours this month. They would send out a topic and word count when the contest began, and entrants would have to send in a story that fit the topic and word count within 24 hours of the original e-mail. Then I forgot about the contest. Until today, when I got the second e-mail from them. That is, the one announcing that the contest was over & no more entries would be accepted. I had never seen the first e-mail yesterday with the topic or word count! After a bit of digging, I found it in my deleted mail folder. :-( I get soooooo much spam, I'm obviously going through my mail too quickly. I guess I deleted it because I didn't recognize the sender (the editor's name), but I don't know why I didn't see the clear subject line. And I was sooooooo bored yesterday. As bored as I've been in months or a year. I complained about it several times. Meanwhile, I was supposed to be busily writing a story! (And the topic was vaguely about cooking, which would have been more timely for me than usual since I've been watching Top Chef lately.) Argh. That's at least the second message I've missed lately, so I've got to get less delete-happy. Sigh.
Meanwhile...this is shaping up to be my longest pregnancy yet. I'm 12 days from the baby's due date. My first son was born 12 days from his due date, at 3:20 pm CST. I have just passed that time in this pregnancy. And my second son was 11 days old by this point. While I'm happy to have this baby a week or more past his brother's birthday, the waiting is still getting frustrating. I'm as huge and uncomfortable as I've ever been in my life, and because I keep thinking it could be any minute, I feel compelled to take everything I might need at the hospital with me every time I leave the house! We have bags for me, the older kids (who will stay with some of our friends while I'm giving birth), and the baby in the trunk of our car, but there are last-minute items I still need at home, so I've been dragging things back & forth to the car all the time. Ugh. Both of the other kids came before I expected them, so I'm not used to waiting & wondering, and I also didn't have all these annoying pre-labor symptoms with them. I've been having contractions on & off for more than 2 weeks now! So I'm getting antsy. It's weird to find myself wishing for painful labor to start. Though I still don't have a name for the baby, and the house really isn't ready, either, so I shouldn't be in a hurry. I was at least very glad not to go into labor when we were iced in a few days back!
So the ice is gone, & we have sun again today for the first time in more than a week. It's lovely! We were really going stir crazy being stuck at home for several days, especially with the kids being out of school for 3 days this past week (one for MLK Jr. Day, two for icy weather). Friday night, we went to see Night at the Museum. It was okay, but I don't think the kids were crazy about it. And the happiest news in days is...Girl Scout cookies are here!! We got 3 boxes so far: Thin Mints, my favorite Caramel deLites (known as Samoas in some other states), and the new Lemonades. I was a little wary of the Lemonades, since I loved the lemon creme sandwich cookies they had in years past, and these didn't look as good (big round shortbread cookies with lemon icing), but the lemon icing tastes the same as in the sandwich cookies, and they're really pretty good. My 8-year-old likes them better, because "the lemon is closer to your tongue." But the boxes have fewer, large cookies instead of many small ones, and I'd really prefer more cookies to larger ones! (I'm trying to eat half a cookie at a time...we'll see how long that lasts!)
Meanwhile...this is shaping up to be my longest pregnancy yet. I'm 12 days from the baby's due date. My first son was born 12 days from his due date, at 3:20 pm CST. I have just passed that time in this pregnancy. And my second son was 11 days old by this point. While I'm happy to have this baby a week or more past his brother's birthday, the waiting is still getting frustrating. I'm as huge and uncomfortable as I've ever been in my life, and because I keep thinking it could be any minute, I feel compelled to take everything I might need at the hospital with me every time I leave the house! We have bags for me, the older kids (who will stay with some of our friends while I'm giving birth), and the baby in the trunk of our car, but there are last-minute items I still need at home, so I've been dragging things back & forth to the car all the time. Ugh. Both of the other kids came before I expected them, so I'm not used to waiting & wondering, and I also didn't have all these annoying pre-labor symptoms with them. I've been having contractions on & off for more than 2 weeks now! So I'm getting antsy. It's weird to find myself wishing for painful labor to start. Though I still don't have a name for the baby, and the house really isn't ready, either, so I shouldn't be in a hurry. I was at least very glad not to go into labor when we were iced in a few days back!
So the ice is gone, & we have sun again today for the first time in more than a week. It's lovely! We were really going stir crazy being stuck at home for several days, especially with the kids being out of school for 3 days this past week (one for MLK Jr. Day, two for icy weather). Friday night, we went to see Night at the Museum. It was okay, but I don't think the kids were crazy about it. And the happiest news in days is...Girl Scout cookies are here!! We got 3 boxes so far: Thin Mints, my favorite Caramel deLites (known as Samoas in some other states), and the new Lemonades. I was a little wary of the Lemonades, since I loved the lemon creme sandwich cookies they had in years past, and these didn't look as good (big round shortbread cookies with lemon icing), but the lemon icing tastes the same as in the sandwich cookies, and they're really pretty good. My 8-year-old likes them better, because "the lemon is closer to your tongue." But the boxes have fewer, large cookies instead of many small ones, and I'd really prefer more cookies to larger ones! (I'm trying to eat half a cookie at a time...we'll see how long that lasts!)
Friday, December 29, 2006
The end of the year as we know it
All over the Internet, I'm seeing people doing recaps of 2006 and resolutions for 2007. I wasn't sure I was up to doing a recap of 2006, which has been a very odd year for me, but on one group people listed their top 10 most memorable events of 2006--whether good or bad--and I felt I was at least up to that.
So, in chronological order, 10 of the highlights & lowlights of my 2006:
1. Moved from Texas to Florida
2. My husband and I renewed our wedding vows in a citywide ceremony on the beach
3. Got pregnant!
4. Our van got totaled
5. My husband lost his job
6. Our youngest son started kindergarten
7. My husband and I celebrated our 15th wedding anniversary
8. My grandfather died
9. Moved from Florida back to Texas only 8 months after moving there!
10. We had our first Christmas at home (not traveling)
I wasn't planning to make any sort of new year's resolutions, seeing that I'm about to have a new baby, which will throw everything off. I feel like 2007 is a big mystery, what with a baby I haven't met yet and (I hope) a job my husband hasn't gotten yet...so I don't feel like I can plan anything. However, I just read Anastasia Suen's blog post about deciding on a "theme" for the year instead of a resolution, and I'm thinking "passion" would be a good one. Well, either passion or love, I'm not sure yet. Passion would be more all-encompassing, and I try to make it one of my theme words anyway, but maybe with the baby coming I should focus more on family.... I guess I have some time to think about it, but I like the idea of thinking of a theme instead of specific goals, especially for this coming year.
In other news, I'm finally 35 weeks pregnant as of today (yay!). That means my due date is in 5 weeks, but at the moment I'm just hoping not to have to add "had our baby early" to my list of 2006 events! I've had SO MANY "false" contractions the past couple of days. And as mentioned, we stayed home for Christmas for the first time this year, and had a lovely celebration, but my parents also visited us for a late celebration a couple of days ago, which was nice. And today, we went to see the new movie of Charlotte's Web, which we all enjoyed. It seemed faithful to the book, and pleasantly old-fashioned compared to the usual smarmy kids' movies these days that are loaded with pop culture references that will be outdated in a year.
Also, our friend Jeff is getting married tomorrow. We can't attend because I don't want to travel at this point in my pregnancy, but Happy Wedding & Marriage, Jeff!
So, in chronological order, 10 of the highlights & lowlights of my 2006:
1. Moved from Texas to Florida
2. My husband and I renewed our wedding vows in a citywide ceremony on the beach
3. Got pregnant!
4. Our van got totaled
5. My husband lost his job
6. Our youngest son started kindergarten
7. My husband and I celebrated our 15th wedding anniversary
8. My grandfather died
9. Moved from Florida back to Texas only 8 months after moving there!
10. We had our first Christmas at home (not traveling)
I wasn't planning to make any sort of new year's resolutions, seeing that I'm about to have a new baby, which will throw everything off. I feel like 2007 is a big mystery, what with a baby I haven't met yet and (I hope) a job my husband hasn't gotten yet...so I don't feel like I can plan anything. However, I just read Anastasia Suen's blog post about deciding on a "theme" for the year instead of a resolution, and I'm thinking "passion" would be a good one. Well, either passion or love, I'm not sure yet. Passion would be more all-encompassing, and I try to make it one of my theme words anyway, but maybe with the baby coming I should focus more on family.... I guess I have some time to think about it, but I like the idea of thinking of a theme instead of specific goals, especially for this coming year.
In other news, I'm finally 35 weeks pregnant as of today (yay!). That means my due date is in 5 weeks, but at the moment I'm just hoping not to have to add "had our baby early" to my list of 2006 events! I've had SO MANY "false" contractions the past couple of days. And as mentioned, we stayed home for Christmas for the first time this year, and had a lovely celebration, but my parents also visited us for a late celebration a couple of days ago, which was nice. And today, we went to see the new movie of Charlotte's Web, which we all enjoyed. It seemed faithful to the book, and pleasantly old-fashioned compared to the usual smarmy kids' movies these days that are loaded with pop culture references that will be outdated in a year.
Also, our friend Jeff is getting married tomorrow. We can't attend because I don't want to travel at this point in my pregnancy, but Happy Wedding & Marriage, Jeff!
Saturday, December 23, 2006
Holiday wishes
or someone else getting ready to make a special delivery?
Happy Holidays from me & my little elves!
(P.S. Baby due Feb. 2!)
Sunday, December 10, 2006
Highlights of the week
I met Louis Sachar yesterday! You know, the Newbery winner for Holes, and author of twenty-something other children's books including the very funny Wayside School books that my 8-year-old just happened to be re-reading this month anyway. Mr. Sachar spoke at an Austin SCBWI meeting yesterday, at a Barnes & Noble bookstore in Austin. Then I got to speak to him very briefly when I stood in line to have him sign my copy of Holes, a new copy of Sideways Stories from Wayside School for all of my boys (which we already had...but this copy does have new art), and a Marvin Redpost book for my 8-yr-old.
Not that I could really think of anything to say. During the question & answer time, I asked a question that I think seemed stupid in that setting, but which I had really wondered about before--that is, whether he'd had really mean teachers growing up. I only asked it because he had just related a story about a real-life mean teacher (not his) who had inspired part of one of his other books. To my surprise, he said he could only remember one mean teacher, and didn't seem to think his books had many. But the third Wayside School book, which we'd just finished two nights earlier, has several really mean teachers and other school authorities, his book Someday, Angeline has a particularly mean teacher in a more realistic setting, and of course Holes is chock full of cruel authority figures. I think the third Wayside School book actually gets pretty dark, especially for a humor book. I also asked why he chose to write for kids, but he didn't get around to answering that part. I think I've read, though, that the first Wayside School book got started when he was actually working at a school. Anyway, he was a friendly, personable guy, and I was glad he agreed to speak at our meeting! He lives here in town, but rarely speaks in public, at least here. (He did mention a book tour he recently went on, though, where he met a young woman sword swallower who had a potato tattooed on her ankle like one of the kids in a Wayside School book, & appeared on a reality TV show about tattoos, getting another tattoo based on one of his books!)
Not that I could really think of anything to say. During the question & answer time, I asked a question that I think seemed stupid in that setting, but which I had really wondered about before--that is, whether he'd had really mean teachers growing up. I only asked it because he had just related a story about a real-life mean teacher (not his) who had inspired part of one of his other books. To my surprise, he said he could only remember one mean teacher, and didn't seem to think his books had many. But the third Wayside School book, which we'd just finished two nights earlier, has several really mean teachers and other school authorities, his book Someday, Angeline has a particularly mean teacher in a more realistic setting, and of course Holes is chock full of cruel authority figures. I think the third Wayside School book actually gets pretty dark, especially for a humor book. I also asked why he chose to write for kids, but he didn't get around to answering that part. I think I've read, though, that the first Wayside School book got started when he was actually working at a school. Anyway, he was a friendly, personable guy, and I was glad he agreed to speak at our meeting! He lives here in town, but rarely speaks in public, at least here. (He did mention a book tour he recently went on, though, where he met a young woman sword swallower who had a potato tattooed on her ankle like one of the kids in a Wayside School book, & appeared on a reality TV show about tattoos, getting another tattoo based on one of his books!)
In other news, I'm 32 weeks pregnant now. Meaning I'm due in just under 8 weeks, but again, expecting the baby anywhere from 4 weeks on. We're not at all ready, but...I do feel ready to stop being so huge & uncomfortable! I can't believe how active this little guy is, and how hard it is for me to do basic things anymore, like roll over in bed, tie my shoes, or lean over to something up! At any rate, I'm glad I've gotten this far with no complications! I'm on a group for moms expecting in February, and two of the members have already had their babies! One at 29 weeks, one at 30--the babies seem to be okay, but are both in the NICU, of course. I'm really glad I'm far enough along now that if the baby decides to show up early, he will likely do pretty well. But here's hoping he at least holds out until 2007!
Monday, November 27, 2006
And now for something completely self-indulgent...
Because I haven't posted in so long, and was kind of bored, I decided to compile one of those "100 Things About Me" lists I've seen on lots of blogs in the past.
Without further ado, 100 things about me.
Without further ado, 100 things about me.
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