Thursday, September 13, 2012

Yes, It's Been A While

I've been noticing the phases that I go through in a year's time. Sometimes I pull way back and suck into my little turtle shell and don't want to be social at all. Other times, like right now, I go through these diarrhea-of-the-mouth phases where I sort of overload the world with my every thought and feeling. The good thing about this is that it has me wanting to blog, something I just learned I haven't done since February!! (Gasp) I'm sure this phase, like all the rest, will pass in the near future and I'll stop blogging again but for now I'd like to take advantage of it. So here's where I'm at. (Remember, this is my private blog in which I share personal thoughts and feelings.) I am trying to find my way in this new school year, with the house empty again except for me and a cat competing for the gold medal for Most Hours Slept In A Day. (So far it's a close race.) I am working on getting up in the morning and getting things done that need to be done and not just what I want to do. (ie doing the dishes or laundry instead of sitting on my couch in my pjs knitting, watching hour after hour of Downton Abbey. What I have become a pro at is finding anything else to do except write my sequel. Seriously, I've mastered it. And it's not good. And it's weighing on my mind every bloody hour of every bloody day. It's not that I don't want to write it, I do. It's just...well, we'll save that for another post. So that's me. Knitting, watching Netflix and Hulu Plus and working on not succumbing to the autumn funk that gets me every time, the sneaky little minx. Also, I'm still trying to find a part-time job, which, besides a little extra income, would help with the whole getting out of bed/the house thing. So cross your fingers for me that I'll find something soon. Well that's it for now. Hey, at least it's something, right??

Monday, February 13, 2012

Reality Check

Now that my blog is private I feel safer, more secure, about what I can and want to say here. It's a nice feeling after the last few weeks of growing more and more exposed online. I have to laugh at my one New Years Resolution that I truly did have the best intentions of carrying out: blogging more. In a way, I guess, I have been. Just not here, not on this blog. How could I have known that a few weeks after making that resolution that my life would shift in a new direction (ie phase 2 of my publishing journey) forcing my focus to be dedicated almost entirely to my new Internet home (ie my book website) and basically, the online world in general. Such a huge percentage of my days are spent on my laptop, contacting, connecting, networking. Business, business, business. But what a business it is. This is my business now. I am, by trade, a writer. An author. A novelist. All of the above. And it feels akin to standing on the highest peak of a very tall mountain. I did it. I made it. My book isn't printed yet, but it's being printed as we speak and one day in the very near future I will receive a package on my doorstep--a box. And it will be full of my books. My book. My precious piece of me that I dug from somewhere deep in my gut and laid out in word form. A fraction of my soul.

And because of this thing I've created, my life is changing. Every day, I can feel it. Undoubtedly one of the most exciting, anticipating times of my life, and it's only going to change more. I already find myself struggling to stay grounded to reality, to break away from this high I'm riding to clean my house, remind my children and husband why I'm here and that I love them more than words can say. And then I read yet another 4 star review from someone who fell just as in love with my Jude and Olivia as I did, who hurt when she hurt, who cried tears of joy when she did, who fell in love with Jude as Olivia did and my dream is fulfilled. I'm right back up there, up in the clouds, riding that high. This was my dream, my goal, when I started this journey: to have people--even one person, but hopefully the world--love my story as much as I do. I could quit and walk away right now, before the first royalty check ever comes in, and die happy.

I'm a writer, and a mother, and a wife, except not in that order. And that is all I want to be.

Saturday, January 14, 2012

NOT Talking About My Book.

So life got insane. Fast. And I feel like I have tunnel vision. And all I do is eat, sleep and breathe my book and not even the good part (aka the story). I can't break away from the constant wondering of what I should be doing to promote it and pretty soon everyone's gonna get sick of it. Of me! But it's my job and it's what I have to do.

But not here. Here I can write about anything other than my book. Like, about how Bill and I went on the most spur-of-the-moment date tonight when we suddenly found ourselves without kids to go see Sherlock Holmes. (Love R.D.Jr., LOVE Jude Law, didn't so much follow the movie. Like, at all.) And about how Payson was playing baseball (pitching) on the Kinect and said, "I'm gonna give him a hard one!" and his super mature parents burst into a fit of giggles. And about how Macy came home from school today sobbing cause one of her best friends called her a "big fat ugly jerk" and my heart literally broke into a thousand pieces. And how I'm getting my hair cut and filled tomorrow and I'm really excited about it. And that I've taken myself off gluten to try and prove my theory that it causes my weird, bloaty stomach pain that gets worse every day. (So far, my theory has been correct.) I can also talk about my amazing friends and family who are here to support me and help me in any way they can. And that I had no idea today was Friday the 13th until just now, which is actually Saturday the 14th. And that my kids' beds are empty and I don't like it. There's so much more I could talk about but I really have to try to go to sleep in my efforts to break my cycle of living like a firefighter.

Thanks for listening.

Sunday, January 8, 2012

I never thought it'd be so hard to blog so much. Me? Run out of things to say? As it so happens, my life isn't as interesting as I thought. I thought my problem with blogging more often would be forgetting to, or lack of desire, not lack of material. What if people don't care about the fact that I did absolutely nothing today? What if I'm not too keen on advertising that fact? But I don't want to be that person that I always end up being, making grand declarations and not following through with them. And so, I blog.

I may have done nothing today but last night I did. And I mean literally, all night, while the rest of you slept soundly in your beds, I was wide awake. All night. Because I slept all day. Because I still didn't feel good and it's completely thrown my sleep schedule off. Anywho, by 5:30 this morning I gave up hope of getting tired and had a sudden desire to work on the "about the author" page on my website. Yes, I have a website, my very own .com but I can't tell you what it is yet cause its not ready. Cause I've been dragging my feet. Until last night. I mean this morning. Very, very early this morning. I sat in the dark and wrote 10o interesting (I hope) facts about myself, ranging from my love of desserts to my childhood nicknames. It was really fun to do. Then, after FINALLY falling asleep at 6:30 and getting a few hours of sleep under my belt, I woke up and thought about my list and realized that some facts that seemed totally appropriate to share with the world at 5:30 am on no sleep didn't seem so much anymore. Not to mention the fact that I had two number 34's, was missing numbers 72-75, and stated my age as 33, not 32. So I revised and re-edited (like the good little author that I am) and came up with what I hope is an entertaining (but not too revealing) list of things about me.

With that done, all I have left to do is write up a quick summary of my book (so ridiculously easy i have no idea why I've put it off) and we can launch this thing! I can't wait! Seriously, it will be awesome. I can't wait for you all to see it.

But now I'm gonna be a good girl and attempt to put my phone down and go to sleep cause 8:30 church is coming whether I want it to or not!

Friday, January 6, 2012

Things I'm thinking about today:

-Marketing. I've never done it before, I have no idea how to do it, and I'm expected to do it. Perfect recipe for anxiety.

-Money. Why is it either feast or famine? Why can't it be, like, always feast?

-Writing. I'm itching to do it again, only I don't know where to begin. I need to start my sequel but I need to decide a few things before I can begin.

-Sickness. It sucks.

-Sleeping. Why am I obsessed with it?

-Kids. They're growing. Way too fast.

-Cats. Why do they insist on pooping on the floor a foot away from their freshly cleaned litter box?

-Reading. I finished my book club book and have $30 sitting in my Amazon account just begging to be used. The possibilities are endless!

-Friends. I love mine. I wish I could tell them without freaking them out.

-Basketball. Macy had her first practice today. There goes my Tuesday and Thursday nights. On the plus side, she loved it. (Any 9 or 10 year olds wanting to join? Her team has a few spots left and she would LOVE to have a friend on it. We don't know anyone on it.)

-Cowboys and Aliens. Just finished watching it. It was okay.

-Diets. I'm sorry, "lifestyle change." It's just not happening. I need a miracle. I need to feel okay about my body. I need to look good in my itsy bitsy teeny weeny yellow polka dot bikini in Hawaii. Did that make you laugh? The thought of me in a bikini? Well it should have, and if it didn't, you have no sense of humor at all.

-Hawaii. Cause I'm always thinking about Hawaii.

-Bedtime. Yeah right! This is the one time of day I don't think about sleep.

I'm out.

Wednesday, January 4, 2012

Sicko

Oh, how I love to be sick. It's not very often that I get this kind of sick; the kind that is actually something you can catch from someone else and isn't just some kind of unexplained "don't feel good." I woke up yesterday morning with a slight sore throat. By mid-day it was more than slight. By evening it was making my head ache. (Which was extra fun preparing for a house full of Bunco friends.) This morning I woke up...and rolled over and went back to sleep. All day. This isn't unheard of for me, but at least this time I had a valid excuse to do so. I finally forced myself out of bed at dinnertime and now I'm sitting here wishing I could go back to bed, but even sleeping doesn't feel good anymore. My throat hurts, my head hurts, and it feels like someone is pumping air into my head. Good times, good times.

But Bunco was fun, even hosting it, which always stresses me out big-time. I can never relax enough to enjoy the game. Am I moving it along too fast? Am I going too slow? Is my house too hot? Too cold? Is my cat rubbing up against people's legs and I'm totally oblivious to it? (I sometimes forget that not everyone is a cat-lover like me, and that, in fact, there are some people--shocking as it may seem--that actually hate cats. Go figure.) But all went well. My fellow Bunco players raved about my dinner (tortilla soup, my absolute fave), my new home decor they hadn't seen since I'd switched it out, and, as always seems to be the case when I host for some bizarre reason, I won High Score, the biggest prize you can win at Bunco. ($20 gift card to Target, holla!)

Now my hubby is at basketball and I have to decide if I want to curl up on the couch and watch something good or get in the bath and finish my book for book club, which is always something I love to do when I'm not feeling good. But that would mean having to clean my bath first, so...looks like watching something it is.

Tuesday, January 3, 2012

Memory Lanes

Today we took our kids bowling for the first time ever. It was one of those things that made me feel like I could put on my "Good Mom" badge, even though the whole thing was Bill's idea. Today was the last day of his 10 day vacation and he wanted to spend it doing something fun. So bowling we went. It was definitely pricier than I'd thought it would be, but I have to say, it was totally worth it. The kids had a blast, and, frankly, I'd forgotten about my stellar bowling skillz.


"Take a picture of our hideous shoes." --Macy

That's right. I pretty much rocked the lanes. I took a picture of the scoreboard after our first game but it was too tiny and blurry to show the multiple X's across the board and the final score of 140, which happened to be the highest number on the screen. Hidden talent? You could say that.

I think the best part, though (besides beating Bill), was watching Payson try and chuck the ball that was bigger than him down the lane. It was priceless. It only flew out of his hand on the back swing twice. And I must have passed on my bowling genes to Macy, cause she got the hang of it really quickly. I nicknamed her the Spare Queen, cause she got one almost every time (with the aid of the bumpers, but, still.) All in all, it was an awesome time that I will always treasure.

Now I am in full panic mode because I am hosting Bunco at my house tomorrow night and my house isn't clean (that was my idea of what we should do today), I have no groceries, no idea what to make for dinner, no prizes, no idea what to even do for prizes. I usually give myself two full days to get ready for Bunco. Tomorrow promises to be insane. Wish me luck.

Monday, January 2, 2012

Apparantly Surfing Movies Make Me Cry


The first day of 2012 went fairly well. I woke up at the crack of dawn to be to church by 8:30. (1 week down, only 51 to go) I embarrassed myself by sleeping through the second half of the first hour like I knew I would, and then I spent the last two hours chasing around five toddlers as opposed to 17, which was, needless to say, fabulous. Then I came home and took a nap for a length of time that I am neither proud of or going to disclose. (New Year's Resolution #4: Sleep less = FAIL) I woke up to the smell of frozen lasagna baking in the oven that my amazing husband threw in for me so I didn't have to wake up (even though I was weeeeeell past the time that I should have) and had a yummy family dinner, after which we decided to watch Soul Surfer, which Macy got for Christmas.

This is where my day took a bizarre turn. I had heard that the movie was good. Really good. Clean, feel-good, inspiring. What I wasn't told was that it would inexplicably become the third movie I would ever cry during. Literally. The third. And I didn't just well up and squeeze out a tear or two. I cried. And cried and cried and cried. And when I wasn't actually crying my eyes were burning, tears hovering on the brink just waiting for the next emotional moment to send them over the edge. And then I was crying some more. I have no idea why. There was just something about this girl, experiencing one of the most tragic, horrific things imaginable (getting her arm bit off by a shark, for those of you who don't know what Soul Surfer is about) and just going back out there, trying her hardest to continue to do what she loved most in the world. Now, I know there are 6, 394 other "don't give up" movies out there with the exact same message, and, if I'm being honest, I usually can't stand them. I find them incredibly cheesy and I hate being made to feel emotional. (Don't tug at these heartstrings, they are un-tugable.) But when this girl's arm disappeared down a shark's throat and she's paddling one-armed to shore in shock, she's muttering a prayer, over and over. And something about that--her faith--hit me hard, and for the rest of the dang movie, I was a blubbering mess.

I want that kind of faith. I want to know that if I'm ever out surfing and a shark attacks me and rips off my arm (highly probable), that instead of screaming my head off and thrashing around, I pray. She was such an example to me. If you haven't seen this movie, see it. Besides the message of faith, it also stresses family togetherness, positivity, service, and forgiveness. Seriously, I can't say enough good things about it. Oh, and as a bonus, it takes place in Kauai, Hawaii, where Bill and I will be in June!!! So excited.

Now the day is over but thanks to my lengthy nap, I'm on the opposite side of the world from tired. Thank goodness for iPhone games.

Day 1, 2012: success.