New Mooooon..... you saw me standing alone....

...but then I found out that two of my friends are closet Twi-Haaaaards.....
and we tricked a fourth unsuspecting friend into braving the 10:00 show with ussssss......

(You have to sing that part really fast to make it work.)

So! As I have declared elsewhere, I am both psyched about the movie AND no longer embarrassed about said psyched-ness. But I'm not going in costume (even though I not-so-secretly want this shirt), and I'm not redecorating my room in RPattz posters (in part because I would definitely go wolf pack paper first), and I'm not doing any of these other things listed below*...


like getting a tattoo...

or creating Twilight crafts...

(This is the cover in cross stitch. I bow to this woman's tenacity.)

(And wtf is this, you might ask? Why, Bella's womb, of course! *shakes head* What else would it be?)

 or making corn mazes...

or having a Twilight birthday party. ETA: Turns out my girl Amanda made this cake! She is awesome! EATA: Turns out it wasn't THIS cake, but an identical one. She's still awesome!














So what AM I doing?

I'm thinking it's embarressing that KStew throws a decidedly better spiral than me.


I'm kind of wishing I knew a Twi-hater I could do this to, just for fun:


I'm loving the fan-made signs from the premier:


You know anything with a Wayne's World reference is going to get my approval:

I'm watching it restaged with action figures...

And I'm loving Myra's explanation (and hope she doesn't mind that I borrowed Edward On A Stick):

"I adore the fact that all of this hype originated in one woman's head, manifested itself on her computer while she juggled small children, winged its way to an agent who believed in the power of the story and ended at a publisher who felt the same. Except it didn't end there .... because I'm going to see part of that story on the big screen. TONIGHT!"

But mostly? I'm just killing time online. Hence this post.

Now is it time for the 10:00 show yet?

*I'm not trash talking about these people. If that's what keeps them off the streets? More power to them. I should be so lucky as to create characters someday that inspire this kind of loyalty and creativity.


,,,*checks clock* It's still not ten?!?

**Special thanks to my dear husband, who bought me two tickets and said, "I'll go, but I understand if you want to go with some girlfriends," and also to Krista for the sparkly gif.

Winter gardening

Did you know that you can grow vegetables in the winter? I didn't either. But husband is convinced it is possible. (See, people, this is why books are dangerous! They make people think!)

Seeds starting in our kitchen:


Cold frames in our garden. What's a cold frame? It's just a box with no bottom and a transparent lid. It retains heat like a teeny tiny greenhouse. Our green cold frame used to have a glass lid, but guess what happened when the lid slammed? Yup, glass all over my yard. So we switched to plastic.



Garlic is planted and sprouting in the farthest one. I know peas and herbs are also on the agenda.I'll let you know how this goes...

Of mice and meow

So. Someone gave my son this toy mouse on Halloween, and really? I could have done without it. The tail is especially realistic and creepy.

My cat is no help, but at least someone is using my quilting supplies.

Seriously, I got nothin' today y'all. Too many errands and not enough time. But I really did have bad dreams about mice last night. I'm not even scared of the damn things!

Gifts To Make For... Readers and Writers

A collection of gifts you can make for the readers and writers in your life

A bedside organizer that doesn't take up any room from Sew Mama Sew

Fabric covered journals from kirin notebook

Bookmark ideas from How About Orange








Little House in the Suburbs










and Skip To My Lou

Catnapping

My best friend started reading my third draft in chapter installments as I revised this weekend. YA is not her thing and of course honest criticism can be dangerous to a friendship, but writing is what our friendship was originally based on... which I suppose makes the stakes even higher, since she hadn't read anything of mine in a decade or so.

Imagine my relief when I woke up to this in my inbox Sunday morning:


Jack says


*This title is extra funny if you know that my best friend's name is Cat.

Follow Friday, Blog Style

Alternative title: When Cool Things Happen to Cool Kids

Networking is one of those things that I know is important. In theory. But I hate it. I've read tons of articles about its importance and cringed through them all, thinking, "How the hell am I going to network with authors? I live in Arkansas!"

But I read about a forum called Absolute Write, checked it out, and slowly but surely got sucked in. AW's Young Adult forum is friendly and full of talented writers of all ages and all stages of publication who are happy to offer support, constructive criticism and the occasional much-needed kick in the pants. Today I thought I would spread some blog love to some of the unbelievably nice people there.

Kids for whom Cool Stuff is Currently Happening:

• As Stephanie puts it, "A is for awesome-- and agent!"
• My fellow southern belle Krista just signed with an agent as well. Give her some love as she switches her blog from one platform to another.
• HUGE news for Kody this week: Her book The Duff, scheduled to come out in 2010, has been optioned for film rights! More on her blog about what that means, exactly.
• Kirsten's book Like Mandarin is due out in 2011, and she is currently traipsing about Europe. She also posts cute animals on a regular basis.
• Katie's book Bad Girls Don't Die has been out for awhile (it's on my "to read" list). She was nice enough to leave me a thoughtful crit in the "share your work" forum, and her blog regularly features craftiness. You know how I feel about craftiness!
• Hannah's book Break has gotten nothing but rave reviews, so far as I've heard.
  

(Apparently it helps to have a name that starts with K. Score!)

Cool Kids for whom Cool Stuff Should Happen ASAP

• Cory let me read her awesome book Touched when I was a brand new newbie on AW. Turns out it's awesome and so is she.  
• Deb keeps me in snark and snitches and demon exorcisms and Boomer Sooners.
• Laura is an expat living in the UK who goes cool places (Istanbul, anyone?) and posts cool quilts.
• I never know what Kathleen is going to post-- author interviews, funny videos, deep thoughts...
• Race is delightfully random.
• Vero posts tons of information about her current WIP and is just as sweet as they come.
• Jamie doesn't have a blog linked but she does post on the OPWFT blog. She also has a Twitter feed and a wicked sense of humor.
• Annie has some of funniest book titles ever.
• Sage! Where's your blog?!?
  

Cool Kids who really are still Kids but are Cooler than I was as a Kid

• Amna, Sarah, Karla, Emelia and Leasie are brave souls attempting school and writing at the same time. 
• I *think* Margo and Laurie are teenagers. I'm afraid to be wrong. I'm pretty sure Margo could take me.
  

Cool Kids who don't post as much but I'm still pretty sure are Cool

• Leila,  Kaitlin, Lee, Kristin and Kristin are some of the contributors on YA Highway. (See? K names!)
  

ETA: Cool Kids with big freaking obvious links in their siggies that I somehow managed to miss

• Becca!
• and Herb!
  

Disclaimers:

• Verla Kay's Blue Boards also come highly recommended, but they don't run on VBulletin so I can't seem to navigate them.
• If I missed you, I'm sorry!! It's nothing personal. Leave me a comment and I'll add you with an enormous mea culpa for being such a lameass.
  

Go Outside

When I got back into writing and starting talking about it on this blog, I wasn't sure if I should keep the other categories-- crafts and sewing and playing in the dirt. But agent Rachelle Gardner says:

"...spend time everyday in activities that are productive, that keep you moving physically, but don't engage your brain."

And Stephen King says:

"It starts with this: put your desk in the corner, and every time you sit down to write, remind yourself why it isn't in the middle of the room. Life isn't a support-system for art. It's the other way around."

I say: Done. And my boys say: Woo hoo!

Peter Piper picks a peck of pickled okra

My best friend makes killer pickled okra with habañeros and/or Thai chilies.But she lives very far away, and we had a ton of okra and peppers ourselves, so I bugged her until she sent me her recipe. My better half put his brewing expertise to work and voila: Spicy pickled okra.

Okra Pickles (hot pack, 4 pints)

3.5 lbs sm okra pods (bigger is ok, too, see below)
1/3 c canning salt (*sub: 1 c canning salt = 1 c + 2 T Morton kosher salt; purists will say it's not an ok substitute, but the chemistry in pickles is very forgiving, and I think it works really well.)
2 teaspoons dill seed
3 c water
3 c vinegar
4 cloves garlic (as desired)
hot ass peppers

"Trim okra (try not to cut the pods, but if a couple get poked, it's ok). Boil salt, dill, water and vinegar. Pack okra into hot jars with 1/4" headspace. Distribute garlic and peppers as desired. Ladle hot liquid over okra with 1/4" headspace. Remove air bubbles and adjust two-piece caps. Process 15 min in BWB.

I did three pints and one quart (I think), b/c some of the okra I had were too long for the pint jars. The vinegar/water/salt ratio is what's important for the preserving process, so I'm pretty sure I just whipped up some extra liquid to get the quart jar to full size (that was cool, since you can't make adjustments on the fly like that with jams et al). I found that the headspace was really important in this one, since I'm pretty sure some of the liquid gets sucked into the okra, so if you start short on headspace, it ends up definitely too short by the time it's all done with. I remember reprocessing at least one of the jars.

Also, if you have both wide and regular neck jars, I strongly recommend using the regular neck jars for this kind of thing. It has no inherent benefit for the pickled okra, but it also doesn't impede access, and since having wide mouth jars does matter on other recipes, I've found pickles to be a great way to use up the reg necks. Just a thought.

Also also wik: my understanding of the lay of the preserving land is that if you're going to store something for more than about a month, it's highly advised to use a proper BWB, rather than using the "upside down hot jar" suction method. I'm not sure what your plans are, but I thought I'd mention it."

Platonic character crushes

I posted here and here about characters that make me wish they were real. So I could smooch them. Just a little. I posed the question of why they are appealing, and for me, Emilia hit the nail on the head when she said it's a sense of humor. (She also has impeccable taste in fictitious people, and a really great blog.)

So I was surprised when I put together my "List of Characters I Would Want to Be BFFs With," because instead of comic relief, it's mostly characters who are trustworthy, steady, smart... okay, and a little smartassed.

In no particular order...

Donna from That 70's Show. I hated that her story line ended up "sit around at home and wait for Eric and dye your hair blond." Her character was so much cooler than that.

Apparently this is the kid who is playing Seth in Eclipse.

Personally, I picture him like this:

By the way, a friend accused me of writing fan fiction the other day. I don't. Thanks. But at some point I was directed to a piece that I fought against reading ("fan fiction? are you kidding me?") and when I finally gave in, I laughed my ass off. No lemons, just silliness from Seth's perspective.

Anyway.

Another BFF candidate: Liz Lemon from 30 Rock. This one might actually just be a celebrity crush-- but she created the character, so I'm counting it.





"Oh hai, I am SO not Frannie from The Stand."



Definitely Hermione and Ginny. 10000 extra cool points to JKRowling for making girl characters that are realistic AND worth emulating.



Someone I don't recommend you emulate, but that I might know in real life: Slater from Dazed and Confused.


I would definitely be buddies with Mater. Yep.


How could you not adore Einstein from Watchers?

This picture makes me sad because our golden retriever ran away a few months ago. His name was Augustus Woodrow-- after these fellas:

Unlike someone above, these two were brilliantly cast in the miniseries version.

And last but not least: Turk from Scrubs. Seriously, how can you resist the all time air band champion?

The horror... the horror

I haven't read Stephen King's new book, which prompted one journalist to claim that King is the most underrated literary novelist of our time, but I did read King's On Writing this weekend. It was every bit as good as my writer friends had claimed, which was a relief, because I spent a good chunk of my teenage years reading and re-reading The Stand, and might have been crushed by a less-than-stellar book of advice.

But I wasn't, and I copied a ton of quotations from it for future inspiration, seeing as it was a library book and I didn't think they'd appreciate outright theft of the book.

The first thing I took away from this book: Spouses *can* be good beta readers. Should they be your only extra pair of eyes? Definitely not. But so much of the conventional advice says that spouses and friends can't be objective. Judging from the amount of scribbling my husband did on my 2nd draft, I'd beg to differ-- and so would Stephen King, whose wife is his "Constant Reader."

"Whenever I see a first novel dedicated to a wife (or husband), I think, There's someone who knows. Writing is a lonely job. Having someone who believes in you makes a lot of difference." (p. 74)

Should I get published some day, I doubt anyone would be surprised to see my husband's name front and center on the dedication page.

*pauses for audience to say "Awwww!"*

Ahem. So I won't post every quote I wrote down, but here are a few more: Two good descriptions of what has always grabbed me about King's writing:

"If you want to be a successful writer, you must be able to describe it [a scene or object], and in a way that will cause your reader to prickle in recognition."

"You cannot hope to sweep someone else away by the force of your writing until it has been done to you."

And on writing groups, which King suggests you take with a grain of salt... or grit, if you will:

"It is, after all, the dab of grit that seeps into an oyster's shell that makes the pearl, not pearl-making seminars with other oysters."

Monitor motivation

Natalie Whipple has an "inspiration" section in her sidebar, including some words of encouragement from a fortune cookie. I happen to have a fortune taped to my monitor (right between the RGB codes for work's logo and the CNTL+ALT shortcuts for accent marks):

"A dream you have will come true."

Of course, that's BS unless you put some effort into it, so I also have these reminders:

The first I copied from a Facebook status update by the insanely talented Hudsons: "All vision and no action is a dream, while all action and no vision is a nightmare."

The second came from Natalie Goldberg's Wild Mind: "No one cares that much whether you write or not. You just have to do it."

Whether it's writing, another passion or just life in general, what are your motivational words of wisdom? 

An egregious error

In yesterday's post about character crushes, I left out my current and favorite TV crush: Jim Halpert from "The Office." *swoon*




I might also have a *slight* crush on House.


Oh! And Hyde! How did I forget about Hyde?!?



An Allman Brothers shirt is a quick way to my heart.

This show shouldn't have gone for the 7th season, but man, I loved it. I kept watching because they felt like friends. Hmm... maybe tomorrow's post will be about characters you just want to hang out with...

Anyway. I don't love these characters because I have the hots for the actors who play them. I love them because some writer created a quirky, appealing personality that for some reason or another grabbed my attention and made me laugh or say "Awww!" I want my own characters to have that same spark, and thinking about my personal faves seems like a good exercise in ferreting out that "IT" factor.

So tell me: What makes you squee over a character?

*A lot of these icons came from random LiveJournal communities I found in Google searches. My apologies for not crediting the owners-- if you recognize one that's yours and want credit, let me know!

Character crushes

I don't think I can phrase this better than the original poster over at AW, who asked:

"Who are those characters--in any genre--you're secretly crushing on? You know--the ones you wouldn't kick out of bed for being figments of other people's imaginations?

Or, more chastely, the ones with whom you wouldn't mind having a coffee date, saving the universe, fighting terrorists, or sharing mutual comfort over the untimely but painless demises of your respective spouses as you grow ever clos--ahem. You get the idea."

Here, in no particular order, are my answers:

In the world of fandom, I am firmly entrenched on the side of Team Jasper.


No, not that Jasper. This one:


I also come down on the side of the Weasley twins. *bites back comments about choosing one... or not*


Much to my husband's annoyance, I am a Legolas fan. But I wouldn't kick Aragorn out of bed. (That's a metaphorical bed, of course. OF COURSE.)


Confession: I have never actually read Last of the Mohicans. But I watched the movie about a gazillion times in junior high and high school. Although Hawkeye is nothing to sneeze at...

I always had a special place in my heart for Uncas. *swoon*


I also read The Stand ad nauseum as a teen. I loved Stu. I HATED the mini-series, for many reasons. Gary Sinise was actually not one of those reasons, but he wasn't big and burly the way I pictured the character.








Speaking of movies...

I'm dead serious. Wooderson from "Dazed and Confused." I have no idea why.

So now that I've confessed my embarrassing crush confessions, fess up. Who are yours?

ETA: Dang, I should have used this picture from Amna's blog!

Friendly pumpkins

My oldest randomly decided he was scared of Halloween this year. Carving pumpkins was just about the only activity he would agree to participate in (besides eating candy), so we kept this year's jack o'lanterns strictly non-scary.

 Per his request, a Lightning McQueen for himself and an Elmo for his little brother.




























He also requested a "pumpkin with race car flame eyes," which my mom took care of:










I think they were a hit:


My dad said he didn't care what his pumpkin looked like, so I picked something I was sure he'd like... although with the year my team is having, this is a little scary...

Harvest

The first frost caught us off guard this year. Our pumpkins went down, followed quickly by our tomatoes (although our peppers are still hanging in there-- our theory is that even winter is too scared to mess with habañeros).

So we spent Saturday afternoon tearing out dead plants, prepping the garden for winter planting and smiling at our pile of brightly colored veggies.

Fall colors

A few shots of fall in Arkansas. A chapter or two of my WIP take place here (write what you know, right?) and I'm trying to memorize the season for edits later in the blah of winter.

My backyard:

Downtown Fayetteville:

Pea Ridge Battlefield:

My husband took these:

Something else I'm sure I'll always want to remember...

Spreading the Book Lurve

Via Deb, via these ladies: The challenge of the day for those of us not posting Tuesday teasers is to blog, Tweet, or leave an Amazon review for a book that you've read and loved.

Wintergirls by Laurie Halse Anderson
I didn't want to read this book. I pretty much swore off of all eating disorder books after reading Wasted, a memoir by Marya Hornbacher. But then I read an excerpt... I thought it was on Kirsten's blog but now I can't find it... and decided I was going to have to man up. So I did, and I was glad.

Books about anorexia and bulimia tend to trigger people with those disorders back into their behaviors. Wasted, while an interesting read, was horrible in that way for a lot of people. But something about Wintergirls managed to realistically represent the mindset of a girl suffering from anorexia without ... I don't want to say "making it appealing," because Hornbacher certainly didn't do that either. Maybe Anderson did a better job of showing the pain. Maybe her metaphors and style of writing allow the reader to both understand the mindset and see the reality of what's happening, while the memoir plants the reader too firmly in the eating disordered mind-- a dangerous place for those in recovery. I don't know. But it is a beautifully written portrayal that spreads the blame and responsibility evenly on the characters, victim included, while leaving the reader with hope at the end.

Excerpt:

Five hundred calories a day is working. Truth = 094.00.

Another goal weight. W00t.

I should be diamond sparkly champagne shooting to the stars, but the loudspeaker between my ears crackles on, full volume, with another goal: 085.00, 085.00, 085.00.

085.00 is dangerland. 085.00 is Fourth of July fireworks in a small metal box.

The second time they locked me up admitted me for my own good, my whole body, including my skin, my hair, my baby blue toenails, and all my teeth weighted 085.00; 010.00 pounds of fat, 070.00 pounds of everything else. ... When my brain started working again I checked their math. Someone made a mistake because they didn't figure in the snakes in my head and the thick shadows hiding inside the cage of my ribs.

085.00 is possible. I've been there before, in dangerland, sweet buzzing high gingersmoke air, crafty trolls hiding under bridges.

But 085.00 makes me want 075.00 . To get there I'll need to crack open my bones with a silver mallet and dig out my marrow with a long-handled spoon.

Anderson's book Speak is also fantastic. My other rec: The Perks of Being a Wallflower by Stephen Chbosky. I stayed up until 3:00 am reading it. Then I convinced my husband to read it, and he stayed up until all hours trying to finish it. Dear book-reading family members: Expect a copy in your stocking this Christmas.

In case you hadn't noticed...

New Moon is coming out soon and the interwebz are pretty much full to the brim with spoilers, clips, trailers and screaming fangirls. Amidst the insanity, there are also lots of Twilight parodies These two made me literally laugh until I cried.


Hang in there-- the end of this one is the best part.

This one deserves some kind of award.

600 days old

He's a little bigger than he was last time I remembered to take a picture of him with his quilt.

19 months versus 6 months

Road Trip Wednesday: WIP Haiku

It's YA Highway's third Road Trip Wednesday, but my first. This week: Turn your WIP into a haiku.

I only have one lonely untitled WIP at the moment, but here goes...
*clears throat*

Power can corrupt
absolutely even if
it’s not absolute.