Make Next Year Gorgeous!

...with an awesome wall calendar that will inspire you to do great things!

Is this an advertisement? No, but if you are looking for a copywriter or someone to enthusiastically shill your product, let me know in the comments.

Seriously, I'm just super excited that I stumbled across Jen Oaks, an artist from San Francisco, and that she is making the perfect calendar for 2010. Check out her blog for a sneak peek.

Jen's calendar is perfect for me because, unlike a lot of artists' calendars I've come across, it has actually has room for writing notes. And boy, do I like to write notes. How else do you think I write my monthly wrap-ups? If I didn't have a calendar to write on I wouldn't know what was going on, and I definitely wouldn't remember what I did two weeks ago.

I also just really love Jen's illustrations because they have a feminine, yet urban feel.

Nanowrimo: week one

This is day eight of Nanowrimo. The good news is that I hit my word count. I have written 13,357 words so far. The bad news is that my right hand is starting to hurt and I'm already burned out. Everything was going along swimmingly until today.

Yesterday alone I was able to bust out over 5,000 words, but today was a struggle.
Those last 300 words took me over an hour to type. I am really not looking forward to week two.

Even though I feel like I have a better story than I did when I participated in '07 and that my writing is more compelling and the characters are more interesting, I still can't shake the feeling that it's all crap. This is a huge time commitment and my worst fear is that once it's over I'll have 50,000 words I never read again. 50,000 words in exchange for aching hands and sleep deprivation. That doesn't seem like a fair trade.

Everyone says week two is the toughest. I can't remember what it was like for me the first time around. Every week sucked, if I recall. I guess I'll just keep doing what I'm doing and hope for the best.

Why am I doing this again?

October Wrap Up

October was amazing and I'm kind of sad to see it go. November marks the beginning of cold, wet weather and gray, gray, gray skies. (At least in Seattle, anyway). I'm already considering buying a light therapy lamp!

Here's what went down last month:

The social media contest I was working on came to an end and we announced our Verity Mom. Her name is Rosemary and she is awesome. I can't wait to work with her this year.

My boss' first book was released. It's called Motherhood is the New MBA. You should buy it so she can get rich and famous and be on Oprah.

Saw Handmade Nation with Ashley.

The Texas Longhorns beat the Oklahoma Sooners. Texas, Texas, YEEHAW!

Katie and Carrie got a year older.

Big A and I took our 2nd annual trip to Leavenworth for Oktoberfest. Can I tell you how much I LOVE that place? This year we stayed at the Enzian, and while it wasn't as quaint as the last place we stayed, it was a blast. The hotel is within walking distance to everywhere you want to go, and they have an underground, indoor pool and hot tub called The Grotto. We were literally in Leavenworth for less than 24 hours, but we managed to walk around the entire town, eat dinner, do a wine tasting, shop, go swimming, go to a beer garden, get breakfast and visit the river.



On the way to Leavenworth, we stopped by Roslyn where the exterior shots of the show Northern Exposure were filmed. It's a cute, very small town with a few places to eat, some pubs and wine bars. A few of the buildings have some great murals:



Katie moved to San Francisco.

Luke, who just came home from months in Afghanistan, came over to visit with Carmen and Kaden.

Big A and went to The Farm to pick pumpkins. We felt like city slickers because we weren't wearing the right clothes to be in a muddy field. Everyone else had on waterproof boots and we had sneakers on. So, here is a picture of me pretending to pick out a pumpkin. We ended up buying some at the grocery store.



And lastly, of course, there was Halloween.

Shining

In honor of Halloween, here is a trailer for a movie called Shining. It may look familiar, as it is made up entirely of clips from the movie, The Shining, which is being hailed as the scariest film ever made.

Trust me, this is worth watching:



This seems like a fun project -- take a well-known piece of art that's part of our pop culture and turn it into something totally unexpected. I love the idea, but I have decided that I am one of the least creative people on this planet, so I wouldn't even know where to start doing something like this. Luckily, my boyfriend is right-brained and off the wall and can help me come up with a wacky idea to implement. I'm all about implementation. Aren't I exciting?

Just yesterday, I asked him to come up with two story lines I could use for Nanowrimo. Right away he said, "How about writing from the point of view of a high-society Yorkshire Terrier named Ambrosias?" SEE WHAT I'M TALKING ABOUT HERE? Genius.

Ignore for a moment this cliche of a post.

I had a long day and need a smile.

Solution?

Baby animals that are so ugly they are adorable:

What I Will and Won't Be Writing

Last year I contributed a chapter to a book called the Age of Conversation 2: Why Don't They Get It?, a collaborative effort comprised of over 200 authors. The purpose of the book was to get marketing professionals talking about the new era of communication we now work in. Proceeds from the book were donated to Variety, an international children's charity. I wrote about the experience here.

I am glad I contributed to AoC last year, but I won't be participating this year. Since they only let a certain amount of authors write, I figured I should step aside and let someone else's voice be heard. If there is anything I know about this "age of conversation," it's that there needs to be more people talking and not just the same folks speaking up time after time after time.

Instead of writing a focused piece of non-fiction, I've decided to participate in Nanowrimo again this year and write an unfocused, rambling piece of fiction! Yay me.

If you recall, oh loyal readers, I did Nanowrimo two years ago and reached 35,000 words before throwing in the towel. I was kind of on the fence this year about doing it, but after reading Kerri Anne's post, I knew I had to.

What will be different this year? For one thing, I will have Kerri as a writing buddy. Secondly, I know what to expect so I feel like I'm less likely to get stuck with writer's block. And I know I'll need to wear my carpal tunnel gloves all month and take a lot of Tylenol. Yes, typing can be dangerous to your health, especially when combined with knitting.

I really think I have a chance of writing the required 50,000 words this time! Color me excited.

Oh, I have one more project on deck that I'll need to write for, but it will be a combo of pictures and words so hopefully it won't be too time-consuming. I need to have it finished by the first week in December so I can have it ready in time for Christmas. I know you are intrigued now, but it must remain a secret.

Thinking about November makes me tired. Lots to do!

Keep Smiling

Over the past few weeks I have found myself in some situations where I've felt used, abused, or ignored. This happens from time to time, but it happened A LOT this month in particular.

Most of time I can brush off these events, put a smile on my face and move on...quietly. Well, not this month. I'm not sure what has gotten into me. I guess I'm tired of not dealing with things.

So, I've had to pump myself up for some difficult conversations and I've done a good job at voicing my frustrations. What I'm not very good at is being able to stay on track once the conversation gets started. I get easily distracted by strategic and stealthy topic changes or compliments and before I know it, I'm walking away without any kind of resolution.

Frustrating.

Is it enough to just be heard and how do you know the person was really listening? In a perfect world, I would love to be able to state my peace one time, be done with it, and never have to deal with whatever was frustrating me in the first place again. Inevitably though, the offense is repeated and I get doubly frustrated. Did they not hear me the first time, or do they just not care?

And what about when the person really does listen and tells you that things are not going to change, that they either can't or don't want to make the effort to stop the behavior that's making your feel bad? What do you do then?

A person can only accept so much, can only compromise to a point before they start to feel like they aren't being true to themselves. They can only keep smiling for so long.

*this post inspired by Sizzle's post.
** this post is not about my wonderful boyfriend Big A, who always listens.