How I write, on this sunny Sunday morning.

Good morning to all you wonderful ladies and gentlemen reading this.  I hope you've had one fabulously extraordinary weekend.  Mine has been pretty darn good, if I do say so myself.

Yesterday our oldest daughter had her very first school dance.  It was very sweet, and really only the tip of the iceberg for her.  She's in 7th grade and this was a two hour "social" at school.  She wore jeans, a black t-shirt, black heeled boots, and her jean jacket.  I fixed her hair and put her very first full face of make-up on.  She was so excited.

There was no date for this dance.  She met up with all her friends, and from what I hear they had a fantastic time.  She even brought a friend home when I picked her up.  We ended up with a sleepover buddy, but they were very well-behaved and had fun. 

I had a great writing day yesterday.  Today, once I find the time to write, I'll hit the halfway point.  25K here I come!  I can't believe the month is half over.  I wasn't even planning to do NaNo this year, so it's no wonder that I probably won't be finishing early this year.  However, I know I will at least finish on time.  Woohoo!

I love how a story starts out one way, you have an idea of how it's all going to go, and them *WHAM* it takes a turn you weren't expecting and the entire story changes.  I had a character in this story who was going to be a helper in the story.  However, things went dark and he's actually turned into the bad guy!!  Eek!  I wasn't expecting that one!  It's very exciting to see where my characters go and down what paths they'll take me.

I'm a character driven writer.  I let them take the lead in a story.  I have an "idea" of what the story will be about, or what the ending will be, but I never know how my characters will create the ending.  I couldn't imagine being the type of writer who plots the entire story out from beginning to end.  I actually tried to do that once and the story went so far off of my story outline that I couldn't believe I'd even tried it that way.

One thing that I love about being this kind of writer is the fact that even I don't know what will happen next.  I've had moments with all of my books where I will literally say out loud, "Wow! I wasn't expecting that to happen."  Tim just looks at me like I'm nuts, but it's true.  LOL.  I really didn't know that was going to happen next until my fingers type it out.

So anyway, that's how it works for me.  I let the characters take me where they may and I'm simply along for the ride.  :-)

Right now I have banana bread in the oven.  Once it's done, I have to get dressed, take the oldest's friend home, and head to the hospital to visit Tim's mom. 

She's still in intensive care, with no hint of when she'll be moved to a regular room.  They're saying this hospital visit will be a long one for her, and the doctors were even discussing life support wishes with both her and FIL.  And when we were up there Friday, the nurses had been discussing the option of putting a breathing tube down her throat.  It doesn't sound good to me.

I'm off!  If anyone wants fresh banana bread, come on over!  There'll be plenty for sharing.  :-)  Have a great day!

Sunday Morning

Morning everyone.  How has your weekend been?  It's been gorgeous here in north Georgia, but it's cloudy this morning.

Yesterday Tim & I got to sleep late since the kids went to Mom's Friday night.  We got up at 9:30, but I probably could've gone back to sleep for at least another hour.  I really needed the rest it seems.  I did wake up quite refreshed though.  :-)

When the girls came home we spent several hours outside cleaning up around the house and enjoying the sunshine.  We cleared out the pool and put it away.  Straightened up the outside furniture and focused them around the rock firepit Tim & I built a few years ago.  We don't use it much during the summer but it gets used a lot in the autumn.  Then we confisgated the dog's stick collection.  That dog picks them up all over the year and piles them in one spot.  It gets bad if we don't clear them out from time to time.  LOL.

After that we spent the evening just hanging out and enjoying our time.  Tim watched some Nascar and football.  The kids played games together.  I watched some missed shows on the dvr & Hulu.  Just stuff like that.

Ooohh, I did find out that I finally reached 1 million pageviews on Associated Content on Friday.  Woohoo!!  It was actually 1,000,006 pageviews.  ;-)  A big thank you to all of you who have read my articles from time to time!  It makes me happy.  :-)

In about an hour we'll be going to visit the in-laws.  After that we'll come home, I'll do laundry, Tim'll watch Nascar, the kids will play outside, and then I'll lock myself away to finish up my chapter writing.  It has to be done today as tomorrow and Tuesday will be dedicated to article writing.  I'm planning to make enough $$$ from the article writing over the next 2 weeks to cover all the expenses for our race trip on the 17th.  It won't be too difficult, but it does take 2 full days per week of article writing focus.

It'll be a fun trip though.  And it makes my man happy.  That's what matters in the end.  :-)

Okay, time for me to get going.  I need to go change clothes and make sure the kids are dressed.  Have a fabulous Sunday.  Go out and enjoy the sunshine, if you have some. 


*Image: Another lovely tag from my friend Mis*

Wanna Know Wednesday #11...

Morning! How's it going? How are all my wonderful readers out there? I hope that you're having a good morning. :-) Looks like it's going to be a nice day here. The early morning sky is blue and I see sunshine peeking through the trees that surround my house.

I woke up to Tim cupping my cheek, saying he loves me, and wishing out loud that he didn't have to leave me to go to work. Say it with me... Awwwwwww! He gets up about 40 mins before I do, and leaves 10 mins before I get up. In all the years we've been married he has always kissed me good-bye before work. It's a nice way to start the day. :-)

So today is yet another Wednesday. It's Tim's last day of work this week. We have another nice weekend planned. The sun is suppose to be shining brightly for the next few days. I love it! Sunshine puts me in a good mood, and the you throw in the kind of temps where I can open the windows in the house and, well, I'm walking on water! LOL. What more could I ask for?

Since it is Wednesday, it's time for my weekly list of rambling facts. You never know what will end up on my Wanna Know Wednesday list. :-)

1. Only 10 hours until Tim gets home from work.
2. The big girls last day of school is May 27th. Won't be long now.
3. Stalkers, fuck off!! I'm really, really tired of seeing the IP address for people who have no business being in my life. If you say you're not coming back, then damn, don't come back! Sheesh, stop stalking. Sure, I'm interesting, but I didn't think I was THAT interesting.
4. I'd like to get a boob job. Not so much for size (cause I have plenty of size), but more to just put them back where they belong after birthing and nursing three kids. LOL!!
5. I have more social networking pages than I can even remember signing up for. Especially when it comes to Ning sites.
6. I'm planning on taking full advantage of the hubby this weekend. ;-)
7. No, I do not allow my oldest to read my books. They are definitely ADULT CONTENT.
8. I'll never understand why so many writers are afraid to use their real name when writing erotica. Hell, I want people to know my work is my work. Plus, I have nothing to hide and don't give a damn if people know I write about sex. That's kind of what my books are known for anyway. LOL!
9. 9 days, 9 days, 9 days!!!!
10. Tim & I can't wait to go to the Georgia Renaissance Festival below Atlanta soon. We usually go around Mother's Day, so hopefully it won't be long before we get the chance to go.

There you go! This week's Wanna Know Wednesday is now complete. I have some S&M to write about in one book, and a major battle scene to write in the other. I don't have anything outside the home to do today, so I'll be right here until pick-up time. Time for work!

I hope you have a great day. Stop by tomorrow when I'll finally be posting some new pictures of things I've been meaning to share. :-)

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Thursday, Thursday, Thursday.

Yep, that's what I said... It's Thursday. I had a late night last night. Tim and I went to bed at a reasonable hour, yet we ended up talking and laughing in bed for over an hour after that. No,we weren't doing that (we'd already done that earlier, lol), it was just a bunch of chatting and laughing over some stupid people from his work. All in all, it was fun to not be interrupted and to have an actual conversation with my man that lasted longer than five minutes. LOL.

Nevertheless, I woke up a bit more tired than usual this morning because of our late night talk session. Tim is off work today, so he hung out in bed for another hour after I'd already gotten the big girls up. He crawled out of bed just in time to be up with the youngest as I took the other two to school.

Ooohhh, guess what! We have sunshine today!! Woohoo! Beautiful blue skies and bright rays of sunshine! With the way my house sits, the sun shines in all the windows on the backside of the house in the mornings and the front side of the house in the evenings. Makes for me never having to turn on a light until darkness falls when we have these bright days. I love it! Now if only those temps could get up and out of the 40's. I know, I know, I'm sooooo demanding. LOL!

I'm looking forward to warmer days, lounging by the pool, hanging out in the backyard at night by the glow of our lanterns and firepit. There's only a little more than a month until the big girls are out of school for the summer. Usually it's hot by then, so we'll see what happens. I'm sure that one morning I'll wake up and the summer heat will be here in full force and we'll be wondering where Spring ran off to.

Okay, I better get off here. I have some errands to run, a dog to feed, and a load or two of laundry to do. Tim is playing his Xbox, and it keeps distracting me, so this took a lot longer to write than usual. I doubt I'll be getting much writing work done today. :-)

Have a great one!

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Welcome to a bright, sunshiny Saturday!

Woohoo!! I woke up to chirping birds, blue skies, and SUNSHINE! Yay! All the gloomy, cloudy, rainy days have sucked completely. I knew it was suppose to be pretty today, but you never know until the day arrives.

So yesterday was a good day. We got all of my Friday errands done so early that Tim & I were able to spend most of the day here at home together. Then my mom took the girls for last night Tim and I cooked dinner together, watched a movie (Max Payne sucked), and then he actually helped me sew a skirt for our middle daughter. He has NEVER done that. It was all very nice.

Today we're going to go do a family photo shoot in the mountains. Once the girls get home from mom's, I'll get them all dressed and prettied up and we'll head out. If the mountains are too muddy (from all the stupid rain), then we'll just hit the local park and do them there. Either way we'll come home with a variety of new family shots for me to go through.

I try to do Spring pics of the girls every year, but it's been a while since we've done family shots too. So this time I'll get Tim in front of the camera too. He hates it, but he does anything for me. *Love* Besides, with our anniversary next week, we need a few new pics of the two of us.

Anyway, once I wade through the tons we'll have, I'll share some of my favorites with all of you.

Now I'm off to enjoy this beautiful Saturday! You have a great one too. :-)

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What a beautiful day it has been!

Wow! I knew I was missing warmer temps, and I have been begging for Spring to arrive, but I didn't know just how much I wanted it until it arrived today! It has been in the mid-70's today here in north Georgia. The weather has been just spectacular! I'm in heaven!!

The girls spend the night with mom last night, so Tim and I woke up to a very peaceful house. The morning had clouds and a light misting drizzle. However, right after lunchtime the clouds parted, the sun shone brightly, and the sky became a beautiful shade of blue. It has been fantastic!

We worked outside most of the afternoon, just cleaning around the house and raking leaves. Then Tim grilled out cheddar brawts for us. Yum! Now everyone has a full tummy and it beginning their bath-taking. I look forward to a relaxing evening with the family because everyone is tired out. LOL!

On another note. I did take Tim to the doctor yesterday and I was right, he has bronchitis. He's now on a Z-pak and an inhaler. He should be feeling much better in a few days. Actually he looks and sounds a lot better today than he did Thursday. Poor guy was wheezing and gasping. Now he's sounding a lot better.

He's been so careful about not giving the rest of us his germs. I'm missing my mouth kisses terribly. Does anyone know how long he might be contagious? I haven't the foggiest idea.

Since he's dealing with this, we aren't going to visit the in-laws tomorrow. They are smokers and, even though they don't smoke when we're there, the smoke would be aggravating his lungs terribly. Tim smoked when we met, and during several years of our marriage. Once we built our house (and I was pregnant with the oldest), he was banned from smoking in-doors. Luckily, six years ago he finally kicked the habit.

He's been cigarette-free for 6 years and I'm soooo proud of him. What's really funny is that now the smell of smokers really bothers him. I just keep reminding him that I had to deal with it all those years he smoked and he's just getting paid back for it. LOL!

Anyway, he's feeling better now and that's what matters. We've had a glorious day and all are happy and relaxed. Oh, and we have to remember to move our clocks up and hour tonight! I love this time of the year. I like having daylight later in the evening.

I hope you're all having a good weekend and enjoying nicer temps. Til next time!

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Clouds, Clouds, Go Away!

Man, it's cloudy yet again tonight. I'm missing the full moon this month! It makes me sad because the weather is just perfect for sitting out under the stars and spying at the bright orb above us.

I'm a creature of the night. I've always enjoyed stayig up late, playing under the stars, and even sneaking around with the hubby all those years ago when we were only dating. But on the opposite end of the spectrum, I love sunlight, need sunlight, gotta have sunlight to functin properly throughout my day.

So I've been abandoned by both the sun and the moon lately. I miss you both! Clouds, clouds, go away!

I'm off to bed, dealing with a headache, and hopefully will see the sun tomorrow morning since themoon has abandoned me tonight. Night all!

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Thursday Thirteen #27

Yes, yes, I'm still on vacation, but I couldn't miss giving you my Thursday Thirteen for this week! We are having a blast here on Tybee Island. The ocean is always beautiful, the sun is shining brightly, and it's downright hot & humid. LOL!

So since I'm on vacation, this week's TT theme will be the BEACH! :-)

Thirteen Things I've Seen or Done at the Beach! 1. Lots of sand. LOL! 2. Dolphins frolicking in the waves 3. People wearing swimsuits that should've had a LOT more material! 4. Loads of seashells that the girls wanted to keep (we bring home tons ea. yr.) 5. Sand dollars 6. Blue crabs 7. Alligators in captivity 8. We ate tons of shrimp & crablegs at our favorite resturant--The Crab Shack 9. Tim & I drank, relaxed, & people-watched from our condo balcony 10. Spent a day roaming around Savannah 11. Gotten a nice tan from spending days on the beach 12. Did NOT get attacked by a jellyfish this year. YAY! 13. Lastly, I'll be packing tomorrow to head back home Saturday. We don't want to leave, but I'll be glad to sleep in my own bed. See you next year Tybee Island, Georgia!! We love you!

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