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Thursday, December 11, 2014

I'm suppopse to be working on writing my unfinished NaNoWriMo


but instead I decided to write a little blog post first.  I'll think of it as a warm up.  I've just consumed my dinner which is a whole wheat bagel and cream cheese followed by a vanilla late'.  My day has been crazy and this is as healthy as I can get at the coffee shop.  I really wanted wings and a big beer from the Vine tonight or even the chocolate cheesecake calling my name in the glass case at the coffee shop, neighbor of the whole wheat bagel. 

However, I'm going to be good and go whole wheat!  I know all you real healthy nuts are saying- "you know how many calories/carbs are in a whole wheat bagel", but I'm saying instead "way to go didn't pick the cheesecake". 

Today has been so chaotic and I laugh, because it is all brought on by me being me.  Here is a recap, you can feel free to laugh, and say you are a busy bee or you are an idiot or just pass up the timeline and go to the end. 

0700-wrapped some presents, cleaned up kitchen, drank my breakfast shake
0800- PT for 50 minutes (today's workout was hard from the start), my knee and legs-both- were feeling tired from the get go.
0900-Starbucks stop for coffee and turkey bacon breakfast sandwich (you really didn't think I was just going to last on a breakfast shake until lunch did you :)).Stopped by UPS store to pick up Wine (gift from our awesome parents- Matt's for our recent anniversary)
0920- Michael's to return a purchase and of course get sucked in to purchase more xmas decor and crafts
1015- Bible study at church- big group today- read Psalm 31 and discussed
1130- off to library to return books and pick up as many Christmas movies as I could- kids and I are going to have a Christmas movie marathon while hubby is playing cards Sunday night.
1230- home to start cleaning the house for company and make the Lutheran Campus Ministry meal
1400- It took me an hour and a half to peal potatoes, cut potatoes, boil water and cook potatoes, then get the gravy done and in a crock pot along with putting the potatoes in the bigger crock pot and finishing off the spuds with cream cheese, butter and Greek yogurt.
1415- kids arrive home from school and I continue to multi-task by cleaning kitchen while helping Kate do art and Mason work on his "Son of Neptune" poster for his upcoming book talk at school.  After kitchen was cleaned up I vacuumed, cleaned hard wood floors (which side note- keeping hard wood floors clean is harder than I thought it would- doesn't help that we picked a dark wood so it shows everything, which hubby reminds me is a good incentive to keep the house clean)
1640- rush out of the house with the LCM meal head to church and drop it off all the while having my youngest change into her hockey gear while the car is moving, because I knew we would be running late to 5:30 hockey.  Wouldn't you know we were late, but it was due to a malfunctioning stop light- the turn light letting cars turn onto the interstate which was the fastest road to get me to mall for hockey never turned green and the cars were backed up until someone go the "balls" to turn on a red light. 
1735- youngest on ice and oldest now working on math homework.  I'm finally sitting still and realizing my knee is sore and swollen
1840- leave hockey to head to a local running store for "ladies night".  Catch up with a friend from church and then head off to writing group
2000- at the coffee shop and trying to find a place to sit, because I've forgotten it is the week before finals and so study space in a college town is prime real estate. 
2036- finishing this post so I can start my real writing for the night

WHEW!  I'm worn out and why am I sharing this long run on list of what I've done today- well I'm sharing it for me as a reminder of how we make choices to be active, busy, living life to its fullest with my cup somewhat running over.  Although my eyes are again surrounded by some lovely wrinkles and bags I feel pretty lucky and thankful for getting to make the above choices in how I'm filling my day.  Some may think crazy, some may think frivolous, some may think selfish or inefficient, but I look at the above list and think this is me, this will likely always be me. 

Wednesday, December 10, 2014

November Reads

I'm sitting watch my children practice for their Sunday school Christmas program. My eyes are hardly staying open and I feel the bags growing under my eyes minute by minute.

I'm tired for many reasons, but the main ones are: returned to the gym this week so getting up much, much earlier than use to, and then staying up to late working on all those holiday "to do's".

I wish I could say I'm staying up late reading/writing but alas both have not been that prominent in my life this month.

Last month I did a whole bunch of writing for NaNoWriMo and hardly any reading. Here are the books I finished in November and my book club read I finished the day after book club (Dec 5). We normally have book club the last Wed of the month but for the month of Nov we push that Wed to the first Wed in Dec and then have off for the holidays.

Harry Potter the Prisoner of Szkaban by JKRowling. I enjoyed this one even more than the 2nd. Now my oldest is talking me into book 4- saving that one for Christmas break. We enjoyed watching the movie but again the book was better.

Fly Away by Patricia Lachlan
This one I read with my oldest and I think we both didn't particularly get into it. Beautiful writing but just not an interesting story line for us.

Word after word after word by Patricia Lachlan
I enjoyed this one and thought the writing was again beautiful. My oldest thought it was OK but he wasn't overly sad when it was over. It was a story about children learning about writing- poetry mainly,through a super "neat" teacher. We all need to have experienced at least one of these "neat" teachers in our lives.

Lastly, Some Luck by Jane Smiley was our Nov book club pick. I didn't enjoy it but others in book club really did. It is the first book in a trilogy- the first 30 years of a family's life. Each chapter is another year. I struggled with the plot, didn't keep me interested ( other than the part about WWII),didn't really enjoy the characters and the characters I did like weren't main one's, and lastly couldn't get into the flow. I would just be getting into the story line of the chapter and the chapter would end and we'd be into another year and another story line. I've been told this book shouldn't dissuade me from reading A Thousand Acres by Smiley. So that one will stay on my "to read" list.

Reading a great mystery writer's newest book currently and two others lying on my bedside table calling my name. Hoping to get some major reading done over the holidays.

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Monday, December 1, 2014

NaNoWriMo 2014

Wrote this yesterday and didn't get it posted, so better late than never :).

I have about 6 1/2 hours left of this year's National Novel Writing Month. I will not be making the 50K words goal.  Here is a screen shot of how fat I got. I plan to finish the writing of this novel by Christmas. I learned a lot in the month if this challenge. For me I do much better when I write daily. I'm much more consistent. I felt like my best days of writing occurred when I'd hand write the words first and then I'd type the words I wrote which gave me the ability to add to the draft I'd write earlier in the day.

I found having a brief outline with basic chapter ideas helped my writing flow. The days I didn't write weren't many but they add up as list work productivity. I rarely fall short with finishing a goal I've started but alas writing 30,000 words and 46 pages still felt like I accomplished something. My goal now is to finish what I've written, revise, and edit. Next work in progress is putting together a history of the nurse practitioner organization I belong too. I need to have this done and edited by mid April in time for our 40th anniversary of the organization. I have all tge material just need to organize the works and words into timeline form.

Due to so much writing this month I really didn't read as much. I wasn't super excited with the books I read and am currently reading so looking to reconnect with some good books the month of December. I really appreciated this forced writing experience and hope to participate again next year.
Novel successfully updated.

chattynatty

Member for about 1 month

chattynatty
  • Novel: Growing Up on the Farm
  • Genre: Mainstream
  • 30308 words so far
Your Average Per Day
1,010 
Words Written Today
1,562 
Target Word Count
50,000
Target Average Words Per Day
1,667
Total Words Written
30,308 
Words Remaining
19,692
Current Day
30 
Days Remaining
1
At This Rate You Will Finish On
December 20, 2014
Words Per Day To Finish On Time
19,692
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