Category Archives: Reading & Writing

Of Frost and Novels. And Vacuuming.

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It’s late, and I’m tired, and I have to get up early tomorrow, but I feel like writing a blog post, so here I am. ^_^ *bounce*

We woke up to frost this morning. :D I love frost. It sparkles under the sunlight, or, if it lasts throughout the day and into the evening, under the light from the streetlamp. It makes a sort of crust over the gravel, and the mud–so it feels like I’m walking a fraction of a millimeter above the ground. And it gives a really awesome crunching noise as I walk through the pasture. ^_^ Like I said, I love frost.

And I don’t think I’ve ever written about frost in my stories…must do that soon. :P

NaNoWriMo is done! :D I reached 50,000 words on November 29th–a day early–and haven’t touched my novel since. It’s been collecting dust deep in the recesses of my documents. Mwahahaha. However, I just looked at it and unfortunately, I really really REALLY want to edit it/finish writing the showdown. >_> *sigh* Part of me (the part closest to the frantic thirty days of novel-ing) wants to leave that poor document lying there for at least another week. Especially since I have a map of Africa to finish for my World Geography in school. And if I decide to edit, that project will most likely get pushed to the side.

But then again, I do really really want to start work on it again. :P Dilemmas, dilemmas. ::)

Vacuuming. I vacuumed the house today, and felt like putting that in the post title for some reason. XP Vacuuming is strangely…fun, once you get started. ^_^ I like cranking up the volume on my iPod (which I will never allow myself to do normally. I don’t want to end up deaf :P ) and vacuuming to the rhythm of the music. :D

Humdeedum… Have I mentioned algebra is way too much fun? :mrgreen: Oh, and I have a new favorite song: “Hold Me,” by Jamie Grace (featuring tobyMac). I blare it while I do my algebra. That is also way too much fun. I end up hoarse by the end of it, because it’s such a catchy song, and I can’t help but sing (yell) along while solving for ‘x.’

I’ve been getting in the mood for Christmas. B-) I’m pretty sure the fact that the radio station started playing Christmas music literally THE DAY after Thanksgiving helped, though. :P I love this part of the year. Winter is so much less dreary with lights on all the houses. I like the colored lights the best, but it always seems like those are the first to burn out, so we never use them…

So–happy December 6th, and I hope you have a wonderful rest of the week! :) I will–as long as I get both my novel and my map of Africa completed. Ha. ^_^

Week Three=*bulldozes ahead*

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*zooms in* I’m finally ahead!!!!! My NaNoWriMo word count is finally filling up quicker than quicksand sucks someone down the drain!!! (Where did that analogy come from? And all those extra exclamation points? o_o)

But, yes, yes, indeed, I am not only ahead, I am a whole day ahead.

I happen to be bouncing off the ceiling at this very moment, using the built-in anti-gravity boosters on the computer for the first time since they were invented five seconds ago.

Er, sorry. (I think the sci-fi aspect of the story I’m writing is taking over my brain. Eeeee. Help.)

So, anyway, my superbly awesome NaNoWriMo word count/graph/thingy:

*continues bouncing off the ceiling*

And, because I’m so happy, I just can’t resist giving you this series of adorable pictures, featuring my siblings as they were five years ago (ish). :mrgreen:

Aren’t they adorable? XDXD <3 <3

Snow

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It snowed this morning! A couple weeks ago, if you’d have asked me if I was happy for the prospect of winter and snow, I would have said no. But now, I am rather excited. :D

Christmas is just around the corner (and Thanksgiving), NaNoWriMo is over halfway done, my novel passed my other stories in length, and I’m getting used to the idea of staying inside more than normal because of inclement weather. :P

And the couch by the fire makes a very good place to write. Lots of inspiration. ^_^

NaNoWriMo word count: 28,338 words.
Days left in November: 12.
Words left to write: 21,662 words.

*squee* It will be AWESOME to have another story done. ^_^ I never think this except when I’m in the middle of a project, but writing is hard. :P

I Love This Story So Much

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NANOWRIMO IS AWESOME.

I feel like I’m on a roller-coaster, ’cause I’m either really super excited about my writing, or very depressed about it. :P

But, seriously, this is one of those better days. Let’s celebrate! *throws confetti*

Unfortunately I only write a mass (well, for me) amount of words when I need to catch up. So I’ve never gotten ahead by any significant amount. :P I mean, take a look at the number of words I’ve written each day since last Saturday:

Saturday: 224 or thereabouts
Sunday: 2500 (to catch up XP)
Monday: 2000 (okay, so I did get ahead that day. Only a little teensy-weensy bit, though, so it doesn’t count)
Tuesday: 0
Wednesday: 3014 (again, to catch up *bops self*)
Thursday (today): 1510-ish

And my grand total of all ten days of NaNoWriMo is (drumroll pleeeeeease!!): 16,671 words. YAAAAAY!

(Just so you know, I am a mere five words above where I absolutely need to be. Lovely. XP)

Day Four: Must. Remain. Optimistic.

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Day four of NaNoWriMo! I woke up this morning rather awed. I waited three looooooooong months for November, and now it’s passing in a flash. :P

But I’m much more optimistic about my story than yesterday. I reread my post and thought it rather melancholic. :roll: I’m up to 7,002 words, and making progress! Yay! And, I wrote a scene I really like this morning:

I plugged it in again and dialed voicemail.
“Please enter your password,” crackled from the phone.
Uh….
I pressed a couple numbers and waited.
“You have one unheard message. One unheard message, sent July 15th, 10:09 AM.”
I grinned, plunking down on the couch.
“Hey, Chloe, this is Mum–”
I froze, staring at the phone like it was a bomb, ticking down to my demise. Wait, July 15th?
“–sorry about that. I’m gonna need you to call them for me, all right? Oops, I’m gonna have to go…almost ran into the guy in front of me….” She chuckled.
“Anyway, I’ll be back in time for dinner, ‘kay? Talk to you later. Love–” Screams from the recording. Mum gasped and started shouting my name. The roar of something, growing louder and louder….
Her voice–how did I turn it off–I didn’t want to hear her! I pressed a button.
The default female voice came back on. “Message repeated.”
Mum’s voice again. “Hey, Chloe, this is Mum, and I’m at the store, but I forgot–”
No!
I pressed another button with a “beep” from the phone.
“Message saved. Continue to archives?”
I jammed the end call button down before it could take me to the archives and play it all over again.
My heart hammered. The phone slipped from my fingers and thumped on the floor.

For anyone wondering, July 15th is a month and a half before the story starts, the day the heroine’s mother dies.

It, of course, needs some serious help (what rough draft doesn’t? :P ), and I’ll probably hate it tomorrow and bop myself over the head for posting it on my blog, but yeah. The joys of NaNoWriMo-ing. :D

I’m Procrastinating

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Which is really terrible, I know. I feel so badly. :P Well, maybe not. Because I haven’t written here for a while, so procrastinating one thing means this post actually gets done.

Hey! I have succeeded in convincing myself I’m doing the right thing. Yaaaaaay.

So this is the third day of NaNoWriMo, and I have written 4,144 words. ^_^ That’s pretty good–just around average, I guess. I haven’t reached my word goal for today yet (which is why writing this post is procrastination) but hopefully will soon.

NaNoWriMo is hard. XD Harder than I expected. :P Or, harder than my excitement allowed me to expect. But, seriously! I have got to get in shape! Cranking out 1,667 words a day isn’t that hard!

I am still not finished with chapter one (the equivalent of day one, since each chapter equals a day) which is rather alarming. It’s stretching on quite a ways. It’ll get a lot shorter when I edit, but for now, I feel like I’m crawling along at a snail’s pace. :P

I’m also not sure if I’m satisfied with the quality of my writing. Some bits (especially the bits I wrote yesterday) are fine for now, but the majority of what I wrote on November 1st I think I’ll scrap in December. At the moment it’s relatively safe ’cause it’s adding to my word count. :P

Another thing bugging me is I feel repetitive. Or at the risk of being repetitive. Several things in this story are similar to things in Wanted. A lot of it is drastically different, but I’m still so connected mentally and emotionally to Wanted, I feel like I’m using phrases and concepts I’ve used before. Stealing them, I guess, from something I’ve already written. Bleh.

So there you have it, my ramblings on NaNoWriMo. I’m definitely still pressing on–this story has to get out onto the paper (computer screen) somehow. The end result might be rather messy, but at least it should be edit-able! Something beautiful will come out of this in the end, I hope. ;)

And now–back to my word document! Aaah!

It Has a Name!

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Like all babies, stories must (eventually, in my case) be given a name. I happen to move at a snail’s pace when it comes to naming my stories, and by the time I get around to it, the “baby” has grown up quite a bit. >.> The snail’s pace is not very fun in times like these:

Person: Ooh, sounds interesting! What is it called?
Me: Umm…well, for now… *insert very boring title*
Person: *pause* …awesome.
Me: *wince* Yeah. I haven’t thought of a more interesting title yet…

Photo credit: Naomi.

But, moving on to the positive side of this post. :P After many many months of wincing every time I spoke, wrote, or thought the title East Circus, I finally present to you its new name:

Wanted.

*cue wild applause*

I’ve actually had that title in my head for about a week now. I was slaving over what on earth I should name my book, when it popped into my head on my way out of the barn one night. At first I dismissed it. But it sort of grew on me, and I ended up naming my book it after all. XD YAAAAAAAY! I quite like it now. ^_^ Hopefully you do too. :P

And hopefully it doesn’t make you think of burly guys on wanted posters, because the MC is female, and not burly at all. (Danie: *NODNODNOD* What she said.)

If you want to read more about the story, you can visit Wanted‘s own little page over here.

My Favorite Characters Ever

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While I was drawing Pippi Longstocking 1 out in the woods today, I thought about blog posts, and this sprang to mind. ^_^

Good characters are amazing. I’m afraid my own characters aren’t quite up to scratch when it comes to complete development (*sound of outrage from aforementioned peoples*), but fortunately they have models of perfection to look up to while I’m getting my act together. :P

Photo credit: Naomi.

So. Let us begin. My favorite characters ever–in any book I’ve ever read. :D In no particular order.

Bilbo Baggins from The Hobbit, by J.R.R. Tolkien. YAY for Bilbo! *hugs the little guy* Even though this list isn’t in order, he definitely takes top spot. I love him because he’s a Hobbit–ordinary, never did anything unexpected for his whole life–and then he went on this great adventure, bumped around in barrels, wielded a glowing sword, bested a dragon. He’s just so utterly inspiring. :) That’s why I love him.

Hermione Granger from the Harry Potter series, by J.K. Rowling. She’s so much like me it’s scary. Though I suppose I’m so much like her it’s scary, since I’m pretty sure she was around before I was born. But we’re not exactly the same, since I’m not as smart and enjoy goofing off more than she does. Anyway, ’nuff said. She’s awesome.

Sekker Equinox from Fable Weaver, by Carlie Gernhart. Don’t read this if you haven’t read the book. XP But he…made me cry. *cough* Halfway into the book, he betrays the heroine, but a while later it turns out he was on the good side all along, and then he gets trapped for eternity in the void between worlds. *sob* Heartbreaking. I cried myself to sleep the night I finished the book.

Beast from Beauty, by Robin McKinley. I happen to love Beauty in the story as well, and Greatheart the horse, but the Beast takes the golden medal. :) He’s so…complex, kind, and sad, and has trouble reading books because he can’t turn the pages with his unwieldy claws! Wonderful detail, that, by the way.

Mr. Darcy and Elizabeth Bennet from Pride and Prejudice, by Jane Austen. Okay, now, really, you had to know this was coming. :P They make the perfect couple, and as such, do not deserve to be separated into their own paragraphs. <3

Jo March from Little Women, by Louisa May Alcott. Lovely, lovely character with all the struggles of an aspiring novelist=win. And yes, I would be freaked out if someone burned my notebooks, too. *shudder* Oh, and her name! I love her name. So quirky and short and utterly perfect for her character. B-)

Mr. Rochester and Jane Eyre from Jane Eyre, by Charlotte Bronte. I think I like putting couples together… *blink* Anyway, firstly: THEIR NAMES! Don’t you just oh-so-much love their names?! And then, yeah. I just really love the whole book, and the complexity of Mr. Rochester, and the honesty of Jane (plus her artwork, if you’ve seen the movie).

And now, because the favorites of my own characters are lobbying for a part in this post,  please give a warm welcome to…

Reyn Aduis from East Circus (working title), by yours truly. He’s my favorite villain, and a master of disguise. He actually (SPOILER) poses as the mentor for the first two-thirds of the book. ^_^

Chloe Erila from my NaNoWriMo. She is half English, half African American, an aquaphobic, and modeled after my sister just a bit. :D I like her because she’s so drastically different from my other MCs (main characters). Cilla and Danie had more of a personality based off myself, and even though Chloe does too, she has more freedom to express herself, which I think rounds off her character more. ^_^

Savannah Buckle from my NaNoWriMo. She’s as loyal as they come, and very revenge-driven until about the middle/end of the story. Quite the learning process for her. :) *hugs Vannah*

Nella Cutt from my NaNoWriMo. She’s…just…really my best mentor. I am definitely looking forward to writing her. She was tormented by the villain all her life, and yet somehow she manages to have that little spark still inside her somewhere–she’s not quite crushed yet.

Aidan Clambuson from Freedom Trek, also by yours truly. He is my first ally, and even in all his first-novel-ness, he’s pretty cool. :D

Lianne Staide from (you guessed it) Lianne Staide. She’s rather moody, determined, and most definitely belongs in the Civil War era. I’ve tried rewriting her into different places around five times, but she remains firmly planted there… I’m playing with the idea of keeping the civil war concept, but making it fantasy. We’ll see. ^_^

And lastly, Swift Blythe from Lianne Staide. He’s ally to Lianne and amazing! Ilovehimsomuch. One of my favorite allies, but obviously, ’cause otherwise he wouldn’t be on this list. :P He is desperately loyal to Lianne, and also to his cause (unfortunately for you I haven’t figured that out yet, otherwise I would tell you XD).

 Okay, this is getting really long, at 900-some words. :P So I’ll wrap it up now. Toodles! xD

  1. It was my own version of Pippi–with clunky boots and fingerless gloves ’cause I’m still rather bad at drawing hands. XP I also decided to put a little frame around her head and make it (her head) bigger. You know, like those blown-up images of a map or something? Same concept. It turned out rather well, actually. ↩

Not for Arachnophobics

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We found this MASSIVE spider lurking in the beans while gardening today. He was pretty cool. :D Check out his coloring! It looks like a face! :P Albeit a somewhat creepy face…

Even though Naomi is a little freaked out by spiders in general, she was interested enough to take this picture. Which–and I think you’ll agree–is a pretty awesome picture. :D

I’ve been really interested in phobias recently, ’cause my NaNoWriMo heroine is an aquaphobic. And I have very little idea what that means, since I love water. So, yes, I need to do some research. ^_^ Are there varying degrees of aquaphobia? Will she be terrified of something like drinking a glass of water, or is it only bigger things that freak her out?

Rain

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The autumn weather officially started about a week and a half ago. Normally I’m quite happy to see all the rain, but this year I want summer to stay. Maybe it’s because I spent so much time away from home this summer, and so didn’t get my share of Oregon sun. :) At any rate, winter is coming on fast, and this morning during barn chores, my fingers and nose felt the cold. :P *shiver*

In honor of the rain, here’s a quote from one of my stories:

Rain dribbled off the tent sides and slid into the sand. Rain, marking my departure, the coming winter, plopping angrily at Father. It was raining in the desert….

On second thought, that isn’t that great of a quote, though (I think) it works well in the story. Oh well. :P It’s from the very beginning of chapter two, and rather melancholy. ^_^

And speaking of my stories, I have officially (it was unofficially decided quite some time ago) to have each chapter of my NaNoWriMo equal a day. So “Chapter 1″ is “Day 1.” Should be sorta cool to write! :D

Time to bid you all goodbye, ’cause Naomi has an orthodontist appointment (an insanely early one, if I say so myself :P ) and it’s time to leave for town. *waves*

Restoring the Ruins (Part 2)

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The recap post part 2 is finally here. :D Now, because I’m terrible awkward at introduction paragraphs, I shall jump right in to the awesomeness of this post. :P

I’M IN HIGH SCHOOL!

I’m thrilled because…

  1. It isn’t just called 9th grade. No. It’s called my freshman year of high school. And that’s coolness in and of itself. :D
  2. My social studies is called world geography.
  3. My science is called biology. Now, while my favorites of the science “ologies” are climatology, seismology, geology in general, and a couple other things, biology remains, as ever, pretty awesome.
  4. I’m officially in algebra! *faint* YAY! I love algebra! Or at least pre-algebra. I’ve peeked in my heavy-duty, 2 inch thick workbook and–apart from the fact that the size of the font is maybe 2x smaller than my last workbook–everything is overwhelming. o_o

And, guess what?! We have chicks! They up and wandered into our barn during evening milking a couple weeks ago. Awwwwww. :D They’re pretty cute.

And because they have grown up quite a bit since that last picture, here’s another one. :mrgreen:

Photo credit my sister, Naomi. :D

Ta-ta for now, folks! *rides zooms into the sunset mountains with her nonexistent snazzy Jeep*