Meredith Wood

I hope I'll have a teaser to post soon.

I hope tomorrow will be the day the window to my novel cracks open and I actually do write.

I hope the kids don't mom me to death. 

Today I'm gonna share a video I named Joe and Shea Plus 3.  As you can see this is why I never watched Jon and Kate.  My three are all the kids I need. 



I wonder if the world would want to watch me try to get this book finished while the kids are home on summer break?  Could I make some money or what.  :-D

Not
1. I'm not wearing anything that isn't super comfy.
2. I'm not putting on makeup.
3. I'm not going to worry about the dirty towels.
4. I'm not going to fold the clean ones.  They work fine out of the basket.
5. I'm not going to remember there's an outside world out there.

Am
1. I will listen to music because it inspires me more than anything else in the world.
2. I will get up from my computer and take a walk in the backyard when I get frustrated with my book.
3. I will remember what it's like to be seventeen because Aspen deserves this.
4. I will not shy away from the sad parts of the book because they need to be there and I need to write them.
5. No matter how raw Jason's feelings may be, I will let them wash over me.  His heart and his story deserves my best.

My youngest daughter is gone to her state tourney this weekend--five hours away from me.  Eek!  I'm trying to remember to breathe, but it's pretty darn hard considering she's only eight and, like...soo many things could happen.   It doesn't help much that I have a HUGE imagination. Grandma and Grandpa are with her, so that's a teeny relief.  Now as far as my oldest daughter and her never-ending softball season, she's headed to her last weekend tournament,  (so they say...again).  But that's all on Daddy's plate not mine. 

This leaves me with the little guy this weekend.  It also leaves me with a full weekend to stretch out my writing muscles.  :-)

Oh yeah, writer peeps,  Shea's on her way back to finishing that novel.  :-0 

but I had an hour to kill before the vet opened after lunch.  I should be stripping the kids' beds and washing their sheets, but hey, they haven't been washed in 4 months what's another day gonna matter?  :-)   

So here I am.  I actually got to read twenty posts off my friends page while I crammed a burger in my mouth.  Life is good, eh?

Keep writing LJ buddies 'cause I need to know there are writers still out there.  Love y'all and miss ya.

Now I'm off to buy flea meds for my poor mutt.

I'll probably be on hiatus from LJ until sometime in June.   Both girls are playing league and travel ball this year.  Talk about busy.  :-)  Every evening it's about ball games and every weekend we're out of town for tournaments.  It's kinda funny.  When I tell them to get dressed for their games they ask, "Which uniform?"

Roo's wanting to pitch so developing her for that is taking up a lot of time too. 

I have squeezed in a paragraph or two here and there on TBOM.   

Enjoy your spring everyone!  I'll be back for lots of summer fun.  :-)

Inspired by robinellen 's post today which was inspired by brian_ohio 's post yesterday, I have a nice, long opinion post destined to be the most amazing tidbit of inspiration you'll ever read.

Too bad that's not today.  Because today I'm supposed to be elsewhere.  Also, I have this wonderfully encouraging post about writing emotions into your work.  That's not today either.

So?  What is today?

Today is me finishing up my very last of appointments and schedules which will set me free from all responsibilities save my writing--for a few weeks.   Can I get a heck yeah?

Thank you.  I'm rather excited myself.

I ended up with maybe three scenes that I'm not in so I snuck into the audience on the night of rehearsals and recorded a little bit.  I have the complete play on file and I'll upload it sometime soon for those wishing to watch.  :-)

That's all that keeps running through my head--along with the long list of things to do.   I'll post a video of our passion play as soon as possible.  :-)  Yes, you'll get to see me acting.  Badly. 

In related news:
Little Roo came down with strep again--I think.  She's running a fever.  Around 103.5 this morning early. (The Temporal Scanner says our body temperatures are higher along that vein.  Otherwise I'd be at the hospital beating some doctor over the head to fix her AND NOW!)   Never fear, we have antibiotics and started the rounds with them.  She's upset that she's having to miss out on the next two nights of the program.  Poor little Roo.  Mommy's sorry, baby.


Miss you all!

I miss my book too.  :-(

Oh my gosh.  Oh my gosh.  How can this show keep doing this?  Every time I think it can't get any better it does.  It's official.  Eric Kripke has totally and completely surpassed Joss Whedon.  Totally.

And what show has ever woven such a cool shout out to their fans into the storyline so well?  I am in awe.  Plus, I mean, I even felt a little special since they pulled in a "writer" to play such a cool part.  And his line?  "What?  You think if I was psychic I'd be doing this?  Writing's hard."

That is my most favorite line ever.

Yesterday evening we asked the girls to practice stealing home.  After being idle all winter it seemed they forgot how...

They also seemed a little scared to do it in shorts, though in September sliding home in shorts didn't seem to bother them.  Thank goodness we start the season off in ball pants so they can get used to using the padding on their sliders.  One girl came prepared and we'll hope the other girls come dressed for practice the right way next time.  ;-)  We tell them every time to wear their sliders. 

You think the not listening stuff is the age? 

Roo's one of the younger girls sliding in her blue jeans.

Two years of me and LJ.  I think it's going to be a forever kinda thing.

Shea
♥s
LJ
4-evr

In celebration I'm going to...

Post an excerpt!

Ha, you knew that was coming, didn't you? 

Okay, so I searched through my WIP last night but had some trouble finding the perfect snip.  I wanted something full of action or suspense.  I couldn't find it.  You know what?  TBOM is just a sad book.  Not sad as in bad, but sad as in sad.  Then I remembered that I'd wanted to write a bittersweet love story.  I guess I'm on track with it it then.

Spread the word about SAY THE WORD and win a free book! Check out the contest in this link.

Not only is Jeannine Garsee an outstanding author, but her blog is one of my favs! Cause, I mean, even her life is just really entertaining. :-)

onegrapeshy.livejournal.com/302070.html

Oh yeah, I'm ready for Spring Break to come to a close.  Some pics of this week:

   We played softball.

  We went fishing.  Lots of crappie.  (The fish, not my feelings over it.)  Yum.

and Little M fell asleep in a box last night.  *g*  

Today we're going kite flying and then onto more softball practice.

  Edited to add Little M with his glasses.


TBOM news:

Remember that new beginning I worked so hard on?  The one I said I wasn't sure if I'd keep?

It's gone.  No  matter how much I edited it, I couldn't be happy with it.  So goodbye new beginning.  In with the old again.  :-)

Finally, after what seems like decades, I finished my revisions on PC.  I stayed up until 2 this morning finishing it.  Now I can focus completely on TBOM.  :-D   

I'm so happy, so very happy. 

Yeah, until the next round, huh?  I looked back on my LJ last night and I started PC back in December of 2007 while I was still finishing up ITLOF.  It's been a long road since then.  Lots of tears, lots of excitement, lots of hope.  It started in third person then went to first person and finally back to third.  Funny I can't imagine it anyway but third now.

So anyway, it's printed up and going to two different places today.

Wish me luck!

I have like a billion things to share.  Tiny things.  Things that I can't post publicly anyway.  I seem to never have the time to type them up though. 

I ran into an old friend who then became an ex-friend so I guess that would make her an old ex-friend, right?  The conversation was interesting.  And I mean interesting.  Well, to other writers it would be.  I plan to post about it sometime soon.  There's more, of course.  Other stories.

I feel very isolated these days even though I'm constantly on the go and talking to so many people.  Might be this is because this isn't what makes me happy.  I'm not a snob or anything.  People just make me uncomfortable.

So far Spring Break has been going well.  The kids have cleaned when I asked them and their friends have kept them busy.  I'm sure by Friday I'll be pulling out my hair. 

And that's about it for today's journal as I'm sure my total number of loads washed and dishes loaded and unloaded aren't worth mentioning.  I did get both bathrooms clean today!  That takes tons of energy.

1.  I'm making headway on my new outline, though stalling at the moment because of sheer laziness.  (okay, I'm coming back to be honest here.  I've reached the huge catastrophe of the book and I don't want to force myself into a depression to write the amount of detail I need for the emotions of the scene. But I want to outline the emotions and important parts of dialogue now since I'm tying everything together with this outline.  It'll make it easier to remember why this was done here and that was done there when it comes to scene writing later.  I just don't want to sink so low today.  It's so hard to come back out of those self induced funks.) 

2.  We have NO practices tonight!  I'm planning to cook dinner for once.

3.  I watched the pilot of Kings this morning and I think I've found another show to add to my long list.

4.  Supernatural blew my mind last night.

5. Next week is Spring Break for the kids.  I'm not sure how I want to feel about this.

I've been struggling to get back in the groove after my long break.  I swear nothing is more frustrating than this.  I totally forgot where I was going with the story and even though I could remember a few tiny scenes I couldn't remember what order they went in or why I needed them.  Some time after going to bed last night I regained my focus and also figured out what went wrong.

I hadn't been feeling my characters because, as usual, once I hit the halfway point in the story I realized it's really going to be a story.  I then started thinking about all the things my characters could do for me instead of all the things I could do for my characters.  Bad thing to do.  Really bad.  It breaks my concentration and makes me think my book is better than it is.  When I read over it I realize I was wrong and that's when I start thinking I and my writing, plotting, characters and life stink.   This is fine when I'm editing, but first draft is a terrible time to have these feelings.  It's hard to be creative when I'm thinking I can't be.

There's no way to stop this stuff from happening though.  My brain has its gears and we all know we can't force our muse out.  We can coax it, but that's it.

Now that I've realigned all brain waves and plot lines, I'm going to get the second half of my scene list finished so I can finish this book--hopefully without losing my way again.

My main character Aspen is going Christmas shopping for Jason.  She wants something totally original, something his girlfriend Jinx wouldn't think to get him.   Any ideas?

My husband beat me at Scrabble three times last night.  He did pout and bully me into using a different word twice so that he could use the letter I was planning on using...

I don't know.  I think this crazy-no-time-to-write stuff is turning my brain into mush.

The weather doesn't seem to know this, but my life's schedule is in full spring mode.  Cheer clinics for one, softball practices for two and then baseball for little M.  It's his first year.

The past week's been pretty darn busy.  It did involve a lot of, "Where's your glasses?"  I need to get a pic up of him in them.  He's too cute.  Seems to me he's starting to get used to them.  The night before last we had a family hunt for them.  They ended up on his bed under his Spiderman shirt where he'd taken them off to change clothes.

Right now it's taking everything in me to keep up with the kids and laundry, but I thought I'd pop in to say hi and let you all know I'm thinking about you.