What I learned at the Writers Workshop...

I am very excited today!

Not because my cold is starting to dissipate, or because I've just caught pink eye from one of my lovely chillens, but because I just returned from an Awesome Writers Workshop!

Yes, this blog is going to be about writing, so before you tune out I just want to say that I feel very hopeful about my future!

It was an interesting workshop. Eight writers, including myself, in two cabins for five days, writing. Sounds fun right? My husband said he'd rather hang himself, but to each his own.

Anyway, it was great and I mean that. I met an agent who told me my story sounded old-fashioned and she didn't know where she'd put it on the shelf, and I still think it was a great experience. In fact that's what made it so positive. I didn't go away with my head full of myself, but with a plan. A foundation to take me to the next level.

So this is the latest plan of attack. I'm going to read like crazy. Pick a genre and read the heck out of everything being spewed from the publishers mouth so I can figure out where I belong. I'm also going to be practising these writers drills so I can find my "voice". That's what they all want. A clear, strong voice and someone that knows for sure what genre they are writing in. So the next few months for me are going to be soul searching. What the agent reiterated was that you have to find your "niche" and stick with it. Only when you are famous can you hop around and hope to have any sort of a following. After all it is a business. Somewhat grudgingly I'll accept this, though I really don't like being labeled or pinned down, but I get what she's saying.

Any writers out there want to share how they picked their genre? Or maybe you could pass along some favorite books for me to read.

I always love your thoughts.
Until next time

It's December already?

It's ten o'clock Thursday night. I'm sitting in the darkened living room staring into the abyss and feeling totally overwhelmed. My nose is the size and color of a strawberry and I've got ten little drummer boys beating against my already swollen sinus's and I'm thinking, Bah humbug.

Normally I look forward to the holidays with much anticipation. We usually go traipsing through a Christmas tree farm, or in the very least a grocery store parking lot to get our tree right after Thanksgiving, and the lights--the lights are always up before the first snow flies, which around here would have been about two weeks ago. Yet here I sit. And I've got nothing.

I don't know what is happening, but my life is in a tailspin, and I can't keep it all together anymore. Hubby is working an hour and a half away and often stays away for two or three days during the week and I don't know, I just need him to come home and do a bunch of stuff. But really what is kicking me in the tail, is this monster of a cold I've come down with. Sinus pressure, ear ache, and the ugliest snotty nose you've seen since your two year old nephew wiped his mucus on your new pair of pants.

It doesn't get better at night either. It's one of those, gagging, wake you up in the middle of the night, cause you must have water before you choke to death, kind of coughs. Then there's the post nasal drip to think about. What's there to think about? How I'm going to wedge a little piece of tissue up my nostril without it tickling me into a sneeze, or worse,worrying that it will become lodged until spring. It's ugly. I'm ugly and my head is so full of gunk that I don't even want to think about Christmas yet. And don't even get me started on those steamy things you stick up your nose to drain all the...Okay I have said way too much about this.

But this is what is so cute about having children. I was lamenting the fact that we still didn't have a single Christmas decoration up, let alone a tree and my little three year old piped up, "Yes we do!" and then she climbed off the couch, ran upstairs and came down with a little Christmas tree that has been the only piece of landscaping for the barbie house all summer, (since we forgot to put it away last Christmas see, and I was feeling way too lazy to pull down the Christmas box just for one tiny little piece of greenery.

So here is our Christmas tree. Cute isn't it? And how proud Macy was for making everything all better. You know what was the best though? We didn't even have to walk across the parking lot to get it. That's my kind of Christmas Tree!