Hours away...

...until the release of Catching Fire, the sequel to Suzanne Collins' The Hunger Games (haven't read it? What'r ya waitin' for?).

Daughter #1 is ITCHING to read it. She has requested it for her birthday, which is coming up in just over three weeks. I bought her The Hunger Games for her birthday last year. So, here's my dilemma: Do I buy it for her now, wrap it up and make her wait till her birthday? Do I buy it and secretly read it and THEN wrap it up and make her wait till her birthday? Do I buy it for her as an early birthday gift and pester her to hurry up and read it so that I can?

Ahhh...decisions.

34

It's fun to have a birthday on the weekend.

Yesterday we spent almost all day at the Air Show, watching all that fancy wing-work in the skies. Very cool, especially when the Blue Angels performed! We hadn't been to the air show since before my first child was born, even though my own dear hubby spent 8 years in the Air Force. I'm sure we won't wait 14 years before going again. After the air show we had dinner at an all-you-can-eat buffet.

Today I woke up with a sore throat (felt it coming on yesterday), so I stayed home in bed watching TV. Hubby came home from church with a chocolate silk pie and then he made steak fajitas for lunch. Yum! (I'll turn him into a cook yet). I didn't have much of an appetite, but I enjoyed the yummies anyway.

My birthday present from hubby was a kit for making wax seals (to seal envelopes like in the "olden" days). How cool! Even cooler that he remembered me mentioning it several weeks ago.

We ended the day watching one of my favorite movies, Independence Day.

It was a good day.

Big Bug

This is the praying mantis that my daughter discovered clinging to the screen outside her bedroom window. Look how big she is!

Writing backwards

Today I wrote a synopsis for a book I haven't written yet.

I don't know what made me do it. I didn't even have a story idea before I started writing, only an image of a creepy forest. What's going on in that forest? I wondered. Something dark. Something evil.

So I sat down with my journal, imagined a problem and a hero and started writing. The synopsis has everything except a solution, but those never come easily.

Maybe this synopsis will lead to my next big project (NaNoWriMo?). We'll see!

Tuesday Tip #24: Waste Not

I love saving things and reusing them. My Grandma used to make cute little geese from old gallon milk jugs and use them for holding wash cloths and soap in the bathroom. I had an article published in Pockets about making old "junk" useful for something new. I've been saving pop tabs, wrappers and other throw-away items to use in a family collage project. It's fun to give those old things a new purpose. Not that I never throw anything away!

It's not so different with my writing, but I never throw anything out! Hanging around in my writing folders with nothing to do (for now) are countless tid-bits waiting to be given new life. Poems that I started, but were never finished or polished. Lines of dialogue, title ideas, scenes that were cut from stories, clever rhymes that never made it into that rhyming story. It may seem like a bunch of wordy clutter, but some day I may be browsing through that old junk and find a way to give some of it new life.

So don't throw any of your words out. You might find a way to use them some day!

The Last Day

Summer Vacation

I've enjoyed your visit,

though you were a bit chilly at times,

nipping at my toes and arms,

complaining, I imagine,

of the effort required to bring the heat.

Thank you for the lazy

stretched out

days,

the jewel-toned

perfumed garden,

the kiss of the sun on my cheeks.

I will miss the twinkling

lightning bugs,

evenings that reached into mornings,

extra time spent

with those I love.

I look forward to your next visit.

You're welcome to stay longer

if you wish.