Adventures in Crafting with Words

One of my friends was gifted this awesome 400 writing prompts book for Christmas.  Naturally, I needed it. So his wife told me where I got it and I went to my local branch and looked all over the story for that book of 400 writing prompts.  I'd even settle for the book of 300 writing prompts. But nope.  I had to settle for this one... Whatever.  *shrugs shoulder* 'But,' the little voice in the back of my head challenged me, 'what if you use this book to help you with the plethora of stories you are struggling with?' 'And,' another voice agreed, 'you use them for your writing prompt blog posts... The catch with these prompts:  there is only one page to write and there are a handful of words that must be added into the scene.   For this scene I brought in Winnie from Half-Moon Manor.  I've been pondering her story for a while now, and she volunteered for the prompt.  And now... Magic in Everyday Occurrences Winnie closed...

I know, you are probably waiting with baited breath, or at least pretending to, on information about that cryptic NaNoWriMo project.  Surprisingly, I haven't finished yet.  I don't have a title.  Or a cover - because of lack of title mostly.  So that reveal will have to wait. Some of you might even be waiting for an announcement about The Trouble With Chasing Aileen - The Hastings Sisters number 2.  - Soon.  I promise.  Final rewrites and Beta reads got caught in the middle of finals (for the Beta) and NaNoWriMo (me).  Now, to the point of the blog - Betas.  What are they good for.  (Absolutely nothing!) Joking.  Joking.  That's a dig at my current Beta who is only still around because she's my best friend and she's in college while dealing with a four year old.  Betas aren't perfect, after all.  They can't spend all their time reading over your manuscript.  Why?  It's my livelihood isn't it? ...

I first encountered John Green the spring of 2009.  Not literally, although that would be great.  I had just graduated college and still wasn't through the young adult stage of books. I grew up on The Baby Sitters Club, Sweet Valley High, and a few other serial teen books that released one new book a month (written by a ghost writer) for over a hundred months. And I could eat one of those books in a day or two.  Again, not literally. The Young Adult books as we know them now didn't come out until my senior year of high school and college. And I love them! So I spent a fair amount of time going to the library and checking out books I didn't have to pay for past updating my definitely expired library card.  (At least 5 years expired.) And there I found An Abundance of Katherines, Looking for Alaska, and Paper Towns.  Consumed one by one in a week. And I waited for more.  Finally came The Fault in Our Stars. And Hank Green's YouTube webseries l...

Things have not been okay around this writer's family. On Father's Day my grandfather suffered a stroke.  A week in the hospital. 3 weeks in rehab. Then we moved him into a retirement village.  Before that he'd spent a week in the hospital followed by a week of us staying with him 24/7.  All that was after the Alabama trip. Then about 10 days ago, right as we were settling into our new routine, my mom had a mild heart attack.  Thus yet another week in the hospital. That week I made a lot of chainmaille for the etsy shop.  The etsy shop has gotten a lot of attention, mostly because I can easily send out tweets with projects. My brain had stalled on me.  I was doing things by rote.  That's why chainmaille was so easy once I'd gotten the patterns down.  Go ahead. Look. Not everything is posted, but enough is already available for sale. Www.overthinkercreates.etsy.com And now we're back to 24/7, only this time I'...

Sometimes things get frustrating over on my side of the laptop.  Keep watching reviews and determining ways to bounce back, to create better.  Watching the numbers and wondering if those handful of bad reviews are just pulling the rest of the potential readers down where they don't want to read, not even with Kindle Unlimited.  I have to watch the day by day because at the end of the month if I don't hit minimum page reads and sold books then I'm losing out. I'm running out of time.  I'm running a gamble here by wanting to be a full-time writer.  A crafter of words. But this and etsy don't always pay the bills.  They certainly aren't paying me enough to get out of my parents house. Who am I? I am a writer.  I've been a writer since the seventh grade. And Yet... It hasn't even been a year since I've started.  I really need to not lose hope. A

*Warning: Contains a free write that is basically a stream of conscious jumble of verbal diarrhea. Yes. Writer's block. A freeze on words that are necessary for forming the next story in the Bookworm Stories series. I have my base. I already know the major event that is going to happen during the prom chapters. I've already referenced it. I'm working my way towards it. But what about what happens before this event? After? It's been 12 years since I went to my own prom. Even then I went stag because I was too shy to ask any off the guys - including the track team member I had a crush on, or the baseball player I had a crush on. That was an interesting semester... It's not like I was Miss Popularity. I was Miss Bookworm. Miss Awkward. Miss Socially Awkward. I'd rather be on the track running in circles and trying to improve my personal best times instead of dealing with the boys at my high school. (No offense, guys, if any of you are actual...

I'm having trouble reconciling the person I knew to the person being talked about.  I hear the idealization given by the guilt-ridden and grieving. I hear the words being said. I don't recognize the actions. Grandma played favorites.  I didn't know that my family was a blended family until I was eight years old.  It didn't matter. My cousins were my cousins and my grandparents my grandparents. I didn't realize my Dad was a divorced kid. It didn't matter. Family is family no matter how it's assembled. I have little claim to favorite status.  I wasn’t her only biological child's children.  I was eight and almost in the third grade (it was before school started that year) when I was told the difference by one of those favored cousins. In front of both grandparents. During a roadtrip.  It wasn't until later that I noticed what my cousin's damning words really meant. It meant that I was an afterthought to Grandma.  It meant that I had to sit at ...