Project 365: 3/365 - Blackbirds

O blackbird! sing me something well:
While all the neighbors shoot thee round,
I keep smooth plats of fruitful ground,
Where thou mayst warble, eat, and dwell.

Excerpt from The Blackbird by Lord Alfred Tennyson

Project 365: Day 2/365 - Playtime @ the Park

One nice thing about playtime at the park is that momma gets to read her library book before the overdue fines get out of control. :oP

Project 365 for 2012: Day 1/365 - Grammar Be Good

Back in 2008, I learned from my dear friend Beth about a little thing called Project 365. It is basically a challenge to take a photo every day for a year. The purpose? To create a visual diary of a single year in your life. Time moves surprisingly fast, and if I didn't keep a daily account of my comings and goings, I honestly don't think I would remember even half of what I do.



I managed to finish Project 365 in 2008 (video above). Started it in 2009 but fizzled due to extreme busyness. In 2010, I made a concerted effort, but stopped in April because sometime at the end of 2009, I got a crazy hair spiraling out of my cranium and attempted to do a photo AND a video each day. (It was extremely fun to do a video a day though; don't get me wrong. One of my faves is here below.)



For 2012, I'll attempt no such daily video nonsense, but will most definitely be posting daily photos here.

Please feel free to comment! Creative people are feedback junkies; we thrive on pats on the back and constructive criticism. So I welcome your comments as we progress through the year. Many thanks for following! And now, without further adieu...let's begin.

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2012 Project 365: Day 1/365 - Grammar Be Good



How, oh, HOW does a sign get publicly posted with a blaring grammatical error such as this? The "in assure" is bad enough, then let's add the fact that there are capitalization and punctuation problems to boot. ACK.

Into the Etsy Foray: First Item - Robot Figurine

I've been thinking about creating an Etsy account for several months now, selling only items I can make with things I already have. So this morning, I started a store and listed my first item: Robot Figurine Made from Spare Parts

I wonder if people are interested in tiny robot figurines? Anyway, I'm excited to see what happens, and if anything, I'll have had fun creating adorable artwork. See the Etsy listing HERE.

Christmas Break Event for Young Writers

Thanks to the brainstorming help of some talented (albiet easily distracted) Inkaholics I know, we are planning a special young writers event over Christmas break. If you or a young writer you know is interested in doing something creative over break, this could be a perfect opportunity. Here are details:

Eight Players:
Character RPG
3 Wednesdays, 2:00-4:00 p.m.
December 21, 28, 2011
& January 4, 2012

Dream up characters together, set the the stage, then send them on an unforgettable adventure of our own creation. Participants will receive a FREE professionally designed and published copy of the final story. Illustrations by writers are welcome!

Ages: 13-18
Cost: $40 per person
Participants: 8-10 total


REGISTER ONLINE

It will be an amazingly fun, fast-paced project that will leave young writers with a sense of having accomplished something grand over their break from school--besides getting to level 100 on a video game or watching three dozen movies. ;-)

If you have any questions about the Eight Players Event, please feel free to contact me.

UPDATE: Only 2 spots left! (12-8-11, 8:00 PM)

Inkaholics Books on Sale!

For those of you who have been waiting to purchase Inkaholics Group books for Christmas, this is a great sale to get a few ordered! This offer is only good through December 7, so act quickly to get the deal.

If you're seeing this late and missed the deadline, you can still use this coupon code through December 14:

25% off any of your books
Coupon Code: BUYMYBOOK305
Coupon expires December 14, 2011
$50 Max Savings

Just go to themangycat.com/books to find all the selections, then use the coupon code when you get to the checkout. NOTE: Lulu only allows one coupon per order.

NaNoWriMo 2011: Day 30 - WON

NaNoWriMo 2011 is in the books! I finished this afternoon with a validated word count of 50,830. And guess what? I STILL love the story. (That's something that has never happened in my NaNo history; I usually despise everything about my novel by the last day.)

I am totally smitten by Beckon, and I can hardly wait to start editing it. This is most definitely something special, and I have a publisher in mind already.

I leave you with a final excerpt from this novel that I love:

My eyes scanned the landscape. The village was in a shambles. The buildings, even though they were on fire, were very unlike the buildings in my world. I wondered what had started the fires, and automatically looked to the skies for dragons.

Soaring high above, through white rain clouds and black soot columns, giant stiff birds with strange wings and noses flew in a V-formation.

I touched Beck's shoulder, where he crouched on the dirt. "What are those birds? Did they start the fire?"

He looked up and squinted at the shapes. "Those aren't birds." His eyes widened.

I turned back and saw that the birds were dropping what looked like little dots from where we stood.

"Chan, we have to go." He grabbed my hand.

"Where are we going?"

"Away from here!" He pulled on my arm, urging me to run.

I lifted one side of my dress and ran after him.

Oh yes. This is something special indeed.

NaNoWriMo 2011: Day 9

Writing days have been up and down lately, squeezing in just a few hundred words here and there. It's been a weird week, and I've found myself behind. Tonight, I've got to get some serious noveling done!

'Round about chapter 7, I decided that it was time to change POVs (point of view) to the secondary main character, Beck. He's from a contemporary world (ours) and, as I discovered surprisingly, a total geek. He even wears glasses. I love, love, love his voice. Some great lines have come out from Beck's third person POV.

He had no idea the the old doorframe from the antique shop would take him to a distant realm of fantasy where there was no indoor plumbing and certainly no wi-fi to speak of. If he had known, he wasn’t sure if he would have walked though that shimmering portal at all. But standing here, even freezing to death in the stables, talking to Chan, he wondered if maybe she was the reason he was here.

Back in his world, a techie geek was sexy in theory, but in practice? Perhaps not so much. Not many cute girls liked to hang out in the computer data server room at corporate offices. It was dusty. And hot. And there was always the possibility of breaking something just by turning around. Or getting electrocuted.

And here's an awesome, comical scene from today's writing:

Beck stared at the ground from atop the enormous horse. He really didn’t want to meet the dirt any faster than necessary, but Chan was already too far off the road to call. No, he didn’t need help to get off of a horse. How hard could it be?

Fingers gripping the saddle horn, Beck leaned forward and brought one leg up. He rested it atop the horse. While adjusting his other shoe for balance, he lost track of his higher leg, and his body twisted. He reached out for something--anything--to grab. Finding nothing but air, he peeled backward off the side of the stallion and fell on his face.

The horse whinnied and sidestepped away.

Beck spat gravel from his mouth and tried to stand. His every sinew ached. “Thanks for nothing, Lester,” he muttered to the animal, who whinnied at him once more. Funny, he sounded like he was laughing at him. Or was that his pride turning into a cherry slushie?

I'm having a ton of fun writing both of these characters. So far, I still love the story. Here's hoping it lasts at least another 21 days.

In other news, the next episode of Month of the Novel was released today. Check it out!

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YOU TUBE CHANNEL: MonthOfTheNovel
WEB: monthofthenovel.com

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Day 9 Word Count: 12,580 (pre-noveling tonight)
Words Remaining: 37,420

NaNoWriMo 2011: Day 3

Didn't get a whole lot of writing done today--about 1,000 words. But I'm still a bit ahead, so there's no cause for alarm just yet. This excerpt is actually from yesterday's writing, but I still like it, and it shows the main character's personality very well.

"Stay alert, Princess.”

“Yes, indeed I will, Sir Joshue.”

It was the burly man’s turn to blush. “Please, Princess. You embarrass me.”

“Precisely what I intended then.”

ON A RELATED NOTE: A handful of my young writer friends from the east side of the country and their cohorts have started a series about a writer who is attempting to write a NaNo novel, but she's...running into some creativity issues. This is hilarious and done completely by teens and young adults.



YOU TUBE CHANNEL: MonthOfTheNovel
WEB: monthofthenovel.com

I just discovered that they were working on this project and had to share. Enjoy!



Day 3 Word Count: 6,211
Words Remaining: 43,789

NaNoWriMo 2011: Day 2

I didn't get any noveling done during the day today, but my friend MightiMidget and I squeezed in three 10-minute Word Wars in the wee hours of the night. Here's an excerpt from tonight's writing.

Now that I looked closer, I could see that he wore some kind of decoration on his face. Two circles of metal with glass windows in them, perched on his nose and affixed to his head by two metal bars that wrapped around his ears. “This is curious,” I said, reaching for the adornment.

I didn't realize Beck wore glasses until this moment. Love surprises like that!

Day 2 Word Count: 5,212
Words Remaining: 44,788

As a side note, I entered a short story into a contest at Lulu.com. It required putting that short story in eBook format to submit it, so here it is if you're interested in taking a look: The Question: A Short Story