Internets!!

Internet!!

My gosh it's been too long without internet. It felt like. . . like there was just not as much to do as usual. I hope I don't have to deal with that again. Downside is that there's only 1gb of speed so it takes a bit longer for some things to load than I'm used to. And videos? Omg, if it's not in the lowest quality setting I have to wait longer than the length of the video for it to load. But I can browse pretty okay so alls. . .okay.

In other news: We're halfway moved to the shop. We got all the important things, beds, fridge, other stuff that we use often. We pretty much just have the craft room, garage and other small spaces to move, and the garden dirt, then we're done! I can't wait till then, I hate, hate, hate! moving. And then. . . then we start putting up the walls for the new house in the shop. I can't wait until that either!

Anyways, while I was away from the internets an amazing thing happened! I read and finished (the finishing part is very important here) four, FOUR books! I read Crank by Ellen Hopkins, finished Shatter Me by Tehereh Mafi, which was awesome, loved it!, and read the last two books of the Hunger Games series! Which was really awesome as well! I can't believe that! It's been so long since I've read and finished any books and it feels so great :D

And then I found out that the Hunger Games movie comes out next month! I mean, I knew they were making the movie but I thought it would be coming out late this year cause they always seem to talk about the movies like two years before they actually come out. So I will hopefully definitely be seeing that movie in theaters when it is released if I can scrape a bit of money together.

Also, the no internet thing gave me a jump start on my art as well. I got some stuff in the works for my book which I think I'll post here soon!

So, till next time!

:)

2012 Troubles

Wow, there are so many things going on (or perhaps it just feels that way). Mostly not good, but some of it good. First off, me and my family (brother, parents) are moving. We're not moving very far, about 45 minutes away, but we're not moving exactly by choice. Our financial situation isn't good with having to pay a loan on our shop and house and other stuff. Our house is about to foreclose so we are moving to the shop. Might not sound fun but the silver lining is that we are going to build our house within the shop and essentially get everything that we want in a house.

We're going to be able to garden and maybe even get chickens, and since we're not renting, our four dogs and two birds won't be a problem. The shop is so large we'll be able to have a full sized home inside and build it for relatively low costs since the foundation is already there and though it'll be lots of work it'll be better in the end because we'll only be paying one mortgage and one electricity and water bill. Really, I'm so glad my Dad is a carpenter because he knows all about building houses and stuff. (his dad is a carpenter and so was his grandparents. . . runs in the blood I guess.)

So, it's not so bad. I'm actually sort of excited. I'm not looking forward to having to pack and move though, I always hate that part.

Another thing: some of you might remember the post awhile ago about my cat Fritzy. Well, we had to put her down last month, right before new years. It was sad but she was so old (19 years!) and you could tell she was in pain. It was sorta weird the first few nights after we put her down because I always expected to see her sleeping in the living room or meowing for food and once or twice I thought I saw her, but no.

So, my posting on here will probably be non-existent for a bit longer. I'm hoping that setting up the internet at the shop will be easy but, with the way the internet has been for the last couple months I'm fearing the worst. . .

I hope 2012 is fairing better for everyone else! Happy belated new year!

Unfinished Bissuness and a Blog Award

Wow, it's been awhile. Um, I could come up with with a lot of excuses but what happened was I lost internet and therefore lost inspiration to write and then lost the inspiration to blog and then I procrastinated longer and longer even after I got internet back and therefore was more reluctant to post. So there wasn't really a reason at all. But here I am now.

It's times like this that I think that I perhaps shouldn't blog. I can't seem to keep up with it even though my life isn't really busy or anything. I do enjoy blogging but I hit these. . . blocks, where I don't blog for awhile.

But enough of that. I think I should feel you guys in about the end of Nano.

About halfway through the month, pretty much right after my last post, I changed internet providers and with the new provider my laptop, for some reason, could not get the internet. But the internet was supposed to be better and cheaper so I though I could just live with using my desktop. I was wrong. My writing inspiration went down the drain, I kept pushing off writing because I had already written way over the current goal.

Long story short I waited until the last three days to start writing again. I wrote twenty thousand words in those three days. It was hard, it was painful but I was not eager to let this be my first year to miss the goal. And I just knew I wouldn't let myself live it down if I didn't get after writing twice that last year. I won by a hair, 50,020.

I'm so happy I won! I'm so happy that I didn't give up in the end. I'm happy and satisfied with what I accomplished. :)

And another thing, long overdue. I've been given an award! I was given the same award by two people back in August (I know, I'm horrible *cowers*). Given to me by Sarah McCabe and Claudie A. (now at The Novel Experiment).


Sarah said: Taylor Roseberry has the most beautiful header and a great blog. I find myself just gazing at that header though.And Claudie A. said: I met Taylor during last NaNoWriMo. I can't recall how, but I know we ended up pushing the last days together. A bond was formed, and it so happens she has a great blog with a super shiny header. Sarah tagged her for this already, but she hasn't answered. So there. You have no choice.

Yes, talk about guilt. I soo should've posted this award before now. I totally slacked on my blogging and currently feel way undeserving of the award and all the wonderful things they had to say about me and the blog. But I'll try to get back on track.

 Anyway, it is the Liebster Blog award!



The goal of the award is to spotlight up and coming bloggers who currently have less than 200 followers.

The rules are:

   1. Thank the giver and link back to the blogger who gave it to you.
   2. Reveal your top 5 picks and let them know by leaving a comment on their blog.
   3. Copy and paste the award on your blog.
   4. Have faith that your followers will spread the love to other bloggers.
   5. And most of all - have bloggity-blog fun!

S.B. Stewart-Laing at Writing the Other. Stewart has TONS of useful information and tips and advice on things you probably haven't ever thought about but probably should.


Larkindale at Fiction and Film. Her posts are amusing and interesting :)


Nicole at Write me a World. Her blog is interesting and awesome :D


Angeline Trevena. She's got a good blog! :)


Miss Cole at Miss Cole Seeks Publisher. Love her blog :)


Awesome blogs everyone! Thanks for the award Claudie and Sarah and I hope to get back into the groove of things!


Hope to be back on the blog soon!

NaNo Day 15

Wow. It has been so busy! I've had like three violin lessons in addition to my usual weekly ones in preparation for recital and then (though this is entirely my own fault) had a Harry Potter marathon which I just finished yesterday.

Actually, finishing the Harry Potter marathon and watching the last movie in my own home, it's really really hit me that Harry Potter is pretty much over. I'll always be able to read the books and watch the movies but there won't be any new movies or books to look forward to. I'm feeling sorta sad about it, I'd never thought before that I'd feel so sad about Harry Potter ending and yet. . . I'll probably watch the last movie a couple more times over the next few days. I would turn it on right now if I didn't have to wake up early tomorrow.

So I haven't written anything at all since the 10th, I think. I know, it's horrible! I've gotta catch up! My word count is currently 27,242. I've gotta get writing again!

And of course I'll be getting the video game Assassins Creed Revelations tomorrow and therefore waste more precious writing time. Why? Why did it have to come out this month? Of all the months of the year, this one?

At least there's a write in this week. Maybe I can make up a decent chunk of wordcount there?

I hope everyone is writing exciting things and that your muses are being kind to you (probably not to your characters though ;p)!

Nano Day 5

So today was great! I went to another write in and wrote about 5k words today. I've got a total of 14,441 words, 10k of them in my story Sun Touched. Things are going pretty awesomely with Sun Touched really. I didn't know how far I'd get with the idea before I got stumped but ideas are popping up like crazy and the general idea of the plot, saving the world from a dying sun, is coming along nicely.

I'm really glad I switched from the Chronicles to Sun Touched because when I had been writing the Chronicles I was getting stumped and I wasn't even 5k into it yet. With Sun Touched? Bring. It. ON!

I'll go ahead and explain a little bit more about the characters (because I can).

Dalon Av Baen is 159 years old and lost his power a century ago when the sun began to die. His outlook on life is predominantly negative and memories haunt him. He's pessimistic, sarcastic, and I like writing him :) I view him as the main character of the story even though his POV time is split with. . .

Nara Belvene. A sun-touched around 20 years old. She is rather optimistic and this irritates Dalon to no end. She thinks she might be able to save the world and drags Dalon from place to place as she tries to figure out how to do this.

I like writing about both of them because while Dalon is very negative, Nara is more positive and I like the contrast between their POV's.

Anyways, I'm getting to a part of the book that will be exciting. I think I may be getting close to the first plot point. They're about to come upon the ruins of a sorcerer city. There will be some rather nasty surprises there, and some good ones too. But for some reason I can't wait to write about the nasty ones. I almost feel bad for my characters, they have such a cruel author. *evil grin*

My grandparents are coming to visit tomorrow (Sunday) so we'll see how much writing I get in. If I wake up early I might be able to get some writing in but somehow I don't think that will happen. Seeing as I'm writing this at 1 o'clock in the morning. Cause that's how I roll.

Goodnight everyone! Have happy dreams of making things unbearably difficult for your characters! :D

The First Few Days

Augh! I was wanting to post everyday but I didn't Dx Well, here I am now so. . .

Day 1, I went to the midnight kickoff. It was a bit subdued, probably cause it was midnight or something. I got in about 2.5k before I left at about 2:30am. And then after sleeping I wrote about 2-2.5k more. So all in all a pretty good day :)

Except, well, I started out writing The Chronicles of Siron like planned and then I had a sudden plot bunny about something totally different about the sun dying and stuff and now I'm writing that instead because it has a simple but - what I think is a - compelling plot. Compared to The Chronicles which is endlessly complicated and I'm very indecisive on many points of the plot.

Day 2, I wrote about 2.5k more. (what's with all the 2.5k's?)

And then today, day 3, I wrote nothing until the write in at a coffee shop near by, where I wrote about 3k and won both 15 minute word sprints by writing more than 700 words both times. That's, like, the most I've ever written in that amount of time. I usually average at about 1k every half hour if I'm really writing, but 700 every 15 minutes? That blew my mind.

Today's write in was fun. We all laughed about milking sheep and dolphin cheese XD It's nice to write with other wrimos in real life. I can't wait to go to more!

So my total wordcount so far is 9,189, so far so good!

As for my 'new idea' I'm calling it Sun Touched and here's the synopsis:

Dalon Av Baen, former sorcerer, lost his power 98 years ago when the sun began to die. Now with winters growing long and cold, he has done his best to blend with the others and forget his former life, waiting for his death. But when he meets Nara - a sun-touched - and her foolish ideas about saving the world, he reluctantly begins to have hope.


How's everyone else doing? I hope everyone's got good inspiration. Sending writing vibes your way! :D

My Dream Writers Desk

Last post I mentioned that me and my dad had built a custom desk for me. Well, it's finally finished.

First let's take a look at the desk I had before:



This picture was taken before my desktop was completed so my 27'' monitor isn't up there with a keyboard and mouse. Now imagine how little space there was up there :-p

Building my new desk took a lot of hard work. It all started in August. My birthday was coming up and I decided that I wanted a desk. So I got drawing my dream desk, looked at some pics online of some desk styles that I might like and stuff. There wasn't much to see really. The only things I found were the average plain jane/john desks that can be bought from staples or ikea. But I eventually found this:

That's a picture of Charles Dickens desk. I couldn't really make my desk look just like it, what with having a computer and all and plus it's not much bigger than the desk I already had. But I really liked the way the top was done with distressed wood and framed out. And the color.this was enough to get my creativity going.

So with that to go on I began to draw. I knew I wanted a space for my desktop and tower, speakers, some books and still have plenty of room for papers and my laptop and drawing tablet and anything else I might need.

This is what I drew:

('Tay Tay' courtesy of my mom)

I know it looks nothing like the Charles Dickens desk but this is what I needed.

Anyways I didn't get my desk on my birthday, things were too busy and then next month we were preparing for vacation so early this month my dad taught me how to use cabinet vision to draw up my cabinet and then the next day we went up and started building it.

I don't know about you guys but when I see pieces of wood on the floor like that I just can't see a cabinet. But  we started to put them together and got this:

And my uber awesome counter top!

(My dad is there for size scale :p)

Anyway, that was day one. The next day we built the face frames and and drawers and long(er) story short this is what happened:

It actually took 3 days to build because even after we got it home we still had to touch up the counter top and stuff.

And then the stain took like 2 weeks to choose and then apply. It was horrid having to do all that work and more than once I wanted to rush it. There was so much sanding and staining and with the cabinet so massive on top of it all it took forever!

But we eventually finished it (yesterday) and here's what it looks like!

It's so awesome but it gets better. Here's a pic of it with all my stuff on it:

So there it is! My dream desk from fantasy to reality. I can't wait to really start using it come next month during Nano.

And speaking of Nano, I'm going to a Nano kickoff party tonight. It'll be the first write in I've ever gone to so we'll see how it goes :)