Tag, I'm It!

So, Kelly the Culinarian tagged me, and since I've only done one of these since starting this particular blog in January, I thought I'd go ahead and give this one a shot.

1 How long have you been blogging?
Technically I've been blogging since May of last year after I found out I was pregnant. I'm not giving out the web address to the entire public, but if you're interested in seeing that one, let me know and I'll hook you up. This blog is my first public blog, and I started it on July 2, 2007.

2 What inspired you to start a blog and who are your mentors?
Manic Mommy and Random Faerie were both major inspirations in the starting of this particular blog. Random Faerie has been suggesting I give blogging a shot for years. I've taken her off my blogroll for the moment because her site is currently being reconstructed. She's been blogging since before blogging was cool, and it was always such a joy to read her posts. Manic Mommy is wonderful at making stressful situations hilarious with her writing style. Part of the inspiration also came from the number of blogs I read on at least a weekly basis that all seemed to have this friendship, this special bond, that I wanted to share. A lot of times I feel like I'm doing this motherhood thing all by myself. Blogging helps keep me connected with other mothers and helps boost my confidence in being a mother. It's my link to other great moms out there.

3 Are you trying to make money online or are you doing it for fun?
I'm doing this for fun, but I figured while I'm already at it, why not see if I can generate a bit of income, too! Personally, I'd love to be like Dooce and have my site support my family, but I'm not holding my breath for that one.

4 What three things do you love about being online?
A. Connectedness without having to actually meet face-to-face. I can let it all hang out here without worrying about what people think or whether or not they'll still like me tomorrow after I've said something offensive today.

B. Meeting people (okay, Kelly, I'm borrowing your last two). There are some amazing women (and men) out there, but sometimes they're hard to find. I've looked locally, and either they're in hiding like I am or there really are none locally (I prefer to believe they're hiding). So, I branched out.

C. Getting feedback. Especially getting feedback from people I know are not trying to kiss up to me for any reason. It's sad to think that people online tend to be more real than the people talking to your face, but sometimes it sure seems that way.

5 What three things do you struggle with online?
A. Tangents. I get online to look up something or do something specific (like writing a blog post), and something 'sparkly' catches my eye. Off I go, reading about some new scam or health kick instead of fulfilling my original intent.

B. & C. Okay, I can't really think of anything else I struggle with online. I, like Kelly, would like to improve my readership, though I'm slowly taking the steps to do so. Struggle is such a heavy word, though.

That's it. Now it's my turn to tag, right? Okay, hmm.

I'm going to be a puss, but I'm admitting it before you can call me one, so it's okay.

Dear Readers...

TAG!!!

Now run with it and leave me a comment if you post it on your blog!

(Oh, and Carrie, I will do your tag at some point!)

Wish It Was Friday

Can this week get any longer? I don't know if it's because of the time change or what, but this week has been dragging it's butt. Ugh. I know I don't like leaving work after dark, not because I'm afraid of the dark or anything. I don't like leaving after dark because I'm SOLAR POWERED! I don't get enough sunshine this way. I've done very well in the last few years to not get SAD (Seasonally Affected Depression), at least not as bad as I used to, but for some reason I can feel it coming on already.

I don't like Daylight Saving Time, but I would prefer we keep the DST setting on the clock instead of the regular setting. I like having more daylight in the evenings. I don't really care about the mornings. In the spring, I didn't mind that the President announced we would switch to DST early, but switching off of it late has thoroughly messed with me. And it's all due to the amount (or lack thereof) of sunshine in the evening.

So, now that I'm done complaining, on to other news...

I have over 1,500 words written in my book. Colorado Writer suggested I set a goal of 100 words a day. I immediately adopted the idea. Now, when I write 500 words, it feels like a great accomplishment. And since I'm only writing in my "spare time," I'm really glad I already have most of the story worked out in my head. It makes it easier to pick up where I left off. I'm getting less nervous about it as the story begins to unfold.

Speaking of books, I got an offer to review this children's book, and I can hardly wait for it to come in! In case I've never mentioned this before, I love doing reviews, though I usually don't do a full review without being asked to do so. I love books. I love to read them, to touch them, to smell them. Every single one of my bookshelves is overflowing with books, but I refuse to get another bookshelf because I really need to go through my books and donate the ones I don't plan to read again. I prefer fiction, though I've read a few non-fiction books that I liked. My problem with most non-fiction books is that I don't get carried through, therefore I lose interest. With a fiction book, I get carried along by the flow of the story, therefore I devour it as quickly as possible. I like light reads and heavy reads. I like many different genre's, though I'm not crazy about the romance novels full of emotional turmoil, heavy petting, then more emotional turmoil. I'm also not crazy about war stories. I love horror, fantasy, and science fiction.

I'm trying to instill my love for books in Tree Faerie. I don't know if it's working or not, but she loves to touch books (especially books she's not supposed to - like DTTF's school books), she loves to taste books (see previous note), and she loves to crinkle the pages of books (again, see previous note). I made a commitment to read to her every night before bed, no matter how many times we read during the day. We always finish with the same story, a book titled The Bear Snores On by Karma Wilson. One of the neat things about always finishing with the same story is I can tell she's starting to comprehend things differently. When we first started reading this story 7 months ago, she would "talk" and kick while I was reading it. As time passed, she started responding more to the actual story. Now she sits on my lap and "helps" me turn the page and touches the pictures. She knows when we're getting to the end of the story, and when the story is done, we have to close the book, turn it over, and rub the cover hard enough to make squeaky noises. Then she pushes the book away and we're ready for bed.

I have several books on the bookshelf that I'm keeping for her to read when she gets older, books I loved when I was younger. I just hope she has a love for reading!

(shhh! I've got a secret!)

lean in close and I'll tell you...

I've started writing my book. You know, the one that's been bouncing around in my head for a while now? That one. I've actually started writing it. I have a synopsis and a gameplan, and have written more than 500 words in it. I'm scared to death. I don't want it added to my list of projects-never-completed. I'm trying not to feel overwhelmed, because every time I look at the book as a whole, it seems like an impossible task. I have to look at it in small parts. Starting it was a small part. I've got several of the main points outlined in my head already, so I'm looking at those as small parts, too. Tying them in together hopefully will be easy, especially since I have that part outlined pretty well. So, I'm joining the ranks. Wish me luck. I'm going to need it.

Whew! Now that my secret is out, I actually feel better. It makes it more real, more believable. Yesterday, when I started it, I only told Random, Manic, and my hubby. I toiled over the idea of telling the rest of the blogger world. This morning I decided that telling you all would be therapeutic and hopefully help commit me to writing this story.

It's time for this story to be born.

Procrastination

Manic Mommy recently made the comment that one reason for procrastination is the FEAR. She's absolutely right! I am one of the world's greatest procrastinators, and a good portion of the time it's because of fear! (The other times are usually because I just don't want to do whatever it is that I'm putting off, otherwise known as laziness.)

Now, this is not news to me. In fact, I will freely admit to the right company when I'm procrastinating because of fear. The right company is usually DTTF, partially because he knows me best and partially because he's my sounding board for a lot of things.

I think my book is in its incubation period, though. When I talk about it, I get goosebumps, but it's not quite ready to be birthed forth into the world yet. Or maybe I'm not ready for it to be born yet. Either way, every time I've sat down thus far to write the book, it just doesn't feel right.

Fabulous Friday

I feel great today! I’m finally in my pair of pre-pregnancy khakis and look good! I’ve been able to put them on for about a month now, but they didn’t look good. Now they look good. These are my last pair of pre-pregnancy pants I had to fit into before allowing myself to go buy new clothes, because I simply was not going to buy anything bigger than my pre-pregnancy clothes. I need to go buy about 3 new shirts – a black, a red, and a white. I wouldn’t mind a new pink one, too, and maybe a new pair of pants (which would give me 4 pairs of work pants). I really want to stop wearing the maternity shirts, though, but right now I don’t have enough regular shirts that fit the breastfeeding chest to be able to do that. I also need to go through my clothes again and get rid of the things I don’t see me wearing anymore, which would be a lot at this point. My criteria – must be comfortable, unstained, and can fit me now, plus I have to WANT to wear it. That’s going to GREATLY reduce the amount of clothing I have.

*TMI warning on*
Tree Faerie woke me up at 5 this morning, and I've been awake ever since. She woke me up because her body is trying to re-learn how to have a BM. When she was exclusively on breast milk, her BMs were always loose. Now that she's eating a lot more solid foods, her BMs are considered "normal" but much, much thicker than she's ever experienced. I feel so sorry for her when she's having trouble with it. This morning, she just keep screaming at me occasionally like she was saying, "Mommy, fix it!" In between the screaming moments when she was actually awake, she'd give me kisses, which was really sweet but very confusing. I finally put her in her Bounce Bounce Baby chair. Her little face turned almost purple, but she finally went and wasn't screaming about it. I actually brought the chair into the bathroom with me while I took a shower. Usually she sits in a pink bouncy seat while I take a shower, but I received a bit of information yesterday from her daycare teacher about bounce chairs and babies' BMs, so I figured I'd give her time in the chair.
*TMI warning off*

Tomorrow morning, my sewing buddy KH is going to become my home improvement buddy. She's coming over tomorrow morning to help me finish painting Tree Faerie's room. I have all the stuff, but I just haven't had the time/energy/help/gumption to finish it. We did paint one coat of Kilz and one coat of paint when we first picked up the stuff to do her room, but that's as far as we got. I'm looking forward to getting it done, because I plan on having her moved into her room and us moved upstairs next to her before the year is out. We won't be working on it too late, though, because she and I both have other plans tomorrow evening.

I have not started actually writing the story, though I have a lot more worked out in my head. I just actually have to put it down in pixels.

Let's Talk Numbers For A Moment

Forgive me for a moment, but I work with numbers daily, and sometimes those numbers help me see things from a different perspective. :) Sorry. I'm a geek. Or a nerd. You pick.

I started this blog on 7/2/07. In that time, I've written 33 posts. Those 33 posts, including titles, come to 16,275 words (I copied them into Word and made it count them for me). That averages out to about 493 words per post. I'm impressed and surprised. It may just be that easy to write a book! Granted, I write about a different topic every day, and I usually only post during the week.

Jess Riley commented that if you write a page a day, then you'll have an entire book in a year. If you figure that the average page is 400 words long, then I've already written almost 41 pages. Another way to look at it - the average book (young adults and adults) is about 50,000 words long, which means I've already written 1/3rd of a book, or 32.5%.

I guess I'm trying to convince myself that this is really possible to finish. I know there are thousands of writers out there, and they all finished their books, but it's a bit different when you're looking at yourself wondering if you can actually write a book.

When We Grow Up

What did you want to be when you grew up? Are you doing it? Antique Mommy has a great post today about that exact thing, and it, with a little help from Manic Mom's post, inspired a lot of thinking.

I've ALWAYS wanted to be a mom, but that's the only thing that I've consistently wanted to be. And now I'm a mom. I love it, just as I knew I would and despite the lack of sleep and lack of personal time.

The other thing I wanted to be that I still have the desire for - a writer. When I was a kid, I used to write short stories, poetry, and even started a novel when I was 13, though I only wrote about 7 chapters. I wrote it in pencil in a wide-ruled spiral-bound notebook, and my handwriting is so atrocious that by the time I was working on the 7th chapter, I couldn't read the first.

Well, now I type. I type MUCH faster and, of course, more clearly than I write with a pen. What's stopping me from writing a book? I can type almost as fast as I can think and still be able to READ what I typed, whereas when I'm writing by hand, if I'm on a roll, it takes an interpreter to figure out what I wrote. Seriously. And even then, they're guessing.

I have a couple of book ideas rolling around in my head. I might as well spit them out, let them have a bit of water/sunshine/love, and watch them grow just to see what they become.

What's stopping me, you ask? Laziness. Fear of failure. Fear of success. Fear that I won't complete yet another project.

I use the excuse that I don't know how to start writing a book. That's B.S. I know how to start writing. First, I have to get the idea out. I just don't feel like I know where to take it from there. I've done copy-editing, so I know that most books go through many changes before being published. I am just afraid that I won't be able to get it to the point where it can even be SUBMITTED to a publishing company.

Okay, now that I've exposed my fears, maybe seeing them in black-and-white will help me overcome them and get motivated enough to start writing...

*****
Other things I've wanted to be when I grew up (in no particular order):
Actor
Singer
Musician
Dancer
Marine Biologist
Medical Doctor
Librarian
Veteranarian
Massage Therapist
Naturopath
Lawyer
President of the United States
Herbalist

The ones I still have interest in are blue, and those are things I can still do while writing. You know what's not on there? My current profession. Nor is the profession I was going to get a degree in. I chose the degree to persue based on practicality, not what I want. I chose the degree because it's safe, and there's always a need for it, which means job security. I think I'll still get that degree because that degree can easily lead into other degrees, but I think I will also go ahead and start writing.