It’s Friday…finally.
I don’t know what it was about this week, but I swear it’s lasted a year. But it’s Friday and today, five things I’m doing are…
Hanging out with Brynn Paulin and Carol Lynne.
Laughing at…with…Brynn’s husband.
Prepping my faery story for submission to an agent.
Making some kind of cream cheese mints with Brynn and Carol this afternoon. Yum.
Tonight we’re going to visit Dakota Rebel and Cindy Spencer Pape and go out to dinner with them.
So…what are you doing today?
Another great book featuring a butt kicking female character is Wild Robin by Susan Jeffers. this fairy tale is loose combination of my three all time favorite tales, Tam Lin, The Snow Queen and The Wild Swans. Robin was a wild boy and much to the annoyance of his older sister, Janet, he refused to do his share of the chores at their family farm. He runs away and falls in with the Queen of the Fairies and it’s up to Janet to save him.
The Paper Bag Princess is on my top ten list of favorite books of all time. Elizabeth is a typical princess in love with a prince named Ronald – unfortunately a dragon smashes her castle and carries off Prince Ronald leaving Elizabeth with nothing more than a paper bag. She puts on the paper bag and goes after the dragon to get Ronald back…only Ronald isn’t quite who she thought he was.
The Wild Swans is another hans Christian Andersen tale that I adore. It’s the story of a young princess and her eleven brothers who are cursed by their evil (of course) step mother. The boys are trapped in the bodies of swans by day returning to their human form at night. Their sister discovers the only way she can free them is to silently knit them all swears from stinging nettles. If she speaks, the spell will be fixed and they’ll be forever trapped as swans. Unfortunately, she gets tried as a witch and will not speak in her defense in order to protect her brothers.
Ah…Princess Smartypants. Princess Smartypants has no intention of getting married. Despite her dedication to remaining single, her mother lines up one prince after another, but Smartypants outwits them all in this delightful story.
So I’m waiting in line to vote today, and behind me are my neighbors – a mom, dad and three of their adult children all voting together and planning on making popcorn and watching the election results together tonight. I thought that was pretty freaking cool.
Then there was the asshat in front of me who announced loudly that he wasn’t voting because one of the candidates was a republican and the other was a (racial slur that I can’t bring myself to say.) Then the asshat looked around proudly as if he expected others to agree with him. I honestly just about fell over.
The little old ladies running the polls shut him down pretty quickly, threatening to make him leave if he didn’t shut up, but the whole thing was absolutely unfreakingbelievable.
Anyway, I hope those of you in the US who are voting today remain blissfully asshat free.
Well…it’s that time of year. T-minus six days ’til Halloween and I’ve been chained to my sewing machine. This year, I don’t have as many costumes to make as usual.
Corwin wanted to be a Clone Trooper more than anything, so he saved up his birthday money and bought the voice changing Clone Trooper helmet while I tried to figure out how to make the armor. Luckily, we already had a blaster. This is what I came up with. Yep…the utility belt actually holds stuff. After all, what good is a non-functioning utility belt?
Killian, bless his heart, only needs a salt shaker and a knife – he’s going as “Assault (a salt) with a deadly weapon.”
Now I just have to make a pair of dark faery wings for B, an 80s outfit for Jess (since when did the clothing I wore in high school become relegated to the land of costumes?) and an Edwardian frock coat, fit for a vampire for my sister, Cait.
Yeah…it’s time to hit the sewing room again.
Anybody else out there making costumes?
So I woke up this morning saying WTF?! (I’d like to preface the telling of this dream by saying I in no way hold any ill will toward either Portia Del Rossi or Ellen Degeneres. In fact, I love Ellen.
Okay, back to the regularly scheduled dream insanity.
In my dream, Ellen Degeneres and Portia De Rossi had a baby – unfortunately, Portia died and somehow I was given the task of raising this child. The baby and I had to stay in the hospital while hospital workers tried to extract breast milk from Portia using an Easy Bake Oven and ‘reverse gravity.’ Yeah…don’t ask – I have no clue.
This was no normal baby. He grew from an infant to a toddler overnight. He was incredibly active and kept breaking his only toy. When we’d go to visit Ellen, I mentioned it to her and instead of helping us out by replacing the toy, she just showed me where I could stand in line in the hot, hot sun with a cranky toddler to get it fixed using chewed gum and scotch tape.
Later I took the baby and my other kids to visit my mom – I thought she’d want to meet her new grandson. Instead of her neighbourhood, she now lived at the end of a two-track in the woods. Unfortunately, the road to her house was riddled with piles of hot tar and burning tires so I had to utilize stunt driving techniques I didn’t know I possessed.
When we got there, my brother’s girlfriend was hurling shoes (one of each pair that she owns – which holy cow, in real life is a metric ton – in the dream, it was never ending) at my brother and my mom. She stopped briefly when I came in with the kids, took one look at the baby, screamed and ran away.
So…thoughts? Comments? Apocalyptic prophesies?
Anyone? Anyone at all?
Oh hey!! Don’t forget about the Halloween contest! Free books, people! Free books!
I’ve been ridiculously busy with the day job – mostly because the work schedule has changed. GRRRRR I’ve also been trying to get ahead so the holidays are slightly less insane than usual. A girl can hope, right?
Don’t forget about the Halloween contest! It’s super easy and there are lots of great prizes!
All you have to do is between October 6th and midnight October 20th, click on the following links and find the Jack O’Lantern each author has hidden.Send an email to
http://webmail.wingsisp.com/src/compose.php?send_to=dakota.rebel%40hotmail.com with the name of the author and a description of what is depicted on their pumpkin, as well as your name and email address.
On Wednesday October 22nd a winner will be selected at random from the correct entries.
Winners will be notified by email, and announced on each of the sites listed.Good luck and Happy October!
Here are the blogs to visit.
www.brynnpaulin.blogspot.com
www.bronwyngreenblog.blogspot.com
www.cindyspencerpape.blogspot.com
http://www.vampsmut.blogspot.com/
And here is the list of authors donating ebooks.
Brynn Paulin
Bronwyn Green
Carol Lynne
Cindy Spencer Pape
Dakota Rebel
Kaenar Langford
Good Luck Everyone!!!
That was me turning in my latest book. I didn’t think that thing was ever going to get finished! Thankfully, it is and can move on to other projects…like obsessing about my new haircut.
I got seven inches hacked off on Saturday…on a whim. So my hair is now up to my chin. I’m assured by my dear friends and family (except for my kids and day care kids) that it looks good. It just takes me a while to get used to change so I keep squinting at it whenever I’m in the bathroom.
Anyway, I’m off to work on a book that should have been done ages ago. Don’t forget to enter the Halloween contest and while you’re blog hopping be sure to check out Brynn Paulin’s post on Alpha Males on the Get a Grip blog!
when I was sixteen. He was trying to pitch those little red-hot candies into my cleavage.
I was not amused.
In retaliation, I dumped my coke on his open calculus book.
And the war was on.
Six years later, we married on my twenty-second birthday and have been happily married for the last nineteen (!) years.
Today is his birthday. Happy Birthday Matt – I love you!!!
I’m glad you have good aim, despite your poor decision making skills.
I’d like to share some of my very favorite pirate-y books.
The Ballad of the Pirate Queens is by the brilliant Jane Yolen and tells the story of Mary Reed and Anne Bonney and Calico Jack Rackham. The paintings are exquisite and the story while likely not historically accurate is great.
Edward and the Pirates by David McPhail is probably one of my all time favorites. Edward, a little boy who loves to read spends all his time at the library with his nose in a book. One day he checks out a book about pirates. It’s a special book because it tells the location of the pirates’ treasure. The pirates know this, but they can’t read so they sneak into Edward’s room and demand that he tell them where the treasure is. Edward gives them more than they asked for – he teaches them to read. Best. Book. Ever.
Penelope and the Pirates by James Young is the story of a cat who longs for adventure so she convinces a sea captain that her markings are actually a map to a buried treasure. Unfortunately, some pirates get wind of this info and they kidnap Penelope. However, Penelope is a resourceful cat.
Sailor Song by Nancy Jewel is a sweet bedtime story about a little boy who’s father has gone off to sea.
Grandma and the Pirates by Phoebe Gilman tells the tale of a brave little girl who must rescue her Grandma. Because of her great skill at cooking, the Grandma has been been kidnapped by pirates to serve as their new cook.
And finally, Tough Boris by Mem Fox – how I love this book. Boris is the toughest of all pirates and he never cries, but one day his parrot dies. This book manages to be a little suspenseful, sad and hopeful all at the same time.
