UPDATE: The winner is…Colleen C.!
*~*~*

We had a 7-hour power outage yesterday due to heavy thunderstorms. It started in the morning and lasted well into the afternoon. We pulled the generator out of the shed to power the refrigerator and make cups of coffee (priorities!). Working by candlelight in my basement office was impossible. It’s a daylight basement. From the front of the house, you think it’s a one-story home. From the back, you see two stories. Well, my office is tucked into the way back of the basement and has no windows. I call it my “mole hole” and that lack of windows is perfect for a writer with W.A.D.D. (writer’s ADD).

However, my basement craft room has windows, so that’s where I settled. The light that reached my worktable was dim, but I had to do something. I’ll be cutting out the watercolor flowers for collaging so the ugly marks around them don’t matter (I didn’t like looking at all the white space!). The ink drawing was kind of fun. I used the dropper on my ink bottle to draw it. I’m going to practice with it more. So, not a wasted day. I learned something.

Puzzle Contest

For a chance to win a $5 Amazon gift card, tell me what you want to read right now! (My picture clues you into the genre of book I wish I had right now!)

Open Contests

1. May into June (“Me in My Mind” Puzzle-Contest — and More Contests!) — This one ends soon! Win an Amazon gift card!
2. Diana Cosby: For the Love of Nature! (Contest) — This one ends soon! Win a signed book!
3. Hump-Day Contest! —  Win an Amazon gift card!
4. Cara North: 10 Free Ways to Support Your Favorite Authors (Contest) —  Win a Kindle Fire!

I’m used to accomplishing something every day. However, today, I accomplished nothing.

I’m a writer. An editor. Those are the things I do to earn a living. I work seven days a week. Because I’m self-employed, I determine my hours. I try to keep to a plan. Sometimes, like today, nothing goes according to plan.

First, I spent my morning babysitting dogs (the five little ones—they’re very yappy) to keep them quiet while my daughter ran errands and my SIL slept (he’s currently working the night shift at the local PD). When she returned home, it was only to gather the two older kids to take them into town to a blood drive. Funny story. Neither had ever given blood. The 17-year-old fainted when the tech pricked her finger for a blood test—and that was it for her. She passed right out. Wish I’d been there to see it. The same girl thinks she wants to get her first tattoo when she turns 18. Ha!

Then I headed downstairs late afternoon to try to get some little thing accomplished, but the 17-year-old had promised her mom she’d make spaghetti for dinner. She called me to ask me how to make it. Of course, I headed up to the kitchen and took over making the meatballs, browning them, making the sauce, while she boiled the noodles.

After dinner, I came downstairs, but the 8-year-old is trying to figure out things she can do to earn money this summer, so she said she’d show me how good she’d be at doing “spa work” (she’s inventive, I’ll give her that) so I let her soak my feet and scrub my callused heels. Then she gave my hands a massage, my face a facial, including a mask and a heated “eye treatment.” She even brushed my teeth! So, if you can imagine, after she’d worked on me for about an hour, my room was a mess. She did a marvelous job, so professional, but then it was time for her to shower and go to bed, so I cleaned up all the sundry products she left in my space.

So, here I am. Doing at least one little thing—getting my daily blog posted. What a day. Oh, and the 8-year-old is hired. 🙂

UPDATE: The winner is…flchen1!
*~*~*

I missed posting at the end of the month because 1) I forgot, and 2) I had guests! It’s still the first week of the month, so here goes…

May

May was challenging for soooooo many reasons. There was all the prep and pageantry related to the 18-year-old’s graduation, and the entire family contracted COVID—something we evaded for over two years! Folks, get your shots and boosters! We’re all recovering, although some slower than others!

Here’s what I managed to accomplish…

Work-related:

1. I completed only 2 editing projects for other authors in May!
2. I wrote eight chapters of my next book! I had hoped to finish the thing, but considering the alternative… 🙂

Health-related:

1. I fell off the Weight Watchers wagon. However, I am maintaining 25-27 pounds of my loss! I’ve been doing this since January, and am committed to going slow, so I do not view this as a failure!
2. As to physical activity, the pool finally got warm enough toward the end of the month, but COVID kept me from doing much swimming and impacted my steps.

Happiness-related: 

1. I finished the #100DayProject art challenge! I didn’t hit 100 pieces completed, but I did get to 83! Here are the last two pieces I finished…

June

Here’s me putting this out in the world…

For work-related, I plan:

1. To complete and publish Victoria’s Six on June 21st! And this one, I can guarantee will happen!
2. To complete and publish Wild Thing in June—something that’s very questionable at the moment!
3. To begin work on my next Montana Bounty Hunter story!
4. To complete 4 editing projects in June!

For health-related, I plan:

1. To get back on the Weight Watchers wagon and hope to lose at least 5 pounds, remembering: Slow is good!
2. To swim at least five days out of the week!
3. To begin some low-impact aerobics, which will include a video workout, plus, add some outdoor activities, like pool maintenance and blowing the patio. Maybe I’ll do more housework, too. (This is an old goal, but I’ll repeat it. Maybe I’ll actually do it!)

For happiness-related, I plan: 

1. To continue working on getting my art room better organized.
2. To produce something art-related at least once a week! More than that would be hard due to my work schedule!

Contest

Solve the puzzle then comment on anything you’ve read in this post. Tell me about any special summer plans or tell me what you plan to read…
Like I said, comment on anything for a chance to win a $5 Amazon gift card!

Open Contests

1. Anna M. Taylor: M is For the Million Things She Gave Me (Contest) — This one ends soon! Win an Amazon gift card!
2. Saturday Puzzle-Contest, Plus More Open Contests! — This one ends soon! Win an Amazon gift card!
3. Breathing Fire! (Contest) — Win a FREE book!
4. Finding the Fun, Country-style! (Contest) — Win an Amazon gift card!
5. Gabbi Grey: Ace’s Place and Marcus’s Cadence (Contest & FREE Reads!) — Win an audiobook!
6. Lynda Rees: Heart of the Matter (FREE Read!) — Get a FREE story!

UPDATE: The winner is…Pansy Petal!
*~*~*

Psst! Just a reminder!
There are four open contests on this blog. Be sure to enter while you still can!

While I was down for the count with COVID, I watched a bunch of movies. Some romcoms, a short British series called Slow Horses (loved it BTW!), and some Hallmark Mysteries. Those Hallmarks have long been my guilty pleasure. I love the Crossword Mysteries and the Aurora Teagarden series, in particular. Not high art, but they aren’t meant to be. Some light sexual tension between the leads, and a mystery to solve. I hate it when I figure it out too quickly!

On Sunday night, with everyone feeling better and a little housebound, we decided to have some fun outside! Nothing too strenuous, because we’re still feeling the effects of the disease.

We set up a projector attached to a laptop and shined the image at the side of a shed in our yard. It was the perfect outside theater! Of course, we scouted the location ahead of time for fire ants! We burned a large citronella candle and lit tiki torches around our perimeter to discourage mosquitoes. We brought out drinks and snacks and laid on blankets with pillows (or they did—I lazed in an Adirondack chair). We tried streaming My Girl, at first, but the buffering got annoying, so we decided to pull out a DVD and ended up watching episodes of Jimmy Neutron! It was so much fun and reminded me of my childhood when my parents would load up the station wagon with all four kids and head to the drive-in theater, sleeping bags laid out for the kids in back, and a pillowcase of popcorn.

Everyone loved it, even the 8-year-old who is scared to death of bugs. We’ll be doing it again this summer.

Contest

For a chance to win a $5 Amazon gift card, share some fun childhood memory of your family or an idea for some unique activity families can enjoy!

We planned, worked the plan, kept ourselves apart… Then the local numbers improved. We got a little lax. We still wore masks inside at Walmart. We had just started eating inside restaurants (not often), but only when they first opened and weren’t very populated.

Then the 18-year-old had all these senior events and practices for graduation…

Graduation happened last Saturday. His symptoms started the next day. By last night, both him and his father tested positive for COVID. Now, everyone in the house has varying symptoms. My dd is making one last trip to Walmart—delivery to the car—for medicine and soups and tissues before we hunker down to get through this.

As for me, I have a sore throat and mild cough. I’ve had a headache for three days. My joints hurt. My eyes are constantly watering. Still, I’m sitting at my desk. I’ll hope for the best and keep moving. I’m healthy-ish, eat right, keep hydrated. I could use good thoughts. One of the family seems to be on a worrisome progression.

Oops. I had a guest scheduled for today, but she had to bale at the last minute. No worries. I’ll fit her in another time!

In the meantime, I’ll just share a picture that makes me smile. This one was taken in New Orleans—pre-COVID. The little one is 8 now, so not this small, but she’s always so much fun. She loves shopping and fashion shows, so getting her to pose for this wasn’t hard. Someday, when I get good enough as an artist, I’m going to try to paint this.

Hope this made you smile, too. ~DD

UPDATE: The winner is…Brenda A!
*~*~*

This summer, we’ll have four kids underfoot. The two older ones have part-time jobs and driver’s licenses, so I’m not so worried about keeping them occupied. The 13-year-old and 8-year-old will present tougher challenges. I was thinking of maybe trying to get them excited about some crafty projects. Maybe tackle one every couple of weeks. I’d love to pass along my “craft bug” to someone!

Something my dd and I did a few years ago was make soap. We tried just one recipe, and it actually turned out very, very nice! It was an oatmeal-honey-goat’s milk recipe, and we added some essential oils for scent. The project didn’t take more than an hour to put everything together, and after we stuck it in the fridge while it hardened, we had lovely bars of soap!

This was us putting together our ingredients before sticking the measuring cup in the microwave to melt the mixture.

We found some cheap, basic molds on Amazon. All we did after stirring our hot, melted mix was pour it into the mold.

And we had pretty, nicely scented, smooth-as-butter soap!

So, I’m going to hunt for my old molds and purchase ingredients to be ready!

For a chance to win a $5 Amazon gift card, share your ideas for crafty summertime activities!