Oof. Well, my plan to start writing The Desperate Adventures of the Badger Bandits today was foiled by an unexpected hospital trip which took up most of this morning. (The good news: the baby is fine! The less-good news: I've just picked up a fun new pregnancy condition which means I'm slightly less fine...but I will be absolutely fine fairly soon ( Read more... )

Wooot! Saturday morning I sat down with a cup of decaf tea and two pieces of delicious chocolate fudge (made by MrD and his classmates and VERY happily bought by us!)...and I finished the first draft of Family Magic! I am sooooooo happy about this. I love this book, I love the characters so much, and I was SO desperately hoping (but not really ( Read more... )

I love how quickly things can change.

Sunday night, I had to spend hours awake in the middle of the night with MrD. When I woke up, I felt like a zombie - and there was housecleaning to do. Aaaghhh! What a terrible day! All I wanted to do was go back to sleep - or, failing that, hide in my bedroom and binge-watch more episodes of The Lizzie Bennet ( Read more... )

Less than twenty-four hours until we get in the car for Bristolcon and my launch party - wootwootwoot! :) MrD is most excited about the cookies our friend Trish is baking for it. I am most excited about the people who will be there! (But I am excited about the cookies, too ( Read more... )

Today, I am going to list some of the things that brought me joy in the last few days:

1. A picnic. This morning, after I finished my writing session, I made two cheese sandwiches, packed them with an apple, a flask of water, and (I'll be coming back to this later!) some luscious leftover panettone. Then MrD and I shared our picnic lunch on a ( Read more... )

Yay! Today is a happy Friday. In the last few days, I:

1. ...hung out with much-loved family members in a sunny garden;
2. ...ate chocolate cake;
3. ...finished my first knitting project in several years;
4. ...discovered a wonderful, new-to-me writer of adult Regency novels (I reviewed her upcoming novel on Eating Chocolate, Reading Romance) and ( Read more... )

Here are the two things that have saved my sanity in the last few days, despite lack of sleep and various other frustrations:

1. Vegan marshmallows! They were a surprise gift from a wonderful friend, Sheela Chari, and just shockingly delicious - she sent me the vanilla-flavored marshmallows, and I genuinely love them at least five times more than ( Read more... )

There's been a fair amount of stress in the last few weeks, as I've dealt with my CFS crash, taxes, a creative revision that scares me, and the endless search for more freelance work, all at once. But this week has been ten times better than last week, not just because the CFS is easing off a bit, but because I've been actively using my rest times ( Read more... )

This afternoon I began the Yearly Horror, i.e. sorting out all of my taxable receipts for the last year. This doesn't really sound that bad, does it? After all, all I have to do is keep all those receipts filed neatly throughout the year and then...

...yeah. Oops. Every single August, I swear that next year I will be a filing demon (or angel). ( Read more... )

Thanks so much to everyone who sent good vibes yesterday! No news yet on the bigger life-/career-wishlist items, but the launch party was full of chocolate-and-cherry goodness and truly delicious lime-and-coconut cupcakes. (I have fallen deeply, deeply in love with the baked goods made by the Cwtch* Café in Abergavenny. Sooooo yummy ( Read more... )