This is my last post for the wonderful year of 2010 and that is hard to believe. Let us look back at some of the best posts and great moments of 2010 here, and on Meditations of His Love.
What were your favorite blogs posts?
I have a cold which means some things fall through the cracks. One of the things that I try to do but don’t do well is write blog posts. So, if this post seems to ramble, know that I usually do better.
Can you believe it? In just two days we will start our Bible challenge, (chick on the picture below for more information). I can hardly wait to start reading through the Bible in 90 days! It is hard to think it has been a year since I did the Bible in Six months challenge; it would seem I am starting a tradition in my life.
What are the other happenings in my life? Well, I soon will begin training for my new job. I cannot believe that I will be working at the capitol twice a week for my new representative. As many of you know, I enjoy politics, and this year I have been heavily involved. I worked on his campaign and so pleased at the offer to work in his office during the upcoming legislative session.
I have also been busy keeping my writing on target even though I have been sick. I am hoping to take the first week in January to do some serious writing work, which includes writing some posts for my sadly neglected Writing Saturday. There will be a post this Saturday, so stay tuned.
One more random note; If you have a Facebook page you can follow my blog through networked blogs.
I can hardly believe that the New Year is just around the corner. This year has gone by so fast it is hard to believe. But before we jump into 2011, I want to share with you about my Christmas.
Although Christmas isn’t our major holiday (Easter is), we have a lot of fun celebrating it. As with every holiday at our house, we give it our own little twist. One of my favorite things we do differently is that we make Christmas last all day. We open gifts one by one, enjoy them, spend time together and eat between gifts. Pretty fun, right?
Another thing that you will find very different in our house is the decorations. While we do have a tree, a beautiful one that our grandmother gave us that we enjoy, we have nativities everywhere. In this way remind ourselves of the reason for the season.
Probably the oddest thing we do on Christmas is we turn off all electronics for the most part. If fact, this year, we took off almost a week to spend time together. It is hard sometimes for me, who is used to spending about four hours a day alone writing on the computer, to not turn it on but is it a good reminder of what is really important.
One of the last things we do on Christmas is turn off all the lights, light candles and sit around singing Christmas carols. It is a perfect way to end out Christmas festivities and I think a perfect way to end this post.
I will be taking a Christmas break. See you next week!
Merry Christmas!
Merry Christmas!
1. Do your research. The more you study the time period, the better your book will be
2. Incorporate actual people into your story. What I mean by this is that one of the best ways to make something authentic is for the main character to meet a historical person, even if it is briefly.
3. If you are writing historical fiction that has less to do with the history that is going on and more to do with the time period, spend some learning about the inventions that they did and didn’t have. Simple things like can openers, plastics, or even tooth picks can be out of place in certain points in time.
4. When describing clothing, movies are not always the best resource. If you look closely, you will often find that they will make the period clothes and put a modern spin on them. Look up pictures or paintings from the time if you really want to know what the clothes looked like.
5. Make sure that attitudes are correct for the time period. In the Victorian times, actors and actresses were looked down on by proper people. In some time periods, arranged marriages were the norm and girls were fine with that. While in still other times, people believed that the world was flat and that saying different was heresy. Catching the attitudes of the time is very important.
6. Peoples’ thoughts on war and warfare has greatly changed through the ages. In some times wars were deemed a necessary evil, in other times it was considered important and honorable to go to war. If you plan to write about a battle, make sure that you find out the reasons behind it.
7. Before writing about a doctor coming to cure someone, make sure you know what doctors had and how they treated people way back when. In the middle ages, illnesses were believed to be caused by bad blood so they would cut them and let the blood drain out, having them come in and give some sort of other treatment would be unlikely.
8. How educated is your main character? Is she is a girl in the prairie in the 1800’s her mom probably teaches her what she can. If it is a rich boy in the 1900’s he probably goes to school. If it is an average person in ancient Egypt, they have probably had no education.
9. Accents and words from cultures you write about should be included, but don’t overdo it.
10. Have a question about something? Often local college professors are willing to help you.
Need a good laugh? Put your MP3 player, iPod or media player on shuffle and answer the following questions
If someone says "this is okay" you say: It wasn’t a joke (You thought I was teasing you when I said the Christmas tree was leaning and about to fall on you, uh?)
What would best describe your personality? Ezekiel 42 (this should be interesting…)
What do you like in a guy/girl? A shepherd speaks (No silent ones please)
What is your life's purpose? Hinds feet on high places (You’ll just have to read the book to find out.)
What is your motto? Holy is the Lord (Good one)
What do your friends think of you? You are Worthy (Finally a little appreciation)
What do you think about very often? Amazing Grace
What is 2+2? Leviticus 22
What do you think of your best friend? Fingerprints of God (Don’t you feel special now?)
What do you think of a person you like? Psalm 16
What is your life story? An untimely accident (Wait, that can’t be right)
What do you want to be when you grow up? Peter’s Family (Try to figure that one out)
What do you think when you see a person you like? 2 Samuel 7 (Boy, I think of a lot of scripture, that’s a good thing, right?”
What do your parents think of you? Go light your world (leave mine alone. Kidding they already light mine)
What will you dance to at your wedding? Hark! The Herald Angel’s Sing
What will they play at your funeral? The real me
What would best describe your personality? Ezekiel 42 (this should be interesting…)
What do you like in a guy/girl? A shepherd speaks (No silent ones please)
What is your life's purpose? Hinds feet on high places (You’ll just have to read the book to find out.)
What is your motto? Holy is the Lord (Good one)
What do your friends think of you? You are Worthy (Finally a little appreciation)
What do you think about very often? Amazing Grace
What is 2+2? Leviticus 22
What do you think of your best friend? Fingerprints of God (Don’t you feel special now?)
What do you think of a person you like? Psalm 16
What is your life story? An untimely accident (Wait, that can’t be right)
What do you want to be when you grow up? Peter’s Family (Try to figure that one out)
What do you think when you see a person you like? 2 Samuel 7 (Boy, I think of a lot of scripture, that’s a good thing, right?”
What do your parents think of you? Go light your world (leave mine alone. Kidding they already light mine)
What will you dance to at your wedding? Hark! The Herald Angel’s Sing
What will they play at your funeral? The real me
What is your hobby/interests? Isaac the procrastinator (Yeah that is an Adventures in Odyssey episode, do you have a better hobby?”
What is your biggest secret? The gift (And I’m not telling)
What do you think of your friends? Job 8 (It’s nothing personal…)
What's the worst thing that could happen? Leave it to Sol (He makes a mess of everything)
How will you die? Flower in the Rain (Talk about a strange way to die)
What's the one thing you regret? Come on back to me (Don’t ask)
What makes you laugh? Missing you (Hey, it is better than crying about it)
What makes you cry? Isaiah 20 (Need I say more?)
Will you ever get married? Listen to Wisdom (Does that mean yes or no? Help!)
What scares you the most? Always tomorrow (Umm… I was hoping you wouldn’t find this one out….)
Does anyone like you? The other side of me (LOL!)
If you could go back in time, what would you change? Galatians 2 (I’m not saying there is a problem with it; it just needs a little something
What hurts right now? Child of Promise (?)
What do you most often exclaim? Hallelujah (Great choice, isn’t it?)
Where is paradise? Make us One
What did you first say as a baby? Psalm 12 (I was spiritual even then)
If you had a pet, what would you name it? There is a foundation (I’ll call him Found for short)
What is your favorite sight to see? Step by step (Yep, that is it, sure)
What makes you gag? Without you (being without you is so bad, it makes me gag. Oh cool that rhymed.
What are you best at? I have no doubt
If you wrote a book, what would you call it? The Spirit Style (Except there is already a book by that name and that is why it is on my MP3 player.)
What did you wish for last? No way, we are not ashamed (What did you wish for?)
What would your superhero name be? Heaven will be near me (cool, no?)
How soon will this be over? Thankful (I guess that means soon)
Where are you sitting? The ruins of Cair Paravel (You just wish you were here too)
What do you most hate? He is exalted (But I won’t tell you who “he” is)
What do you most love? Awesome God (So true!)
What do you not care about? More Chaos
What is your secret name? Love Theme (Why? It’s a secret, remember?)
What will you post this as? Lucy and Mr. Tumnus (Because this post has been fun as well as strange)
How soon will this be over? Thankful (I guess that means soon)
Where are you sitting? The ruins of Cair Paravel (You just wish you were here too)
What do you most hate? He is exalted (But I won’t tell you who “he” is)
What do you most love? Awesome God (So true!)
What do you not care about? More Chaos
What is your secret name? Love Theme (Why? It’s a secret, remember?)
What will you post this as? Lucy and Mr. Tumnus (Because this post has been fun as well as strange)
Movie Rating; PG
My Rating; (On a scale of 1-10) 8
Age recommendation; 14 and up
I have so looked forward to this movie since I knew that they were going to make it. It is one of the only ones that I have ever kept up with the process, or watched while it was still in the theaters. So today I would like to give you my review.
My first two impressions after leaving the theater was that, one, they had followed the book a lot closer than they did with Price Caspian. Two, it was darker than the past two.
Someone who loves the book will be happy to find more of the original dialog in the movie and the characters more in line with the books than they were in the last one. Even where they didn’t follow the dialog or story plot perfectly, I thought they captured the spirit of the book much better.
Some people might be surprised at the age recommendation I gave but as I said, the movie was darker than the last two. Without giving too much of the movie away, I will just say that they are battling the Island of Nightmares long before they reach it. The sea serpent scene is very intense and even I wished it had been a little shorter. I strongly urge parents to read up on the movie, find some pictures or maybe even go to see it before they take their thirteen year old or easily scared child.
As with every Narnia movie, it still had that wow factor, that humor that we have come to love as well as the powerful messages. I was on the verge of tears at the last scene as they say good-bye to Narnia. Wow, It wasn’t a feel good ending but it was very powerful and got me to thinking.
There are some incredible lessons in the movie, such as, fighting the evil (sin) that exists in all of us, sometimes what we wish for isn’t what we really want, not trying to be someone else, and much more.
Both of these blog are so good and help me in my writing, I couldn’t decide between them. So let me introduce you to two of my favorite writers and writing blogs.
Literary Pursuits is written my good friend and fellow Meditations of His Love member Jessica. Jessica has so many good things to say and so many great challenges on her blog. If you get the chance, you really ought to participate in one of her Writing on the Weekends challenges, they are really fun.
Jessica and I have been writing buddies for two years now. She has really helped me with some of my author short comings.
Wordplay is written by the author K. M. Weiland (go here see my review for her book Behold the Dawn). She has to be one of the most brilliant writers I know personally. This blog is dedicated to help writers become authors and she is good at that. She has affected the way I write for sure.
What will be next month’s blog?
Dance as though no one is watching you, love as though you have never hurt before, sing as though no one can hear you, and live as though heaven is on earth.
Evil triumphs when good men do nothing - Edmund Burke
You never know how strong you are until being strong is the only choice –Anonyms
The One how gave the vision still calls - Pendragon; Sword of his father
“Do not assume that she who seeks to comfort you now, lives untroubled among the simple and quiet words that sometimes do you good. Her life may also have much sadness and difficulty, that remains far beyond yours. Were it otherwise, she would never have been able to find these words.” - R. Rikle
1. Have a designated work space. Writing at the same spot most of the time will help your brain more quickly transition into the writing mode.
2. Have pictures and items that relate to the time period/theme you are writing on. Are you writing in the Middle Ages? Have pictures or books on castles. Writing a Si-Fi? Keep space books and star pictures around.
3. When you want to get a lot of work done on your book, surround yourself with it. Change the background on your computer to something that relates to the book, hang up some pictures, eat food they might eat, etc. Whatever makes you feel close to the book and its characters, do it.
4. Try to read and watch things that go along with your book. Writing a book where an F. B. I. agent is the main character? Trying reading books and watching movies that are set in the F. B. I. You never know what kind of ideas they may spark.
5. When writing the first draft, don’t worry about spelling and grammar errors or a scene that needs work, leave it for the editing process. If you start to fix them before you finish the first draft, you’re more likely to get bogged down and not finish.
6. Be careful what you eat and drink when you want to get writing done. Avoid things that make you sleepy or things that make you so pumped you can’t sit still.
7. Sometimes, when I am struggling to write I take some time off. I might not write for an hour or longer. When I’m really struggling to be motivated, I take a forced two week break were I don’t allow myself to do anything; it always seems to work. By the end, I am dying to write again.
8. Have good inspiring music around. I have a playlist of a bunch of movie soundtracks and inspirational music to listen to whenever I write. Believe me, it helps me keep going.
9. Have a daily word count goal in mind; for me it is 1000 words. I don’t always make it; if I did I could turn out a book every 60 to 65 days, but goals always help push me to do more.
10. Don’t neglect the things that are really important. Make sure you continue to spend lots of time with family, make bread, eat chocolate and laugh with a friend, or read a book. What we do apart from writing has a huge effect on the quality and consistency of our writing.
