Horizontal Snow

We got the first snow of the season today and in true Wisconsin fashion it couldn't be pretty movie snow. No, it had to be accompanied by gale-force winds that made the snow fly horizontally instead of vertically. The square green feeder was swinging wildly and a few gusts even blew so hard that the top of the feeder lifted up and clanged down when the wind slacked off. I'm very grateful that I didn't have to go out in it.

 

A couple Sparrows visited the feeder before the snow started. And one brave soul landed on it when it was being blown all over. I didn't get a decent picture of that but here's the morning bird having its daily seeds. You can just see that a few snowflakes had started to collect on top of the feeding ports on the feeder.

 

I hauled up the electric slicer and sliced up both loaves of onion bread. The slices are so even I can stack them up vertically and then just slide a gallon zipper bag over them and seal them up. Slick. 

 

I had so much fun painting those watercolor Christmas postcards yesterday that I jumped back in this morning and painted a bunch more. I'm not sure I want to mail them because the one time I mailed a watercolor postcard the post office's machinery scraped off part of the picture. Maybe I've got envelopes they'll fit in? I'll check.

 

While the postcards dried I wrote today's words. 1,553 of them which took me over 50,000 for the month. I'll keep going until the 30th to see how far I get and so that I'll have written every day of the challenge. Once I had the words written I caught up on reading emails that I've let slide for a few days. I seem to get a lot of emails. Do you too?

 

I couldn't resist painting a couple more postcards. I posted the morning's efforts on Instagram along with the ones from yesterday. I'm having fun doing this. But I wish that Meta's algorithm would let me see other things besides people painting Christmas cards. That's all it's showing me. Gah! Maybe if I called Jeff Bezos. Do you have his number?

 

Alexa told me I had two packages delivered at lunchtime. I was expecting one and couldn't figure out what the other one was. It was the five copies of Open for Business I ordered on Nov. 13.  According to the email order acknowledgement they were supposed to arrive December 3 with the additional copies of Christmas at Seaview, which it turns out I probably don't need but it's probably too late to cancel. I just went on the order and told them to cancel them and they said they'd email me if it was possible. *shrug* Anyway, I got Open for Business signed, stickered, and bookmarked and put them into the pile with the few remaining copies. 

 

Today's drawing figures were Snowman & Mittens. I can draw those. I made the snowman big for some reason but that's okay. and I made the mittens small. Oh well.

 

I also drew a gratitude journal page for today. I am most grateful for not having to go out driving in that terrible wind.

 

According to my phone's weather prediction it's supposed to snow on Saturday for our second to last vendor show. I am not looking forward to having to haul my table, chair, and all the other things in the snow but I guess I will if I have to. Maybe I'll wear boots.

-- Barbara

Swapped

I've put it off as long as possible but the weather guessers are saying we're going to get 1-2" of snow in the next day or so. Snow accompanied by wind. So this afternoon I swapped the lawnmower and snowblower. It wasn't hard because the snowblower started right away. Whew. And we get to drive 40 miles to Shawano for Thanksgiving dinner. Should be interesting. I'll leave early if the roads are dicey. And drive slowly. I'll be the irritating little old lady in the right hand lane, gripping the steering wheel in a death grip, and clenching her teeth in concentration.

 

The squirrel was back inside the feeder this morning. All that was sticking out was the tip of its tail. I waited around but it didn't oblige and stick its nose out for a photo.

 

After driving over to Edw. Jones for my annual complimentary pumpkin pie, I baked onion bread to take along for Thanksgiving dinner. It went very smoothly, the dough was silky, and raised well. And it made the house smell so good when it baked. The aroma hung around all day. It smells great in here. I'll carry up the slicer tomorrow and get it all nicely and evenly sliced. I thought Durwood was nuts when he chose an electric slicer as one of his sales contest prizes but I really like it.

 

I took the time to draw this afternoon. Today's figures were a Watering Can & a Whistle. Both were pretty easy to draw and fun to color.

 

Then I got out the watercolors and a few watercolor postcards to try my hand at painting Christmas cards. I found the Instagram account of a painter who has been posting a raft of cards to paint so I saved a few of them and tried them out. I like them. I like them a lot. The starry sky one is my design but the rest are hers. And the Insta algorithm has decided to ONLY show me watercolor demos today. None of the other accounts that I follow, just watercolor demos. And it took 7 hours for my latest post to show up on there. It showed up on Facebook right away and I was confused because I posted it on Instagram. I don't understand.

 

I wrote 1,442 words today. I had the mean lady attack Iggy in church and then he went back to Seaview to tell Rose all about it. I'm almost to 50k words but the story isn't anywhere near finished. In fact, I have no earthly idea where it's going. What can I make happen tomorrow?

I sure hope the weather people are wrong about where the snow and wind will be on Thursday. I don't want to drive scared all that way and back. It's foggy right now.

--Barbara 

Overcast & Dreary

It occurred to me that I feel and do much better when it's sunny out. Today it was not sunny. I didn't have a lot of oomph today. The only birds I saw were these Sparrows on the square green feeder. I hoped to see a woodpecker but no luck. I didn't even see a squirrel or maybe all the interesting wildlife showed up when I was on this morning's Zoom with cda or when I was doing the afternoon school run or writing today's words.

 

While waiting for the school bell to ring, I knitted on Car Knitting Washcloth #19. I even managed to knit wearing fingerless gloves. Usually I'm not talented enough to do that but I did it today. This yarn is skinnier than usual washcloth yarn so the cloth is smaller than usual. That's okay, I'll just knit more rows to make it bigger.

 

cda had a lot of good suggestions and ideas about the next Seaview Series book. I sent her the first 7 pages last week to critique for today and she caught the fact that I needed to clue the reader in as to time and place and relationships. Stuff I didn't think of when I dived into writing this story. Writing went a little easier today than it has the last few days. That felt good.

 

LC baked pumpkin snickerdoodles for her Girl Scout event tomorrow and gave me a few to take home. I had to sneak one at a red light on the way home and they're delicious. I'm trying to save them to make them last. That may not work out. They're so good.

 

That was my day. I didn't draw or do a gratitude journal page. I watched Antiques Roadshow after supper and knitted a few rounds on Llama Mitten #2 but not enough to warrant a picture. Tomorrow I need to bake a batch of onion bread so it'll be ready for Thanksgiving dinner on Thursday. If I bake tomorrow, it'll be cool and stable enough that I can use the electric slicer on it and not have it fall apart.

According to my phone it's supposed to rain tonight, snow on Wednesday and again on Saturday. I guess that means I really have to move the snowblower from the shed to the garage and put the lawnmower in the shed. I wish I had someone young and strong to do it but there's only me so I guess I'm it.

--Barbara 

45,798

That's my word total for Novel November as of 4 o'clock this afternoon. I have seven more days of writing to reach 50,000. I'm not worried. Although at this stage story ideas are getting a little thin on the ground. Maybe I'm just a little bit worried. I wish I could think of a different way to take a picture of my writing but you're stuck seeing my laptop screen. Today's word total was 1,712.

 

This morning the squirrel inside the square green feeder was digging around in the birdseed. It didn't bother the Sparrows on the right side perches but when a Sparrow would land on the left side perches and the squirrel moved, the bird would fly away.

 

Today's figures in Drawing Cute were Film Camera & Video Game Controller. The movie camera was easier to draw than I thought it'd be and the controller was pretty simple too. I'll still be glad when I've finished this section of the book. One more day.

 

I got smart and waited until the game had started before going over to Meijer for bananas and pretzel rods. Those are my blog-writing snack every night. Just a few of them for salt and crunch. I put my trip to the grocery on today's gratitude journal page. There wasn't a lot of sunshine around but I squeezed a little on the page. 

 

Along with my pretzel rods tonight I have a little Pyrex bowl of green jello. I'm sure a lot of you aren't fans of green jello but it's my favorite, especially if I make a big bowl of half lemon and half lime. Mm, good.

 

When I was drawing after supper tonight I heard the owl hooting again. It sounded closer than before. I wonder where it was that I could hear it so well. I wish I could see it.

--Barbara 

Only Two Left To Go

Since the first weekend in October, GBB and I have done book fairs and vendor shows and we have two more to go. In June when we signed up for all these, it seemed like a good idea. Today I'm tired. We've got one at the Presbyterian Church in DePere (5 miles south of Green Bay) next Saturday. We have high hopes for that one, just like we've had for all of them. Today's show at the Swan Club, a long-established banquet hall, started slow but we all made sales. I ended up selling 7 books which more than covered my booth fee. And made up some of last week's shortfall. (That's EMB photobombing. She's joined us for the last couple shows. She writes historical fiction and had a banner day today.) The final show is on December 14 at Townline Pub & Grill, where we started this journey.

 

Only one of the books I sold was Christmas at Seaview. That surprised me. I thought people would buy a small Christmas story with a beach and palm tree on the cover with a Santa hat and Christmas lights. Evidently not.

 

This morning I was lucky enough to catch sight of the Red-bellied Woodpecker on the suet nuggets. I snapped a couple shots and off it flew. Then I had breakfast, did the Wordle (lucked out and got it in 3), and left for the vendor show so I didn't see any other wildlife the rest of the day.

 

When I got home, after I unloaded the car, I came back here to write some words for the day. I hit 950 words in about an hour. Not the 1,667 that's recommended but I've been piling up words all month over the goal so I'm not in danger of falling short. Today's pages are about the end of a scuba dive/snorkel that Rose, Iggy, and their friend George took on the reef in Iggy's front yard. Writing about diving is easy for me so I didn't have to struggle too much to hit the number I did.

 

My Christmas cactus bud is appreciably bigger and there's another tiny bud that's near it. I got both of them in the frame but the one closest to the camera lens is blurry. But it's there!

 

I didn't follow my GPS on the way home from today's show. Instead I avoided the highway and took a different way home that took me past Lambeau Field, home of the Packers. The parking lot was crammed with cars. It was only when I got home that it occurred to me that there's probably a home game tomorrow and I was lucky to not be stuck in traffic. I'll have to go get bananas tomorrow so will be sure to wait until after kickoff to go to the store.

I wore some of my new lipstick today. I must have bought 12 hour lipstick because even though I ate lunch and drank water, I still had red lips when I got home. You can see in the picture of me with my writing reflected in my glasses how red my lips were. I'd better be sure to wash my lips before bed so I don't smear red lipstick on my pillowcase.

It's time to finish my Jello and hit the sack. Like I said, I'm tired. It was a long day and that folding table isn't exactly light. I was lucky enough that GBB managed to wedge it into her wagon so I only had to carry it about 20 ft. instead of all the way from the building to the car. Thank you, thank you, thank you.

--Barbara 

Squirrely

I didn't see any birds at the feeders today. All I saw were squirrels. And mostly one chubby one trying its best to sample all the goodies the feeders had to offer. First I saw it wrapping itself around the suet nuggets feeder enjoying the fruity goodness.

 

In the afternoon, the chubby squirrel did its best to figure out how to avail itself of the birdseed but it climbed up the crook and landed on the lid of the square green feeder. It shuffled around trying to find a way to the seed but eventually it gave up and went back to the nuggets.

 

But in between the visits of the chubby squirrel, this one did the patio chair leap and pulled itself into the square green feeder for a nice quiet dig through the seed for peanut halves.

 

This morning I worked on the day's words. The story isn't playing out the way I thought it would but the words are still coming, albeit more slowly than at the beginning of the month. But I'm not complaining. I wrote 1,534 words today which took me to 42,897 for the first 3 weeks of the Novel November challenge. I will admit that I started a few days early to make up for having vendor fairs on every November Saturday. I'll write on them but not at the level of the other days.

 

Today's figures were a Tent & Magnifying Glass. I liked drawing the magnifying glass and the caterpillar. There are only two more days' worth of figures left in this section of the book and then we move on to Holidays which should provide more interesting things to draw. I hope.

 

After supper I drew a gratitude journal page for today. Because it was a sunny day, I forced myself out for a walk. I need to do that more often because even that little distance makes me feel good.

 

At Friday Night Knitting, I put the thumb stitches on a holder and then started knitting the hand of Llama Mitten #2. I got a little over 2" done. I need to get to 4" before doing the top decreases and then circling back to knit the thumb. I'll be glad to have this one done. This dark brown yarn is challenging to knit on at night.

 

I loaded the car this morning when I was procrastinating writing. My table is in there too. We'd hoped to rent two 6" tables this week but she had only 8" ones available and if we used two of those there wouldn't be a way to get out of the booth. So I'm bringing my table because it's a little lighter weight to carry than GBB's table. Her hubby's at deer camp so he isn't available for hauling this week.

 

While sitting here typing this I kept hearing a hooting sound outside. It finally dawned on me that it's an owl. Very cool. I wish I could see it.

--Barbara 

Standoff

There I was watching the squirrel in the feeder when it started making a weird grunting sound. Turned out there was another squirrel perched on top of a patio chair looking like it wanted to leap over to the feeder. The squirrel in the feeder was letting the other one know that the feeder was its turf. The second squirrel faced off for a few minutes and then jumped down and scampered away. 

 

The next items in Drawing Cute were a Guitar & Violin. Those weren't as easy to draw as I thought they'd be, especially the long straight lines of the strings. I confess I used a ruler to draw them with a fineliner pen because my pencil lines were all over the place. Maybe I need to find something else to draw. I'm not very inspired by these things. Or maybe it's just this section of the book? 

 

I sat down before lunch to write. Today I gave Rose her first grandchild and her regrets at not being closer to hold it. But she has a plan. She's put out the word that she's available to hold and rock fussy babies and figures she'll have lots of takers. I managed 1,494 words which means I'm over 40k words for the challenge. Fewer than 10k words to go. (Not that the story will be finished at 50k, of course, but it's a goal.) Woohoo! This is my character notebook which is so handy for reminding me of people's names, especially people who've been in earlier Seaview Series books.

 

I even made myself draw a gratitude journal page today. The first item is a weather report. It isn't that I was grateful for an overcast day but I couldn't think of many things to put on the page so the clouds got included. I should have put on that I finished an audiobook but I didn't think of that until just now.

 

While I was writing this morning my computer chimed and I had a new message on FB Messenger. It was from a friend of a friend. My friend had given her friend my first two Seaview books and she really liked them That made me feel great but now I wonder if it wasn't a scammer. Man, I hate being so suspicious but I get two or more fake complimentary emails a day offering to help advertise my book or have their book club read my book if only I'd pay them to do it. I've already fallen for that once and now I'm skittish about it.

I also had a webinar about the Amazon Ad changes for 2026. There was a bit of good info at the beginning of the hour and then a very long, very insistent plea to get you to add a year to your ad school membership for a very good price. He went on and on about what you get and how much he enjoys helping us and I finally bailed. Info I want, commercials I don't need.

--Barbara 

I Might Have a Problem

I went to the grocery this afternoon for ingredients to make onion bread for Thanksgiving and I might have gone into the makeup aisle and I might have bought two more lipsticks. For someone who hasn't bought makeup in 25 years I don't seem to be able to stop. I think this might be the end of my buying spree. I haven't been thrilled with my lipstick choices. They've all been not red enough. I don't want a real deep red but a reddish rather than coral shade. I think these may be it. They'd better be, that stuff isn't cheap.

 

When I opened the drapes over the patio door this morning something was staring at me. The squirrel was in the square green feeder, propping up the lid, and staring right at the patio door. It didn't scamper off immediately and I didn't chase it. It was still really frosty out there so I wasn't going to go out to chase it away.

 

I was late to sit down to write this morning and only had a little over an hour before I had to stop for lunch and then haul in the trash and recycle bins before time to leave for the school run. I made it to 1417 words in that time and when I got home I tried to pick up and add more but not much happened so I quit. I'm up to 39,869 words so far so if I'm short some days I'm not worried. There are eleven days until the end of the month and I need to write only 10,131 words to meet the goal. Woo!

 

The next sports things to draw were Croquet and Darts. I lost my way a little drawing the circles for the dart board but as my friend, BF, says it's not a graded course. I think they look okay.

 

After supper I sat down to watch Jeopardy! (didn't get the Final, it was Chewbaca) then I knitted a few rounds on the Landscapes Leftovers Hat. I went downstairs to see if I could find any more Landscapes leftovers to add to the hat since I'm nervous about having enough yarn, but couldn't find any more. I weighed the last hat I made with that yarn and it weighs less than the yarn I'm working with so I should have enough. I know I'll be playing yarn chicken at the top of the hat. Fingers crossed.

When I sat down to write a check and address an envelope to the lawn mowing guys, I heard a loud leaf blower outside. It was them and it was getting dark, really dark. I went out to clip the envelope to the mailbox and he was right there and I asked if he'd get done before dark and he said, "Maybe." Well, I was on the inside where it was light and he was on the outside and I sure hope he could see out there better than I could see him. If I'd tried to take a picture, the frame would have been black with an orange blur when the mower went by. I was glad for the streetlight on the corner of my yard and for the motion detector lights on the front and back. On the bill, I discovered that I'm paying extra for leaf collection but I don't care. I am so happy that I don't have to deal with raking. My hamstring is still not 100% and I don't want to risk the progress I've made by stepping in a hole in the yard again.

--Barbara 

Worms

I went over to Michaels this morning and found some yarn that I thought might be like the yarn of the original fidget worm I bought on Saturday. It kind of is. I think it's thicker than the purple stuff but it was the closest I found. I bought some fiberfill too. It's not as nice as I thought it'd be. It's kind of scratchy. I crocheted a couple worms tonight. I forgot about eyes in the first one so it's a blind worm and I didn't put any fiberfill in so it's kind of flat. The second one has a single eye because the ones I have are too big for the project so it's a cyclops. I managed to shove in some fiberfill but it's kind of bunched up in the middle. I'll keep working on it. I won't run out of bendy hair clips for a while.

 

The flock of Sparrows was all over the feeders this afternoon at lunchtime. They were on all the feeders and a bunch of them were on the ground too. I'm guessing the squirrel tosses out seed when it's in there so the birds reap the rewards.

 

On the next page of Drawing Cute were Badminton & Hopscotch. I was disappointed in myself when I drew the badminton racquet. Evidently I've forgotten how to draw a circle. Today mine's all wonky.

 

I passed the morning playing with my ring light and tripod. Here's a picture of the box. I set it up in here with my desk as the background and practiced making videos about The Seaview. I even put on makeup! Most of the videos are pretty darned terrible and I don't know how to put text on them which it seems most of the author videos have. I'll keep practicing.

 

Words were hard to come by this afternoon. I didn't have a clear idea of what to write so I just blabbered along for 1,690 words in over three hours. I wonder if they make any sense.

--Barbara 

Mostly Writing Stuff

That's what I did today. Mostly writing stuff. I spent the morning after my shower working on today's writing goal. I hit 1,620 words before I ran out of words and ideas so that's where I stopped for the day. By then it was lunchtime anyway.

 

The squirrel in the feeder didn't notice the Sparrow on the perch sharing the square green feeder with it. I was hoping a whole flock of birds would come and swarm over the feeder but this little lone Sparrow was the only one.

 

At the Holiday Extravaganza on Saturday, the booth across from us had all sorts of crocheted softies. Very cute. Very popular. One thing she had was a basket of what she called fidget worms. They looked interesting so I bought one figuring that LC and I could work out the pattern and make some. The cool thing is they have those bendy hair clips in them for the fidget element. I have a bunch of those so I got one out and, starting with the tater tot monster pattern, tried making one. First, my acrylic worsted weight yarn is too thin and makes a too stiff worm. Second, the fiberfill I have is little balls instead of the regular stuff I could wrap around the hair clip. I finished one but want to go to Michaels to see if they have the right yarn and the kind of fiberfill I need. Maybe tomorrow. Besides I have a $5 voucher that's burning a hole in my pocket.

 

I did something crazy yesterday. I went on Amazon and bought a ring light with a "selfie" stand because I want to explore making TikTok videos about writing and my books. It may not work out and I might be terrible at it but it's worth trying and the light and tripod weren't very expensive. I can use better lighting for Zooms anyway.

I had an afternoon critique Zoom with cda. She liked my short story and wanted more. I liked her poems and only had a few comments.

The only other thing I did was the after school run. I love doing it because I get to spend a few minutes with LC and OJ. LC gave me some cookies they're trying out for a cookie-off with friends. LC made peppermint brownie cookies. I'm saving that one for tomorrow. She also gave me two Moose Farts no-bake cookies that DS made. They were okay, a little crumbly. Despite their awesome name, I don't think they'd win any prizes. They sure are a fun family.

While I was driving around this afternoon I noticed that the city had brined the streets. When snow or ice is expected they spray some kind of brine on the streets to keep them clearer. I guess we're near where a rain and snow mix is supposed to pass through tomorrow. I hope it misses us. 

--Barbara