Getting Ready

Today I ran around and did all the things I wanted to accomplish before the deep freeze sets in on Friday. I went to the grocery (no, the OTHER grocery) to pick up a prescription and stocked up on a couple of my new favorite frozen meals. I stopped to fill up the gas tank so I'll have a full tank so that there's no gas line freeze happening when the temps fall below zero. I also got to do the afterschool run so I saw LC and OJ for a few minutes. We even stopped on the way for a treat. Yes, I'm that grandmother. A little bit of a pushover.

 

While I was yoga-ing this morning, the Red-bellied Woodpecker landed on the suet nuggets for a snack. I paused my practice to take its picture because I couldn't rely on it sticking around until I was done.

 

Today's drawings are a Kite & an Airplane. They turned out pretty well, if I do say so myself. I especially like the kite's tail.

I moved slowly this morning. Just didn't have the motivation to do much. I did my yoga, then took a shower, and reread what I'd written yesterday and decided that I'd jumped the gun having the guest arrested right away. So I lopped off that part of the writing and pasted it on a separate page to use later. Then I read on to see where I needed to change things and where I could ramp up the tension by having her arrested. Haven't gotten there yet, but I will. 

And that's it for today. Not much to say or show but it was a good day because the sun was shining and it got up to 21 so I didn't freeze solid while I was pumping gas. Just got a little cold. Oh, and I noticed that one of my favorite mittens has a hole in it! How that happened I do not know but I'm hoping I can find the remnants of the yarn and fix it because they're my warm car mittens.

--Barbara 

It's Good To Have Friends

I had a Zoom with my writing friend, cda, this afternoon. She critiqued a piece of my newest manuscript which might be called Sailing the Seas (or not). When it ended she asked if a character was going to die and another one be accused of the murder. !!! That hadn't occurred to me but as soon as we got off Zoom I buckled down, figured out where to put it, and wrote it. Or the beginning of it anyway. I wrote 1503 words altogether today, 979 of them about the death and arrest. Now that's conflict! 

 

It was bright sunny again today but not quite as cold. It was -5 when I got up at 7am but was 10 degrees when I was making supper, so not too bad. The squirrel was on the suet nuggets when I was finishing lunch this afternoon and it was even in the sunshine.

 

No so the little Sparrow that visited the square green feeder a couple times that I saw. He was in the shade no matter where on the feeder he landed.

 

There was a murder of Crows in the big tree behind the house. Really, that's what you call a flock of Crows. Five of them were lined up on a branch but as soon as I snapped the shutter one flew toward me and another one lifted off on its way to follow. They're surprisingly big.

 

Today's drawings are a Washer & Detergent. I like them. For some reason I like the Detergent the best. No idea why. Every time OJ sees what I draw he says that I draw "stuff." He draws stories.

 

And I repainted yesterday's Soft Blue Flax. It turned out better, I think, although the petals aren't quite symmetrical on the left one. It's better though. Maybe I'll try again.

 

After my haircut this morning I went to the grocery and one thing on my list was another 25# bag of ice melt salt because I'm using the stuff I bought before faster than anticipated. Well. The Meijer app said they had some more of the 25#ers, but all I found were 50# ones. I could lift one, but couldn't get it on the bottom shelf of the cart and figured I couldn't get it into the car or the bin in the garage. So I ended up getting 2-12# jugs of pet-friendly not-salt that's supposed to work as well. We shall see. I was just glad that the car started this morning. It's been so darned cold and I hadn't gone anywhere for a few days so I went out early to crank it over. It started right up. Whew. It's supposed to be bitter cold this coming Friday and Saturday. I don't have to go anywhere but will make sure my gas tank is full before then. It's best to have a full tank when it gets very cold. I'm not sure why but that's what the big kids tell me.

--Barbara 

Better Late Than Never

I lay in bed this morning watching the shade move in and out with the breeze coming in the window over my head. It was a very cold breeze. I berated myself that I hadn't plastic-ed the window sooner, like before the new bed arrived when I could have done it from the security of the step stool instead of being on top of the squishy mattress that kept trying to tip me off balance. But I took my time and kept the tape and scissors in my hoodie's pouch so I didn't have to keep leaning over to get things off the nightstand. And survived. I'm considering just leaving the plastic there after winter because I can't guarantee I'll be brave (or foolish) enough to do it again next winter.

 

I can show you how windy it was today. When it (eventually) stopped snowing the day before yesterday the snow was a smooth blanket of white. This morning that changed. Look at the way the wind sculpted the snow in the backyard. Just to the left of this picture the grass is partly exposed because the wind blew all the snowflakes to the right. I don't even want to know how much snow encroached on my nice clear driveway but I'm not going out to shovel it because it's just too darned cold. It got up to 4 degrees today but the feels like temperature was in the -15 degree range. I have to go out to get a haircut tomorrow morning and then I'll go to the grocery on the way home and stay inside for the rest of the week if I can manage it. It was also clear and sunny today. I love the sunny part but I'm not a fan of the bitter cold and the strong wind.

 

Today's drawings are a Toaster & Refrigerator. Fun to draw and color. Five more pages to draw in this book and then I'm on to something new.

 

The watercolor today is Soft Blue Flax. I don't know that I've ever seen it in real life but it was fun to paint because I used a filbert brush. Its bristles are basically the shape of the petals so I could use it like a stamp. I want to try painting this one again to see if I can't get better at spacing the petals.

 

I wrote 726 words today, words of conflict. Yay, me! We all know how conflict-averse I am so I was very pleased with myself for putting Iggy in a situation that Rose misinterpreted and stormed away from. Maybe I can do it again tomorrow. I started by rereading the critiqued part of the manuscript to see if I could insert some emotion and conflict but only managed to do a little editing and break that beginning part into chapters. Baby steps.

--Barbara 

Shoveled & Salted

The day of snow showers yesterday meant that I got to go out this morning when it was 10 degrees to shovel the driveway. Yay! It wasn't too bad, not really windy, and the snow was light and fluffy so I was able to shovel instead of snowblow. As I always do, I salted the top half of the driveway with ice melt salt so that I won't have any trouble getting traction when I pull in. Naturally we're having snow showers again so there's a thin film of snow on there again.

 

Here's the suet nuggets squirrel hanging upside down and enjoying a nibble. The squirrels are all fluffed out and furry this time of year and they're not shy about getting up there to stoke up for the cold weather. I haven't seen one in the square green feeder lately.

 

The drawings today are a Blender & Cutlery. I wasn't so sure about drawing the cutlery but it wasn't a problem. Those are shapes I'm familiar with.

 

Today's watercolor is Stock. I'm not very familiar with it but the artist said it's popular in bridal arrangements and bouquets. It turned out okay. It's a little blurry looking I think, especially the stem. Maybe I'll try again.

 

And I made time to draw a gratitude journal for today. I was mostly grateful for the few minutes of sunshine we had early in the morning. It went away pretty quickly but was nice while it lasted.

 

Today's word count was 549. Not great, but better than no words at all. Still haven't come to an end. I'm getting a little worried.

--Barbara 

All Day Snow Showers

It's snowed all day today. No, really, I mean ALL day. Not a lot of snow accumulated but every time I looked out some size flakes were falling. Sometimes the flakes were close together, sometimes they were far apart, but they were always there. They're still there. One of the squirrels leaped from the birdbath to the top of the suet cakes crook and then to the suet nuggets crook on its way to hanging by its back feet to have a nibble. I took this picture while it was still catching its balance from the leap.

 

This morning I drew a gratitude journal page for yesterday. Most of what I did yesterday was sit on Zooms. I like drawing the little peepers in the Zoom boxes, mostly because I'm not very good at drawing people.

 

I made lime jello this morning so it'd be jelled enough to be eaten tonight. I also emptied the dishwasher and folded the basket of clean laundry because I'm wearing my last pair of not-hand-knitted socks.

 

Today's drawings are a Pot & a Mixer. These are not my best efforts. I thought I was doing okay but then when I was coloring them I saw that they're a bit wonky. *shrugs* Oh well, it's not a graded course.

 

But I really like today's watercolor. It's Cornflowers, what my grandma used to call Bachelor's Buttons. We all know I'm not a blue fan but I like the way these turned out. I need to practice painting a straight stem but next time I'll turn the paper so I can paint from left to right, which is the easiest direction for me to control what I'm drawing or painting.

 

After supper I sat down to watch mindless TV and knitted a few rounds on the Campfire Hat #2 that I cast on last night. The yarn's supposed to be super bulky but it's half the diameter of the Licorice yarn I just used. Maybe once it's knitted up I'll soak it and the yarn will bloom. That makes me want to knit faster just to see if that happens. I bet it will.

 

I wrote 852 words today about Geneva, Rose's housekeeper, organizing a meeting of the women stuck at home while the men play with sailboats. Naturally Rose is included because the Point Of View is first person so she has to see and/or hear what's going on. Still can't figure out how to end this thing and it's over 310 pages.

--Barbara 

On The Third Attempt

I finished the Licorice Hat! It only took me knitting the crown decreases three times, ripping them out twice when I was running out of yarn before I finished (losing at yarn chicken), and third time was the charm. I ripped out an extra round the other night so I ended up with about a yard of yarn left. Whew. That was a relief.

 

Here's what the backyard looked like when I opened the drapes this morning. An inch or so of snow to replace the snow that melted yesterday in the sunshine. We seem to be in a cycle of snow-melt-snow-melt. In the afternoon I went out and shoveled the driveway. The snow was light enough so I could clear it with the shovel instead of having to fire up the snowblower. Of course, as soon as I came inside there was an hour of snow showers so only the part I salted is clear. I walked by the patio door and saw a squirrel on the suet nuggets but I was in a hurry so I didn't take its picture.

 

The drawings today are Lamp & Files, two easy things to draw and color. For some reason the Files really please me. Maybe it's the colors, maybe it's the pale blue and red lines on the yellow paper in the folder. I counted the pages left in the book and there's about a week's worth of things to draw before I go find another drawing book.

 

After I finished the Licorice Hat, I went downstairs and found this Landscapes Campfire yarn so I started another hat using the same pattern. This yarn is thinner than the other stuff so the hat will be smaller but that's okay.

 

I wrote 472 words today. I like some of them.

I had three Zooms today. On the first one I met with my assistant, KM, about making TikTok videos. She led me through setting up a TikTok account (well, she did it and I watched), then we talked about what kind of videos I want to make. My assignment is to scroll through and find ones I like and save them so we can maybe do something like it. In the second one, I meet with a few other women writers for a few poems and uplifting videos and a 10-minute free write. We meet every Friday for an hour or so and hold each other up. And the third one is Friday Night Knitting. Self-explanatory. 

--Barbara 

Taxing

This morning I attended a webinar on filing business taxes. Ugh. It was boring but informative. Then I spent an hour or so tabulating my book sales for 2025 using Excel (badly) and then paying my Sales Tax for last year. I was surprised to learn that I'd sold 160 books. I guess doing all those book & vendor fairs wasn't such a bad idea after all.

 

Today's drawing figures were a Polaroid camera and a Telescope. I know they still make telescopes but do they still make Polaroids? I don't know. You'd think that technology would endure, wouldn't you? It'd still be fun to have a camera that spits out an actual picture instead of one just on your phone.

 

I wrote 870 words today. Today's words are more showing rather than yesterday's telling. There's even dialogue in it--and chickens in the lobby! That part was fun to imagine and write about. I wish I could figure out a fun way of showing my writing but a photo of the page is all I've got.

 

I don't remember the official name of the flower I painted this afternoon. It's common name is Lily of the Nile. Pretty, don't you think? I'm happy with the way it turned out. It doesn't look a whole lot like the example picture but then hers didn't either. One thing I do have to learn is to add black very slowly and sparingly to darken my paints a little. I can't swipe the paint cake willy-nilly and expect not to overpower the original color. 

 

In the afternoon I got an email from my Clearing watercolor teacher asking a favor. When I replied sure, another email came back telling me that she wanted to buy an Apple E-card but her credit card was declined and it'd take a couple days to straighten it out. Would I please buy the card with my credit card and she'd pay me back? NO! SCAM ALERT! So I texted her to tell her about it and got an acknowledgement of the hack. I swear, those scammers must think they're smarter than the rest of us or maybe enough people fall for it that it pays off. Either way, they should be ashamed.

I hauled up the basket of clean laundry today and have to face the fact that I'll have to fold it soon because I'm almost out of socks. Folding laundry is a pain.

--Barbara 

And Back to Snowy and Frozen

Whiplash. That's what this winter's weather's giving me. Yesterday it got up to 45 degrees. Today it got up to 20 degrees with a windchill of 5. When I opened the shades this morning and looked out it was snowing. Jeez. The ground was turning white and the birdbath was frozen again.

 

By the afternoon it was sunny and the morning's thin layer of snow melted away where the sun beat down on it. It was windy and cold but I was glad for the sunshine. I looked out and the Red-bellied Woodpecker was on the suet nuggets (in the shade, of course, but you can see the sunshine on the wall behind it) so it's a good thing I refilled the feeder yesterday.

 

Today's drawings kept to the nostalgia theme. They're a Boombox and a Record Player, both things from days gone by. They were fun to draw and color.

 

Wild Rose is today's watercolor. It was easy to paint and I even managed the patience to let the petals dry before adding the center. *pats self on back*

 

I wrote 650 words today. What I wrote is more of telling what's happening without any showing to give it life. I just want to get to The End so I can focus on going back and editing the daylights out of it. I have the feeling that it's just a collection of isolated incidents without a through line. That has to change.

MB, my cleaner gave me a bag of these snacks she discovered at Costco. They're dark chocolate quinoa crisps, about the size of a Ritz cracker but chocolaty and crispy with a slight salty finish. They're addictive. I ordered some from Amazon but just got a notification that they're stuck in Customs. What??? On a whim I looked to see if Meijer has them and they do. So when I was there tonight I got some. Take that, Customs officials.

--Barbara 

Melted & Thawed

Weather is unreliable around here. Today it got up to 45 degrees. In Green Bay, WI. In January. On Monday it's supposed to top out at 6 degrees. It's a wonder we don't all have colds with the wild swings of temperatures we've had so far this winter. I went to the birdseed store this morning and stocked up on suet nuggets. When I got home I filled the feeder. I didn't wear a coat or gloves to go out to do that little chore. I didn't even wear boots because there was so little snow left anywhere. Last night my neighbor and his little girl were using our common backyard as a sledding hill. They'd start at the top of the slope in their half of the yard and whiz down and slide all the way across past my patio. They had such fun and now it's all melted.

 

MB, my cleaner came today and now my house smells lovely and my living room carpet has vacuum tracks in it. While she dusted, etc. I drew today's little figures--a Television & a Walkman--two outdated electronics. The TV was fun to draw the old way because it was more interesting and the Walkman was fun too. I never had one of those. At least I don't think I did. I remember an iPod but not a Walkman. I had a CD player with an earbud but I don't think I had a Walkman.

 

My knitting pal, MW, stopped over to lend me a 3-CD audiobook because he thought I'd enjoy the author interview at the end. I had to dig around downstairs to find an old boombox that I brought upstairs and plugged in. It still works! It took a little fiddling to remember how to make it go but I finally managed to poke the right button to get it to play.

 

Today's watercolor is a Lupine. I should have painted more little flowers in the center over the stem, I think, but I kind of like it the way it is. I especially like the leaves.

 

While watching Finding Your Roots tonight I unknit the rounds of the Licorice Hat pulling out an extra round so I'll be sure to have enough yarn to finish the darned hat. It's cursed, I swear. 

I got an email this morning with the first draft of the cover for Anneke's Legacy. I love it! The only thing I don't like is that the horizon line goes right through the middle so I asked for it to be moved either up or down. Otherwise it's exactly what I was hoping for. That means I can finish making the front and back matter and register an ISBN number for it and get it published. Woohoo!

--Barbara 

Almost

Last Friday night at knitting I realized I was going to lose at yarn chicken so I pulled out the needles and pulled back a few rounds of hat decreases and one round of hat body. I was sure that would give me enough yarn to complete the hat. I knitted on it tonight and got to the second last round and only had about 4" of yarn left. Not enough to finish the hat. Dang it. I lost at yarn chicken again. So I've unknit one round and will unknit more rounds until I have enough yarn to finish the darned hat. I hope. Maybe if I knit faster...

 

Today's watercolor is of a branch of Orange Firethorn berries. It's better than the last time I tried to paint it. (This is the second time I'm painting through the 31 day challenge.) It'll be even better next time. The branch isn't bad and I like some of the leaves. Next time I'll let the berries dry longer before I add the blossom ends. I'm trying to be less self-critical. It might even be working.

 

The word count today was 606. Way better than yesterday's which was zero. I feel real scared when I can't think of something to write, like I'll never think of anything again. My critique friend, cda, gave me the idea to add a storm to the story so I did. It worked! I added new guests who are peeved by the weather problem, which gives Rose something to have to overcome. Thanks, cda!

 

I saw a gray blur on the fence this morning and there was one of the squirrels hanging from its hind legs on the cob corn feeder munching away on one kernel after another. 

 

Tomorrow I've got to go to the birdseed store for more suet nuggets because the feeder is nearly empty so no birds or squirrels have shown up. I'll be out of bananas tomorrow too so I'll go to the other grocery where I can pick up my prescriptions as well as bananas. The birdseed store is on the way. I don't think it's supposed to rain or snow tomorrow so that'll be good.  I just checked and it's supposed to hit 40 degrees tomorrow and then be 8 on Sunday. Crazy.

--Barbara 

Barely Anything

Hardly any of my day was worthy of photography. I was quick to capture a squirrel in the square green feeder taking a breather from digging into the seed.

 

And after supper I painted these sunflowers from my new book, Easy Watercolor Flowers. I like the golden yellow of the petals of the top flower better than the bright yellow ones of the lower flower. I don't even mind that the sepia brown of the flower centers spread into the petals.

 

Today I got to pick up LC for her birthday shop. We went to the Sephora store in the Kohl's department store where she picked out a few tubes of lip gloss and some face cream. Not cheap stuff. Then we went to Michaels where I had a $20 voucher so we loaded her up with solid color yarn so she can make any of the little amigurumi critters in her Christmas gift pattern book. We came back here and started crocheting a bee. She worked on the body, I crocheted the antennae. I was going to make the wings but we ran out of time. After that we went to lunch at Home Town Cafe and then it was time to take her home. I really enjoyed the day with her. She gave me a few ideas to think about for my latest manuscript and how to make TikTok videos and go viral and therefore become rich. I told her I don't think it works that way.

I tried writing when I got home but no words popped out of the ends of my fingers. Frustrating. So I worked on the two memoir pieces cda sent me to critique for our meeting tomorrow. That isn't quite as much fun as making stuff up.

--Barbara

Back To Snow

Here's what it looked like when I finally woke up this morning--snowy and gray. Ugh. We had yesterday with sunshine and melting and then today it was overcast and snowing. Later in the afternoon the sun shone for a bit but I hadn't gone out to shovel the driveway yet so it didn't help dry it off. It's good snowman making snow so the kids will like it.

 

To be honest I hoped that the good fairy (or my neighbor) would clear off my driveway so I waited until nearly dark at 5 o'clock to go out and move the snow. I thought it'd be light and fluffy but it was heavy and wet so I only shoveled one swipe, then fired up the snowblower to clear it. There were plenty icy spots under the snow so I had to be extra careful. I sprinkled plenty of salt on it once it was done. I should probably have bought another bag of salt because the first one (of two) is about half gone already.

 

I got a delivery today. It's a porcelain watercolor mixing tray with 8 pans. I used it when I painted this evening. It worked great. And I figured out how to slow down the video I watch so the teacher's hand and brush aren't moving quite as quickly. I have trouble following her at full speed. 

 

This is what I painted. It's goldenrod or astilbe. It wasn't too difficult to paint. I was pleased with my leaves this time. Slowing the video really helped me learn how to move my brush to approximate her brush strokes.

 

Today was laundry day so between loads of laundry I wrote. I'm struggling with where the story needs to go right now. Today's word count was 921 but it took hours to get there and I'm not thrilled with them. I need to figure out how to end this thing. Haven't got a clue as of now.

 

I got my act together this morning and made a bowl of orange Jello. I just finished my little bowl of it and it's sooooo good. It seems silly to be so crazy about a kid's food but I like it.

 

I got the Christmas decorations all put away while I was down doing laundry. I still haven't found where I put one of the framed things I took down when I put the decorations up, but that's okay. It'll turn up and for now my hollyhock watercolor is in its place.

--Barbara