22nd May 2009
Lily and I have been working on getting our letters together for Christie’s Kid’s Mail Swap. She’s making beautiful butterflies to mail off on Monday. How good is that kid’s sense of symmetry? I promise, I did not micro-manage that! Other creative things I have been doing this week? Not much… The heating is back on so I am thawing out and beginning to feel like getting up and writing again. Every day in May has been a bit quiet these last few – I wrote myself bored on Tuesday and haven’t got back to it since. I still need to break out the sticky notes and work on the structure. Maybe I’ll have a burl this afternoon while Lil sleeps – although now I’ve said that, of course there’s no chance of her napping at all.
More My Creative Spaces here – thanks to Kirsty! I’m late again as usual.
17th May 2009
Yeegads – a busy weekend. I think I emptied a tank of petrol with all the running around we’ve had to do. Amelia and I dropped in on Christina and Paul for a cup of tea today and as usual we came away feeling very inspired (and warm! There’s certainly nothing wrong with their heating). Amelia came home and sorted all her Blythe postcards, and I’ve been working away at my Paper Moon sketch, ready to gocco-fy as soon as I can get some time to get to a photocopier. Does anyone know if there is a Melbourne gocco supply source or do I need to go back to Nehoc?
Tonight? We have a chick-flick and the rest of the Green & Black’s white chocolate to devour.
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I’ve lost track of my days. I know I missed one due a packed schedule- and it’s way too cold to get up at 5.30 at the moment. Every other day I have managed to dash down somewhere between 500 and 1000 words, usually in the evening after the girls are asleep, so none of it is particularly good. I do like my 5.30 starts. I also really need to find a solid slab of time to write all my scenes down on sticky notes (a la Will Self) and rearrange the lot so the plot structure makes sense. I think I need to chop out a major subplot which means a couple of my favourite characters get the flick – but hey, this may be the book that ends up in my bottom drawer, and I can resurrect those characters at a later date in my BLOCKBUSTER. Yep.
14th May 2009
This is the stuff that I pulled out of my bag (apart from the laptop) from last night when I got to go and do some stitching in a place where the ducted heating was belting out good warmth. Thank you to my kind host who kept it running for my sake even though it meant several people had to go bare foot to enjoy the balmy climate.
“My Creative Space” this week has still mostly been on my laptop doing my Every Day in May writing, but I have also been working on my doll to send off for the Casa Bernabe Orphanage project. Her head is much smaller than the dolls I made for my girls for Christmas but she should still be a decent, huggable size.
Other acts of random creativity this week:
1) I made a chicken pie. It wasn’t ready when I had to leave last night, but there’s enough to serve up again tonight and I am looking forward to that goodness. I learnt that I can make a pie (including the pastry) fast, if I need to.
2) I started sketching some ideas for a Paper Moon print. I will need to clean the studio before I can get the gocco out but it’s great motivation.
3) … hmm.. it’s been a bit quiet creatively speaking. Oh, but that’s right : the writing! Apart from yesterday, I have managed to get at least 500 words down every day, even though it’s way too cold to get up at 5.30 at the moment. My manuscript’s at 65, 363 words and that’s with some heavy edits. The plot structure is out.of.control – I was thinking yesterday that it’s a little holding a jelly (jello?) in my hands. No matter how hard I try and hang on to it, bits ooze between my fingers and the whole lot threatens to fall at my feet in a big messy splat. But it’s draft one, it’s always going to be a jelly draft. At least this one is raspberry flavoured.
Other My Creative Spaces here, thanks to Kirsty. xx
13th May 2009
Vintage paper moon photographs can be found in the It’s Only A Paper Moon flickr group. It was difficult to chose my favourites. Definitely the inspiration for my next gocco print.
Day 12: Left the writing until after the girls had gone to sleep. I was tired and at a bit of a dead end for ideas so wrote off on a tangent for 500 or so words. Not sure if any of it is useful but by the end of it I was writing a bit of dialogue that could be used to flesh things out a little so perhaps not all a total waste.
I have a new, moon-planting theory that I write best when the moon is waxing and I edit when it’s waning (cut, cut, cut!). Other days I feel as though I just have a great big rocket in my eye.
12th May 2009
Our heating is broken, and it’s warmer sitting outside in the overcast gloom than it is at the kitchen table. I feel like we live in the olden days – at least – that’s what I tell the kids as they peer at me under their beanies and try to move their arms to eat their breakfasts, hindered by all the thick clothing layers they’ve been made to pile on over their pjs and under their dressing gowns.
Only a week until someone comes to replace the logic board in the heating unit.
Three things that happened to me today (that didn’t involve complaining about the cold):
1) I made a new friend. Amelia’s new friend from school has a very nice mother who… SEWS. Ahh, kindred spirit.
2) I told my mum the plot of my novel over lunch and her eyes started moving in spirals like she was a hypnotised cartoon character. She told me it sounded very complex.
3) I made the head for the doll to send to Nicaragua. I am making one of my punkdorf dolls and the swearing that goes on as I wrangle large wads of fleece has not got any less despite the practice.
I haven’t written my 500 words for Every Day in May today, yet, so I’d better go do that now. At least my laptop is keeping me warm.
11th May 2009
Oh how I love the library! I took the girls there on Saturday morning and while Amelia read a story to Lil in the childrens’ section, I went and found the “writing and publishing” section and couldn’t stop myself snatching large wads of books off the shelves (because it’s all free!), including two books on writing romance and two books on writing Young Adult fiction because you never know what might suddenly become a good idea. I felt a little embarrassed staggering back to the girls with my enormous stash. I sort of slunk past the serious browsers hoping they wouldn’t notice my “Writing a Romance Novel for Dummies”. Don’t get me wrong, it’s not that I’m ashamed to be dabbling in romance writing, it’s just that the universally familiar, big black and yellow cover and well-known font loudly flashes “Look, she’s a dummy! AND she’s a dummy, wannabe romance writer! What a dummy!”. I want to carry the title around called “Writing Romance Novels for Very Serious, Intelligent People who like to try New Things and Don’t Mind a Little Escapist Fiction from Time to Time.”. Where’s that book when you need it?
Day nine: Managed a 5.30 am start. Wrote happily for an hour before kids realised I was up and about. Changed major sub-plot and got rid of a very annoying love-interest and associated useless threads, and felt kind of excited at the slightly new direction.
Day ten: Mother’s day. Sat up in bed with my breakfast and wrote at least a thousand words. New sub-plot took good shape.
Day eleven: Heater broken. SO COLD. Sitting on the couch with the laptop warming my knees while Phil takes Lily for a walk. I’ve already written 580 words and they’re still not back so I’ll keep going. Love my new sub-plot characters so much. They might (or might not) be based on a couple of my parents’ friends. But I won’t tell anyone that (except you).
6th May 2009
1. recent paintings, 2. Marshmallow Bunnies In Their Shoe-Shoes, 3. finn’s room :: birds and matryoshkas, 4. Best Birthday Cake Ever, 5. becky doll, 6. Untitled, 7. leetle owls, 8. totoro!, 9. dream bedroom, 10. Sue Shi, 11. To love what you do and feel that it matters – how could anything be more fun?, 12. …, 13. pick your poison, 14. bedtime, 15. Halloween 2001, 16. killing next approacher, 17. Pretty houses!, 18. Snowball DeMellow – no looking!, 19. My creative space, 20. august moon spoon, 21. The Paint Soldier / Żołnierz Malowany, 22. the streets of alicante, 23. Rural Hills, 24. wooden figures, 25. COLLAGIN’
I really do like flickr favourites. A patchwork of lovely images. The image at the top is one of my absolute favourites at the moment, from the flickr photostream of Sasha Nikitin. I go back and look at it time and again. Look at that expression. There’s a 1000 words right there.
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Day 6: There was too much sleeping today. I slept in way past 5.30 and then also slept in the afternoon. I wonder if all these 5am mornings are starting to catch up with me. I am off to go and sing a lullaby, pour a glass of bubbly water and write my 500 words right now.
5th May 2009
Here’s our list of things that we need to do around the house. A fair bit of painting as you can see.
Look how I spelt bitumen! The weird thing is, I know how to spell bitumen, but my brain was obviously feeling a little subconciously cranky.
I think if we do all these things I will be mighty impressed and possibly go and find a new career producing a show on the lifestyle channel. More likely we will do some weeding and then find the need to check twitter 6 times a minute for weeks on end.
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Day five: How are you going? I was up at 5.30 and pumped out 700 words. Played with that scene I started yesterday and had so much fun. Then I got into the shower and thought some more about it realised that I am still listing towards the clichéd obvious so asked “what else could happen here?” and came up with a far better, funny even, outcome. I wrote while Lily had a rare nap this afternoon so my day’s word total (so far) is 1439.
4th May 2009
I so wanted to watch Vicky Cristina Barcelona tonight, but it’s not out on dvd here yet. Instead Phil brought home Burn After Reading which is still something I have been looking forward to seeing almost as much. Before we begin I thought I should do a super quick update on the Every Day in May project. Lots of writing.
Day Three (yesterday): I wasn’t going to get up early because it was Sunday, but was awake around 5am anyway and started thinking about the plot, so got up and wrote 500 words. Kids have totally cottoned-on to me being awake early and were up and banging on the door at 5.45am and then lay on the floor to moan at me through the gap under the door. Fortunately I also found time to work on the plot on and off throughout the day. This Every Day thing is working a treat. It’s all in my head again.
Day Four: Amelia was up at 4am and then on and off for the following hour. There was no way I was then going to get up at 5.30am to write. Instead I sat in a waiting room for 45 minutes during the morning and read my Plot & Structure book and it was pretty inspiring . I kept going through my bag to try and find a pencil to jot down ideas in the margins to no avail. V. useful for me was the idea that our minds naturally jump to clichés when coming up with ideas for scenes. The book suggests consciously jotting down several alternative possibilities for these otherwise clichéd scenes and then choosing the idea that seems right but also fresh. At the moment I have many, many scenes making me internally groan with boredom each time I open the files, so going back and asking myself “what else could happen here instead?” is kind of entertaining. Found time later in the day and wrote 761 words – worked on a scene I have had in my head since September 2007. It was one of my original ideas when I first started telling the story in my head. At the end of it I started feeling like it was a bit of a yawn so asked the “what else could happen” question and have started to twist it around a little. I will pick it up from there again tomorrow.
1st May 2009
Are you joining the Every Day in May challenge? I have decided to get back into my novel – every day of this month. I had a good start today as I got up at 5.30am ready to roll. Me, a cup of tea, the heater and my laptop. Perfect. Didn’t write a lot, but wrote soemthing so here’s to getting creative (and going to bed early) in May!
Day One: 500 dodgey words. Read over first four chapters. Spent a lot of time working out what music I needed to be listening to. Decided I like my book well enough to get back into it. I consider this to be a successful morning.
