MERRY CHRISTMAS!!!

     As my family and I sit around the living room relaxing, watching movies, and waiting for a couple of pies to finish baking, I wanted to wish all my friends, followers and loved ones a very Merry Christmas! My kids are enjoying their new gadgets, my dogs are exhausted from playing with their new toys and I'm loving my new iPad 2! My kids are teaching me how to download free games and apps. I keep hearing about Face Time on this device, so this should be interesting. We enjoyed a wonderful meal and my husband made an AMAZING standing rib roast. Here he is below is in his element:

I'm thankful he is a great chef in the kitchen, or we would all starve. Okay, I'm kidding - I can cook some, but my skills are no match for his culinary expertise. I made my signature green bean casserole and candied yams which turned out better than I hoped. Just when we think we cannot fit another morsel of food or cookie in us, we are anxiously awaiting the timer to go off on the oven so we feed on some pie. After all this eating, I'm off to the game room with my son to do some cardio on his new Just Dance 3 and Michael Jackson's Experience games on the Wii - Lord knows I'll need it.
     I also wanted to use this time to reflect on memories of those who are not able to join us here on Earth for this special holiday but we know they are with us in spirit. My heart goes out to those serving in the military, here and overseas, and their families. 
     I hope everyone enjoys their time with loved ones today. I'm finishing up a couple of chapters to post later this week. Take care! 

Spoke-n For

I have to take a moment to share something that has really intrigued me. The other day, a dear friend and co-worker gave me a special Christmas gift that I have fallen in love with - a Spoke-n For bracelet. Have you heard of this? My friend purchased it in a jewelry store in Asheville (for those of you familiar with Asheville, you know it is known for its eclectic arts and culture). The bracelets are designed by an artist named, Sergio Ruano who grew up in Los Angeles but currently lives in the Virgin Islands. They are made from Wheelsmith-brand, stainless steel bicycle spokes and turned into beautiful works of art with beads. I love mine and I feel like I'm wearing a very cool piece of jewelry having been recycled from a bicycle spoke. They can be purchased at various retailers or ordered on-line and they make great, unusual gifts! 
Check out the website: http://www.spoke-nfor.com/

We're getting down to the last few days of Christmas shopping and I have yet to wrap my gifts. I'm also trying to carve out time to clean my house (this is the one part I hate about living in a huge house - CLEANING IT!) and get it ready for my mother's visit tomorrow. I'm thankful my husband loves to vacuum with our central vac system - just walk around the house with the tube and plug it into vacuum hole in each room's wall. I've been forbidden from vacuuming since nine years ago when I sucked up my son's bib and broke an expensive vacuum cleaner. Hmmm, that wasn't such a terrible loss for me, actually.

I'm so excited about having Friday through Tuesday off to spend with my family. Planning to bake cookies with Mom and the kids on Friday night, which will be loads of fun. 

Book Excerpt II

Below is an excerpt from another chapter of my book.

Some of us go through awkward, adolescent years. I was swimming in it. Try having the most expensive head on the block. Growing up near Pittsburgh, I was always an outdoor kid especially during the winter months. I loved to go sled riding, participate in snowball fights and ski downhill. This would cause my mother considerable amount of worrywart moments. Not only did I wear hearing aids, but I wore braces in addition to glasses. Guys weren't exactly burning up the phone lines to ask me out with that much money riding on my noggin.  Mom would say the same thing to me every time I walked out the door: Honey, I can live with a broken arm or leg, but just don’t let anything happen to that head of yours. I don’t have enough insurance coverage on it! I never let it stop me. At an early age, I figured I was invincible. My head was loaded with appliances, but I managed to avoid the ER. 

     When I reached high school, my braces came off and my glasses were replaced with contact lenses. I gradually grew out of what I considered to be my dweeb phase and tried out for the majorettes. I had never twirled a baton until two weeks before tryouts and, to my surprise, I made the squad.            

Holiday Hell: Don’t Sweat the Small Stuff

My schedule has been crazy this week which has prevented me from posting sooner. I’m almost finished with my Christmas shopping – I still need to buy a few more items for my kids for under the tree. But I FINALLY finished my Christmas cards and sent them out. Whew. As much as I do enjoy this tradition, it becomes more work and stress than it is probably worth. Don’t get me wrong, I love sending out cards to friends and family, but in years’ past, I tried to channel Martha Stewart and send out 60 of them, all home-made with stamping, cut-outs and personal notes in each of them. My light bulb moment was when I came to my senses and remembered something: Martha had a staff of 100+ to do her bidding – I didn’t. So, I resorted to going on-line and uploading a couple of photos of my kids and dogs to make a beautiful photo-card with a short caption of "love from" and voila, we’re done. Here’s this year’s results:

 

My mother is arriving next week from Pittsburgh to visit us for the Christmas holiday. The kids are spoiled relentlessly with shopping trips when she visits. Sure, it provides wonderful memories for them, but then we have to put the kids through grandma-detox every time she goes back home. I’m not a big shopper and I typically don’t enjoy malls – I prefer on-line shopping – so, I cringe when Mom wants to venture out with us for a spoiling session. This typically occurs the day after Christmas when we embark on the great sales for additional items we really wanted for Christmas, but didn’t get – I’m speaking from my kids’ perspective, not mine. Mom will also push me to buy more clothes for myself which I definitely don’t need. So, I cave and let her buy me a few items (but do end up liking a lot later). It’s something she enjoys doing for us and I don’t want to take that away from her. She has done so much for my family over the years – I just try to be careful not to let her do too much. Ever watch last year’s Christmas episode of "The Middle?" Marsha Mason plays the mother to Patricia Heaton’s character, spoiling the grandkids on Christmas morning, making "Santa" look cheap. Yep, that’s Mom. My husband and I were almost on the floor laughing when we watched it, realizing with new eyes that we need to just let it go and allow the grandparents to do their job. I’m thankful to have loving, caring parents who want to spoil our kids.

Okay, getting ready to post a new excerpt of my book tomorrow morning. I’ve really appreciated everyone’s support, so far!

Fiddling Around . . .

     I have fallen in love . . . with the fiddle. I had a lesson with my teacher, Gary, tonight and he is such a hoot. He asked me who some of my favorite performers are and I mentioned Keith Urban, Martie Maguire (Dixie Chicks) and Allison Krauss. He played some Dixie Chicks and Allison Krauss tunes on my violin so I could hear how it sounds on my instrument which was very cool. I'm an early beginner, but he seemed pleased tonight that I could do well with this. He was intrigued (and very surprised) when I told him that I was hearing impaired, which I'm sure is an unusual quality in a musician. But, I did inform him that I wear digital hearing aids and can probably hear better than a lot of people. Haha. He has me practicing Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star and Mary Had a Little Lamb for next week - it will be a while before I can ever play Charlie Daniels' Devil Went Down to Georgia - haha! He invited me to see his band perform locally Friday night which could be fun and a great opportunity to introduce him to my husband. As I get to know my teacher better, I hope to hear stories of when he toured with Dolly Parton. He was using a violin tonight that looked to be approximately 30-40 years old - I asked him about it. He said it was made in 1618 and appraised for $40,000! Wow, I would be terrified to play something that old and valuable, but the sound quality was beautiful. My daughter asked me tonight why I wanted to play the fiddle - she had looked at me weird when I announced a while back that I wanted to do this. I explained that I've wanted to learn for many years but didn't have time when she and her brother were little. Now that they're getting into their own activities (photography, karate) I wanted to do this for myself.

     I'm making good progress on my book. I've finished a 1/4 of the book, but I need to tweak some of the chapters before I post anything. I also need to confirm some details from my childhood with my mother to ensure accuracy. She'll certainly remember things better than I did when I was five years old and she has an excellent memory. 

     The temperature tonight is down to 27 degrees - my kids are praying for snow. I love the cold weather and love watching the snowfall, but I HATE driving in it, especially when my driveway is at a 45-degree angle.  I'm always paranoid one of these winters I'm going to plow into my neighbor's living room leaving for work one morning. We live on top of a mountain and the ice can make steep roads/hills scary.

     The title of this post is courtesy of a dear friend who said I need to use it sometime since I've taken up fiddling (Thanks, Nancy!).  

Prologue

Below is the prologue for the book. Those of you who know me will recognize this is autobiographical. I know what my book title will be, but I'm not revealing it until it is completed.

  

PROLOGUE

Several years ago, someone asked me what it was like to live with a physical disability. Strangely, I never considered my hearing impairment to be a handicap. The official diagnosis was Bilateral Neural Sensory Hearing Loss, a birth defect. It was a mouthful that I was proud to learn and pronounce accurately at the age of five. I’ve always thought it to be a gift. I felt it made me unique, setting me apart from my friends. I sometimes felt I had special abilities and I was privy to experiences no one else I knew had. In high school, I could read lips from across the room and spy on what our cute crushes or enemies were saying. As a loyal friend, it was my pleasure to provide this service. If I was in trouble at home, I turned off my hearing aids to shut out the verbal scolding. That didn’t stop my mother – she was on to me and would reach over to turn them back on. Noisy roommates in college were never a problem if I needed to study. While driving, if my kids were fighting in the backseat, I could simply turn myself off in order to enjoy a quiet drive home. To this day, I am a sound sleeper - I can never complain about my husband's snoring. I can share with my husband what the coaches are saying while we're watching a Steelers game on TV. Of course, I’m thankful my husband serves as my set of ears in case of an emergency in the middle of the night. I’m not so sure he is as thrilled to provide this service full-time, but he has been on duty for 18 years now. My son will occasionally start a conversation with me shortly after I wake up only to discover I don’t have my hearing aids on yet by the dumbfounded expression on my face. Without missing a beat, he will walk over to my dresser, hand my aids to me, and say, “Mom, are your ears on now?”     

New Adventures . . .

I've completed the outline of all my chapters for the book, entering notes for each, then started on my prologue, which I'll post in a couple of days. Some mornings, I wake up with a number of items I need to remember to make notes on to add to my book - yesterday was one of those moments for me, remembering at least seven things I wanted to include. I worry about forgetting things, so I asked my husband to purchase a mini-recorder for me as a Christmas present to carry around and jot down notes when things come to my head. I'm so busy these days and it's difficult to grab a pen/paper to take notes when I can just whip out the recorder and speak to it on-demand.

To get my creative juices flowing, I have decided to study music again. No, I'm not going back to school. I merely want to learn a new musical instrument - time to refresh my ability to read music.  Living in the Blue Ridge Mountains has certainly inspired my taste of music in the genres of country, bluegrass and blues. Are you ready? I'm taking fiddle lessons. Once Paul wiped his tears away from laughing so hard, he did say he would support me. I've always wanted to learn how to play the violin, but I'm a fan of country music having loved how Martie Maguire of the Dixie Chicks would perform on stage with her fiddle.  So, I'm taking up the fiddle.  The cool thing is my instructor is based in Tennessee and he travels every Wednesday (2-hour drive) to Hendersonville Tempo Music on Main St. to teach his classes.  He is a renowned fiddler having performed for several years with Dolly Parton's band.  I'm pretty excited about this - I'll keep you posted on my progress.

I'm hoping to encourage my kids that nothing is impossible and you can always learn something new no matter how old you are or where you are in your life. 

First time for everything . . .

Okay, this is my first blog - so excited to make this a reality! I'm an aspiring writer and wanted to create a mechanism to build my proficiency in writing as well as post excerpts of my work for feedback. I've started my first novel (memoir, actually) and hope to connect with other writers or those in the creative community (whether it be performing arts, acting, directing, publishing, singing, song writing, etc.). 

To me, personally, writing is a foundation of creativity and it energizes me. It is a way to record thoughts, dreams and memories. I can go back and re-live what I've written - I can change it if I don't like it. Writing also connects me to my second passion: music. Music and lyrics can be a soundtrack for life.  Certain songs allow me to re-live specific moments in my life - I can take a "mental vacation" when I'm plugged into my iPod. I can also be inspired to write more when I listen to music.

Writing is an important part of who I am - sometimes I'm inspired to write a lot and my typing has a mind of its own. Other times, I will experience a "block" and need a way to channel my thoughts to pick it up again. Hence the name "Writer's Block" as the title for this blog. It has double-meaning for me: I may blog when I need to be inspired because I have writer's block - or, I may blog to generate others to comment/post their thoughts if they're experiencing the same. It could turn into a "block party" (okay, now I'm being silly).

I'm new at blogging, so bear with me. I'll try not to be boring and ramble (well, I can't promise that). I'm looking forward to meeting new people out there who share my passion!