Five Word Friday

Today’s 5 words come from Mom’s April 12×12 story.

17. Mother – We celebrated Mother’s Day yesterday. I am not allowed to go shopping, so I gave Mom kisses and cuddles instead of a gift.

I also put my bony head on her arm for a while. She said, “Patooie. Dog spit.” and “Ouch. I think my arm is paralyzed.” and “I love you, Cupcake, but please get off me!”

98. Skinny – When Mom first found me at the rescue named Purrs and Pups I was kind of skinny. Plus kind of naughty and kind of nervous with lots of bite marks on my head and some bugs in my belly. Mom had a lot to work on.

My Gotcha Day.

She fixed me up, just like she fixes up some of her stories that have bugs in their belly.

33. Dolls – I like to play with dolls. They’re actually more like stuffed (or unstuffed) animals, but I like them better than bones or tennis balls. I cuddle with them

and act like they’re my babies.

Plus sometimes I try to hatch them like eggs.

2. Running – I do running a lot. It’s for protection. Moving target and all that… Mom says, “These floors don’t stand a chance.” and “This is why we can’t have nice things.” And then she calls me the name of Psycho Crackpot.

 

146. Hiding – When running doesn’t work, I do hiding.

Stranger danger!

It also keeps me safe from scary things.

Mom is not hiding from her 12×12 Challenge this month. She started a new story for May and even though it’s not quite halfway through the month, she’s halfway through the story.

 

 

Inspirational Quote of the Week

“The bad news is time flies.
The good news is you’re the pilot.”

~Michael Altshuler~

Time flies A LOT when you’re a doggie. You wait for Mom to come home.

You wait for somebody to play with you.

You wait for friends to come by.

You wait to get chased out of bed.

I’m not the pilot of ANYTHING around here. I’m mostly waiting. And watching time fly by.

Mom has been writing a picture book a month for her 12×12 Challenge. She nailed it in January, February, and March. Here we are halfway through April and so far, she hasn’t written a book or an opening sentence or a word or even a letter.

Mom has not been the pilot of anything around here. She is mostly waiting. And watching time fly by, just like me.

She promises herself that she will get busy tomorrow. She will not just get busy being busy, she’ll get busy being productive! She will jump into the cockpit and fly.

I might jump into the cockpit,

but I have a feeling time will still fly by me while I wait for something fun to happen…

Mom will scan her idea list, pick an idea or two, decide on some characters and a setting, and for sure START WRITING. Tomorrow. First drafts are allowed to stink, so yay. She’s on it.

I will wait and maybe get to the park or Petco or the dog park.

Or maybe I will just play by myself for a while.

Five Word Friday

Today’s five words are from one of Mom’s recent stories.

16. Gingerbread – Lots of times when Mom puts a doggie into one of her stories, she names it Gingerbread. Gingerbread is her favorite food. Sometimes at Christmas, she lets me taste a gingerbread man.

Mostly, she does NOT like sharing gingerbread. She eats it all till she gets a gingerbread-belly-ache.

42. Fingers – These days, while my “fingers” are resting, Mom’s fingers are busy busy busy at the computer.

She is in the 12×12 Challenge, so she is writing a story a month even if it stinks. Also, she is revising a story a month even if it kills her. Three months and 6 badges in, she’s doing OK.

Resting fingers… I’m doing OK, too.

8. Licked – There’s pretty much nothing in a 10-mile radius I have not licked. I am a floor-licker extraordinaire.

I also like licking dishes, mugs, the sofa, shoes, faces, fingers, and books. If you smile when I lick your face, I will lick your teeth. Teeth are delicious!

Also, strawberry shortcake is delicious!

64. Snowflakes – Snowflakes are serene, peaceful, and beautiful.

Plus, sometimes they are crazy-windy, slippery as heck, and way too deep

and way too cold to be allowed to touch my delicate belly.

53. Faces – When kids come to read to me at the library, Mom and I watch their faces. Some stories make them smile a lot. When there are difficult words to read, their faces look worried and scared. Mom helps them with the hard stuff, I give them kisses and lick the pictures in the story. That usually brings back the smiles.

29. Flowers – Soon there will be a million flowers everywhere around my neighborhood.

Flowers grow just like Mom’s stories. They start as tiny seeds. Then they get lots of attention, and the next thing you know, they’re big and beautiful. If only the lawn guys could take care of the stories like they take care of the neighborhood flowers. Then Mom would have more time to play at the park with me!

Five Word Friday

 

Today’s 5 words are from a story Mom is writing for the January 12×12 Challenge. The story isn’t finished, yet, but each day it gets closer to the end. In the 12×12 Challenge, she will be writing a story a month for the whole year!

16. Ladybug – I have never tasted a ladybug. But once, I ate a butterfly. It didn’t taste as good as it looked, but I ate it anyway. One day when Mom and I were hiking, a butterfly landed on my back. I didn’t eat that one, but he looked delicious.

42. Sidewalk – Our sidewalks are covered with rock salt. It was put there to fight off the 18 snowflakes that fell the other day.

Mom is threatening to put my boots on to protect my delicate, little feet. So far, she hasn’t done it. She’s settling for scrubbing them clean as soon as I come back inside.

Totally unnecessary!

9. Tiny – Sometimes, Mom writes tiny 100- or 200-word stories for magazines. Lately, none of them has been picked up, but they are still fun to write. One really tiny one was rejected yesterday, in fact, so things are going along as usual.

Sometimes, I am very tiny…

87. Flying – Mom is flying through her Storystorm Challenge this month. She has to make a list of 30 picture book ideas in 31 days. And guess what – she already HAS 30 ideas! All the rest of the days and ideas are just gravy. (Mmmmm… gravy…) Each day, she reads a blog post and it helps her get an idea. Or two. Or six.

33. Legs – Mom keeps her writing-legs in shape by practicing. She reads, writes, revises, edits, submits, and critiques. Her writing-legs stay strong, so when Book #2 comes along she will be ready to run with it. I keep my doggie-legs strong by running, sliding, climbing, begging, and jumping a lot.

Mom worries that my fat little meatloaf body will get too big for my skinny, stick legs. She weighs me every week to check for fatness.

23.5 – Not bad…

Sometimes, I am put on treat restriction.

24! Blerg!

Snow pea? Seriously??

 

 

 

Inspirational Quote of the Week

“You know what the issue is with this world? Everyone wants a magical solution to their problems, and everyone refuses to believe in magic!”

~Alice in Wonderland~

No, Alice. Some people and puppers DO believe in magic. There are many magical things at my house. Mom believes that magical things will help her reach her goals. Since I have no goals, I go along to get along and humor her.

The Daruma Doll brings optimism, good fortune, and strong determination. Daruma dolls are sold without the eyeballs painted in. People paint in one eye when they set out to do something and paint in the other one when they have achieved the goal. As you can see, our poor, little Daruma dude still only has one eye…

Heart shaped rocks…and 4-leaf clovers are a couple of the things Mom is always watching for on our walks.

This guy brings faith, magical power, and spiritual strength.

And of course the dream catcher filters out the bad dreams and lets the good dreams fly through. The dream feathers carry the dreams home.

So, Mom has big plans for all her lucky, magical things to take her to the elusive Book #2 in 2019. Well, that and some hard work, new twists, and a couple of online challenges and support groups. Paws crossed that something works.

Mom’s magic and mine are slightly different. I think the most magical thing in the whole house is the treat drawer! Bags and bags of treats.

All I have to do is be a good girl and ba-bam. I get a treat from the drawer! Yum. Magic!

Oh – and the car keys hanging on the doorknob are pretty magical, too…

Road trip!

Inspirational Quote of the Week

 

More…. I LOVE more. It’s my favorite thing.

More treats.

More sweaters.

More walks at the park.

More toys.

More naps.

More playing. More. More. More.

Mom loves more, too. More ideas.

More time.

More writing.

More submitting.

More acceptances. More. More. More.

She’s thinking about doing more learning with 2 challenges in January. If she joins 12×12 and does Storystorm, she will end up with 30 more ideas and 12 more first drafts.

That’s a lot of …more.

Five Word Friday

Today’s 5 words are about forgetting.

1. Rollerblades – Somebody forgot about their rollerblades at the park. I tried to encourage Mom to give them a spin, but she wasn’t interested.

Wanna race?

2. Dinner – Forgetting my dinner is just plain wrong on all levels. I save this face for those occasions when dinner is “a little late.”

Not cool…

 

3. Ideas – Mom has so many lists of story ideas, that she sometimes forgets what she wrote. She gets very surprised when she looks down the lists. She says, “This sounds fun.” and “This is genius.” and “Ugh! WHAT was I thinking?” and “Forget it. You’ve had enough treats for one day.”

4. Rules – Once in a while I forget the rules, especially the rule called don’t-mess-with-Christmas-stuff.

5. Chairs – Mom has been busy decorating and shopping after the painters got finished and decorating and shopping for our new furniture and decorating and shopping before Christmas comes.

 

So lots of times, she forgets to sit in her chair and work on writing, because of too much decorating and shopping.

I may have to take over this chair….

92. Chairs – That being said, sometimes, I completely forget how chairs work….

Change of Scenery

Sometimes a doggie needs a change of scenery. New chair,

new bed,

new place.

Yeah. That happened. While there were painters at my house trying to kill me, Mom and I got out of the way and stayed at a hotel. It was a whole new place to be. It’s scary, but if you tuck in your tail and slick back your ears, you can get through it and even settle in, lie down, and rest up after a while.

A change of scenery is good for getting ideas.

Since Mom is up to her eyeballs in PiBoIdMo, she needs ideas to keep trickling into her head so they can be typed into the list on her phone. A change of scenery is the perfect way to make that happen. Sometimes it’s as simple as a walk in the park.

Sometimes it’s a ride in the car.

Or shopping. Or the gym. Or a visit to the *gulp* vet

or *yay* Petco.

Or a short-stay at a pet-friendly hotel.

As far as ideas go, change is good. And it can’t hurt to have a special idea-getting-coffee-mug …with a picture of an idea-getting-dog that looks suspiciously like ME!

Wait. What?

When?

Lots of leaves are falling all over my neighborhood. Big fluffy piles of them.

The lawn guys come every week and take them away. But somehow, there are more leaf blankets the next week and the next and the next. I can’t figure out how to know when they’ll be finished.

Almost…

Sometimes it’s difficult for Mom to know when a story is finished. It’s NOT finished when she writes the last word. That’s a no-brainer.

But what about these?

Is it finished when she reads it out loud 5,700 times and changes the language and order of events, adds details to develop the characters and setting, and deletes every word that doesn’t move the story along?

Is it finished when her critique partner sends her comments and she fixes the things she hadn’t noticed before? Is it finished when it comes back from RYS with a score and some more suggestions? Nope.

Not yet…

It isn’t even finished after Mom submits it to an agent or publisher, because if it comes back rejected, she will start editing like she just wrote the last word all over again.

Here we go again…

Being finished for sure is a tough call….

Surgery

I’m having surgery today. It’s nothing big, just a little wart sort of thing on my back. The vet said bing, bang, boom, she’ll give me a tranquilizer, take the bump off, and put in a staple.

Wait. What? *gulp*

I’m not sure whether there will be a cone involved, but we’ll see… We’ll ALL see. I have a feeling if I’m wearing a cone, the camera will be out in a nanosecond.

Sometimes Mom does surgery on her work. When she reads the story over for the 98th time, she notices something unsightly or unnecessary and bing, bang, boom, she cuts it and staples the story back together.

Last week, Mom was working on a story about a little girl named Pinky, when all of a sudden, she went insane and deleted the whole first page. Suddenly the story was better and started off with something way more important, on what was formerly the second page. No cone necessary – surgery done and the story was absolutely fine.

I’m planning to be absolutely fine and back in the swing of things (See what I did there?) by this afternoon, so think happy thoughts about me, cross your paws that I don’t have to wear a cone, and feel free to throw in a happy thought for Mom and her Pinky story, too. Thanks!

UPDATE: THANK YOU ALL FOR YOUR LOVELY AND SUPPORTIVE COMMENTS. MY SURGERY WENT WELL. I WAS VERY WELL BEHAVED AND EXTREMELY BRAVE. I WAS HOME BY NOON AND ATE AND DRANK AND DIDN’T BOTHER MY STAPLES (TILL LATER). I DIDN’T NEED A CONE, BUT I’M WEARING A DRESS WHEN MOM CAN’T WATCH ME SO MY STAPLES ARE COVERED. I GOT A LOT OF COOKIES AND A NEW HEDGEHOG TOY TO AID IN MY HEALING.