When they come to you, ask yourself why
PS This is several hours early because CJ and Louisette and I will be travelling to Hong Kong tomorrow, and our housesitters have enough menial tasks to do without posting my blog for me.
————————————————————————————————
Here is an article from an extremely helpful website, Writer Beware. It’s solid advice, because it is all too easy for us wannabes to fall for scams.
“I don’t often write posts like this, because it’s really like shooting fish in a barrel. And there are so many red flags here that savvy writers may wonder why I bother. But there are a lot of new writers searching for agents, many of whom are probably new to Writer Beware, and may not yet be clear on what to watch out for. I also think it’s important, every now and then, to emphasize the basics of author self-protection–because as cataclysmically as the publishing landscape is changing, the basic warning signs remain the same.”
“Temeraire: Throne of Jade” by Naomi Novik
This is the second book in the “Temeraire” series. This is where we first discover Novik’s penchant for investigating other nations from the same historical period. And, given that the series is about dragons, China makes a whole lot of sense. China has a whole lot of dragons, and Great Britain is just very lucky they’re not interested in the war. Or are they?
The rest of this review is at Comfy Chair, where I get paid for it.
Heels
I bought these shoes for the upcoming China wedding. It’s so good to wear heels again, even if I seem to now be a size 11 (yikes).
Half her lifetime: Photos from month 1 to month 2
Here is the second month-long installment of the daily Louisette pictures. The first month is here. The Project 365 album (with my comments and others) is here. I update it pretty much every day.
When I say, “She gets more beautiful every day” I have proof that it’s the literal truth.
Skyfire 2012
Skyfire is an annual event in Canberra that manages, even in our tiny town, to draw actual genuine crowds of people. It is always a huge hassle to get there and back, because Canberrans are bewildered by the whole experience of moving en masse. Also, this year, it rained. A lot.
But CJ and I force ourselves to make the effort, and when the fireworks start (they’re set to music because it’s run by a local radio station, FM 104.7) there’s always a moment when I think, “Oh THAT’s right. It is worth coming, after all.” My muscles are all still really rubbish from pregnancy/birth so even the ten minute walk from the car was moderately difficult, and sitting on the ground for hours was quite painful. But again – worth it.
We left Louisette with my parents (one less trauma for her to endure at our hands). With startling organisational skills, we managed to make it to the end of Anzac Parade (the family-friendly section, with almost no drunks) several hours before the fireworks began. We both promptly fell asleep. At seven, we were woken by cannon fire.
The rest of the article is at weekend notes.
Then the Roulettes did their pretty thing overhead.
And then, once the rain was good and steady, fireworks!
Strange Kitten
So Ana has decided that our bathroom is her favourite place to be.
The bath is fine. The sink is sort of fine. Eccentric, sure. Slightly odd when a giant fuzzy thing emerges above the rim while you’re on the loo at 2am – certainly. But it’s better than this:
Here’s hoping it’s just one of those phases a girl goes through. . .
Next week we’ll be in HONG KONG! Yay us! Which also means our house and catsitters will be dealing with this for the next two weeks. 🙂 And of course I’ll be blogging about all the awesome stuff we do, including a visit to a pirate’s cave.
The steampunk dress
Is officially done! I’m wearing it to church this morning. Which is a good thing, since we leave for China and the wedding (that this dress is for, at least in the short term – it’s impossible to buy a dress that allows breastfeeding access) in a week.
Without further ado. . .
And with the optional outer layer added on:
There were quite a few dramas along the way, as there always are due to my “spontaneous sewing” methods. The neckline of the outer top layer has been fixed now (you can’t see it clearly because I forgot to remove a piece from the next layer down), although there’s not much I can do about one of the eyelets in the standard layer being inside out. It was originally meant to have a zipper at the back (which it does have), but I can’t do it up myself. CJ described the zipping-up procedure as “not categorically impossible” when he assisted me. So I added lacing and a detachable modesty panel at the back (so when I lose a bunch of weight – likely in the nearish future – I can still remove the ribbon and zip it all the way up, and the eyelets become a decorative feature). The front modesty panel is also fully detachable – and easy to move aside if I’m feeding Louisette.
The main steampunk elements are the adjustability (the gathering at the front means it’ll fit me next pregnancy – and yes, I can now take it on and off by myself) and the different possible combinations (eg I can remove the modesty panels to highlight a contrasting undershirt). Hypothetically I will add more steampunk elements after the wedding – belt loops (on which to hang my keys, and perhaps a nice ladylike dagger or some such), more metal studs to attach different pieces together (or to be decorative when the pieces are apart) and so on. I’ll make a detachable waistband at some point, so as I lose weight I can cinch it in more.
Ultimately, it does the job it set out to do – give me breastfeeding access in a dress, hide my post-pregnancy belly, and have the flexibility to be a maternity dress or not, depending on circumstances.
Too funny
This article by the foul-mouthed Chuck Wendig isn’t so much writing advice as an example of what awesome writing looks like. Ah, who am I kidding? I’m linking to it because it’s about a baby and it’s utterly hilarious. The man has quite a gift for the original metaphor.
This is a fairly polite entry, but there is still some swearing.
Chuck Wendig on his son’s eating habits:
“He’s like a wood-chipper.
It’s as if his stomach is a molten core, and any food poured into that fiery space is burned away to meager char and ash the moment it touches the walls of his gastrointestinal furnace. You know how some adult human beings can subsist on, say, a small yogurt and a banana for breakfast? Our nine-month son can eat more than that. Just yesterday we had to feed him four meals. You get through one container of pureed food and Baby Jabba over there is suddenly all BOSHUUDA NAY WANNA WONGA BLUEBERRY YOGURT which means it’s time to go seeking a new food source before he starts eating his high-chair.
And you think I’m kidding. He gnaws on his high-chair like a starving badger.”
Pictured: not a starving badger.
“Temeraire” by Naomi Novik
Welcome to a new series (new to my reviews, anyhow): the Napoleonic wars. . . with dragons.
This is a brilliant, well-written series that is often funny. Peter Jackson has optioned the film rights (although he’s a little busy right now). Personally, I read it over and over.
The rest of the review is at Comfy Chair, where I get paid for it.
Toilet rolls and duct tape
Here we have, set up beside the breastfeeding chair, places for my mobile, a muesli bar, pens, two types of medication, the camera, lollies, and my diary. Genius.
They used to all just sit on the chair, but Ana (who paused to absent-mindedly lick Louisette’s head as she walked over the chair arm yesterday) likes to bolt down the hall and leap onto the chair, skidding across it with a startled look and scattering everything on it. (The milk you see here is safe because it’s nestled behind a tissue box weighed down with two novels – one for CJ and one for me – this is also one of the “put the baby to sleep” chairs.)
Felicity Banks 