Christmas story is finished!

Yes, that's right. I finished writing my Christmas story on the last day of September instead of the third week in December. Amazing! I am going to have the most relaxing Christmas season ever. Of course, it's not totally finished. I write everything out by hand in a notebook, so I still have to type it all up on the computer. (For me, that's the worst part of writing.) I hope to have that done by the end of the week. Then, I'll let it sit until November, pull it out again, and see if there is anything I want to change. It's called "Star Blessed," and those of you lucky enough to be on my Christmas list will still have to wait until Christmas to read it. :) It's a straight fantasy, which is a little different for me. It doesn't have a medieval setting, but it does feature an evil sorcerer king.

A little background: I have been writing a Christmas story as my gift to family, friends, and neighbors since 1995. We were pretty much broke that year. I thought it might be nice to write a story to give to everyone. That wouldn't cost me much except for time. Now, the tradition is in its fourteenth year. Most Christmases, I regret ever starting this tradition. At least until the story is finished. I plan to try and sell them all as a collection.

Appreciation

Finlay's Class

I went to speak about writing to Finlay's second grade class yesterday. It was fun. I read them my favorite book on writing, "Arthur Writes a Story" by Marc Brown. Then I talked about how to get ideas (use your imagination, ask "what if?"), and the difference between fiction and non-fiction. They had written down some questions for me like what kind of stories I write, the tools I use for writing, and how books get put together (didn't know the answer to that one), and if I got mad when someone says they don't like my stories. (Sad, maybe. Not mad.) All in all, it was fun to talk to them about what I love. It made my day when his teacher, Mrs. Mecham, said she'd heard that I was really good. I don't know where she heard it, except maybe from Fin. :)

For with God, nothing shall be impossible.

How does a mother of six find the time to write? The past month or so I have absolutely been on fire! I wrote forty pages in the past five weeks, which is double or more what I considered good output even two months ago. If that isn't enough, I also pulled out my first novel and cut it down from 98,000 words to 90,000 words and seriously tightened up and polished the prose. I attribute this great writing output to yielding my heart to God. No kidding. When I got down on my knees and humbly asked Heavenly Father to remove my shortcomings, to give me a new heart and make me a new person, I have found writing more important to me than ever, and through the grace of God, I have dramatically increased what I am getting done in the time that I do have. I also lost ten pounds without even thinking about it. President Ezra Taft Benson said that, "Men and women who turn their lives over to God will find that He can make a lot more out of their lives than they can." I can testify that this is true. The Lord is making a new person out of me, and happily, writing seems to be a part of His plan. Even if I never publish another thing, at least I get great satisfaction just from the writing itself. I'd love to have a larger audience, but I will leave that in God's hands.

Besides the grace of God, I also don't watch TV. We have a TV, just for watching movies, but it doesn't get any channels. And, okay, I do own the entire series of Star Trek: The Next Generation on disk, but I don't even watch that all that much. This is such an amazing blessing. I highly recommend getting rid of your TV. The other thing that gives me time to write, which I can't recommend as highly, is that I don't do housework. Okay, I do some housework. The dishes are done every day, and the laundry, but as far as stuff like vacuuming, dusting, mopping, bathrooms -- those get done on Saturday, and the rest of the week I just don't worry about it. I figure I can have an immaculately clean house or I can write. I choose to write.

Welcome to the Writing Chair

Hi. This is my blog for talking about writing rather than family stuff.