Broncos Suck and Yahoo Groups Exploration

Well. Last night's football game - a divisional rivalry, nationally televised - really disappointing, Denver. Really disappointing! Everything that could go wrong did, plays didn't work, our joke of a quarterback couldn't throw, our catchers couldn't catch, our kickers couldn't kick, and our defense was as full of holes as Swiss cheese. Pathetic! I'm still a fan (Broncos Fangirl forever!), but games like last night's stretch my fandom to the limit. Hopefully the Vikings will do better on Sunday. It helps to have two different teams to support ... sometimes. 

Last night's game was highly disappointing. Ugh! 

I'm almost finished with the first stage in this year's holiday cards. I'm printing out the addresses that you've sent to me and I'm totally stoked. There are a lot of phases, but phase one should be complete this morning, and stage two started. I'm trying to get an hour at minimum into my cards every day. So far it's working well, but realistically I'm looking at a month before I want these in the mail, approx six weeks before I'll be under "Must mail them now" constraints. It'll work, it always does, but sometimes it can get a little dicey. Since I started late this year, I have to keep a really close eye on my time. 

I took time yesterday to make sure I wouldn't lose anything when
Yahoo Groups disappears. I had quite the long list of groups I
belonged to, from costume construction and art techniques
to writing, enamel and metal clay. They used to be active and
vibrant, but they've almost all moved to other media hosts by now. 

I spent some time and went through my various Yahoo Groups yesterday. Few of them had been active, but I did post in the ones I "moderated" to let people know what would be going on. I also went through the photos sections of each and pulled out my photos, unless I already had them stored on my computer. Now Yahoo Groups can go ahead and dissolve. BUT, one thing that was on there were the MEFA files and stories. If's going to be a shame to lose these stories if they aren't already moved to a different location. 

I only participated in a couple of years of Middle Earth Fanfiction Award
nominations before it was discontinued. The stories are archived
on a separate website, so the many writings aren't lost, just moved. 

So, a heads-up to my fellow LOTR authors who may have entered fiction into the MEFAs over the years. The files which are hosted on Yahoo Groups and will probably disappear, although they have been archived with a different host. If you don't have your stories also in other locations (unlikely, but things can happen), pull them off now. The deadline has been extended from October 21st to October 28th, but that's still not a lot of time. 

On that note, time to head out to the gym. Have an excellent Friday and I'l be back tomorrow. 

Counting Down - Blessings of 2012

At the end of a year people tend to look back over the past year and into the future, striding ahead into a future filled with hope and the lessons learned from the past. 2012 was a year of accomplishment and turbulence, friends won and lost and through it all, woven with beautiful pictures and words.

2012 was the year things blew up. The MEFAs exploded and became the TOME Awards. Looking back from a safer position on the outside looking in, it was rather like a Nova. It existed brightly, then contracted and then exploded, creating a great light and something new in its place. 2013 will be the first year for the TOME Awards and I hope it will grow into a respected platform for fanfic authors to receive feedback from a large variety of people. The group of people who are heading up the new awards system are extremely capable, very organized, and enthusiastic. I have high hopes for this new award system.

As happens, in any explosion there is fallout. My personal fallout consisted of friends lost, but these were balanced by others gained. When I look back over the year I recall those people who stayed friends with me vs those who left. But as I look at who my friends are at the end of this year, I'm extremely pleased. Yes, I lost some friends I really enjoyed. But I've gained others who are either new friends or who came out of the background to support me. These friends are amazing, awesome and fabulous. I feel extremely lucky as I end 2012 and enter 2013. I've got a great group of friends both in real life and in cyber life. These are friends I can laugh and cry with, bounce ideas off or ask for a quick edit, and phone every now and again. I am so very blessed by friends in my life.

So as the year end, look over your own friends and tell them that they are important to you. From my longest and dearest friends - Sharon and Seth and my cousin/sister, Missy, to my more recent cyber friends - a long and brilliant list, I am in love with each and every one of you. Thank you for my 2012 and I look forward to walking into and through 2013 with each of you by my side.

24 Hours of Happy, Then Back to Normal

I actually won an award in the Middle Earth Fanfiction Awards for 2011. So I'm going to take today and bask, and tomorrow I'll be back to normal - working hard. My drabble "Morning Song" (that's a story of 100 words) placed second in the Drabble-Elves category. OK, that's enough about me, many of my friends placed numerous times and their wins were far more deserved than mine. So my sincere CONGRATULATIONS go out to all of the winners as well as all those stories that were nominated. Well done!

Today is my studio day. I give a lecture in two months to the Upper Midwest Bead Society on "An Exploration of Beads and Stitches" so I need to start working on examples for that, I also have six colorways that I designed to pack up a colorway kits that I need to start making up. I guess I'll be busy with needle and thread as well as continuing my writing today. It looks to be a good day :-)

Happy New Year to All

I just spent the past 2-1/2 hours catching up on as many MEFA reviews as possible and I think I caught most of my friends and those stories that really caught me over the past year. If I missed you - it was totally inadvertent. If I reviewed you - I wish I had the time to review more of your work.

And finally, on this final day of 2011, I want to wish each of you a safe and happy New Year's Eve and a 2012 that exceeds your hopes and dreams by fulfilling all good things. Celebrate happily with those that you love, curl up with a kitten or puppy, and hug a child. These are the things that make the world worth living in. Felicitations to all!

Heading to a Holiday Weekend and MEFA Thanks

Monday is the 4th of July, Independence Day in the US, and we will celebrate by sleeping in and probably playing Lord of the Rings Online and throwing the carcass of some dead animal on top of burning coals for dinner.  I plan to enjoy my additional day off, I get them so rarely.  And then I have a week before I leave for my next conference, so I'd better also start packing and making sure I have everything I will need for the trip.  I didn't get everything finished that I wanted to before the conference, I won't have charms made for the charm exchange, and I didn't finish the beading that I wanted to give to my wonderful friend, Shruti, so I'll have to mail it to her later (hoping that it makes it through the India postal system intact).  Maybe if I say a mantra or something :-)  But I am looking forward to the journey, the workshops and the conference.  I'm just not quite focused on it yet.  That will come....or not.  This year I seem to be flying by the seat of my pants a bit more than usual, but I haven't crashed and burned yet - LOL. 

I wanted to take this opportunity to thank those amazing people who nominated stories of mine for this year's Middle Earth Fanfiction Awards.  I wanted to acknowledge each of them below with a banner and a personal thank-you.  I am amazed at being nominated at all, let alone by the quality of writers who did so.  Hannon le! 

Wind Song, nominated by Robinka
Before the waves bury Beleriand, the wind returns for a last visit to the destroyed hidden city of Goldolin. 

 Soul Brothers, nominated by Robinka
At the Awakening, two brothers experience the good and bad about life on Middle Earth.  A drabble for Tolkien Weekly - Fell Creatures-Orcs. 

 Horse and Boy, nominated by Esteliel
A horse adopts his boy in this celebration of spring and exploration of friendships in Aman. Featuring a young Glorfindel and the friends of his youth.

 Survival of the Fittest, nominated by Himring
A true drabble for Tolkien Weekly's prompt "Fell Beasts - Wargs". What actually happens in the den to newborn wargs?

 Lady of Colored Light, nominated by Armariel
n response to a challenge that assigned the phrase "Are you mad?", my OFC Helyanwe attempts to go down in family history and cause laughter to follow her example. An early piece in my Helyanwe-cycle. 

 Morning Song, nominated by Elleth
On its final day, a woman awakens to face her fate in the doomed city of Ost-in-Edhil. A response to the prompt "comb" in Tolkien Weekly Challenge.

Hot, hot, hot...

It's hot, and sticky.  When I went to sleep last night it was still in the 90's F with more than 70% humidity.  Can you say sauna?  We don't have air conditioning at home - it does keep my utility bills low for the non-heating months - so we had the fan on...all night.  Currently it is in the upper 70's F, but it will zip right back up to the upper 90's F again untuil late tonight.  I'm usually OK with the heat as long as it isn't an extended period of time.  If this was to go on with these temps for more than four days, then I would be sick.  I'm grateful that we will get rain coming through tonight - it will cool things down.  Of course, we may have other problems accompanying the rain - hail, high winds, and possible tornados.  Life is a roller coaster - LOL. 

I had the time early yesterday to pull this banner
together for my last story nominated.  The center
comb is a hand-carved ivory comb - very old, very rare
and very beautiful. 

Yesterday's main task was getting my works off LOTRFF and onto MPTT.  For those of you who don't live in a world of acronyms and initials, that would be Lord of the Rings Fan Fiction (bad) to Many Paths To Tread (good).  My friend Esteliel is also working on an archieval website for her own work as well as others of us who want to join.  I beta uploaded a couple of stories to her last night and things seemed to work extremely well.  I'll try and do a few every day and before you know it I'll have my things backed up there as well.  I also set up a spreadsheet with each story listed as well as which websites I have them archived on.  That will be very handy and it's a good thing that I did it now when I only had 52 stories to archive than later when I will have more.  What a mess.  I'm happy to have this completed.  Of course all of my MEFA nomination URLs had to also be changed, but Marta was kind enough to do that last night.  So now they are happily pointing to SWG (that would be Silmarillion Writers Guild) for the main URL and MPTT for the secondary.  This was hours and hours of work, and my staff sent me home shortly after noon to get it all done.  I worked almost non-stop on this until almost 10pm.  But it's complete now and I'm happy.  I'm hot....but I'm happy. 

Fulfillment and Happiness

So after more than two hours of frustrated work to get the lettering onto my Big Bang collage, I finally succeeded in exactly what I wanted.  I may still go over the lettering with my wood burner, but I'll test that out with my signature panel on the back of the piece first.  What I can say, happily, is that it is DONE and I will be photographing it this week so that I can Email it to the appropriate people.  Whether or not my author will consider it to be worthwhile?  Hard to say.  My artwork is always off the mainstream.  But my DH, although he did criticize part of the image, generally liked what I came up with - a surprise since he rarely has anything good to say about my artwork at all.  So I'm happy - fulfilled, even. 

The central image is an antique ivory comb that was

heavily carved in the center.  It's a stunning piece!

Yesterday I thought I would work up some userpics and banners for my Middle Earth Fan Fiction award nominees, and noticed that I had been nominated for a sixth story.  Yippee!  I'm so incredibly honored and just floored that anyone would find my writings moving enough to nominate.  Thrilled doesn't even begin to describe my feelings.  So I worked up a banner for Morning Song shown above.  I'm still working on my user pics for my LJ pages.  So, I'm doubly happy.  Unfortunately, I'm looking at four days in a row of work, definitely a downer.  But...I've got good books to read on my NookColor, good coffee and oatmeal for the morning, and only the chapter headings still to draw for my Big Bang things (and those are bonus, not required), so all is well.  Now to get beading on my BFAC piece for the year...

Movies and Art

So Chickie, Chickie Mama and I went to see Kung Fu Panda 2 last night.  Although it was not as good as the original KFP, it still was a lot of fun to see.  It seems that I still have $16 loaded on my movie card and there are several more movies coming up this year that I am looking forward to, so I'll be using that up and reloading my card again before you know it. 

I bought a new blade holder yesterday and started cutting out the stencils and shields for the next coats on my Big Bang enamelwork, and I started drawing what I may offer as one of the chapter heading drawings.  I'm not as good with pen as I wish I was, so the chapter heads may, or may not, actually happen.  My author did send me the third chapter and outlines for the remaining chapters last night so that I could work on them if I want.  I'm still not sure if he'll like my direction, but it's the way that I'm going and there is no time to look backwards, only forwards. 

Here is the final banner that I made.  This one is for my short drabble (a 100-word story) called "Survival of the Fittest".  I was very pleased with the story when it came together and it is wonderful that others also liked it enough to nominate it.  So far the stories that I've wanted to nominate have already been nominated, so I'm happy and I'll just have to remember to find time to review them when that aspect of the awards opens up.  Have a wonderfully creative day! 

Art and Plans

Yesterday was TOO much fun.  I worked hard all day, but I had such a good time doing it.  I printed out a lot of pictures for possible use on my BB illustration, enameled the counter and first coat on the centerpiece figures, and played with the air brush.  I have a bit of blue on my fingers that will have to wear off, and I spilled a cup of pink paint on my floor coverings when the cup didn't seat fully in the brush, but I feel happy with my end results for this project and I want to play some more.  Unfortunately, at this point I'm into brush work to finish up the piece so I had to return the airbrush and compressor to my DH.  I am running deadlines here, so I'll try to get a bit more enamel work done on Friday or Saturday night or during the day on Sunday - but I suspect that's actually more like wishful thinking.  I probably will be able to continue my cut work though, so I will get some work done on this before next week's Studio Day.  I just know that the next group of enamel work will be intense and will require lots of shields to get the wardrobe done well before I begin with the brushwork for these.  I was contemplating embedding fine-gague wire for some of the features, but I think I'd better save that for the next one since the combination of the acrylic enamels and the air brush will already give me two new things for this one project and I have no make-up time available for this if I mess it up. 

This is the banner that I made for my story "Making Colored Light". 

Tonight Chickie and I are going to see "Kung Fu Panda 2" - yippee!  We loved Po in KFP1, in fact we laughed so hard that Claire was afraid we would be kicked out of the theatre.  So we're really looking forward to seeing Po and the gang again.  There's just something about Jack Black that I love.  He's such a funny guy and was the perfect voice for Po.  Enjoy the second day of Summer, it is moving quickly now. 

Studio Day

So today is a studio day and I have a lot to accomplish.  I need to get the initial coats of enamel on my Big Bang Illustration piece, and also get the background painted.  My DH came through and put one of the airbrushes and compressors on the floor for me to use.  I'll read the instructions during breakfast today and if it doesn't work for me, I can go ahead and brush paint it.  I always try to learn something new with every project I do, this time it is using the airbrush.  I'm really looking forward to playing with it.  But I also can't lose sight of the fact that I need to do the enamel work - VERY important.  I have a total of three studio days to get this item completed and, although I don't think I'll have an issue with the timeframe, I still need to keep focused. 



I made one of my MEFA banners yesterday for my story Horse and Boy.  I had an enjoyable time making the banner and hope that I can get the other two (for Making Colored Light and Survival of the Fittest) made within the next day or so.  I did get two stories pounded out yesterday, a drabble for the prompt "part" and a longer story for ALEC's "Celebration of Life" theme.  I'm happy with the revisions that my friends on Lizard Council suggested for the drabble, and I have the longer story being looked over by a friend.  I'm not happy with that story and may let it sit in my discarded file.  I feel it ambles.  But I feel that about longer works in general, I think I am happiest writing in short bursts so the drabble format has worked very well for me.  Have a creative day while I play with head, molten glass and paint. 

Packing and Nominations

So...I suppose that I actually should throw my clothing into my suitcase and make sure I have everything I need for my artwork.  I suppose.  But I'm lazy and uncommitted.  Well...lazy.  I'm actually looking forward to this trip, just not the expense.  This summer is frightening me - I'm so close to the edge.  But so far I'm scrabbling through.  This little trip, however, will cost me $25/day just for parking!  Oy!  That's an extra $175 just for my car.  It makes me sick.  I'll be on the computer tomorrow, but after that I'll be laptopping it for a week.  My laptop has less versatility, so even though I will be posting, I won't be able to do quite as much for my daily computer work as I usually do. 

This lovely banner was made by my friend Esteliel. 

Maybe it is the mountains around Gondolin? 

I have had two stories nominated for the Middle Earth Fanfiction Awards so far.  I'm flabbergasted and honored.  I have no delusions that I will actually win in my categories, but it's such an honor in the first place.  And the thing that makes me really happy is that the person who nominated me only knows me through my stories.  She doesn't share any of my chat boards with me that I'm aware of.  So they really were nominations out of the blue.  Such fun!