MIA - Apologies and Updates!

    I am so sorry I have been so remiss in posting this year. But here's a big huge update about what's been going on.
    So far this year I've started on several business ventures and branching out personally. Now one of my goals was to write on my blogs more, but that's ultimately taken a backseat until I can get everything organized. Which is part of what I've been working on. Along with a lot of ACTUAL WRITING!!!!! OMG!
    There's been a lot of progress with several of my writing projects, including my "Time and Tides" series and my writer's workbook. As well as the setting up of Kickstarters for some of these projects.
    However, personal projects are going on hold for a little bit as it stands. I am biding on a freelance indie project that I am very excited about and hopefully will lead to a great partnership on a really amazing project! Besides this being a really exciting opportunity but this could create some expanded options for my personal projects - by proxy. And add a new asset to the family.
    Thank you for baring with me, and sticking with me through this journey. Onto a new chapter!!!

Keeping Organized and a bit about File Naming **Updated**

   Hi all! Today’s topic comes from a question posted by a new member on FWO; a fiction writer’s site I belong to.

   “Does anyone have any tips on organizing my notes?” (I’m paraphrasing)

   Well we all have our own ways and our own methods of attempting to organize the creativity oozing from between our ears. A lot of us carry around laptops or tablets these days. But, even with the ever changing, more and more portable, highly interactive computing devices available in our world - even right down to our phones - nothing seems to be as popular as good old fashioned pen and paper when it comes to fiction writers. So what does that mean? That means that most of us have shelves, boxes, bins, even closets full of these processed trees. If you’re working on one, maybe two projects at once that’s usually not a problem to keep these organized as carrying two notebooks and switching between them when necessary isn’t too difficult. But if that was your situation you wouldn’t be asking; “How do I keep organized,” now would you?

Blog UPDATES!!!

HI ALL!!!

    Well guess what?! I realized that my writing tools might be a lot more useful if they were editable forms instead of just printable forms. So there's a bit of a delay there. HOWEVER! I finally got around to creating the images and uploading the changes I've been wanting to make to this site for forever! These changes are reflective of exciting new changes coming along. Stay tuned for news about "the Writer's Red Pen."

No Summer Vacation

     Hello all! I'm sorry I have been absent a lot lately. I have been tackling a lot of new things this year. From building my Print and Design company Print Muses, learning the tricks of that trade, realizing and researching the improvement needs of my resources for a large part of the extensions of my writing, as well as looking at Kickstarter - hopefully there will be news on that soon - and learning about that. All while trying to maintain some decent contact with my family. So I've been a busy, busy bee.

     I have had time, though, to complete My Creative Writing Tools. Find out in my next post!!!

Wait; it's March already?!

Wow this year already got away from me! Since December I've been working on setting up a Wiki for my series and with it starting to create the digital media to go with it and the novels themselves. This led to a number of unrelated projects and the setup of a small business - "Print  Muses" design. My own little print and digital design studio, the setup and opening of which has taken most of my time this year so far. I promise to get back on blogging regularly again soon. But for now check out the Mysted Wiki. Stay tuned for more exciting news.

NaNoWrimo - BUST ... Prioritizing and Support

    Well, I started out with the best of intentions, but November was just that; NO-vember. This was actually the first year that I have participated in NaNoWriMo where I did not reach my goal. A lot got done this month, yet nothing at all and very, very little actual writing. Most of the month was taken up by the one-turned-three week project that was the forced re-carpeting of our condo. Followed promptly by several separate invasions of 6 legged critters of the black ant persuasion - which in the 18 years of being in this house has only happened 6 times before and on much smaller scale, which has eaten up most of the days in-between. (We still haven't figured out why they decided, now that the place is the best it's looked in the last 6 years, that NOW was the time. No rain, not terribly cold or hot. No logical reason.) Still what writing (and writing related tasks) that did get done had significant impact and I feel that if priority had been given to NaNoWriMo (as in the past) and had I had the support to make that happen there was the potential for this to be the most productive NaNoWriMo EVER for me. But that did not happen and thus the subject of this post. So why?

NaNoWriMo - National Novel Writing Month

Hi all!

    Again I apologize for my absence but that little thing called life keeps getting in my way. Like the fact that our incredibly full house is being re-carpeted, painted outside, getting a new garage door, and a few other things. Timing couldn't be WORSE, the hubby's job is giving him grief for some personal illness issues, my work comp issue is flaring and I'm playing a game of hurry up and wait with the company and lawyers. But the timing though isn't ours to call - ah the joys of renting. But I can tell you that I am working on 20 new articles as I attempt to accomplish some of my personal goals. And speaking of personal goals, this month is National Novel Writing Month - 30 days, 50,000 words; sponsored by NaNoWriMo Organization. Which I have participated in (officially or non-officially for the last 6 years) and I will be participating again this year.

Away a Spell

    My dear readers, I do not wish you to think that I have forgotten this blog or you. I just have been otherwise 'employed.' Over the last few weeks I have  been doing a bit of print and web design for a friend's start-up business while doing research and working on my timeline.

    The timeline itself has taken a lot of work to find a viable solution - the trials of which I have been putting into an article I hope to have published soon. There are so many ways of doing what you want and need in this day that extensive exploration becomes necessity. My hope as always that in cataloging my explorations that I will help save you some of the time that I've spent and help speed along your process.

    Through my dabbling with the design work I have been downloading new programs that are part of the Adobe Cloud service that my husband and I have, and I found a program that has little to do with art design in these resources. I will be exploring this new piece of software in a upcoming post, as soon as I'm done familiarizing myself with it.

    With that I must get back to these projects.

Base Repository Complete; the Crossroads - and Projects Update

Accomplished - Since 07/04/12

• Base Repository Completed

Well it's not as clean as I wanted it to be but it is done. I was down to my last two story series files, the corner stones if you will of the master series - yes I'm one of those sick David-Eddings-type people who not only writes within a "universe" but series within series, sometimes within series - and I realized that to whittle down those files any further it would mean me starting the writing process. So here I am standing on the threshold of where I've wanted to be for the last 4 years. I have so many directions I can go now. Where do I go now?

Projects - Accomplishments and Goals 06.13.12

Accomplished - Since 06/08/12

• Setup Starter Base Repository

Goals - 06/13/12


This next phase is where the true editor will kick in and will take some fair piece of time. When my laptop had that mishap in the hands of the Best Buy Geek Squad I was in the process of setting up files in for a base repository, so essentially I'm finally back to where I was 2 years ago when this started. Well, truth be told I'm a little farther ahead since I've actually achieved Base Repository. "What is the purpose of having a base repository?" you may ask. I wanted to set up a base repository because some of my stories I have been working on for over a decade, and with so many changes to the underlying plot I want to make sure not to back track story concepts that have already landed me at dead ends. Also if there are concepts that I've cut that might now work I'd like to resurrect them if they're good. Lord knows that there have been plenty of things I've cut that I didn't want to but did because it didn't gel with the current plot line, so we'll see if there's anything to salvage.

• Working on Base Repository
• Looking into types of Visual Version Control for file naming

Projects - Progress and Goals 06.08.12

Accomplished - Since 05/12/12

• Setting up files for Base Repository
• Posts:
• Back It Up! Part Two - a tale of almost woe.
• The Birth of a Book - Blog post share
• The wand which weaves; My Favorite Pen
• Started learning Git

Goals - 06/08/12

• Setting up Base Repository
• Looking into Visual Version Control

The wand which weaves; My Favorite Pen

"Art thou a pen, Whose task shall be

To drown in ink What writer's think?

Oh, wisely write, That pages white

Be not the worse for ink and thee."

~ Ethel Lynn Beers~

    For centuries writers have put pen to paper - or parchment - weaving their "webs of words" to enchant their audiences. I cannot speak for anyone else, but every once-in-a-while I have to get away from the computers, the tablets, the phones and put pen to paper; to let the ink flow. When it's easier to paint pictures with words with the feel of my favorite "brush" in hand whispering softly across my writer's canvas instead of the clack-clack of the keys beneath my fingertips. There is something about the journey an idea takes from knocking around in my head, down my arm and into my fingertips - whether the words flow in a gentle cursive or burst forth in a flurry of print and shorthand - and in that moment an idea can become a tangible thing. It is at those times that I find myself so completely immersed in the experience that the words and pages disappear. Almost as if the pen cradled between my fingers were but a vessel for an entity entirely of its own, the story reveals itself. I treasure those moments.

    Throughout time there has been much praise and homage paid to the virtues of the pen. One of the most familiar quotes being "The Pen is mightier than the Sword" coined around the year 1839, by English writer Edward Bulwer-Lytton. The quote comes from Act II, Scene II of his play Richelieu (liberally based on Cardinal Richelieu);

"True, This - Beneath the rule of men entirely great,
The pen is mightier than the sword. Behold
The arch-enchanter's wand! - itself a nothing! -
But taking sorcery from the master-hand
To paralyse the Ceasars, and to strike
The loud earth breathless! - Take away the sword -
States can be saved without it."

Famous playwrite William Shakespeare wrote in a similar vein in reference to the tool of the scribe in Act II, Scene II of his classic tragedy Hamlet:

"... many wearing rapiers are afraid of goosequils."

But it is not only classic writers who have commented on the worthiness of the hand written word and it's instrument. Even in these modern times Irish author and journalist, Clare Boylan, noted this:

"Some writers have a personal love affair with particular pens. Others do not give a blot what comes to hand so long as it is stick-shaped, silent, and able to make its mark. I was surprised to discover about 70 percent of writers still write full manuscripts by hand." - Clare Boylan

And it is in the spirit of this assertion that we continue on. Now, I happen to be one of those former writers that Clare Boylan mentions, and over the years my writing tool has changed. In this article I'm going to cover several tools that I have used over the years and why. Maybe it will help you find a favorite writing utensil, or maybe it will simply entertain you that a writer can be surprisingly neurotic about something so seemingly trivial.

The Birth of a Book - Blog post share

    I was doing some reading online and found this; Birth of a Book. I thought it was worth sharing and rather funny. Funny but true. Don't get discouraged, just know that it can be a tough road ahead getting from idea to finished product.

Back It Up! Part Two - a tale of almost woe.

This is a Perfect example of why you must not only backup, and back up often, but if at all possible have a third copy (a hard copy or digital - or both) of any important files.

Pixar nearly lost all of Toy Story 2 during production!

Projects - Progress and Goals 05.12.12

Accomplished - 05/11/12

• Completed file comparison of the Merger folder. 
• 82,571 files (30GB) down to 8,006 files (1.07GB)

Goals - 05/12/12

• Organization of the Merger folder.
• Starting Version Control and GIT post and setup.

Projects - Progress and Goals 05.10.12 *BIG ANNOUNCEMENT*

    IT'S DONE!!   I finished the Main folder! I have 3,113 files in the Secondary folder that need sorting but that actually can't be done until I get the Main folder reorganized. But I'm actually at the point where I can organize the main folder. When done with that I can create a new files set and actually start on the creative process again.


Accomplished - 05/10/12

• Main folder file comparison COMPLETE!
• Main and Secondary folders merged.
• Folder organization started.

Today's Goals - 05/11/12

• Organization and file comparison of the Merger folder. 7,043 files total. Whoo!!

Projects - Progress 05.10.12

Accomplished - 05/09/12

• From 1,435 down to 635 files left in the most important folder (singular) to sort.

Projects - Progress and Goals 05.09.12

    Omg it's been almost TWO MONTHS since I have actually sat down in front of my computer for more than a few seconds. Today should see some progress as I am working from the hubby's office today. I had, posted optimistically in April thinking that we were much closer to being done than we were with the housing situation. Was I wrong. We're still not done. But bodies, children and moms can only take so much for so long. So today I take a break from the physical and work on the digital.


Today's Goals - 05/13/12

• Resuming whittling away at the 1,435 files left in the most important folders to sort. There's light at the end of this tunnel, can I reach it today?

"Return of the Pixie" - or "Life Happens"

    It has been weeks since my last post. Unfortunately I have been unable to post because I've been spending my waking hours cleaning out the garage of 17years of accumulated crap of my own and my family's as well as prepping for a pending move closer to the coast; so my few free moments have gone to my daughter.

    One big bonus has come out of this though, in the process of all this cleaning I have found the majority of my had written notes and manuscripts for my projects; including art and diagrams, several dozen notebooks, and possibly thousands of loose papers. This has greatly inspired my creative juices and I'm very much looking forward to getting back to work. There is still some work left to do around here so things will still be limited until that is done but I'm hoping to get back to work on this before May.

    My short term goals are to finish the file sorting, take down my notes for the story ideas I've had over the last few weeks, catalog and subsequently archive the on paper works I've found.

    Future post plans include Office Supplies, Getting in the Groove techniques, My Writing Tools, to list a few. I'm very excited to share this next part of this journey with you.

Least productive week ever ...

This past week had not been productive in the writing area but that's kind of par for the course when the hubby losses his job and spring cleaning starts as result. Even if cleaning hadn't happened, the family out of sorts doesn't make for much productivity. But laying in bed listening to the gentle drone of snoring drifting on the fan driven air, I feel the urge to write. In fact I've caught myself taking my mini note pad and favorite pen to bed several nights. (I still like to write by hand at times as it gives me time to think about what I'm jotting down.) But what to write about? So many things cross my mind in the dark hours of the night. And I realized that where I haven't gotten a lot of writing done, I've had the opportunity to mull things over, plots, character development, things of that nature - all have had time to simmer in the back of my mind. So maybe productive can be thought of as a relative term.