Plumbing has been . . . interesting . . . over the past week. Highlights include the drain (now capped, previously open) beneath the built-in cupboard and bookcase
and the mass of roots where the sewer line met the main line in the street where there has been no tree for at least 15 or 20 years.
What’s new with you on this Monday?
Originally published at Erin M. Hartshorn. You can comment here or there.
I know this post is going to bore my mom because she doesn’t do social media, but the rest of you might find it at least a little interesting.
I don’t consider myself an incredibly social person (definitely more toward the introvert end of the scale), but I can be found all over the Internet. There’s this blog, obviously, and its mirror site on LiveJournal, but I’m also on Ello, Facebook, Google+, Pinterest, and Twitter. I’ve also considered Tumblr, but I haven’t actually taken the plunge yet. (If I do do Tumblr, most likely what I’ll post are images with quotes from my stories and books.) Why so many, and what do I use them for? ( Read the rest of this entry » )
Originally published at Erin M. Hartshorn. You can comment here or there.
Yes, the seasons cycle. I noticed cyclamen blooming among the hostas the other day, and the resident groundhog (it lives under a pile of brush in the back corner of the lot) has been eating fallen apples from the tree. (The dog has, too, though I try to discourage it; the core gets caught in his throat, and he coughs and chokes for hours afterward.) We’ve even had mornings when the girl has wanted her jacket to go to the bus stop.
This past week, I was amused to note I’d been so excited to have the kids go back to school so I could get more work done — but it hasn’t turned out that way at all. With making lunches, checking the girl’s backpack, making sure everyone has breakfast (including the dog, whom the girl is supposed to feed), and walking the girl to the bus, I still don’t settle down to work before 9. At the other end of the day, the boy is home about 3:15, and I have to meet the girl’s bus about 3:50, and then my husband can get home any time from 4 on, depending on what kind of a day he’s had. And everyone’s first action when they get home is to tell me all about how their day went — which means, basically, I have from 9 to 3 to do my paying work, write, edit, check e-mail, and do whatever else I need to get done.
More work done? Nope.
On the other hand, it’s much quiter, and I don’t have to break up any fights over whose turn it is to choose what they’re watching. I’ll take it.
What changes have you noticed recently?
Originally published at Erin M. Hartshorn. You can comment here or there.
Crape myrtles bloom much later here than elsewhere — ours are just coming into their own now. (Photos after cut)( Read the rest of this entry » )
Originally published at Erin M. Hartshorn. You can comment here or there.
Remember that apple tree full of gorgeous blossoms, the branches bending down under their weight? Yeah, sadly, the fruit’s not nearly as impressive. Fewer apples than we had last year, even, and the ones I have any hope of reaching are tiny things. ( Read the rest of this entry » )
Originally published at Erin M. Hartshorn. You can comment here or there.
It probably won’t come as a surprise to anyone who saw my post at the end of May on having the kids home for the summer, but I’m really ready for them to go back to school. Fortunately, that’s just two and a half weeks now!
In many ways, the summer’s been easier than I thought it would be, although that probably has a lot to do with being willing to use electronic babysitters. Yes, my kids have spent an inordinate amount of time on the Xbox, the laptop, and my iPad — playing games, watching movies, and mostly staying out of my hair so I could still work and write. (I’ve even finished and sent out a couple of new stories this summer.) Which isn’t to say I didn’t do things with the kids. Library every week. One memorable trip to a playground (It didn’t end well). A trip to a different park. A trip to the museum.
I’ve made sure the kids are reading (okay, that’s not exactly hard, although my son is complaining that he doesn’t need any more recommendations of books to read now, Mom, thank you) and practicing their math (the boy has his summer algebra packet; I’ve had to print out addition, subtraction, and time worksheets for the girl). And the boy’s started up band camp, too, which takes him out of the house for a couple of hours every morning.
On the other hand, when the kids are both downstairs for any length of time, the squabbling starts. And when the boy has his best friend over, they tend to chatter a lot, which rather distracts me from what I’m trying to get done. And every now and then, we get that age-old plaint of children everywhere — “I’m bored!” (Although my son has learned to follow this up very quickly with, “No, Mom, I’m not asking for suggestions.”)
I’m probably the only one of us who’s eager for this year to start. My son’s still nervous about being a teen, and being in 8th grade weirds him out. My daughter? Well, she went to the same school for kindergarten that she did for preschool, so now that she’s going into first grade, she’s switching schools to a larger place with more kids, most of whom she won’t know. She’s nervous. Last night, in fact, she was telling me she was scared about kindergarten even though it was still the same school and she knew most everyone. So this? Yeah, big step for her.
Which doesn’t change the fact that I’m counting down to August 25.
Originally published at Erin M. Hartshorn. You can comment here or there.
Continuing the ice cream saga . . .
I ran across an article about the science of sorbets last week. It had a link to a peach sorbet recipe. I’d bought some of the most luscious freestone peaches at Wegmans, but my son and I ate most of them before I found the recipe. So instead, I went to Scholl Orchards, a farm stand around the corner. Sadly, they only had cling peaches, but I got two pounds of yellow peaches and one pound of white.
This weekend, I made the peach sorbet, mixing yellow and white peaches. The white are sweeter and juicier, and because the yellow aren’t as ripe as they could be, their color’s not very rich, either. I had to tweak the recipe a bit (1 teaspoon lime juice, an extra 1/4 cup of sugar), but it is incredible, even if it isn’t as pretty as the picture on Serious Eats. In fact, I’m going to have to make more within the next couple of days.
Originally published at Erin M. Hartshorn. You can comment here or there.
Unlike most (all?) of our neighbors, we don’t use herbicides. Thus, our back lawn has plenty of clover, buttercups, wild strawberries, violets (though they’re past their bloom now), purslane, and I’m not sure what else. Looks mostly green when I look out into the humid world. It’s soft enough for the kids to play on. Works for me.
Also works for the deer. One of the local does came by for dinner last night and breakfast this morning.
Originally published at Erin M. Hartshorn. You can comment here or there.
For those who are in the U.S., I hope you had a good (and safe) holiday. For those elsewhere, I hope you had a good Friday. Friday flash will rerun next week.
Meanwhile, some fireworks:
Originally published at Erin M. Hartshorn. You can comment here or there.
Last week, the ongoing copyediting gig was slow (no articles at all that I could grab), the indexing gig had no news, and the proofreading gig would arrive at the earliest on Friday. I got some writing in, but perhaps not as much as I could have.
This week? Copyediting article grist thing this morning, plus proofreading gig landed before noon. Still no word on the indexing, but that’s really just as well, what with the holiday making it a short week and having to take time out to go to the library tomorrow and all.
This, by the by, is perfectly normal for the freelancing life — feast or famine, not steady sane levels. The up-and-down nature also tends to affect my writing, so I’ve been working more on short fiction lately, rather than Corn Maze. I do anticipate it being out by the end of the summer, however. (*knock on wood*)
Oh — and I decided to redo my hair the other day. Used Ion’s teal, which strikes me as very peacock colored. I’ll be adding some yellow to this to get more middle-of-the-road green, but meanwhile, this is the current shade.
Originally published at Erin M. Hartshorn. You can comment here or there.
One of my earlier memories is when my dad first got his ice cream maker — a huge (it seemed to me) wooden thing that ice and salt went in the outer ring of while the electric motor churned ingredients into ice cream. I think it was a Father’s Day present, and I was younger than my daughter is now. (At least, I’m pretty sure he got it while we were in Tonopah. I’m sure Mom will tell me if I’m wrong.) He had that same ice cream maker for decades; it moved across the state with us. I think it may even have still been around when he died. Strange how I’m less certain of that.
But ice cream was something my dad made, not something I ever did. He made it seem mystical, as if the slightest wrong move would mean no ice cream would result.
When my husband and I got married, among our gifts, we received a Cuisinart ice cream maker — also electric, but much smaller, and with no ice and salt requirement. We also got an ice cream cookbook, Ice Cream! The Whole Scoop That summer, we must have made two or three different flavors a week, and we had one party where we invited friends over for pizza (grilled!) and homemade ice cream. There was nothing magical about ice cream after all. Sort of. ( Read the rest of this entry » )
Originally published at Erin M. Hartshorn. You can comment here or there.
As promised, the gallery of photos from egg to young bird, able to fly. Enjoy.
Originally published at Erin M. Hartshorn. You can comment here or there.
The baby birds now have their eyes open and are starting to overflow the nest.
Originally published at Erin M. Hartshorn. You can comment here or there.
Next week — next Friday, to be precise — is my kids’ last day of school for the year. The last day would’ve been Wednesday, but we had all those snow days, and even giving up the in-service days wasn’t enough. I’ve already laid down some ground rules — I get the computer from 9 to 4, even if they don’t think I’m working; they have to play outside for set least an hour a day; if I have to break up any arguments, they’re going to their rooms — that sort of thing.
It’s going to be a bit of a transition for us. The girl’s been in daycare since before she was 2, and she stayed there for kindergarten. This will be the longest stretch she’s been at home all day, every day. If I didn’t have to work, that would be fine, but especially younger children like time and attention. I have promised them an outing a week to the library, a playground, or the pool. (Pool’s probably going to be the least frequent because unlike the others, it costs money. That’s okay; we have a sprinkler the kids can play in — and no water restrictions.)
I think one of the hardest parts may be altering my morning routine. I’ve just settled into a good one, where after everyone is out the door, I have time to relax, eat breakfast, write my morning pages, read a bit, and enjoy the silence. I might still get to do most of that, but I can guarantee the next three months won’t have a lot of silence.
I’ll probably post in late June or early July on how the routine’s shaping up with the kids around. One thing’s for sure: they’ll be doing a lot of reading!
Originally published at Erin M. Hartshorn. You can comment here or there.
You can really see details of the wings developing.
Originally published at Erin M. Hartshorn. You can comment here or there.
This weekend, my husband was trimming the dead parts off the holly bush, and he discovered a bird’s nest with eggs.
Also this weekend, my friend Bonnie visited and we went to a nearby park, where I took several photos. Here are a couple I really liked:
Any idea what type of fern this is?
Originally published at Erin M. Hartshorn. You can comment here or there.
1 Really Cool Thing
I’m on the Andre Norton Award Jury this year! Official announcement
(Hey, look, I didn’t bury the lede!)
5 Things to Put You in a Better Mood
Happiness, confidence, optimism, meaning in life, and success — Eric Barker talks about notes to write yourself to give yourself a boost
9 Things
This actually falls into the series of productivity tools I’ve been talking about. It’s a simple take on the to-do list that I picked up from Jamie Todd Rubin, and he got the idea from the 27 GoodThings blog. Being a paperless ambassador, he advocates Evernote and Penultimate, but you can do the same thing with any notepad. And rather than duplicate his explanation, I’ll just link to his original post. I find this a very useful tool to keep myself (mostly) from trying to do too much on a given day. Getting “9 Things” Done
What interesting things have you found recently?
Originally published at Erin M. Hartshorn. You can comment here or there.
I’ve been using Lift this year to try to encourage the establishment of good habits. It’s more of a social networking approach to habits. You sign in to specific habits, and others who are trying to do the same habit (30-day plank challenge, for example, or Establish a writing habit) can see your activity and comment on it. You can also comment on your own activities (but not the lack thereof, as far as I can tell — you can’t say why you didn’t exercise on a given day until the next day that you do exercise). And if you link your Facebook or Twitter profiles, you can connect with people you’re already friends with to encourage each other.
The site works on the basic practices of accountability to others (your friends and followers) and of not breaking the chain. Fairly simple and tried-and-true methods. Because of the way it’s set up, though, every day has to be accounted for — if you’re doing an exercise program and it has rest days built into it, those days have to be set into the program from the beginning — which is fine if you’re doing something like working for 6 weeks to get ready for a 5k run, but seems rather less practical if you want something to remind you to run three days a week ad infinitum. For me, Lift seems best geared to things you want to do every day (drink a glass of water before dinner) or something that you’re only working on for a short time.
It excels at training for new habits — for things like developing a specific habit, where you’re working up to it, there’s often coaching involved that helps break down the task into steps and lets you look at the motivation and reason every step along the way. For example, the writing one I did (Develop a Writing Habit) starts with knowing why you want to write, then creating a goal, with various motivational posts along the way.
When you finish a habit’s run, whether it’s 30 days or 90 or whatever, it automatically repeats. Again, that can be useful if you’re just trying to remind yourself to keep doing something on a daily basis. For the writing, though, it felt kind of silly to get the same motivational talks each time.
Overall, I’d say if you like social feedback for getting things done, and if you want to create a specific habit or meet a goal in a specific length of time, Lift can be a good choice for you. I think I’m going to go inactive on it, however, as I’m not really finding it motivating.
Originally published at Erin M. Hartshorn. You can comment here or there.
I always have a lot to do. Sometimes, I even manage most of it. Long-time readers might even remember I did a series of posts on time management. The problem with schedules, for me, is that they only seem to work if I’m accountable to someone else — appointments, volunteer slots, anthology deadlines are all well and good. But something as simple as trying to create a set order of things to do each day? Not so much.
Enter HabitRPG. ( Read the rest of this entry » )
Originally published at Erin M. Hartshorn. You can comment here or there.
Yes, we’re running about a month behind usual, but we do have spring flowers in the yard at last. Click through to see them all, as well as a couple pictures of bushes. ( Read the rest of this entry » )
Originally published at Erin M. Hartshorn. You can comment here or there.
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