1/30/2014

But what of the children...


So I shared a bit earlier this week about a writing contest I’ve entered. In my entry a thief has kidnapped the general’s children and instead of acting on his first impulse, Caligulus seeks wisdom from the Table of Elders about the best way to address the situation.
But what of the children? Here’s a little bonus scene that I cut out of my submission that I thought you might enjoy. 
Alexander shifted his position slightly trying to peak through a crack between planks in the solid oak door.  He rapped on it twice, listening to the heavy thunk, thunk sound his knuckles made as they made contact with the door. He traced the square outline of the tiny opening they’d used to pass his breakfast through an hour ago. He was afraid of what was on the other side of that door. He knew he shouldn’t be, but he couldn’t help it.
He turned his attention back to the slumbering form that shared his cell. She looked so tiny there, lying on a pile of hay like a little field mouse. But he wasn’t fooled. His little sister Ellery was anything but a tiny rodent, all cowering and scared. She might be small for her age, but she had enough personality to fill ten stadiums. Maybe twenty. The people who roamed the hallways were wise to keep a strong lock on that door; lest his sister escape and give them a piece of her mind.
He smiled to himself as he imagined the moment where his sister finally came face to face with her captors. How her fury would lick at them like a flame left unchecked; blistering their eyelids and singeing loose strands of hair.
But if she wasn’t afraid of them, then he certainly wasn’t either. He was older after all. Not much older, but enough. Enough to make him feel like he needed to watch over her. Keep her from killing herself with all her stupid stunts.
Boy she’d gotten them in deep this time, hadn’t she? Up to their necks in who knew what? He had no idea how they’d gotten themselves locked up, or where they even were. Aside from being on the wrong side of a locked jail cell door, that part was a bit obvious.
(leave a comment in the comment section)

 I’m number 2. And while you’re there, vote for number 7 also, because the writer for that segment is my pal Suzanne. 

or if you don't want to wade through all those comments you can also drop a line with your votes to 
thequestfortruthbooks (a) gmail (dot) com.




1/28/2014

(nearly) wordless wednesday



gobble...

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1/26/2014

She writes... fiction.

So hey, I have a secret that I've avoided sharing with all of you for a while now, ready for it?

Eek. K. Here goes. I... um... I write fiction.

Whew. That was hard. You have no idea. I'll explain why later. But now that it's out in the open you can hear all about my latest project.

A friend and I have entered a fiction writing contest with a handful of other writers. For my entry I submitted a 1000 word entry based on a photo provided, to be voted on by the general public. The people with the most votes will work with an established writer (who has an arm full of books already published) on a collaborative book to be published at some later point in time.

So that's the general premise of the contest; let the contestants with the best social network win.

So here's the link with all the submissions. You're supposed to read them all and rank them. But just in case you don't have time to read ten 1,000 word entries in one setting, read my submission (# 2 The Thief in the Night) and my friend Suzanne's submission (#7, A Fight for Adenia) first.  

To vote leave a comment with the numbers you liked on the submission page (not here). As far as I can tell you can leave as many anonymous comments as you want. The contest doesn't end until the end of February, so we'll circle back to this topic a time or two before the month is over. I hope you don't mind too much.

Thanks!

1/23/2014

10 years in, part b


Dear Louisa,
When I think about you, my first reaction is always a smile. Since the beginning, you’ve always been the funny one in the group; the one with the jokes that didn’t quite make sense. I’m so grateful that you have never been above a bit of slapstick humor, but you have been just a bit too dignified for the fart jokes. Thanks for keeping it classy around here.
10 is a big milestone to be sure. While a collection of my friends are bemoaning the loss of their “little” girls, I for one, am sort of excited to step through this doorway with you. I’m excited to see who both you and your sister will become. I’m excited to give you a touch more freedom and responsibility and watch you take charge. Mostly I’m just excited to start taking you on “big girl” dates.  
I love that your plan for birthday week was full of fun things for you to do with the people you love. Instead of making a long list of gifts to receive (just Legos for you this year), you and your sister have been dreaming about ways to include your friends and family in your celebrating. Baking dates with buddies, crocheting dates with Grandma and her friends, dinner dates with your parents and brothers. Ok, I might have made you include your brothers in your dinner plans, they don’t have to know.
You are a sweet girl, and your siblings are so lucky to have you. I think intuitively you already know how important it is for you to be close to your siblings; even the one who is a little more special than normal. The road ahead will be rocky. The friends you make might not always be that trustworthy. But the relationships you’ve managed to cultivate not only with your twin but also with your brothers will keep you afloat through the turbulent years that come. Stick together. You’ll be fine.
Love you big,
Mom

1/21/2014

(nearly) wordless wednesday


Just don't do it. K?

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1/20/2014

10 years in part A


Dear Annnie,
I have a confession to make to you on your 10th birthday. When I was pregnant with you and your sister, I wasn’t that excited about the idea of giving birth to twins. God brought you both to our family when your brother was still very much a baby; and having three children under 2 years old just didn’t sound that fun to me.
But really, God knew what He was doing when he planned for you and your sister to join us on the same day. You have been a joy since the beginning. A fun loving, hard working, sweetie of a girl. And I get a little jealous when it comes time for me to share you with friends and family. I don’t know what I’ll do if you ever decide to switch over to the public school. I’m pretty sure I might have to climb in your backpack and stalk you all day.
This has been the year of the horses for both of you girls. You’ve taken to bringing us a report on the neighbor’s horses when you go out to get the mail each afternoon. I think you volunteer for the task just so you can take a moment at the fence and spy on them. It brought so much joy to my heart to watch you interacting with the horses when we took our trip out west before Christmas.
So ten is sort of a big birthday, a gateway if you will. I definitely see the teen years coming in you. The way you roll your eyes and groan at me. It’s amusing now, though I don’t imagine it will always be so.  But I also love what I think I see you becoming.
I can only hope that you’ll always be the girl who loves having dates with your parents, and grandparents. The girl with inseparable best friends from dance class. The girl who can jump in and make dinner when I’m out and about and everyone else is hungry.  And the girl who seeks fashion advice from her (rather unfashionable) mother. Please don’t ever figure out that I’m clueless when it comes to clothing.
I love you more today than I did yesterday.
Mom

1/16/2014

The day I didn't stab my eyeballs out.

As it was for many mid-western families, it's been a long month in the ol' Peterson abode. The kind that makes you want to stab your eyeballs out with a fork.

For those of you who aren't midwesterners, here's the scene: It's the tail end of a very long Christmas vacation, and a crazy snowpocolypse / polar vortex plops itself over your house. For four days the roads were closed to all unnecessary travel, leaving us trapped at home for way longer than any sane family should stay in close proximity.
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Did you catch that? 5,760 minutes. In my tiny house. With my family of six. Which yes, includes a special little boy who doesn't like it when you mess with his schedule. At all.

And I can't even send the kids out to play in that lovely winter wonderland, cause it's like -30*.

And my three homeschoolers still have school work to do, so they are not free to play with that bored, off kilter rascal who would rather lay on the floor and scream for an hour than pick up a toy to play by himself for fifteen minutes.

Eye roll.

So when I say it's been a stressful month, you can nod and smile and say "bless your sweet heart," when I confess that I actually drugged my youngest nine year old to get him to sit and watch a movie for an hour so I could think. Don't laugh. My doctor told me I could.

And I'll let you guess just how whiny and desperate my prayers sounded during those rough moments. Those moments where stabbing my eyeballs out sounded like a very good idea. Have you been there? Please say yes.

But as we all know, those are the moments where God comes closest, and this time was no different. I think I was on day three of my imprisonment when He interrupted my crazy stream of whining to ask me this:

Do you want Me to change the situation, or do you want Me to change YOU?

And in my finite human wisdom I countered with: Do you want me to answer that like an overly stressed out human being, or do you want me to answer it like a child of God? Because to be honest, right now I just want You to change the situation.

Which of course He didn't.The winds kept blowing, and the cranky boy stayed cranky.

He changed me. By the grace of God I didn't stab my eyeballs out. Nor did I feed my children to the snow drifts. I took it one moment at a time. And we got through it.

I'll bet you saw that one coming.

1/14/2014

(nearly) wordless wednesday


Precious. 
Not the photo ya goof, the horse. Her name is Precious.

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1/13/2014

This is not my shirt...


Raise your hand if you’re familiar with the whole “armor of God” thing, you know, the breastplate of righteousness, the belt of truth, so on and so forth.
If not, you can read about it in Ephesians 6:10-18 – the whole idea being to go into your daily routine prepared to battle the schemes of the devil.
Anyway. As I go through my morning routine, I not only put on my regular plain-jane clothes, but I also attempt to pick out a cute spiritual outfit as well. I like to imagine myself layering up with as much God as possible. When I pull on my jeans, I imagine myself sliding truth through my belt buckles. Then I snap up my righteousness, and tug a little salvation helmet over my obnoxiously thick hair.
And then I go to work.
So with all these little preparations, you’d think I’d be all set to face an entire days worth of “challenges”.
Not always.
The other day I was sitting in church grumping about something so silly I won’t even tell you about it, and God told me to open my eyes. Not metaphorically, like really open them, so I could see the clothes I had on.
I thought it was weird, but I did it anyway. Cause I know that sometimes God asks you to do things that are weird.
And then He says to me “this spirit of whining. It’s not yours. You put on faith, salvation, truth and a bunch of other stuff this morning. I was watching. You did not put on any cranky pants, grumpy socks or sour shirts. These pickle-puss clothes don’t even belong to you, so why are you wearing them?
Hmm. Good point. Looking down at my attire that morning I could imagine myself wearing a ridiculous get up of clothes that were 2 sizes too small, obnoxiously flashy, and obviously not mine. They looked like something that should be on its way out to the burn barrel.
I took out my mental eraser and erased all the ill fitting clothing that was making me so uncomfortable and redrew my clothing as it should be. This time I secretly added a robe of splendor just for my own amusement. And because Jesus said I could.
And you can think it’s silly if you want to, but I totally felt better after my little wardrobe swap.

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