For the moment, I'm moving my blog to myspace:

www.myspace.com/jessicatrapp

I'm not crazy about the layout here.

:) jes

I have finished day 7 of my 100 words a day for 100 days writing challenge. Here's a link to the yahoo loop:

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/onehundredwords/

It's both easier and harder than it seems. I'm nearly to page 300 of my work-in-progress which feels good.

This week has been hard to write because it's spring break. Looking back over the business of past five days, it's a wonder that I haven't collapsed. LOL! I think the fun-factor is what keeps me going. We rode rides in Kemah, visited the Children's Museum, cleaned out every nook and cranny of my kid's room, went to the dentist, pulled weeds, donated a bunch of stuff to the women's shelter, visited with friends, ate a lot of great food.

Anyhow.... Monday will be Sprung Broken. THANK GOODNESS! I am SO ready to get back to Starbucks.

I'm reading Eve Silver's book His Dark Kiss right now. WOW! I love this book. The characters are fabulous and I love the setting. http://www.evesilver.net/

I have resigned myself to the insanity of Spring Break and it's actually fun. The Jamester and I have had an amazing week so far. It rained all day today so we had a chill-out day from all the fun we've enjoyed the earlier part of the week.

I started a new yahoo challenge loop for writers to write 100 words (at least) on their work in progress for 100 days in a row.

I'm going to get my Trapped in a Book Read-a-thon 2007 up and running soon. I need to revamp the rules. Make it simpler, I think.

Life has been awesome here! Jack was a model dog in a doggy fashion show on Saturday. He looked so cute in his tux.

I'm plugging along on the manuscript.

Started taking an Artist Way class and re-reading the book a few weeks ago. That has been FABULOUS! All these things to reflect on. The other students are interesting too, to say the least. Mostly, it's allowed me to just relax and enjoy writing again.

I also hired an organizer to help me with this freakin' office which is about to drown in paperwork. Gak.

My tomatoes are good. The one in the middle is making lots of yellow fruit. The one on the left has made two tomatoes. And then there is the dud plant: the one on the right wants to hog all the light and hasn't made one stinking tomato. We whacked a bunch off of it the other day. Take that, you dud! So, we'll see if it starts to make tomatoes.

You know what I noticed? Tomato plants smell funky. Not the tomatoes... the plant itself. And you can't wash that stink off either. Next time I'm growing herbs or lettuce or strawberries.

Gotta run... my son is demanding attention to brainstorm on our top secret project.

:) jes

This is the one my kid got...

Which Hogwarts house will you be sorted into?

Check this out...

Which Hogwarts house will you be sorted into?

I had one FREAKIN' FANTASTIC writing day today. Got to write that hot scene that's been burning in my mind for days.

Other news...



RED tomatoes. Fun, huh? They will be ready to eat soon. So far, I LOVE this areogarden--even with the issues we've had with the pump.

Lookie, lookie... just for fun, I made a Banner.



jes

I'm a hopeless romantic. No doubt about that. Today I posted the embarrassingly sappy story about how I met my husband over at http://www.romanceunleashed.com/blog/

AND....

Yesterday the bumper stickers came in! Here's one on a friend's car:

Today I headed over to the bookstore to find my honey a Valentine's Present. So... I'm wondering around looking at sexy books, love coupon books, romantic date books.(I LOVE bookstores..) Anyway, I look up and see two full rows of "Letters to Penthouse" And, get this... they are in the "SELF HELP" section.

BWAHAHAHAHAHA!

I think I embarrased myself in the store because I started cracking up and had my friend take a photo. If she can figure out how to email it to me, I'll post it.

As Dr Suess says, "From here to there, funny things are everywhere."

HAPPY VALENTINE'S DAY!!!!!!!!!!!

This morning I did a search for someone to help me with paperwork. Guess what I found? Tons of professional organizers that have sadly out of date and/or disorganized websites. Totally cracked me up. If the pros can't get their stuff together, that sure give hope for people like me who waffle between super-organized and utter creative chaos.

Weeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeell...I hear the whip cracking...Off to finish that chapter now.

:)

Ha! I got it: http://www.myspace.com/jessicatrapp

I'm still fumbling around over there, but it's a very fun place.

My brain is fried. I'm trying not to get frustrated. I'm attempting to set up a my space account. gak.

I have some weird number for my id instead of my name.

I think I need to go and chill for a bit.

More and more I realize how much we choose our mood by what we focus on. Every day we face both challenges and blessings. We can choose to focus on the positives--the exciting things that come into our life and the whole brilliance and wonder of it all... or we can choose to focus on the petty things--the people who annoy us or the problems that we face. I want to turn away from the negative and enjoy the awesome adventure of life. To smile more. To appreciate the good things.

I had a really fun West Houston RWA http://www.whrwa.com/ meeting today. The presentation was done by Dawn Temple whose first book A Will to Love comes out in October and Sophie Jordan http://www.sophiejordan.net/ a historical romance author. If anyone hasn't read Sophie's Once Upon a Wedding Night... get thee to a bookstore. WOW! I loved it. I have a sneak ARC of her new book, Too Wicked To Tame that I'm dying to sink my teeth into.

Today in the mail, I got Eve Silver's His Dark Kiss. http://www.evesilver.net/index.html What a HOT cover. I can't wait to read that one either.

My tbr pile grows larger and larger.

Fonts! HOLY SMOKES. My new obsession.

Check out this site: http://www.myfonts.com/

wow. wow. wow. There are tons of them. I think my eyes are starting to cross. But what fun to dig around in all the types and sizes.

I'm trying to figure out something for new websign...

I like these:

http://www.myfonts.com/fonts/linotype/pide-nashi/

http://www.myfonts.com/fonts/drewfonts/celt/

http://www.myfonts.com/fonts/comicraft/spellcaster/

http://www.myfonts.com/fonts/comicraft/near-myth/

But I'm not anywhere near close to picking something... and my brain feels a little overloaded at the moment.

Today I finished a hard chapter. I read it to my husband and he liked it. WAHOO!

I also did some Artist Way stuff with friends and baked a candy pizza. It was cool. Next week I have plans to take a "real" artist date.

I struggle with setting boundaries. Boundaries on life, boundaries on my time. Recently an acquaintance of mine asked me to do something that was so freakin' rude that I wondered if I had a sign on my head that read "yes, please." It was, in a way, a good thing--like a friendly little kick-in-the-butt. I realized I've really got to get a handle on people stealing bits of my time. About four months ago I had a dream that I was divided into these tiny little puzzle pieces and I couldn't figure out how to put my head together. LOL!

'nuff on that... today I locked myself in my room and turned up the Celtic music. And--had an AWESOME writing day. It felt fabulous.

Soooo... other news...I'm in the process of adding to and subtracting from my website. When I first bought the domain, the site was so clean and simple. Then, over time, we've added to it, and added to it, and added to it. Now it feels like an overstuffed and crowded closet. Time to clean it out and get rid of those gigantic 1980s shoulder pads or something.

I'm going to get some real-live professional publicity photos sometime in March. Something else I've been putting off for, well, years. C'est la vie. I've had books to write, a kid to raise, a husband to love, a dog to train and a mom to chum with. Priorities. Priorities. Anyhow... it's time. And I'm seriously looking forward to it. I'm kinda thinking that photoshop trumps plastic surgery any day. *grin*

Tomorrow I'll add more areogarden photos. The tomatoes look terrific!

I've been trying to do a little updating on the website. But I've worn my husband out so I guess I'll do more tomorrow.

I revised chapters 14, 15 today. aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaagh! It's fine. Really.

But then--the good news:

MASTER OF PLEASURE is out in GERMAN!



THANK YOU KENSINGTON!

Now, some info on my friend Jerry. Jerry is 64. I have known Jerry since I was, oh, I dunno, 5 years old. The thing is with Jerry--he's still teaching me things. He's amazing. (His wife is too, but that's another blog entirely.)

We went roller-skating the other day with my son. I just bought these roller skates and I'm not very good, but Jerry is an old hand--10 years of rollerblading. Now, that's cool. So, he holds my hand so we can go a little faster. And it felt great. We followed the kids who were riding their bikes.

And then, out of nowhere, Jerry falls, slams down on his knees onto the pavement. And I'm freaked. But not Jerry. Jerry laughs. He's like, "man, that was fun!" And we head off again.

Oh, how wonderful to be so free with life. It's no wonder people clamor around him. My son is as crazy about him as I am. And so are his grandkids. How cool to be able to pick yourself up so easy and laugh at your failure and enjoy the ride. I've wasted countless hours beating myself up over failures. But how sad, when there are so many fabulous things to enjoy in life. Life is meant to be good. A wonderful, chaotic, creative process. Enjoy every day. It's the only day ya got!

TOMATOES!!!!!





The new pump came in today.

Last night I was on a panel with the HBA group. It was really fun! What an awesome group of ladies.

Here is the preliminary blurb for my work in progress. I've passed the half way mark. Please send good thoughts my way that I'll be able to get this manuscript finished.

Master of Passion

The love of art of was her passion; painting in Italy her greatest desire. But when the King's Enforcer attacks her home and forces her to marry him, her dreams are held captive...and she must embrace a new passion: the art of love.

The Jamester woke up on Saturday morning with 103 degree fever and looking a little glassy eyed. Bad ear infection in both ears. :(

Jack and I had to miss our class to become certified pet therapists. Bummer.

But--James is looking a little better. Still running fever today though.

My garden is coming along, but I sure wish the new pump would come in instead of having to use this make-shift one.



My manuscript is also creeping along. I'm on a panel for the local Houston Bay Area romance writer's group on Tuesday night http://www.hbarwa.com/index.php ... looking forward to that.

And... lookie what somebody sent me today... a link to say that Master of Pleasure and Master of Desire had been recommended on their website: http://www.recommendedreads.net/T.htm

WAHOO!!! Best news I've heard all weekend.

Yesterday was an AWESOME day! I met a friend for critique and we hammered away at both of our manuscripts. I left feeling both inspired and exhausted.

Afterwards I took a two hour class on fear and confidence. It gave me some good ideas to get out of this funk. One thing that amazed me was how amazing the people were that were in the class--half of them owned their own businesses or were in high profile jobs-- I would never have guessed any of them to be fearful in any areas... they all seemed very brave and talented to me.

I felt so energized from yesterday that I spent most of the day reworking the first half of the manuscript per yesterday's critique session. WAHOO!! Thank God for critique partners!

Jack was invited to be a model at the Paws in the Park dog show. Here he is today, just relaxing is some weirdo pose with his butt up in the air. Totally cracked me up. Had to photo it.

Today the Houston Artist Way meetup group met for the first time. http://artistsway.meetup.com/184/?gj=sj10 There were three of us and we had a nice discussion. I've been feeling SOOO freaked about life lately. The book is scary. Life is scary. I dunno. Maybe we all go through phases like that. All I know is that some days I wake up feeling overwhelmed and unable to do even the simplest tasks like empty the dishwasher.

My new year's resolution this year was to give myself a freakin' break and to be grateful for all the things I have and all the blessings that God gives me. I'm going to continue to work on that.

Anyhow... it was a great meeting... Afterwards, I worked on one of the chapters that had really been giving me a fit. There is something nice about having "believing mirrors" as one struggles to wrestle a creative project to the ground.

We had to do another minor surgery on the garden tonight. The hose was kinked, so the water wasn't dripping through the way it was supposed to. Joe took it apart, cut off the end of the hose and readjusted it. I'm not sure what else he did... but it seems to be working now. My husband is a mechanical genius--he can fix all sorts of things. I'm very lucky to have him around!!!!

I'll sure be glad when the new pump comes in. But look at the flowers!

.

Good news! Master of Desire was nominated for best medieval in 2006 at AAR! http://www.likesbooks.com/interim2006.html

I'm working hard on book 3. A ran into a snag and got very discouraged with it--but I think I'm back on the bandwagon now. Please say a prayer for me though! My deadline feels like it's looming in front of me and I need lots of good thoughts sent my way.

This is been a serious week of near misses.Spent the day in the doctor's office on Tuesday getting x-rays for James wrist. Not broken! Hooray! My entire manuscript was wiped off my computer on Wednesday. Gak. I thought I was going to have a nervous breakdown. Turns out I remembered I had e-mailed most of it to my critique partner earlier that day, so I only lost about a day's worth of work. Bad, but not disastrous.

Joe and I did surgery on my garden, which involved taking the thing apart and turning the tomatoes upside down:



NO, I do NOT normally walk around my kitchen in leather pants... we'd been out motorcycle riding. LOL!

I e-mailed the areogarden people. They're supposed to be sending me a new pump.

For now, the garden looks like this:



My husband put a different pump in it (one that was left over from other garden projects) so at least it's working until the new pump comes in.



The plants are getting bigger and starting to flower. I'll take new photos today.

Congratulations Lois! WTG!!!
This year's read-a-thon has been very fun. :) I really enjoyed reading what people wrote about the books. What an awesome group of readers!

I just bought Dragon NaturallySpeaking and am learning how to dictate into the computer. Wow.