Chauffeuring JJ

It's a glorious spring day and I'm going to be spending it chauffeuring my son to his activities. The little guy is 3 months shy of turning 12 so he hasn't been able to attend any Youth retreats yet like his big brother.

However, this weekend he was old enough to attend a Jr retreat in the city so he's been gone since last night. The trouble is this is also the big coin show weekend and he's the president of the Regina CoinHawks.

So that means I have to skedadle into the city, pick him up from his billet, scoot him over to the Western Christian College to set up his coin display (on Canadian Tire money), then scoot him back over to his retreat activities. He should be in time for his first session.

Then at noon, I pick him up, bring him back to the Coin Show to preside over the CoinHawk meeting, then shuttle him back to the retreat for the last session. He'll be done by 6pm and then we can come home.

Phew!

Somebody tell me why the 2 biggest things in this little guy's life have to happen the same weekend when he's free every other one?

Have a great day! Oh, this is what it looked like at 6 am at my house:

Barn Cats Invade the Inkwell

My youngest son and I are blogging about Barn Cats over at Inkwell Inspirations today.

Come on over and tell us if you like cats.

10 Pounds in 28 Days

I just had to tell you. I changed my eating habits on March 10th and so far, I've lost 10.5 pounds. I'm not dieting. And I'm not starving myself. What I am doing is this:

- drinking 6-8 glasses of water daily
- limiting my calorie intake to 1800 daily
- eating something healthy every 3-4 hrs
- not denying myself anything
- am taking smaller portions especially sweets
- weighing myself every 3-4 days
- using motivators on my iTouch to keep track of my water intake, calories and weight loss

My Easter bunny with Toffee is still sitting near my spot at the table because I just haven't felt like eating it. If I do want it, it'll be there waiting for me. I know that if I have one small bite, I'll want to eat the whole thing and I'm not willing to put myself through that. I also haven't touched the cookie jar for the same reason. But, I have eaten desserts and sweets when I wanted them. I just ate a smaller portion and drank lots of water to go with it.

I'm also exercising but only once or twice a week. These last 2 wks, I didn't do them at all. I want to - because my clothes are getting loose and I need to firm up - but I needed to get my contest entries out before and now I need to get my book rewritten and wrapped.

So, we'll see how I do. I've registered for the Romance Writers of America conference in Nashville in July and want to feel comfortable while flying. As well as being able to spend time sightseeing while I'm there. Which means I'm going to be a busy little beaver during these next couple months, but that's okay too because I need all the help I can get.

By the way, one adverse effect about losing the weight is that I'm always cold. Always. Used to be I could go outside when it was below freezing and not wear a coat. Now I'm packing on the sweaters in the house. Weird, eh?

And here's something else weird... everyone keeps saying you need extreme cold for a sun dog to appear. Well, here's a pic of one I took in the Home Depot parking lot a couple nights ago. Not sure what it was all about but the temp was around 10c/50F. Now that I think about it though, the Northern lights made a rare appearance a few hours later as we were driving home. You think there was something in the air?

He is Risen!

And He loves me!

It's April! Robins and Prairie Chicks

No, I won't pull an April Fool's Day post on you this year. I've been too busy writing to make one up. I'll get you next year, though. : )

I'm blogging over at Prairie Chicks Write Romance today. We're discussing the use of 'who' and 'whom' and whether we really need 'whom'. Please join us.

I've changed my photo up top to a current one. It was taken yesterday - March 31st. It's not as pretty as the all white winter scene but it shows you what it's like up here right now.

As for my writing - in the last couple days I've submitted Emma's Outlaw in both the ACFW's Genesis contest and also in the RWA FHL's Touched by Love contest. The waiting game is on now as I won't know if I final until May.

With the warmer temperatures, I've been writing in my garage office whenever the family is watching TV or playing the electronic games in the living room. It quiet out there. I have room for my 4'x4' pegboard which has one of those huge pads of paper so I can make all kinds of plot or character notes. A white board, too. Not exactly high tech but it'll be a long time before I have the type of smart board that was shown on Castle these past 2 weeks. Wasn't that something to brighten your eyes!

I was out there in my office when I saw this robin fly in. My first robin of the year. He thought I couldn't see him. Heh. And yes that is snow in the background. Because it's in the shade, that snow will be there for awhile yet.

Do you know when to use who and whom?