How cool!

I finished the two manuscripts that I'd fallen behind on when I was sick. The second was sent in last night. Woo-hoo!

Celebration time!

Of course, my friend Gina was on it. She's in Barcelona at the moment and guess what she found in a bookstore there:

Seeing this made my day that much better!

The book is the Spanish version of Win, Lose or...Wed! Very cool to see one of my foreign translations on the shelf! Thanks, Gina! xoxox

Hope all is well! I'm back now! I just needed to finish the books which were the two biggest items on my To Do list!

Trish

I didn't get a blog up yesterday morning. I woke to the news that a dear friend and talented author Trish Jensen had died. The news wasn't unexpected. She'd been moved to a hospice, then back to a hospital. I knew what was coming, as I did with my friend Elizabeth who had breast cancer, but the news still hit hard.

I met Trish on the old GEnie forums back in the mid-nineties when we were both unpublished authors. She was a funny, caring, generous woman who wrote romantic comedies for Harlequin and Belle Bridge Books.

Trish loved animals—dogs, cats, birds, you name it. She was a supporter of no-kill shelters. She was one of the first authors to jump in and help my then-foster cat Miss Mousie when she needed surgery. You can read the post she contributed to the blog here. Trish wrote this about her cat Foxy:

It's been a few years, but she's forever in my heart.

And Trish will forever be in mine. RIP my friend. You are already missed.

Goodbye, Vera!

A friend of mine died. Vera was ninety-four and lived a full life. She passed in the home she loved, the way I'd imagined it happening, but there's still sadness and grief that I won't be able to spend more time with her and hear another one of her wonderful stories while sitting on her deck drinking tea.

If you've read my blog for a while, you might remember I spent time in Tacoma, Washington attending Catechesis of the Good Shepherd training courses at St. Patrick's in Tacoma, Washington. Vera was the woman who opened her home to me in 2006, 2007 and 2009. She provided me a place to stay, a home away from home and a friendship I'll cherish. We spent hours talking on her deck, enjoying the summer sun, and eating at various spots around town over the years. We would talk books. I gave her my larger print books. Those may have been her first Harlequins. That I can't remember. I do know we had so much fun together.

I was thinking back and remembered a blog I'd written back in August 2006:

I made it to Tacoma. Early, in fact, due to no traffic. The class was great. So great I didn't think today could get any better until I arrived at the house they'd arranged for me and another classmate to stay. It's 4 blocks from Commencement Bay in Tacoma with breathtaking views from every window. You can see planes and ships and trees and Mt. Rainier if you look East. Needless to say, it's absolutely gorgeous.

We took our host to dinner tonight to thank her for opening her home to us. As we were getting out of the car afterward, I heard cannon fire. One, two. We hurried out on the balcony. Sailing on the bay right in front of us was a pirate ship. It seemed so familiar to me. I immediately thought of the Isabella, the Spanish Galleon that I used in my book IN DEEP WATERS. All I needed was the sexy Ben Mendoza and it would have capped off a perfect day.

There was another ship that resembled a clipper ship. The two ships seemed to be having a battle. All of a sudden two more cannons were shot and smoke appeared. It was so very cool and I wished the kidlets could have been with me.

Our host pulled out the newspaper and showed me the ship on the front page. I read the caption and understood why the ship looked so familiar. It was the same ship used as the H.M.S. Interceptor in the movie Pirates of the Caribbean: Curse of the Black Pearl.

Whenever I was with Vera, I never knew what might happen. We'd see pirate ships, bump into a person (usually a family member) she knew or end up in a situation that we'd talk and laugh about for years. One night we'd decided to eat dinner at a restaurant near Pt. Defiance Park, but misjudged the temperature when we took a table outside. We were huddled under blankets and shivering by the time dinner was over!

One Sunday afternoon when my family and I were on our way home from Seattle, we stopped by Vera's house for cake and tea. I wanted my family to meet her and vice versa. After we'd eaten, she brought out a LEGO chess set a visitor from Denmark had given her. She remembered that my son liked both chess and LEGOs. He was enthralled!

I  met Vera because the church happened to placed me there when they were making accommodation arrangements for our training classes. She invited me to stay there a few weeks letter when I went back for a weekend of training and the next two summers.  I can't thank St. Patrick's enough for introducing me to such a kind woman, someone I'll never forget.

RIP Vera. You will be missed, but I'm so glad you're finally with your beloved Lars.

Small World

The first week of school has gone well! Yay!

Everyone is adjusting to the full-time schedule, including me! Of course, there hasn't been much homework. Next week will be a better test. But both of the younger kids are excited to head to the bus each morning and smiling when they walk in the door in the afternoon so that's a huge sigh of relief. I miss the kids, but am also enjoying the freedom to do things during the day.

Yesterday, I had lunch with my dear friend, Tiffany. We used to be neighbors. We used to climb together. We used to hang out a lot! But between our move and her being an ex-pat in London for a  couple of years, we haven't seen much of each other. We reconnected at The Bollywood Theater to have a belated birthday celebration (mine!)

We picked up right where we'd left off! I wasn't surprised at all.

What was surprising was who we saw at the restaurant...the woman who introduced us over ten years ago! It was fun catching up with her. Tiffany and I used to belong to be shareholders in the CSA she and her husband run. They noticed our addresses and that we were neighbors so introduced us so we could 1) carpool or 2) alternate picking up our harvest shares at the farm. We not only did that, but became friends! Pretty amazing we lived a couple houses away from each other and had never met!

Needless to say a wonderful time yesterday.

And now that the kids are in school, I hope it's not a couple years until we can get together again!

Now What?

I feel like whoever has been making LOLcats the last couple of weeks is living in my house. This one is so Beauty and Yoda. The only difference is both of them are black cats.

I really can see them thinking this. At least twice a day!

Today is the birthday of my friend Elizabeth in San Diego who passed away in June. I wish I could pick up the phone, dial her number and wish her a happy birthday.  I really miss her.

Hope you had a nice weekend and a great Monday!

Bathtime

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The above kitty is too cute! I had to do a double-take when I first saw this because the cat looked like a stuffed animal the first time I saw this!

Our cats do not like baths. Mackenna found a spray shampoo that's she's been trying with them. When we went to Great Wolf Lodge, a couple of them decided not to groom themselves for some reason (most likely they were mad at us even though they had someone taking care of them) so they needed some extra grooming help.

Mackenna is getting good at grooming the dog, too. With all the showing she does in the Jr. Handler Ring and 4H, she's learned how to get Chaos ready herself. That saves so much money, plus it's good experience for her if she ever wants to work for a professional dog handler in the future.

I've been busy working on revisions. I liked the book when I submitted it in January, but it's always fun to revisit a story and make it better. It always amazes me what typos make it through even after a critique partner and I have looked at the pages!

Today is my rescheduled lunch with my friend Tiffany. I can't wait. Do you have any plans?

Thankful...

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I know I complain about things (lack of sleep, deadlines, weight, left arm, etc.) but I truly am blessed and feel thankful for all I have. Not everyone is so fortunate.

The video below came across my Facebook wall yesterday. It was posted by my wonderful friend Tiffany, who has lost a couple of good friends to breast cancer.

If you have a minute, okay four minutes, please watch the video below. The reason? I'm pasting this from the video's page on You Tube:

Help us hit 5 million views by December 13, 2011! When this video reaches 5 million page views, UnitedHealthcare of Pennsylvania will donate $50,000, to the Philadelphia Affiliate of Susan G. Komen for the Cure to empower the fight against breast cancer. Please help us achieve this goal by clicking the "share" link above to tell your friends about this video via email, Facebook, and Twitter.

For the first million views, UHC has already contributed $100,000 for this inspiring, powerful campaign.

Thank you for your support!

If you could share this on Facebook, Twitter and/or your blog, that would be awesome. Thanks!

Friends

This has been around for over a year, but it's new to me and I wanted to share. Enjoy!

Fall Weekend

My hubby never lost one of the kidlets though he did forget to pick one up a couple of times. Once from school and another time from ballet. He doesn't like to talk about it. The kids do, however. I mentioned my friend Tiffany yesterday. Well, I got to see her for lunch yesterday. We went to Mother's Bistro in downtown Portland. She was in town from London. We'd gotten to spend time with her son on Sunday and Monday when he stayed over at our house. It was great to catch up with Tiffany! After talking to her, I am signing up for NaNoWriMo. I'll just work on whatever is left on my book. Right now I'm around 17 or 18k words so I'll still have a chunk to write. Plus this will give me an easy way to follow my buddies! Another weekend of soccer games, writing and preparing crafts for the girls' groups' November meeting. I really hope there's a break in the rain so we can make a run to the pumpkin patch! What are you up to?

Yesterday

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I had a great time with my friend Tiffany yesterday. We spent the entire day together. It was awesome.

Of course, she had her camera with her. Two actually. I'm amazed the pictures she takes in just one shot. She's a very gifted and talented photographer. She got some great ones of the kids and several of Chaos and me.

She also brought the most amazing chocolate dessert to have after our lunch (homemade pizza). We split one and it was totally decadent! So yummy!

Enjoy Good Friday!

Cleaning

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My family is coming over for Easter. We'll be doing an egg hunt and having a ham dinner. Of course company, even family, means cleaning so that's what I've been trying to do. A little at a time, but since I don't like to clean and have been so tired, I've been doing very little.

Time to pick up the pace! I'm sure this lolcat pic will be me come Sunday morning!

As for my rub-addicted kitty...I was so tired Smalls could only wake me up once in the middle of the night. This morning though she head butted me awake so I would rub her. That I can handle.

I'm very excited because my good friend Tiffany (aka Angus' mommy) and her son are coming over this morning. They moved to England last year and are back in town visiting. I cannot wait to see them. I've missed her so much!

Anything going on with you today?

Twins

more animals

I got to spend time with the closet thing I have to a twin yesterday morning and had a blast.

As I mentioned on Friday, Elizabeth Boyle was in town for the Celebrate Romance conference. The morning started off badly when I realized halfway to the Benson Hotel in downtown Portland I'd forgotten my cellphone. (It was recharging.) I was supposed to call or text Elizabeth when I arrived. Luckily, the Benson concierge, Michael, allowed me to use his phone. When she didn't answer, I called hubby who phoned her on my cellphone. Contact was finally made!

We walked down the street to Peet's Tea and Coffee for a quick visit. We laughed. We cried. We gave advice. We listened.

Of course, "quick" turned into two plus hours once we started talking. Oops. We couldn't believe we'd been chatting that long especially because we both had places to be! The truth is we probably could have spent hours talking and not even realized it!

We raced back to the hotel and my minivan. I wasn't late. i actually beat my family to where we were supposed to be at 12:45. I just hope Elizabeth made it to where she had to be, too, though I know she was late!

Still no regrets. It was wonderful to spend time with someone who is just, well, a lot like me. Being with her sure filled my well!

Do you have a twin out there? If so, who is it?

As of 12:03 AM

Thank you. For the support. Your comments. The virtual chocolate. And your friendship!

I don't know how I'd make it through a deadline without you! I mean that. I love you!

Now I'm going to get some much needed sleep. I want to go to Burgerville for lunch and order a Tillamook cheezburger, sweet potato fries and a pumpkin spice milkshake. I've earned it.

Love,
Melissa

Party Time

Yesterday, the kidlets and I went to my friend Amy's house. She surprised me with a birthday celebration. I was so touched. She and her hubby made yummy tacos for lunch, a delicious blueberry crumble for dessert and I even had a present to open. My one and only birthday present. And it was a package of three pretty candles. Amy knows I love candles!

While the kids played Wii (Rock Star was the game of choice) and swam. The water was a little cold for us so we talked some more instead of putting on our swimsuits. It was a great day and a perfect way to end summer!

On the way home, I dropped off at my cousin's house and saw my aunt who was visiting from Arizona. My parents were there so they took the kidlets home with them so hubby and I could have a couple of much needed time to spend together!

What are you doing for Labor Day weekend?

Fun time and bad hair

When our friends arrived yesterday, Angus bounded into the house and screeched to a stop when he saw Chaos. He looked confused and maybe a little perturbed. What was another dog doing here?

The two doggies didn't seem to remember each other from their walk back in May (at least that's when I think it was!). Chaos was the more cautious of the two, but who could blame her? Suddenly, her kennel, her water bowl and her toys were being overtaken by another who seemed to feel very comfortable, almost too comfy, in her house.

Her son and my son disappeared upstairs and the girls followed them. Legos and lightsabers were the toys of choice yesterday afternoon. Pretty soon the girls were back downstairs.

While Tiffany and I talked, we put the dogs outside. Angus had great fun chasing Chaos around the patio table. That is until, she became fed up with the game stopped and growled at him! But they ran along the stone retaining wall, through the yard and seemed to warm up to each other after that.

It was great to see my friend in person. I've missed her so much. We haven't been emailing much. My hands and she wasn't been on line due to a vacation in Corsica so we had a lot of catching up to do. She was back in town for a funeral of a friend and both of us ended up in tears as she talked about the woman's son's reaction to her death. So heartbreaking. But the rest of the time we had fun. She was here for a long time and I only wish it could have been longer.

She gave me a book, Acting up by Melissa Nathan, that has a Pride and Prejudice theme. I can't wait to read it.

I'll add pictures to this blog once I have time to download them. I'm trying to do revisions and pack at the same time!

The one thing I didn't blog about yesterday was my hair. I was in denial, but the truth finally hit me. The highlights are, in a word, horrific. I'd ask that they not be as blond as the last time so she decided to put chocolate lowlights. So now I have dark brown streaks and blond (almost white though Tiff thought they looked more green). It's so not me.

The kids were the ones who first said they didn't look good, though they liked the cut. Son's first words, "You got highlights." Sorry, but an 8 yo boy should not notice things like this. I appreciated their and other's honesty since I knew something was wrong (some streaks looked white to me and so much lighter than the last ones) and had taken to wearing a baseball cap right away. I've been told I look 1) like a tiger 2) older 3) urban.

When I removed my baseball cap to show Tiffany, her expression said it all. She said it was a professional job, but if I wanted to pull it off I'd have to change my whole look. Sorry, but I don't do black. Or tattoos. I'm heading back to the stylist today, but Tiffany wondered if I should just cut my losses. Unfortunately, I can't go to National looking like this.

Hubby can't understand why these highlights came out differently than the ones I had before (with a different stylist who got pregnant). I told him she only did 9 foils. The last two times with the new stylist my head was covered in foils. He said he didn't see anything wrong with the color of my hair in the first place which is a typical guy response, but maybe he's on to something there. I would love to have my hair color, prior to May, back right now.

Please cross your fingers that my hair looks somewhat better when I get home this afternoon. Otherwise I don't know what I'm going to do and we're leaving for California on Friday. Not a lot of time to figure it out!

Have you ever had a bad haircut or color? What did you do?

Yippee!

My friend Tiffany who moved to London without me getting a chance to say goodbye is back in town and I get to see her today! She, her son and our beloved Angus are coming over. I can't wait! I need to check the battery in my camera so I can get doggy pictures for the blog. We're going on a hike around the lake this afternoon.

Other than that I'll be working on my revisions and trying to rest my hands. What about you?

Blinddatebrides.com

I read through the first hundred pages of my book yesterday. It was fun to revisit the characters and story after nearly a month away!

Dru asked what was blinddatebrides.com in the comment section yesterday. Blinddatebrides.com is what we called our trilogy. It's a fictional on-line dating site (though if you type it in, you'll get our blog!) that ties the three books together and where our heroines meet. The trilogy is about three on-line friends who live in three different countries who have never met in person, but become close while emailing, chatting and IMing with each other.

Last night I watched two more movies with the hubby. Fever Pitch, recommended by my sister, which I liked and The Other Boleyn Girl, which is worth a watch for the scenery and costumes, but the movie, especially dialogue, could have been a whole lot better.

This morning I'm picking up the kidlets and heading over to Amy's! (For those of you who don't read the comments here, Amy is a frequent commenter on this blog and has an entertaining blog of her own.) I met Amy on-line years ago. We belonged to a writer's group and when I came up to visit my family (I was living in California at the time) I met her. Her oldest was a toddler then!

BTW, I joined Facebook recently. If any of you are on it, let me know. I'm listed under my name so should be easy to find!

Hope you have a great day!

Dinner at Elizabeth's

On Saturday night, we loaded the kids into the car and drove north westerly from SEATAC to the lovely abode of talented historical author, Elizabeth Boyle. She's got such an awe-inspiring view of the Puget Sound. Sorry, but I haven't gotten around to downloading the pics yet! I got a tour of her house, saw the various rooms where she's had her office and got to see an original Pino, the actual full-size artwork for one of her covers!

We sat out on her deck drinking wine and chatting while the kids (her two and my three) played and our hubbies got to know each other. The two ended up comparing notes about what it was like to be married to a romance author. The consensus-they hate deadline time!

Elizabeth's hubby grilled hamburgers and hot dogs. The kids piled their plates with veggies, fruit and chips, too. I couldn't convince mine to try the potato salad, but that just left more for me!

It was a great time! We hated to leave, but bedtime was approaching and after such a busy day my three kidlets were so tired. Little Rose was about to fall asleep. She actually slept on the drive back to the hotel!

Nathalie posted this in the comment section last week:

I always wonder... it must great to have writers as friends, do you become friends when you are writers or do you usually know them from before.

It is great to have writers as friends because they understand exactly what I'm going through. Elizabeth and I met at the RWA convention in Denver so we were both already published writers then. I was pregnant with Rose at the time, not feeling that great and wishing I could be anywhere else but there. Elizabeth came up to me and said she knew exactly what I was going through since she'd been pregnant at a previous conference. She was so nice. I liked her right away.

After Rose was born, I went to the Emerald City Conference with baby in tow and saw Elizabeth again. We would bump into each other at events like the RCRW Romance Writers luncheon and RWA conference. Over the years, we realized how much we have in common, things that go beyond the writing. I always look forward to seeing her.

A couple pieces of Elizabeth Boyle info you might not know:

• You know The Plan I use to keep track of my writing and have blogged about? Elizabeth and her husband Terry are the ones who created the spreadsheet and they'll be giving a workshop on it at the RWA conference in San Francisco this summer!

• Her next book, Tempted by the Night, will be released on my birthday, August 26th!

Have you read any of Elizabeth's books? If not, you should!

Climbing Cutie Update

It's been awhile since I mentioned the Climbing Cutie so I figured it was time for an update. What's cutie been up to?

Ice climbing, crossfit, new house and work. Lots of work. Oh yeah... and getting ready for swimsuit season (hence the xfit) :P

I don't think he's going to have a problem come swimsuit time, do you?

It's hard to believe I've only known the Climbing Cutie a little over a year now. He's become such a treasured friend, it feels as if he's been part of my life for much longer than that. My hubby and the kidlets think he's pretty awesome, too. Thank goodness for that on-line climbing forum where we met.  He was (and continues to be) so nice and helpful (and patient) with all my questions about men/heroes, relationships/dating and of course, climbing. I don't think he knew what he was getting himself into by befriending this romance writer!

In an email dated March 12, 2007, I wrote:

And while I'm asking questions, what's your favorite malt-beverage brand (or wine, if you prefer) and coffee type. I'm going to owe you;)

No kidding! He's helped me with research for my books, provided a twenty-something guy's viewpoint for my heroes and changed my life by introducing me to climbing and Crossfit. I owe him big time, but paying him back just doesn't seem possible after all he's done for me. But hopefully I'll find some way some day.

I do have a book idea percolating in the back of my mind. The story features a Crossfit instructor hero. A hero who's not only a cutie, but looks totally hot in a swimsuit!