Up To No Good

Giving this a try:

ok they are a bit time delayed (mine, for example, is over 30K), but here are the kids' widgets:

nuts, seems the kids don't have them. ds is at 2,375 and he lamely hasn't written in days. Dd's is 1,570 and she is nearly to her goal of 2K. I'm proud of both, but dd has been the best at listening and keeping up with nano consistently.

OTOH, ds did actually study a script and start trying to write one. Since script frenzy ended on June 30, he's a bit delayed ;-)

Posted by tracy at 07:54 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I wrote a bloody ton today, and got one of the kids to do likewise, but we're not done yet. Here be the region numbers, for those who are worried:

7256078 is what they are reporting for today (well, technically tomorrow, it's 12:37 am Saturday now). Hopefully that is just un-updated. We are not taking things lying down around here, are we folks?

*bump* setting this up top till the 30th

Posted by tracy at 12:29 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Monkey says: "What's that smell?"

"He did it!"

Evolution

Posted by tracy at 05:48 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Yay us!

Ds still has 1K to go, but he'll get it, considering he wrote 1K yesterday...

Posted by tracy at 10:38 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

ds was dusting and knocked a vase down and it shattered--upon picking up the pieces (first of him and then the vase) I cut my finger and got some pottery shard in my finger... hope it's out now but my typing has been compromised... ugh.

Ow.

Press on, press on... 6K to go...

Posted by tracy at 02:23 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

is tomorrow... how much trouble do you think I'd get in for making a donation?

Awwww... ok, not her.

But this picture was taken by ds. And aren't dog's butts hysterical to waste pictures on? Ok, it was digital, but still...

I'm not sure if this is the right picture, but the boy also took a sample from his armpit. Isn't staph in an 11 yo who doesn't wash's armpit hysterical?

(no, really, it's not)

Posted by tracy at 12:28 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I needed a magic tree at the Ballard Locks, so I have two, one is the "entry" tree, the other is the "exit" tree. This may require some revision of the Viking book (which needs CPR, it's so flawed) which is ok... I've also decided it needs renaming, so I'll work on that. Maybe Spin & Park. or Advancing the Whorl. Or Learning to Draft, or... suggestions?

Here are the trees:
exit tree

and close up of entry tree bark:

Me: 10,046
dd: 864 / 2000 (goal)
ds: 1,332 / 5,000 (goal)

Posted by tracy at 12:58 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

We've been talking about third person POV. I explained in detail to dd, struggling for words she could relate to, about knowing some, but not all of the character's thoughts, and how to avoid author intrusion when it hit me--it's like the author spoils it (You know, spoiler alert?). We had that ah-ha moment, which helped tremendously.

I'm a day ahead in word count, both kids have fallen behind a bit, not having written every day, but we'll get back there. They are astounding me with the quickness at which they learn fiction techniques... when ds came down mid-discussion about POV and author intrusion, and not writing in omniscient POV because it's not in vogue, and actually takes less skill than limited 3rd person, he interrupted me to say:

"that would create no suspense, if you wrote in omniscient POV"

Smart cookies, both of 'em. :-) As I said to them, if J.K. Rowling had told us at the beginning that Tom Riddle was Voldemort, Ginny Weasley would never have opened the diary and that whole book would never have happened, and Dumbledore wouldn't have gotten his confirmation of horcruxes as early as he did...

oops, spoiler alert, if you haven't read HP & the HBP... or HP and the COS

Posted by tracy at 12:53 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Me: 5064
Ds: 765
Dd: 864

Dialogue is something of a challenge when you are six. I'm very proud of her, I am teaching her dialogue and how to "research" (which in her case is ask mommy) it and try to have your dialogue sound like real people speaking, minus all the "ums" etc. In dialogue we don't say the other person's name over and over, but the trick to figuring out who is saying what is via action. Combining the two can be tricky, but just as people don't say "hi how are you NAME. NAME, what would you like to do, NAME?" they also don't bounce around endlessly. So no talking heads, no running around without talking to one another--this stuff can be confusing!

They are both doing well. More on that later.

Posted by tracy at 10:28 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

me: 3364
dd: 433
ds: 433

Statistical anomaly that they both wound up with the same word count? Priceless ;-)

We talked about dialogue yesterday, and how "Hi, how are you?" "Hi. I'm fine" is boring. Ds has been absorbing fiction technique on his own via reading osmosis, and BOY had his fiction skills develolped from last year! Dd has an awesome title: Snake Creek Road. Ds's title thus far is The North Portal. Mine? Setting the Twist

On to day two... I've been researching my historical figure, and off to the library in a bit...

Posted by tracy at 10:30 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

me: 2030 words

Kids? Made them go to bed, all sugared up.

Here's from my *FREAKIN AWESOME* email (ok, so everyone else got it too) from Tom Robbins:

It's a bit like being out of control and totally in charge, simultaneously. If that seems tricky, well, it's a tricky business. Try it. It'll drive you crazy. And you'll love it.

Tom Robbins

Posted by tracy at 02:03 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)