picture found at: bookreviewsbybobbie.wordpress.com

We girls with a pen would like to wish everyone a Happy Thanksgiving.

Please share with us what you are Thankful for.

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Mothers and Writing
I’m sitting at my computer intently creating a beautiful work of art. The right word is at my fingertips, so close, and then…my phone rings. The caller ID says “mom.” I contemplate ignoring because I already know how this conversation will go.
“So what are you doing?” asks my mother.
I quickly ran down the list of readymade activities that are considered more acceptable to my mother then writing. She can’t believe that grown woman with a family, and outside job, has time to waste on a mere hobby?
“Um…laundry,” I say, because laundry is never really done.
This usually works and our conversation continues, but a reasonable person might ask, why would a grown adult need to lie about spending time writing? Well, simply put, I don’t want to hear her response that would evoke feelings of guilt and resentment.
Our mothers can be our greatest supporters, and our harshest critics. I take comfort that I am not the only one with ‘mother’ issues. I know of authors who’ve had last minute ‘stage fright’ before their books hit the shelves and have contemplated removing or ‘toning down’ their sex scenes because of concerns with their family’s reaction.
I use to balk at those concerns, but those in glass houses shouldn’t throw stones. I write under a pseudonym and though I’ve recently told my mother that I won a writing contest. I didn’t disclose the name of the contest “Reveal Your Inner Vixen.” *gasp*
I don’t think I am alone in avoiding the subject of sex in writing or even the topic of writing all together with our mothers. So what are your thoughts? Do you avoid telling your family what you write? Do you let your mother read your sex scenes or do you sing it from the tree tops?

KC Cline

KC is our newest girl with a pen. We’d like to welcome her aboard!

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That’s right…you heard me! I kinda likes me a little complication here and there. Well not in real life of course, but in a book … nothing better I tell ya! I love being confused and wondering how, when, why and what the @?#*! It’s these questions that keep me reading.

I started to tell my husband about a story I was writing and he just looked at me and said, “Wow, that’s kinda complicated. Maybe a little too complicated.”

Now I could have sat back and been offended, and lets be honest, for a moment I was. But then … then I sat back and thought to myself. Yeah, this is pretty complicated … Perfect!

How do you feel about complications? Do you welcome them with open arms as though they were the prodigal son? Or do you tend to shy away from them as not to confuse your readers?

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Marybeth is an aspiring novelist currently working on her second novel. For more information visit her website www.marybethsmith.com. She also has a blog Desperately Searching for my Inner Mary Poppins where you can keep up on her moments as mother, wife and writer..

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Random action for the day…I sent a letter to my best friend in the mail! I suppose most of you are saying, “Well, that’s not random at all.” What if I told you that I see this person almost everyday?  In addition, we talk on the phone and send texts on a daily basis. Now, I bet you are like “LOL, this is a bit random”. The funny thing is I felt compelled to do as if I could be more truthful on the page than I could have ever been in person. As I was standing in front of the mailbox for a brief moment there was a sense of angst [ok, to be honest…stupidity] but I dropped it the mail slot anyway. It felt like the right thing to do even though I had that one moment of doubt According to Newsweek, letter writing was once commonplace and the lack of doing so [letter writing] is due to a cultural shift, i.e., texting, internet chats and video chats. For historians, a paper trail is very important in the study of the human race. How they react(ed) to the society around them is crucial to development of the past and present. If one day, the “lights” went out on the internet, where would our history go? So, to make the soul feel a little bit better, I’ll tell it…it was a part of history

As a writer or a soul dwelling in the technology age, let’s challenge each other to write letters more often than texting, video chatting or speaking on the phone. Now, if it is an emergency please do not send letters to the fire department or the police! Picking up the phone or yelling down the street is most acceptable

Moreover, if you feel obliged to share a small portion of the letter with the Ladies with the Pens, it would be greatly appreciated. We would love to have an insight to pieces of your history!

~Confectionately Yours,

Does this resemble a room in your home after your children have left it? Or are you one of the lucky who have perfect children. Today, we are going to share our stories, and hopefully offer advice or support for those parents trying to write, play spouse and parent, work, and stay sane.

I want to know how other parents deal with the mayhem caused by their children, and still find time to write.

All gripes and advice are welcome!

Sarah is writer looking for an agent. She is currently working on novel # 4, editing novels 2 and 3, and querying novel # 1. For more insight to her work, visit: http://legendoftheprotectors.wordpress.com/ or http://legendoftheprotectors.blogspot.com/

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After watching an episode of “Chowder” called my ‘My Big Fat Stinky Wedding’ [which airs on Cartoon Network]…it hit me. For days, I had been agonizing over what my entries should be about and how it should color me as a writer/author/poet who wanted to flex her lingual wings. Luckily, “Chowder” saved the moment! I will attempt to keep these pieces in the style of “Quirk-fo-tainment” thus taking the everyday quirky moments, tying it with hot world topics and sprinkling it with poetic interludes. Can you dig it? I hope you can…

So, “Chowder” is a purple cat personified with childlike qualities who is the apprentice of Chief Mung Daal. Mung owns a catering company in [fictional] Marzipan City! For a complete line up of these groovy characters, feel free to check out The Chowder Episode by clicking on the link! On a personal note, Chowder is my favorite.

Oddly enough, the cartoon grasped my attention about marriage. The ups, the downs, the “what fors”, those denied the opportunity, the laws, the rules, the sanctity and the [in]sanity of it all. Coupled with the overlapping conversations with my “bestie’ on the subject matter [which has also brought her to near regurgitation when seeing and or hearing the word “marriage”] I’m left torn. As someone who once entertained the thought of the ceremony, the dress, the vows and the partnership, I feel like it’s really not worth the song and dance. With divorce rates continuing to rise over “irreconcilable differences” and each party moving on with the remains of the relationship in U-Hauls and therapy sessions dashed with legal jargon, it seems like marriage is a merger that is bad for business. Is it possible for a “couple” to be committed to each another for many years without the ceremonial stamp? If so, why is marriage so important? Aside from the tax implications, if the “love” is more than a “second hand emotion” does shackling the verbal promises in rings and signatures on the dotted lines put a band-aid on loneliness?

To try to obtain clarity on the topic, I shall leave you with a Tanka:

“I Do”, “You Do” and

still left holding uneasy

thoughts for the next day…

Vows left at the alter can

alter the happy ending!

Ehh…cartoons are teachable moments So, for all those writers out there [and lovers of writers], how would a character in your realm respond. What quips or words of advice could be rendered in your character’s soliloquy/monologue?

~Confectionately Yours,