Lighten it up with some Girlie Things

So, after my last post, I kind of got the feeling like people were concerned. For my safety, specifically.

Sorry to everyone who got scared, freaked out, etc. by the things I wrote. That wasn’t my intention and I just want to say the fact you reached out means a lot. Writing is my therapy, always has been, and perhaps that’s the first time you read something in that vein over here.

I want to clear the air and reboot a little bit because the concern actually shocked me. But then I went back and re-read the post and, yeah, I can see how some folks might have been wondering about my mental state.

I’m not, however, sorry for sharing the post because it was something (is something) I felt needed off my chest and in a very publicly shared way.

You should probably know that my mental state is basically fucked all the time.

No exaggeration, I pretty much think like that most days at some point or another. A common occurrence since I was ten or eleven years old. I call it the curse of the creative.

I need to feel things. Everything. Enhanced emotions are what keep me working. When’s the last time you read a book where the characters never experienced anything? Never cried, screamed, flung their arms around the one they love to tackle them to the floor?

Exactly.

I tap into my highs and lows on a daily basis in order to craft my worlds.

Last week’s blog post was a reflection of that deep seeded personality trait bubbling up into my world. That’s all. I swear, if you pulled out my journals from any year of my life since age 14 you would be amazed at how much of that super dark shit comes out.

I don’t often share that kind of raw emotion over here but on that particular day it was something I felt I needed to do.

I’m not defending it, don’t feel I owe anyone an explanation per se but I at least wanted everyone to know that I am a-okay.

But you should also know that I still feel the same. Still frustrated, still a bit lost. But I will find my way and appreciate all the hands I have to hold on the way. Love you all!

Now, in an effort to flip-flop right over to the other side of my self-diagnosed bipolarity, I thought it would be fun to share something here that I haven’t done in a long time.

Nail art! (See ya dudes…)

I’ve been getting back into it lately, watching (read: binging like a zombie) YouTube videos about anything and everything under the sun. So last week while I was working on this manicure:

I decided to give a bunch of different styles a little practice. Since I have a silicone nail art mat I decided all of the designs would be something I could lay down to save until I did my mani this week. And it worked to create a skittle manicure (meaning all fingers are different).

I’m calling it Cohesive Color Chaos.

None of them came out perfect, far from it, but I had a lot of fun creating each of the designs, keeping an eye on the color theory of the full manicure, making sure the two hands were balanced (for example, if I did a white/teal/iridescent on one hand I did the same on the other in a different design), and learning which are my favorite techniques.

So far, I’m not a big fan of water marbling, am only a partial fan of freehand, and love stamping.

Without further ado, here’s the mani in full detail by finger then a mashup of the two hands so you can see what it looks like all together.

First, here’s the mat with most of the self-created decals laid down.

The two on my pinky fingers were supposed to be those pink and white ones but they crumbled a bit and I had to use some backups.

Now here are the nails as I see them, from left to right, starting with the pinky on my left hand.

Drag marble

Blobicure

Stamped flamingoes

Water marble with glow in the dark

Freehand sunglasses and letters

Stamped sunglasses

More attempts at water marble

Freehand flamingo with acrylic paints

Drag marble

Smoosh marble

And here are both hands side-by-side. What do you think?

Personally? I love the mani, not as thrilled with my application. Some of them are already starting to peel up in the corners (applied Saturday) and I’m sure it’s because my nails are so C curved that the decal just didn’t bond with the base coat of polish I laid down.

No biggie, I’ll keep practicing and get better at some of these techniques.

Bottom line, this fun, upbeat girl is who I am today (and every day). It’s just that some days she has to let the darkness surface.

Just like nail polish, I have to let something sucky take the lead every once in a while and share that fail with the world. Because that lets me remove the layers and get back to my natural starting point. The clean slate of my nails and my brain.

xoxo

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In addition to this drivel I also write books, both fiction and non-fiction.
Learn more on my author page.

Tiny Little Victories

So, I’m having one of those days today where everything seems to take more effort than it should.

You know the kind, where you pick up a pen, drop it, pick it up again, drop it again, and it rolls out of reach under the sofa. Then, by the time you retrieve it (with the end of the broom handle you had to retrieve from wherever it lives), you forgot what you wanted to write anyway.

Yeah.

But then I went out to pick up groceries and the gal at the deli counter called me Miss!

Miss!!!

I haven’t been a Miss in ages.

I’ve been firmly living in Ma’am land for at least the last six or seven years now. But today, after the morning of internal chaos forcing me to be gangly and awkward, I became a Miss again.

If only for that one moment, leaving the house today was totally worth it.

And I’m sure that was a big part of why I was a disaster this morning – I didn’t want to leave the house for errands.

Because yesterday I clocked in another 3,000+ words in my new manuscript and I was feeling particularly ready to write this morning. But then there’s that pesky thing called life where I won’t write too much without food.

And if you know me you know I’m not one of those writers who lives on coffee and cigarettes. Bleh. Even in the days when I was a smoker and drank coffee non-stop there was always, always, food in my life.

I eat, like, five times a day. So grocery shopping was a necessary evil because all that consumption leads to an empty fridge eventually.

But, if I waited, ordered a pizza, ate panko crumbs on peanut butter just to survive (the last 2 things in the house, seriously), and gone shopping tomorrow, I may never have been a Miss.

And now I’m back home, ready to blow out another huge word day, but I can’t seem to force myself to work on this new book. 

Because I'm a Miss! And it’s been a hot minute since I’ve posted a blog. After the morning I had, it felt like the right time to catch you all up on the doings around here.

I’ve had a super busy spring / it’s-already-summer-in-Phoenix.

At least this post isn’t three months since my last blog (like my last blog post was), but it has been two solid months of living life, seeing people, doing stuff, typing words.

I’m also getting back into nail art and picked up some supplies to make designs that are more fun and artsy. Which is good because I’d been wearing tan nude nails every week for somewhere near four months.

Over it, time for fun again!

Doing something to my nails (on the regular) started back in junior high school. I’d use markers, polish, whatever I could get my hands on to put color and design on the tips of my fingers. I even used my ballpoint pen to dot flowers onto my pinky finger.

And I didn’t care what color I used as long as there was some color at the ends of my hands. When I was a kid it wasn’t “cool” to use black, navy blue or other colors considered freaky.

I used them.

Because they’re colors. I mean, why was red or pink okay but not black? Why did wearing black nail polish make people think of me as a certain type of person? That shit just never made sense to me and I’d think about it while I slathered shiny blue polish on every other fingernail.

These days I’m trying brushes, sponges, vinyl decals, creating my own decals, acrylic painting, and stamping to get some fun designs going on. And it’s so relaxing to sit and paint for a couple hours without the need for climbing a ladder.

Tiny little canvases. I love it.

Aside from nail art, I released a book, the 2^nd in my California Dreamin’ Series: Alternate Plans. I won’t go into great detail on the book here. You can click on the title and read all about it over on Amazon if you’re so inclined.

Already read it? Then while you’re over there checking out the link, please leave me a review!

Reviews are the lifeblood of authors on Amazon and I’d be forever grateful for your honest feedback. All reviews are awesome because they help me write better books the next time. So, go, review one of my books right now!

Thanks 😍

In the midst of work and life, Matt and I even managed to take an extended vacation for the first time in almost a year. We started out with friends in Temecula, California on a wine weekend of debauchery, madness, and so much fun.

From there we drove up the coast to San Francisco, back down to Big Sur (as far as possible due to the coastal highway being washed out), inland to Paso Robles, back out to the coast (just below the closure), and wound down the entire coast to San Diego before driving home.

It was freaking awesome!

It had been ages since we took a long road trip and it was so much fun to get out, take pictures, reconnect, see the beach. Can’t wait to do it again. Soon.

But, for now, I’ll be finalizing the next book release slated for September (30 Chapters in 30 Days, a writer’s inspiration for getting big word count down in a month or less), and working on this new California Dreamin’ Series book.

And something tells me my main character (who is 44 this year) will get to experience the joys of being called a Miss for the first time in years.

Then again, maybe I’ll just keep that little joy all for myself.

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In addition to this drivel I also write books, both fiction and non-fiction.
Learn more on my author page.