Castle in the Clouds

Instead of camping with my family this weekend, I went to Madison, Wisconsin. The 33rd annual WisCon conference was held there over the holiday. It started Thursday night and ended sometime Monday afternoon. There were workshops, panels, art shows, vendors, and parties. As an added bonus, there was also good food and chai tea within walking distance. The worst part, as expected, was the ride there and back. I'm not a huge fan of hours long road trips. If I'm not driving, I usually read, but since I was a tag-along passenger, I thought I'd try to be sociable. I think I managed for the most part. But I bet you're more interested in the Con itself. I found it interesting, entertaining, and exhausting. There were many times when I wanted to voice an opposing opinion, but wisely kept my mouth shut. Well, for the most part. There were a few times I felt compelled to interject my viewpoint or experiences into the conversations. I probably sounded like an idiot, but...

We had a lot of fun at our friend's party Saturday night. We certainly stayed a lot longer than we had intended - I guess that's a sign of a great host and hostess! However, as we're experimenting with this whole "you're old enough to be the babysitter" idea, we were a bit anxious to get home. Of course our trust in the oldest boy was well-founded. He did awesome!! This morning we rolled out of bed around 9 and hubby cooked up some french toast. After that it was a beeline for the shower. We had lots of chores we wanted to do today, so I threw on an old pair of jeans and a sweatshirt. Hair in ponytail, we were off to the local greenhouse to buy more flowers than anyone should buy in one visit. But it worked for us. Our busy schedules don't lend themselves to days of leisure very often, so tackling all five flowerbeds at once was more of a necessity than an option. While the hubby used the mantis to till up the soil, my youngest and I planted and ...

I can't believe I forgot. I mean really, how could I? I've been looking forward to my first ever writing conference for the better part of the last four months. I even managed to submit my packet for the Writers' Workshop on time. Got approved for a scholarship to help pay for it. Have been asking inane questions about what to wear, what to bring, and what to expect. Now for the Fail. I haven't critiqued a single manuscript yet! I have three hefty packets I need to read, comment on, and write a page or two about. Oh, dear. Between writing final papers, reading short stories and novels for class, and the craziness that comes with two children, I just plain forgot! As you can imagine, whatever spare time I can find this weekend is going to be spent on manuscripts! I just need to fit them in somewhere between dishes, laundry, a birthday party, mopping my floor, finishing the Great Gatsby, and research on the French Riviera in the 1920s. No problem.

The day-by-day breakdown: Sunday: Mother's Day meant a visit to the in-laws (I saw my mom on Saturday to avoid the two houses on the same day nonsense). I took my camera with me and got some great shots of the wildlife and other pretties surrounding their house. Here are a couple of my favorites. Of course, after I took the picture of the Bleeding Hearts above, my youngest son had to show me that there really are hearts inside them. He quickly plucked one off the plant and peeled away the pink outer layer to reveal this: After spending a couple hours there, the kids and I headed for home while the hubby stayed and tried to get the new bathroom faucet installed. While he was laboring away in perhaps the world's most poorly structured home, we lounged around in our jammies and watched movies. Monday: After work the hubby and I each grabbed a kid and went our separate ways. The youngest had an away game a few towns over, so the hubby dashed off in that direction. The oldest ...

After reading several short stories by F. Scott Fitzgerald, I have come to the realization that I can only handle so much "woe is me" from the obscenely rich. The first few stories in this collection were amusing. They were, dare I say it, cute. However, after reading pretty much the same sub-context in the next four or five stories, I became rather weary of Fitzgerald's obsessive fascination with crossing the boundary from rich to filthy rich. I think the problem for me is that I don't care about the characters because they don't resonate with me. With the exception of one short story, there is nothing in them that I can point to and say, even on a very fundamental level, "I get that". The sole exception here was in Bernice Bobs Her Hair and I believe that's because of the gender dynamics he explored. The interactions between the girls could have really happened. The reaction of the boys at the dances and after the climatic haircut seemed...

We had a lovely time at the tea house on Saturday. After eating three scrumptious courses and drinking a variety of teas , we decided to try on a few hats . There were also gloves, tiaras, boas, and fur stoles. It was fun being a little girl again, even for a few minutes. We giggled and we laughed, which made this shot possible: