Happy New Year

Happy New Years!
I hope everyone is excited to see what this year will bring. This is just a quick blog post to share my resolutions and schedule for the upcoming year.

Personal Goal:

I will do my best to be a good person and help to make this world a better place. I will work on my temper and be kind to everyone.

Career Goals:

It’s not really a resolution at this point since it is already my daily habit, but I will continue to write and draw each day.

I would like to find homes for two finished projects including The Martlet, The Light Side of Moon, and the short story, Orbital Junk.

I plan to finish up the Out for Souls&Cookies Series so it could be released at Emerald City Comic Con.

After that, I plan to get started on the serialization of Unintentional Colonists.

Current Schedule:

Rustycon January 17-19 : Science Fiction and Fantasy convention

Radcon February 14-16 : Science Fiction and Fantasy Convention (Tentative)

Out For Souls&Cookies #5 released on March 28th.

Emerald City Comic Con March 28-30 : Comic Book Convention

New Year Resolutions

Rosie’s Resolution is to stay in the snuggle zone.

Once again, I would like to say something poignant and meaningful, but instead I’m starting the New Year sitting on my couch with Rosie snuggled up beside me with Tycho on the top of his crate behind me just like last year. I am sipping espresso as I got a Starbucks Verismo this year in October. I love that little machine. Once Dennis gets up, I will make some eggs with cheese and a side of bacon. It is one of our favorite breakfasts.

I have two resolutions this year

1) Exercise: Every Monday through Friday morning, I need to exercise. I enjoy doing aerobics. I just need to get off my bum and do them. That’s the hardest part for me. This resolution will be the hardest for me to keep. I need to do this before I take Dennis to work, because if I take Dennis to work, I get dressed. If I get dressed I won’t do it.  As you can tell, I am really good at making excuses of why I don’t have time to exercise.

2) Balance my work and the time I spend with my friends and family better. I need to keep my focus on everything I have to be grateful for — not what I think I should be accomplishing (specifically this refers to my book sales, how many reviews I have, etc, my teeny tiny royalty checks.) I have a great husband, a nice condo and two dogs. Though we could stand to lose a few pounds, we are both fairly healthy. I come from a fantastic loving family. I can always call my parents. I have wonderful friends and neighbors. These are the things I should focus on, but at times I take them for granted.

So there are my resolutions, what are yours?

Happy New Year!

My new year’s goal: Physical health for someone who sits on their bum all day!

Bad news everyone. I don’t believe the world will end in 2012. And even if it does, nothing I can do about it. So I figure I better think about some goals for the new year.

My biggest goal this year is to get healthier. It’s not only about losing a little weight. I completely admit I do want to look sexier. (who doesn’t?)  The real reason is I want to go out and enjoy some of the things I used to enjoy: snowshoeing and hiking. Last fall, I had such a great time in the UK, but  there were some days that I hurt from all the walking and lugging suitcases that I did.

I need to get daily exercise, beyond the dog walking. Especially since I sit on my bum most of the day writing and drawing.

Don’t worry, I have a plan which I will now share with the world…

1) I am going to do yoga three times a week. Specifically Monday, Wednesday, Friday at 9 pm with my husband. I have the DVD’s, yoga mats, straps, and bricks. We just got to get stretching.

2) I am going to do my cross training DVD on Tuesday and Thursday since this is a bit more high impact than my husband would like, I plan to do this one while he is at work.

3) Every Free Saturday, my friend Rebecca and I are going out on a day trip around Washington State for a nice hike, snowshoe trip, spelunking, etc.

4) Sunday is a day of rest and recovery or of the day for my writing group. While it sounds like a lot of work, actually my Yoga DVDs are only 30-45 minutes long, and my cross training one is 20 minutes. The Saturday day trip is the reward.

Now lets just hope this works!

Happy New Year! Clean out pantries by throwing a party!

So today is the first day of the new year. I would like to say something poignant and meaningful, but instead I’m starting the New Year sitting on my couch with Rosie snuggled up beside me waiting for my husband to wake up. Then I will do a Starbucks run and make some eggs.

Last night, we  rang in the new year with some wonderful friends up at my neighbor’s house. My contribution was a bottle of Citron Absolute, Bean Dip, Brandy balls and Peanut-butter blossoms. Almost everything–except for the liquor–came from my pantry.

The brandy balls were my own creation after my neighbor needed just a 1/2 cup of brandy for caramel sauce. The liquor store was out of small airline bottles so we ended up with the next smallest bottle (approximately 2 cups.) We were talking about other things, I could do to help use up some of the brandy.

And I remembered in my Betty Crocker’s Christmas Cookbook, there is a recipe for Bourbon balls that even says you can substitute brandy for the bourbon. Well, I didn’t have any of the other things Betty Crocker asked for, so I substituted the whole recipe using the Betty Crocker ratios with marvelous results.

Note: because they are not cooked, they do have a strong boozy flavor and no alcohol is burned off. Definitely not for kids!

Here we go,

3 cups of cookie/candy crumbs. I used leftover gingerbread cookies that were going stale, leftover pie crust baked and dusted with cinnamon, some sugar cookies, other odds and ends of chocolate, crumbled in my blender on the “shred speed.”

(Now the BC Bourbon ball recipe calls for cocoa, but I didn’t bother with that since I added some chocolate flavored things when I was creating my crumbs.)

Added 2 cups of powdered sugar

1/2 cup of walnuts also finely ground in my blender

Then stirred in

1/2 cup of brandy

1/2 cup of something sticky. (B C’s  says light corn syrup, I didn’t have any in the house and since the idea is to use up stuff I had, I used honey.)

Mix well. You will end up with a sticky mixture.

Dust hands with powdered sugar and roll mixture into one inch balls. (For any new candy makers: the dusting of your hand in powdered sugar helps the ball form to itself and not to your hands. Same concept as dusting a rolling-pin with flour)

Roll balls in a mix of white sugar and cinnamon

Cover and put them in the fridge for at least over night. The longer they sit the better the flavors meld.

My husband who is not a fan of hard alcohol was also not a fan of the candy, but the other seven people who tried them last night all loved them and two people asked for the recipe which is why I am posting it this morning.

Now on to my New Year’s resolution of world domination!!! Opps, did I say that last part aloud?