PEN TO PAPER: An Eggcellent Day
What does Easter mean to you? For me it’s about spending time with family, decorating eggs, searching for eggs and eating good food.
When I was young, we always had some pretty intense Easter egg hunts. I wasn’t always a fan, because for some reason, I could never find as many eggs as my big brother. Fortunately as we got older, the hunts became a parents vs. kids event, and let’s just say I’m surprised we didn’t find a few eggs, weeks later, by smell. My brother and I hid one egg at the bottom of the flour bin on the top shelve of a kitchen cabinet. That’s crazy.
When my kids were young we had egg hunts, but it was the decorating that got intense. A heated competition developed with our neighbors that lasted for years. My husband was always the winner, at least in his mind. The rest of us have a different recollection of the final results, but no matter the winner we always had a blast.
I know that Easter is not about egg decorating and egg hunts, that it’s a Christian holiday celebrating the belief in the resurrection of Jesus Christ, but the egg portion of the holiday holds some eggcellent memories for me and is a great place to get some good story ideas.
WRITING PROMPT 1: Write about this Easter weekend or a past Easter that stands out in your memory.
WRITING PROMPT 2: Write about what Easter means to you.
WRITING PROMPT 3: Braden took the egg and….
PEN TO PAPER: Car Craze
Wow, cars bring up a lot of memories for me. My first car was a gigantic white Buick Electra with a 455 engine (that means fast). It was white with a black top and velvety wine colored electric seats. Man, I had some adventures in that. Then came my reddish-orange Opal Manta, I loved that little pumpkin seed. Then I started my Volkswagen run with a VW rabbit, diesel. It was a nice car but it blew a head gasket going up the steep hill just west of Spokane. Next came my first real car, meaning the first one I bought myself , my red-hot sirocco, wolfberg addition. That baby took me back and forth across the state of Washington a million times, probably a bit faster than it should have, especially since the speed limit was 55 MPH at that time. Then came the love of my life (next to Jason, the kids and our dog of course), the Blue Bomber, my 1989 VW Blue Star Vanagon, that I’ve been driving for twenty-one years now.
I could write a book about my Vanagon adventures. Oh no, don’t get me started; I’m already working on two books. Enough about my cars, now it’s time to write about yours, and I’m guessing that you have just as many stories surrounding your cars, or cars that you have dreamed about driving, so let’s get writing.
WRITING PROMPT 1: Write about your first car, or your favorite car.
WRITING PROMPT 2: Write about a car you’d like to have.
WRITING PROMPT 3: Jessie set her hands on the steering wheel of the _______ and…
PEN TO PAPER: Working Together
The focus of my basketball coaching book is how to build a strong team. How to get players to work together. This concept is so important on the basketball court but it’s also important in life. There are so many times in our lives when we rely on others and our ability to work together, so I thought it would be a perfect place to mine our thoughts for writing this week.
As usual, I will list three related prompt ideas and you can choose which calls to you, use them all or make up one of your own. The key is to simply write.
Write on!
WRITING PROMPT 1: Together we can…
WRITING PROMPT 2: Alone I can’t…
WRITING PROMPT 3: Nora called them all together and…
PEN TO PAPER: Mood & Weather
It was so nice to take in the sun this last Saturday. The Vitamin B lightened my mood. Or maybe it was watching the football game in our local park, or perhaps the chance to chat safely with a bunch of neighbors since we have all been sequestered inside of our homes most of the winter.
All I can say is, it was nice.
The weather can change your mood. Sometimes in surprising ways. I also love a rainy day as much as a sunny day (just not too many). It gives me a great excuse to hunker in. But when my husband looks out the window and sees rain, his entire body slumps down upon itself.
All of us are different.
When you’re writing, bringing in the weather can help create the mood of the scene and it can also give the reader a peak into your character’s personality.
For today’s prompts let’s delve into mood and weather.
WRITING PROMPT 1: Write about how a sunny day makes you feel, or a rainy day, or snowy day. Pick your favorite (or least favorite) weather front and write about it.
WRITING PROMPT 2: Write a season, spring, summer, winter, or fall, at the top of your page and write.
WRITING PROMPT 3: A burst of sunlight came through a crack in the door when…
Meet Sonya
Meet Sonya
Sonya Elliott’s memoir, Back on the Court: A Young Woman’s Triumphant Return to Life, Love & Basketball, is her story of finding hope in the wake of tragedy after she and her fiancé were hit by a train. She blogs about writing, basketball, and life and is currently working on a Young Adult Novel and a Non-Fiction Coaching book. Stories of her career as a fashion model are woven through her memoir, as both the Soloflex and Easy Spirit Shoes commercials were filmed during that time period, and this unique and intriguing business continues to be a part of her life.
Sonya played basketball at Eastern Washington University and was a starter for the Big Sky Champion team that went to the 1987 NCAA tournament. She coached for almost 25 years and was voted Seattle Times Coach of the Year, Seattle Officials Women’s Basketball Association Coach of the Year, and twice voted Metro League Coach of the Year. She loves the game of basketball and is thankful, not only for her husband and kids but for her ability to continue to get back on the court.
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PEN TO PAPER: Phone Frenzy
We all have cell phones these days. Phones that we almost never use to make phone calls. They probably shouldn’t even be called cell phones or mobile phones; they should be called mini mobile computers, since that’s what they are.
I try not to use mine often. But with emails and Instagram, I spend more time on it than I’d like. Sometimes I wonder how much more I would get done if I just turned it off all day. But then I think, what if my kids call? What if my parents call? And of course, I leave it on. It’s hard to imagine that twenty-two years ago when I was pregnant with my son, I packed up my Volkswagen Vanagon with my two-and-a-half year old daughter and boxer dog and drove more than 2500 miles to southern California and back (only broke down twice) with no cell phone.
And I survived. […]
PEN TO PAPER: Sleep Sagas
Sleep has been on my mind a lot lately. Mainly because I’m having a hard time doing it. I suppose that I’m not the only one, life in general has been a bit stressful over the last year. I thought I might sleep better after the election and once I was vaccinated, however, it doesn’t seem to be the case.
I’ve watched the Master Class on sleep, read books and listened to podcasts. I’ve adjusted my diet, continued with exercise, I get out into the light in the morning, occasionally I work on breathing techniques and yoga (this is a tough on for me to stick with). I am consistant with the time I head to bed and the time I roll out of bed in the morning, yet good sleep still seems illusive to me, until last night.
Now the pressure is on. What did I do yesterday that was so […]
PEN TO PAPER: Mothers & Memories
With Mother’s Day just around the corner, I want to talk about moms. I’m lucky, I have a great relationship with my mom, but mother-daughter relationships can be complicated and often flex and change over time.
Here is an example from a time when I wasn’t that fond of my mom:
I’ve been eating, sleeping, and sitting in this house for thirteen days now and I want out. I’m with people I love, but I don’t care. I hate my mom for taking a leave of absence from work and being with me all day, for trying to help me get better when I don’t want to.
I hate the way the gold wire rims of her glasses accent her caring eyes.
I hate the way she cooks my favorite foods and tries to mask her disappointment when I don’t show any enthusiasm.
I hate the way she […]
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