Christmas: Jesus, Gifts, and Stress

So Christmas is about three things for me. (Cunning readers may guess what they are based on the title.) This is the beginning of a three-part blog series on Christmas (aka holiday therapy for yours truly). Fairly obviously for a Christian, Christmas celebrates the birth of Jesus aka the God I follow. Yes, I’m awareContinue reading “Christmas: Jesus, Gifts, and Stress”

The familarrr

Edit: For those of you who keep telling me you wish you could make it to one of my Interactive Fiction workshops (I generally run one at Conflux every October long weekend), here’s a video course I made on udemy: Introduction to Interactive Fiction. It’s $20.   This was, of course, taken at the PirateContinue reading “The familarrr”

Christmas Letter

Each year I make a calendar (using Vistaprint) for the following year, in which the photos roughly correlate with the same months of the previous year. I sure hope that sentence makes sense. For example, this was taken in March, during which Canberra hosts a massive international hot air balloon festival every year.   So,Continue reading “Christmas Letter”

The artist formerly known as Miss Four

Last Sunday, Louisette turned five. She’s about to start Kindy. Today was her party. Five years. She’s grown all the way from a giddying hypothetical notion to a wrinkly spew machine to a distinct person: smart, focused, creative, affectionate, gentle, passionate, and gorgeous. I took a photo a day for the first year of eachContinue reading “The artist formerly known as Miss Four”

Dancing, Duelling, Delicious: The official book launch for HEART OF BRASS

You know what’s cool? Nurofen tablets are sugar coated. * HEART OF BRASS had her official Book Launch yesterday as part of the inaugural Canberra Writers Festival, an absolutely huge event. I was written about (with a cover image) in Canberra Weekly magazine (96,000 readers!) and in the Canberra Times, as well as various otherContinue reading “Dancing, Duelling, Delicious: The official book launch for HEART OF BRASS”

Party Post-Mortem

Yesterday was TJ’s 2nd birthday party. It was also the family party/get-together for Chris… and my brother. And my nephew. My brother didn’t actually come, which he probably enjoyed very much. It all started with the knowledge that my parents were visiting Canberra that weekend. With four family birthdays around the same time, I hadContinue reading “Party Post-Mortem”

Deadlines

I love deadlines. That’s not sarcasm. The writing life consists largely of sitting alone in a room (or worse, sitting in the same room as young kids who I desperately hope are sufficiently distracted by the blaring TV) scowling at a screen as I invent worlds and people that absolutely no-one cares about except myself. Deadlines giveContinue reading “Deadlines”

Reflections on a Scrapbooking Mania

Today was my daughter’s third birthday party. It started at 9:00am. I was up until 2:00am scrapbooking – again. Why on Earth would I do that? I know why. Last June, Louisette became a big sister. It was also the time when we realised she was now actively forming memories – which meant that ifContinue reading “Reflections on a Scrapbooking Mania”

Plans Made While Pregnant

When I was pregnant with Louisette, I wrote down some of the stuff CJ and I were desperately looking forward to doing with our kids. Lately, Louisette is old enough to appreciate most of these, so I’ve added comments – three years after writing that list. And on to today’s official topic! Here, in noContinue reading “Plans Made While Pregnant”