Thankful Thursday: A Good Week (And a Contest Winner)

Hump day has come and gone and I’m still smiling, so it’s time for another quick thankful!

1. I’m thankful for people who come read my blog (and hopefully enjoy it) and who leave comments and enter contests like this one. I’m thankful that nrhatch wants to be on an island with a flying dragon that hunts for its own food. I’m thinking, though, that after she reads her newly-won copy of Island of the Aunts, she’s going to see that even her flying dragon is likely to create some work for her to do!

nrhatch: please email me at beckylevine at ymail dot com, with your snail mail address, so I can get your prize sent off!

2. I’m thankful that I did work through to the end of my first draft, even with all the confusion about plotlines and storylines. Not only did the process bring me to some understandings I really needed, I do feel good about having written “The End,” and knowing that I can now get started on “The Beginning” again. And mixed in with this is me being thankful for the critique group who sticks this and every pass out with me, no matter how chaotic it all looks.

3. I’m SO thankful to Scrivener for bringing out a Windows version of their software. Honestly, the timing couldn’t have been better. It’s like the developer with the lovely British accent just knew I was getting ready to replot.

4. I’m thankful, all over again, that I have an interesting, creative son who is spreading his wings in ways I never could have predicted. I’m thankful that he has enough patience (most of the time) to let Mom flap around a lot just to try and coast along with him and check out the view.

5. I’m seriously thankful that my son has a father who truly partners in this parenting thing with  me, because both I and my son really need his take on things. Triangles can be tough, but–yay–this one works.

6. I’m thankful for all the writers in the world who research and write about the stuff I need to learn for my WIP. And, really, I’ll still be thankful, even when all the books I ordered this week show up, gather themselves into an intimidating pile, and glare at me every time I even think about doing anything except read them.

7. I’m thankful for the little sun icon that’s currently displayed on the weather page’s Halloween square. Let’s just keep it that way for another four days, okey-dokey?

8. And, finally, for what must be the gazillionth time in my life, I’m thankful for Dick Van Dyke. (When my son was a baby & had yet to decide sleeping through the night was a good thing, he timed his wake-up session to coincide perfectly with the Nick at Nite Early Morning airing of the Dick Van Dyke show.)  Last Saturday, the man was on Wait, Wait, Don’t Tell Me. Go, listen, and laugh.