Celebrating Our 4th Anniversary!

On October 28th my hubby and I celebrated our 4th wedding anniversary. We went to a bed and breakfast in Stone Mountain, Georgia the weekend before. We stayed at an inn called The Village Inn.

The inn was nice and had a Gone With The Wind theme. The innkeeper put us in the Rhett room. I kept hoping to hear a ghostly spirit sometime in the night as the place was rumored to be haunted. No such luck. Only thing I heard was hubby's ghostly snoring in my ear.

A cool part about the trip was we got to see the laser show at Stone Mountain. Awesome!! If you get a chance to see it, consider it a must do thing. The laser show is set against the side of the mountain and takes place at night. Hubby and I got our chairs, jackets, gloves and some hot coffee and had a ball!

Charlotte True Crime Examiner for Examiner.com

Two of my favorite things...true crime and writing! I just got the position of Charlotte True Crime Examiner for Charlotte, North Carolina. I have worked in the legal position for over ten years, my husband is in law enforcement and I have other family members in law enforcement. I am so excited about the opportunity. Granted it only pays by page views, but I figure local and national exposure on the subject is always good. Plus I am still happily working on my first novel, a suspense/crime/paranormal book. Figure this will give some credibility when submitting to an agent whenever that happens. If anyone is interested in writing for the Examiner, please feel free to put me down as a referring Examiner. My referral number is 26017. Thanks!!

My first article is on cold cases in Mecklenburg County if anyone is interested. I reviewed two of them to see if anyone has any details. One is about a 20 year old man that was gunned down and another is about a 79 year old woman found dead. Click "My first article" to see the article on Examiner.com. I plan to do a series on unsolved cases in Charlotte, Concord, and the surrouding area.

Suite101 and Current Projects

Photo By Kristian D./Flickr.com

The past three months since I quit my paralegal job to work full-time as a freelancer have been hectic to say the least. One of the interesting things that I started working on is as a writer for Suite101. I actually got accepted as a writer there a few months ago but for some reason did not submit any articles. I finally saw an email from Suite101 reminding me about my account and figured I would go check it out.

Writers in some other forums have indicated that they are making a decent income from revenue from Suite101 every month. Granted "decent" is relative from a few extra dollars to several hundred dollars. Seems like a good thing to me. Every little bit helps the income, right?

I was accepted as a contributor for legal articles and wrote my first article on North Carolina DWI law and rules. North Carolina is ranked eighth in the nation for drunk driving accidents and fatalities. The state also has some of the harshest laws in the nation. For more on North Carolina DWI laws (let's hope you don't need it) you can see the article here.

So far the editors at Suite101 seem very professional and I really like being able to write on any topic I want. Serves as a creative outlet since I also work full-time for Demand Studios, WiseGeek and a some private clients. I queried a magazine this month and the editor was very interested in my article. I have a November 1, 2009, deadline and excited about that as well. While I do like writing for WiseGeek and Demand Studios professionally since I have to make a living writing, I at least need something fun to write about. Seems with Suite101 I may make a few extra dollars with it as well. From what I can gather, you notice more money once you hit over 50 or 60 articles. Got to get to writing!

Football!

My son is going into 9th grade and is on the JV football team. They had their first pre-game scrimmage last night at the high school. It was just the JV team and they showed off what they have been practicing all summer and then had a short scrimmage against each other.

It was fun watching them and as I looked around the stadium, I could not help but think that the next four years were going to fly by and I knew I would miss the frantic scrambling to get to the games, making sure Dylan had everything and realizing last minute he had left something out of the bag or at school...I really hope that the next four years goes by very slow and I can sit and enjoy just one more day seeing my son grow up.

On a side note, those stadium bleachers hurt like heck after about four hours and I felt like I could barely walk when we left. My butt is obviously not thick enough to handle those seats. I will be getting one of those cool stadium seats that you brink with you like the other smart moms ASAP.

Meeting the Neighbors

Over the weekend one of the neighbors had a little get together at his house and we were invited. It was a lot of fun meeting the other neighbors who had moved in recently. I felt bad because we have lived here for four years and have only met one or two people.

How is it that several years can pass by and you only have time to exchange a quick hello in the driveway or just wave to people going down the street? It seems like when growing up even though our closest neighbors may have been a half mile down the rural road we lived on and the next maybe a mile away, we knew everyone! I lived out in the country yet when we would see someone, we were caught up on birthdays, babies, graduations, etc...in just a few minutes.

I am making it a goal to get to know my neighbors. I really need to have some friends to walk with, go shopping with, just hang out with. Maybe its my fault for always just working and coming home. I guess if you don't extend more than a quick second hello, then all you get is the same.

Acai Berry Diet Pills Did Not Work For Me!

Like everyone else, I fell prey to the Acai Berry marketing. It has been so heavily flooded into magazines, T.V., the Internet....you would have to be blind not to see it. I have a tendency to try more diet products than I can count and have been looking for completely natural products to try.

I decided to try these Acai Berry diet pills that were listed in the vitamin section. The bottle even had on it for weight loss.....puleaze. The only thing I lost was my money. Supposedly, these give you energy, clearer skin, help your metabolism and supress your hunger. Nope. Nada. Nothing. Zero effects on me.

Maybe there are people who have reaped the benefits of this product but apparently I am just not one of them. If you have tried an Acai Berry product and love it....glad it worked for you. My body is obviously resisting weight loss:)

My First Week Working At Home

I love working from home! I absolutely do. I will say that I need to buckle down on my time management. I am easily distracted and it cuts into my writing time. I envisioned I would be working from home peacefully sipping on lattes and breezing through my work day. I had the coffee part right LOL...and lots of it! Just made right in my kitchen with a dash of cinnamon. The breezing part...not so much.

This week was really an exceptional week. I hope to not have anymore like this. For starters, almost two weeks ago I was involved in a wreck. Not my fault thankfully. My car was totaled and I dislocated my right shoulder and hurt my right hand, wrist and forearm. Not to count the bruises and nasty chemical burn from the airbag. Between calls from her adjuster and my visits to doctors, etc...I have gotten very little done.

In addition to that, my son started drivers ed this week (sigh...he is growing up so fast) and he has football practice every day. I am a full blown mom taxi driver this week. One more week of drivers ed and back to back football practice. After that, just football which does not start until 5:30 p.m. A little bit easier to coordinate my day.

Needless to say, it has really been an eventful week. Geez, I hope next week working from home is a little less exciting LOL!

I Quit My Job!

I quit my job as a full-time paralegal. Yes I did! I had one of those days where I realized I absolutely hated my job working at a law firm.

I decided to pursue a full-time freelance writing career. I already have several clients and have been freelance writing part-time for almost two years. I just knew it was now or never. Since I already had enough work to do it full-time, I figured why not?!

There are those who sit at their jobs every day and complain and do nothing to change things. I am not nor will I ever be one of those individuals. If something bothers you that much, then do something about it.

Of course, I will miss the friends that I made but will not miss the position at all. I especially will not miss that hour drive in and hour drive home. My husband thinks I have lost my mind but that makes me even more determined to show him I can do this. Wish me luck!

Wreck On The Way To Sewing Class

This was not my weekend. I had signed up for a six week sewing class so that I could work on apparel a little bit better. I was on the way to the class and was going to stop to get gas. Apparently, K-Mart was having some kind of a mad sale because a woman shot across traffic in front of me to whip into K-Mart. Yes, she was cited because an officer who was making a traffic stop happened to be across the road and saw her shoot out in front of me.

My right arm is at best swollen and painful and cut. Bruises galore with aches and pain. My car is pretty messed up and never did make it to the sewing class. All in all it could have been a lot worse. Cars can be replaced. It was definitely an eventful weekend.