The Versatile Blogger Award

Many thanks to Yadin Bromberg for giving me the Versatile Blogger Award!!! This is sweet! I just met Yadin, and if you don't know him yet, I highly encourage you to check out his blog!

The rules/instructions that go with The Versatile Blogger Award:
1. Thank the blogger who gave the award and provide a link to their blog.
2. Select 15 bloggers you've newly discovered or follow regularly and give them the award. (I expanded this to include some bloggers that I've followed for a long while, but have lost touch with recently so I'm rediscovering them)
3. Finally, tell 7 things about yourself.

So, again, many thanks to Yadin!

There are so many awesome bloggers out there, but I have to choose 15 . . .so the award goes to:

Joanne at 10minutes2breathe
Pam at  2encourage
Taryn at A Fool's Golden Paradise
Ali Cross
Susan J. Reinhardt
Christine at Christine's Journey
Luana at Emerald City
Jennie at Garden Full of Lily
Allison at GeekBanter
Laurel at Laurel's Leaves
Ellen at Pink Tea and Paper
Julie at Silver Lining
Tricia at Talespinning
Tara at TaraTylerTalks
Kathleen at Writing, Reading, and Life

Wait, I just noticed I awarded all ladies . . .I'm not sure how that happened. Sorry guys . . .but I guess it's ladies award day!

Now, seven things about me:

1. I love tea, but recently started liking coffee. It's part of the reason I stopped drinking caffeine. To join the legions of coffee drinkers in the Northwest seemed too lemming like for me. LOL - actually I stopped drinking caffeine because it was messing with my sleep and my diet. Mint tea, and Vanilla Chai Decaf are my favs right  now.

2. I love to dance, but my left foot keeps me from dancing all that often. I love watching tap videos . . . like of Fred Astaire, Gene Kelley, my daughters, and Greg Russell. Who's Greg Russell? He's an awesome tapper and tap teacher who taught at a dance convention my daughters went to a few years ago. I'm not really into the Lord of the Dance type tapping . . .too stiff, no humor.

3. I love to laugh. Tonight I'm going to see Tim Hawkins and I'm looking forward to laughing until I roll around on the floor.

4. I love being a writer. I love writing, editing, and even revising although that part feels like work sometimes.

5. I love teaching. I love teaching my kids (we homeschool). I love teaching writing and literature classes at our homeschool co-op.

6. My name, Tyrean, is a name that my parents thought was unique. They made it up based on a character from a John Wayne movie that had two lines (I counted). His name was Tyre and he was a scout. They wanted my name to be more feminine (which to them meant it had to have an "n" at the end), and they didn't want it to have two "e"s in it. Hence, "Tyrean" pronounced with a "een" sound at the end but not spelled that way. Turns out there are many "Tyreans" out there - some from America and some from Ireland. I could tell many tales of mispronunciations and even arguments I had with subsitute teachers about the correct way to say my name. I even had an English teacher who told me that "ea" doesn't make a hard "e" sound. Hmm, really, what about "read, leak, teak, squeak, mean, lean"? I think in many ways my love of language came from the defense of my name.  

7. I love the Lord with all my heart, soul,  mind and strength. My faith is part of all that I do, even when I make mistakes.

The Lucky Meme Award and My Toughest Beta Reader

Many Thanks to Tara Tyler who awarded me with The Lucky Meme award!!!
Here are the rules for receiving this award:

1. Go to page 77 of your current MS.
2. Go to line 7.
3. Copy down the next 7 lines - sentences or paragraphs - and post them as they're written. No cheating.
4. Tag 7 authors.

From page 77 of The Crystal Sword

As she reached the tunnel entrance, Master Dantor reached out a hand to stop her from exiting. “We have to hold them until our people reach the ship,” he explained.

          “There’s a ship?!” Clara said.

          “We were the last refugees from the city, and we have some unexpected friends,” he said. Now, I need you, Stelia, and Salene to help me slow these scum down.”

          “Yes, sir,” Clara said, wishing she could at least step out of the cave into the sunshine. She wished that good strategy would allow them more fresh air.

Congrats to these lucky 7 authors:

Carol at Artzicarol Ramblings

L.G. Smith at Bards and Prophets

The Golden Eagle at The Eagle's Aerial Perspective

Karen Lange at Write Now

Emily R. King at Get Busy Writing

Justin W. Parente at In My Write Mind

Allison at Geek Banter

Tag, you're it!

Keeping to rule #3 was tough for me on this one because currently I'm struggling with my third draft. I made major plot changes. The ending seemed impossible to write, and I kept writing junk chapters that delayed writing the end. I struggled and struggled, and finally decided to print out the mess and see if it made more sense after I had killed a small tree.

My ten-year-old daughter woke up in the midst of the print job, and asked if she could read it. I gave her a pink highlighter, and she found two typos in the first ten minutes of reading, asked me questions like "why doesn't the evil villainess kill the king off and just take over?" and in the midst of our discussion gave me an idea that helped me write one of the end scenes.

So I really wanted to fix that section from page 77, but instead I covered my draft with pink and green highlighters, and orange sticky notes.

Anyone else in the midst of a struggle to end their manuscript? Have any kid beta readers who are willing to ask you tough questions about your plot?