Walking in a Winter Wonderland

This morning I woke up thinking it'd be a great time to try out my new camera. Just looking outside I knew...it's damn cold. But, I roused the warm and sleepy Dobie and out we went.

I stood at the backyard fence, noting the ducks absent from the pond. Good thing, or they'd be stuck in the ice. 27 degrees. Now to some of you, that's nothing. Our friends up the hill in Tahoe were at -12 yesterday. But for me and my sunny California constitution it's downright chilly. While I won't get snow, the ice displays are still incredible and fascinating to me.

Boring brown fallen leaves become delicate works of art!

I must admit, I found it funny to crunch through the mud. If I'd ever read that in a story, I'd have thought the author mad. But today, the mud crunched beneath my boots as I tromped along the path.

So, in this last photo, you can see how cold it was. It leached the color right out of the camera...all that was left was the green of the grass and even that started to disappear.

I took my frostbit fingers back home and had a couple cups of coffee. The rest of my Sunday spent indoors, where its a heck of a lot warmer!

Where can a girl find a couple extra hours...

I am busy. Busy prepping to enter the Amazon Breakthrough Contest in a couple weeks. This entails re-editing a published novel to see if I can make it shine even more. It means crafting a savory pitch that will get people salivating.

It means taking a hard look at Return to find any niggling little irritants that need to be removed, and finding errors that have snuck past (I know there are still some in there), though its been edited and proofread more times than I can count.

And, while I'm trying to accomplish this, to help Ravyn and Zelera get a little more acclaim, I've got all the normal daily life activities to pursue.

There is an Iphone that needs replacing, as the dog decided to eat it. The Lifeproof case does not protect against Doberman, in case you were wondering.

Christmas decorations need to go away...sigh. Back up into the garage attic I go.

Child number three's Bell kit was stolen from the car two days before Christmas. So, I need to find new bells...preferably used. And, buy the book again. It's a convenient excuse for her to not practice at the moment.

A couple Christmas gifts need exchanging. I refuse to do those today. Augh!

The bookkeeping for our business needs to be done, so we can decide if we will be jumping off the fiscal cliff, limbs flailing, wallets drained. Gotta have the numbers in order to plan...would be so nice if our government would do that as well. Oh, but I'd better not get started on that...that's a whole 'nother post...

The house could use a top to bottom clean-up. After the chaos of NaNoWriMo and the joys of the holidays, this place is a disaster. Okay, who am I kidding, it's always a disaster, but still...it'd be nice to get it tidied.

Then, there's the whole keeping up with blogs, twitter, Return's facebook page, etc. Something I've been not so good at the past couple months.

My dear sweet husband gave me a wonderful new camera for Christmas! The Sony NEX-5R! Oh the things it can do! I'm so excited, I can't wait to start fiddling with it. Another tiny nibbler of my time. But, I fear it's not high on my priority list at the moment. (Sad face)

So, it you know of a way to turn back a little time, or extend it and would like to share that information with me, I'd be ever so grateful!

Hope your Christmas was Merry, and you are looking forward to 2013!