Little Victories

Hey everyone!  It has been quite some time since I’ve written anything on this blog of mine.  I hope all is well with you!  If you’re still following me- thank you!

These past few months have been a whirlwind.  Between going through months of physical therapy for my hip and our dog running away from his sitter while my husband and I were on our anniversary trip, things have been nothing short of crazy.

But despite all that, I’m still celebrating little victories.

1. I’m able to run again!  Thanks to about four months of PT for my hip, I can now run on my own again.  My hip was so bad that I would wake up in the middle of the night in pain.  Now that it’s feeling better, I do think I’m a little over-eager.  I really want to run a half before the end of the year, but I really don’t think my hip can handle that at this point.  But I’ve been able to run up to 2 miles so far again so I’m definitely on the right track.  My next step is to be able to run a 5K or two before the end of the year.  Possibly even a 10K.  We’ll see how the hip does!
2. I celebrated my one-year wedding anniversary!  Granted, it was spent driving down to Myrtle Beach, but we left early enough that we could still enjoy the pool and great food once we made it there safely!  It was also so much fun trying to find which “paper” gift to get Kyle, albeit semi-difficult because my budget was only so high and there was so much I wanted to get him!  I ended up getting him a rare comic book and he got me a writing notebook and another writing journal that we can both fill out about our relationship/marriage.  But seriously, how has it been a year?  And PSA: one-year-old wedding cake is terrible!
3. We got our dog back!  This is another whole (terrible) adventure in itself.  In summary, I had never been so tired and had never felt so hopeless than I did during the ten days he was gone.  What was worse is that we were on day four of our anniversary trip when we found out Oakley got loose.  But I learned not to give up hope AND to enjoy the little things, even if that means not getting frustrated when Oakley wakes us up at ungodly hours to go outside.  I truly hope that none of you will ever experience anything like that because it was terrible and heartbreaking and the worst thing that has ever happened in my life.
4. I’m writing again.  Okay, so I haven’t been writing on here, but I HAVE been writing and that’s clearly an improvement.  I’ve come down with the inspiration bug over the last few weeks and I even have a few ideas in the works for short stories that I plan on submitting to competitions.  We’ll see what happens with those, but I’m very excited about the ideas!
5. I’m a preferred writer.  As of today, I became a “preferred writer” for one of the client’s on the site BlogMutt who I freelance write for, and they gave me five stars on the article I wrote for them.  I honestly couldn’t be more thrilled!  This is just a small victory in terms of my writing career, but all the little victories will lead me in the right direction!

What small victories are you celebrating today?  Let me know in the comments below!

Long time, no see!

Well hello, WordPress world!  I am writing to you on this beautiful, snowy (wait? Isn’t it supposed to be Spring?) day in the northeast.  This is how it looks outside my house right now: 

So, since it has been a minute since I last updated this blog, I wanted to catch up and explain what has been happening in my world.

1. My husband and I bought a house!  Super exciting, right?  We’ve lived in it for just over two months now and we’ve never been happier (well, besides the mortgage and all of the responsibilities that come with homeownership- kidding!  It’s all great honestly).  Look at our cute picture at the house right after closing! 
2. The day after we moved into our house, we rescued a pit/lab mix named Oakley!  He’s turning 2 in April and he’s just the cutest, happiest little pup of all.  He was super skinny when we first got him because he was a stray found on the streets in Virginia, but we’ve given him lots of love and treats and food and exercise and he’s doing so much better now.  He likes to stare out windows when his daddy leaves for work.  He also loves to cuddle and loves to play with his friends Stella and Odin (our friend’s dogs).

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3. I’ve recently had this creative urge and it has been making me want to write again.  It’s the best feeling and I’ve missed it.  I try to embrace it as much as I can as I’ve had an endless bout of writer’s block (I know, you other writers out there are probably shaking your heads right now).  Luckily, it has been slowly subsiding.  So every day I’m looking up writing prompts on Pinterest or old fanfiction I’ve written for some inspiration.  Not to mention I’ve been rereading the Harry Potter series (aka the series that inspired me to write in the first place) since October and I’m finally a third of the way into the Deathly Hallows. I’ve been making notes of the parts that are so interesting to me and how Rowling foreshadows throughout the whole series without us (okay, maybe just me) realizing it.

So with the above being said, I wanted to ask you guys:

1. Do you think fanfiction is dumb?  Do people even still write fanfiction, let alone about Harry Potter?
2. How do you cure your writer’s block?  Do you listen to music, travel, read/watch movies?  I’m interested to see what helps you!
3. To go off my last questions, what type of movies do you watch, books do you read, and music that you listen to?  What’s your favorite place you’ve ever traveled, and how did it inspire you?
4. Have you rescued any animals?  If so, what kind?
5. Is it snowing where you are now, or is it warm and sunny?
6. How have you guys been?  What’s been going on lately?

Short blog today, my friends.  But I look forward to hearing your responses and I’ll be back again soon.

Em