doodle tastic

Doodling, I have always been an avid and absent minded doodler. Often scribbling silly little things on my notepad while chatting on the phone or watching TV.

While sitting absently doodling yesterday afternoon while waiting for BT to answer my call, I began to ponder the meaning of doodles and went off to explore online. 

Well suffice to say I found plenty of contradicting meanings, a few all the secrets of doodles revealed if you just buy this and then joy of joys, I had a wonderful ooo a bunny moment. 

I love those ooo a bunny moments, when you go completely off track and find something great, well I say completely of track I was still on the oodles of doodles track, but I hit upon some great books that don't tell you the meaning of doodles but instead encourage you to doodle doodle doodle to your hearts content. 

The first was a doodle diary, a wonderful little book that allows you to doodle away to your hearts content and mark the date of your doodle in a very cute book and even has the added cute feature of little squares in the bottom right hand corner which gives you the chance to create flip books with some practice. 

if you want one you can get it here ...

I want a doodle Diary of my very own

Mine just arrived as I am writing this, oh how I love google prime. 

Then second thing I came across are these great books that actually encourage you to doodle, by giving you starter ideas, like draw a puppet on the strings, and all kinds of other great prompts where they start the drawing off and you add your own touches too it. 

There are loads of these to collect but I got the do you doodle one, as pictured below. 

if you would like one you can get it here...

Hell yeah I want one

You see what tempted me to go for these was one piece of advice I did find about the meanings of doodles, and it was simply this. 

Who cares what they mean, they are fun and they help us to express ourselves, so lets forget what it could mean and instead just savour the fun of doodling and the best thing about doodling, you don't have to be a skilled artist you just let go and have fun. 

So happy doodling people I am off to start doodling on the first page of my doodle diary. 

love and hugs Jossie xxxx

Freedom

It is so easy in life, to take our freedom for granted. For years I did it, without a second thought and it was only when I lost that freedom that I realised what I'd been so lucky to have, for so long. 

You see I used to love to walk and I would go miles and miles with my dog's, over hill's. field's, streams and moors and I never once stopped to think how lucky I was.

But then I had my son an amazing and wonderful thing, that sadly took away my freedom. 

You see my labour with my son was very long 53 hours in total and although I tried to get through it with just gas and air, by the time e got to hour 50 I was exhausted. The midwives had been trying to get me to have an epidural for awhile afraid that I would not have the strength to push when the time came, but I had resisted, hour 50 however, I admitted defeat and the epidural was a heavenly relief, at last I could close my eye's and sleep, something I hadn't been able to do, since the labour started. As I lay there, free from pain, I was oblivious to how those few pain free hours, would result in a lifetime of agonising back pain. 

So now, I can stand for just a few minutes, walking even to the top of my short road is impossible and because I loved to walk, I had never learned to drive and didn't want to. 

For 4 and a half years I became a prisoner in my own home, because of my own body. Only able to get out with my husband at weekends and the odd evening, when he would drive and even then only able to go, where the car could go, there was no getting out and walking around the shops, as we would have before. 

I felt completely alone, lost, trapped and then my son time to start school drew closer and I had no idea how I was going to be able to get him to the bus, it was this and this alone that made me admit that I needed help and I got it. 

The motability scheme has given me back my freedom in the form of a little blue mobility scooter that I have named Speedy McNipster, now I can walk my dogs again, in fact we went ten miles today, I can nip to the shop, collect my son from school, I can escape my home, on my own. I can to a degree be normal, once again. 

In life we take so much for granted, we think that this is how our life will always be, that nothing could ever go wrong, but in the blink of an eye it can all change, I appreciate the freedom I now have, it doesn't come close to how my life used to be, but it is a vast improvement on the 4 and a half years I spent trapped in my own home. 

A mobility scooter, a fairly good one, will set you back over £3000 pounds, then their is insurance, recovery if you break down, a complete must if you can't walk and the cost's of keeping it charged which are actually very reasonable and lastly a regular service, because this after all is replacing your legs, so it needsto be reliable. 

I couldn't have got speedy without the motability scheme, I wouldn't have been able to get my son to school, or be able to take him to the park. 

There are two point's I am trying to make here, the first is that we all must live our lives to the full, be thank full for all we have, and cherish every moment because we never know when things might change and the second, is don't misjudge others, everyday I hear stories of people complaining about those who receive disability living allowance, and obtain cars or mobility scooters through the motability scheme. 

Although there are those who make false claim's, there are hundreds more who genuinely need that service and for those of us who do, it is a life saver, giving us back our freedom. 

take care all and thanks for reading xxx

help gratefully received!

Hello all,
So today, I am appealing for help and advice on a somewhat sensitive matter. That involves my son and his grandmother, my mother-in-law. (Yikes, I know)
So to the problem, I have raised my son to be polite and to have good manners, not to hit or kick people, or throw things at people unless, it is in play and then only if the other person is as into the play as he himself is. So that's pretty straight forward.
However, having recently got my husband talking to his mother again after several years of no contact, due to some terrible things she did in the past, that are kind of irrelevant here, so I won't go into them, we have started to allow Kye to go and stay with her for short periods of time over his half terms. He has now been to stay with her twice and has come back behaving in ways that really aren't acceptable.
For example, the first time he went to stay with her he came back with a very bad habit of throwing things at people. Of constantly interrupting people when they are speaking, of having sulks when you ask him to please wait or to say please and thank you, something he always did without thinking before, and well he is just generally being a little brat.
Being that we have only recently allowed my husbands mother back into our lives, I am a bit nervous of bringing the subject up with her. However, I am feeling less and less inclined to let Kye go and stay with her because of this.
There are so many kids running wild these days I was determined my son wasn't going to be one of them and would learn about respect and manners. It's something that we instilled in him from day one and which till now was just second nature to him. I can't believe how quickly that all comes undone when he stays with his Gran, it isn't like he hasn't been away from home before, he has had countless stays in hospital due to his asthma and with my own mother and it has never changed how he behaves, I just can't understand what she is doing with him that is causing him to act out so badly.
At first I wondered if she was just overly spoiling him, which I figured having missed out on him so long was kind of understandable, but when she started to say that he needed to be toughened up, I started to have my doubts, especially as it seemed she was saying this because he says sorry if he knocks something over, or  drops or breaks something. Again something which to me is just good manners, but which she seems to feel is wimpy.
It's all a bit shocking for me we have only ever had compliments for how  polite Kye is, to be told that politeness makes him wimpy is hard to stomach.
So I guess this is why I am appealing to all you lovely's out there in blog land, what do you think about this and what do you think I should do.
love and hugs
Joss. xx

Ready to begin, I think!

Ok so I am less than enthusiastic about getting started with Campnanowrimo, but I did finish reading the last of the Wolves of Mercy Falls by Maggie Stiefvater books which I very much enjoyed if you haven't given it a go and you liked twilight it might be right up your street I really enjoyed it. So that is one less distraction for me as those books were really keeping me enthralled and it would have been hard for me to pull myself away from the in order to fulfil my Campnanowrimo daily word counts. 
Still though I am very much lacking in motivation so it is very much going to be a case of forcing myself to get going and stay going and what with my constant email checking and 5 year old son home, I get the feeling it may be a long and very tedious day. 
Still I just have to keep telling myself that it will all be worth it in the end. For all those taking part in campnanowrimo this year, I hope you are have a more enthusiastic start than I lol. 

I may have lost my mind

So being the normal, sensible, sane person that I am, I decided on the spur of the moment, just day's before the event itself that I would take part in Campnanowrimo. That would be fine if that was all I was doing this June, but with the new publishing deal on Insane Reno, my child off school for a week  and a selection of books to get through that could fill a small public library, in order to shake my husbands claim that I have an addiciton to buying kindle books. I get the feeling that this might have actually been a very silly idea, even if I did decide to do it for a good reason. ie to finish the prequel to Insane Reno, Annie.
Add to that the fact that I promised myself I would devote more time to my blog and the manic border collie pup, I have to keep entertained, I really do believe I have lost the plot lol.

Still what is life without a challenge right, I mean it's only 50K in a month and I did complete the Nanowrimo 2011 in just 17 days, ok so I had a lot less on then but what the heck right. You never know if you don't try. Sleep however may have to be put on hold for a while.

Is anyone else going to be taking part in campnanowrimo in June? If so good luck and I hope you fair better than I expect too lol.

Insane Reno is going to be published yay!!

So yesterday I gave you all the good news that Insane Reno is going to be published. For the last few day's I have pretty much just been trying to process the fact that I am at last achieving my dream of having a novel published.
It is such a huge thing and something that so often I just didn't feel capable of achieving, yet when I started to send it off to publishers and one agent, I received 3 acceptances and only one rejection. I was amazed, two of acceptances however just did not seem right for me and I finely settled on raven crest books, who has Dave Lyons running it.
I liked Dave from the off, he was very easy to talk to and made me feel instantly at ease, so all round it has been a very good experience.
I'm just having the contract checked out and we are discussing cover design and such so it is all very exciting at the moment.
I have always lacked faith in myself but was very lucky to have a very good support network around me, full of friends and family who had complete faith in me, which really helped so much.
When you book is finished looking for a publisher/ agent can be a very scary thing, but it is so rewarding when everything comes together and you have a publishing contract in front of you.
If you are looking for a publisher right now, or in the process of writing your book, just remember to keep you chin up and never stop trying. I realise I have been incredibly lucky to get so much interest in my book right off, but there are many writers out there, who have had a much harder time of it and still come out the other side smiling. So never give up.
love and hugs all
Joss xxx

no longer dreaming.

I am so happy to tell you that I am no longer dreaming of publication, I now have a publishing contract for Insane Reno. I cannot tell you how amazed and excited I am. I am just so happy, that I do not have words to express it. This is a dream come true for me and I hope that all of you out there still trying to get publish achieve your dreams too.
Never give up, because when it happens it is the most amazing feeling in the world.
((((hugs)))) Jossie