Alexa Adams's Blog, page 2

NaNoWriMo 2022 Winner

Ich bin fertig! 50,677 words. Hallellujah! 

NaNoWriMo 2022 Update

Hello friends! Just a quick post to acknowledge that I am on target, for the first time in three years, to actually complete NaNoWriMo! I'm having a lot of fun with the story and feeling a joy in (and fixation on) writing that has eluded me since the pandemic began. What a relief! Current word count = 34,628. 😅Back to it. Happy Thanksgiving to those celebrating this week. We're doing it up Swiss

NaNoWriMo 2022

So, I'm writing. That's the good news. Not what I planned to write. On the eve of November, new inspiration hit, and instead of working (again) on Tales of Less Pride and Prejudice, I began a sequel to Darcy in Wonderland, the long planned Lizzy through the Looking-glass, premised loosely upon recent events in my eldest child's dynamic development. I'm making steady progress, which is great! The

Hardy Har Har

 [Mrs. Ferrars'] complexion was sallow; and her features small, without beauty, and naturally without expression; but a lucky contraction of the brow had rescued her countenance from the disgrace of insipidity, by giving it the strong characters of pride and ill nature. - Sense and SensibilityHalfway through fall break. Daydreams of writing have failed to materialize into anything tangible, but

That will do extremely well, Mary. You have delighted us long enough.

I am still catching up on processing and sharing thoughts and impressions from our visit to the United States last summer. One episode I was anxious to share involved an activity I have very rarely engaged in: going to church.I am far more familiar with synagogues, having been raised jewish, but I have occasionally attended church services, and not just for funerals and weddings. I like observing

It's October! Crap!

I don't know where September went. All my good intentions for getting back into strong writing habits led me nowhere, and next week is already fall break for my kids. I really want to finish A Mixed-Up Mashup as a Twisted Austen piece (it's conceptually different from the other stories, but totally twisted, so I think it fits), and prep for NaNoWriMo next month, when maybe (maybe!) I might

Simple Gifts Take Two

Mother Ann LeeWe did not get to do much sightseeing while visiting the US this summer. After three years away, we were almost entirely focused on just spending time with family. This makes me kind of sad because my children are unfamiliar with so many places I took for granted growing up, especially being from Philadelphia, so seeped in US history. I was pleased we squeezed in a trip to Baltimore

Simple Gifts: The Shaker Village at Pleasant Hill, KY

Note: this is a repost from my "purged" materials, originally appearing on another blog in early October 2015, shortly before that year's JASNA AGM. I share it again now having recently revisited Pleasant Hill. I will share my updated impressions next week. Please enjoy.Aerial view of Pleasant Hill‘Tis the gift to be simple, ’tis the gift to be freeTis the gift to come down where we ought to be,

Thoughts of Persuasion: Touring the USS Constellation

Amanda Root and Ciarán Hinds in Persuasion, 1995"If you had been a week later at Lisbon, last spring, Frederick, you would have been asked to give a passage to Lady Mary Grierson and her daughters.""Should I? I am glad I was not a week later then."The Admiral abused him for his want of gallantry. He defended himself; though professing that he would never willingly admit any ladies on board a ship

The Most Fabulous, Ugliest Bonnet in the World

Hannah More, NPG, LondonI was in Florence last week. Firenze ... you've changed, but you're still the same. I couldn't visit in the manor I'd truly wished, being subject to the whims and needs of a family party (we were together for the first time since the pandemic began!), but I did indulge myself by rereading A Room with a View while there and with some truly wonderful shopping. Florence has