Lauri Meyers .

The Annual Highlights Fiction Contest is coming up! Entries can be up to 800 words and the deadline is 1/31. This year's topic is Holiday . While Christmas & New Years are top of mind right now, I thought a list of other holidays may be great inspiration for everyone, whether entering the contest or looking for a new idea to start the year.   Love this photo of a traditional Midsummer Dance! (By Totte Jonsson via sxc.hu) Nature Holidays: Earth Day, Arbor Day, Groundhog Day, Summer Solstice, Winter Solstice, May Day, Midsummer Day Fun Days: New Year's Eve, St. Patrick's Day, April Fools, Halloween, Festivus (for the rest of us), Talk like a Pirate Day, Chinese New Year, Leap Day Thankful Days : Thanksgiving, Boxing Day Holidays of Love : Valentine's Day, Mother's Day, Father's Day, Children's Day, Grandparents Day, Sweetest Day Religious Holidays : Mardi Gras, Ash Wednesday, Palm Sunday, Passover, Good Friday, Easter, Dyn...

I found a series of writing prompt responses the other day, probably from early high school, lovingly typed on a very large typewriter. I vaguely remember getting a magazine which offered writing prompts or maybe I found a "Learn How to Write" book at the library. Relevant to the season was " Describe a street at Christmas:"       Bright lights line the streets. Sleighbells jingle, hanging from a horse drawn carriage. The horses wear a thin blanket of snow. The driver huddles under his warmest coat.  Little girls in velvet dresses with hands tucked in white muffs flash smiles. The children's red noses clash with the white surroundings. Billows of white breath rise in the chilled air. The sweet smell of baking cookies fills me with warmth, and circles of smoke from Papa's pipe wrap me in comfort. I recognized the staccato poetry I often fall into without thinking and my propensity to respond very literally to the request: describe . I must have b...

Susanna Leonard Hill is hosting a Holiday Contest this week!  To participate: Write a  children's story  about a  Holiday Mishap , mix-up, miscommunication, mistake, or potential disaster, not to exceed 350 words and posted by Friday December 13 th at 11:59 PM EST  Check out the full rules at her site .   Her site has the links to the 700 other entries (plus or minus a few hundred) which are full of holiday cheer and laughs!  Enjoy!     The idea came to me during PiBoIdMo, but the rest of the story had to noodle itself out the past few weeks while I've been shopping, wrapping, cooking and watching the Sound of Music for the 10th time. So on the last day... Here's my 349 word entry:  Christmas Confusion By Lauri Meyers Cries of confusion filled St. Ive's Orphanage on Christmas morning. "This strange sword has a hook on the end," Bobby complained. "This nightgown is big enough for Santa," Maggie w...

It's my birthday today! I was having a deep philosophical conversation with my 3-year-old this morning about how cool it would be if I became a kid again on my birthday.  So when I was asked to play Cootie, I said "No! It's my birthday! And I want to play Cootie AND make puzzles!" (Sidenote: I won Cootie, not that it matters of course...) I followed that with toast with butter and jelly which is a treat because my adult self usually skips the butter.  And I showered! (that really wasn't the kid in me so much as the overworked mom who often neglects to care for herself.) Happy Birthday to me! (Just be thankful I didn't have any Easy Cheese in the pantry.) We walked to kindergarten this morning, because I definitely would have done that when I as little.  I did a happy birthday to me song and dance in the kitchen (does it go without saying that this was a silly dance?) twice, because my daughter said "Again!" and kid me sai...