July 28, 2010

Costume Tips

In this month alone I've dressed in costume for a Costume Ball, a Masquerade, a Murder Mystery Party and a Victorian Photo Shoot. For some of those events, I splurged. For others, I either used stuff that was right in my closet or stuff that I could find super-cheap. Take a look.

What about you? Where do you like to find your costumes?

posted by Deeanne on 07/28/2010 - 4 comments - Post a Comment    RSS FEED

July 15, 2010

Murder, Darling, Murder

I was in Denver this weekend for RomCon. It was a Romance Readers convention and it was an absolute blast. We spent the weekend hanging out with readers and other authors. One of the games we played was Murder, Darling, Murder. It was a murder mystery where five authors were the suspects and the readers had to figure out who was the murderer.

The murder was set in Bigroot, CO during WWII. I played Lilly White (she had a checkered past). At first I figured I'd be able to get into character right away because Lilly White sounds so Southern. But as it ends up, Lilly was of German descent! Jawohl! So I did the best I could. Here's a peek at part of my monologue:

LOL. Everyone was a good sport and I was really impressed with the company that created the mystery. They are Mysteries by Vincent and if you want to do a mystery dinner party, I highly recommend you checking out their website. Because of time constraints, we couldn't set the room up with all the trimmings (where the parlor looked like a parlor and the conservatory looked like a conservatory), but if you did this at home, you could really go all out.

Here's the group of authors (suspects) who played in our game:

From left to right: Keena Kincaid, Cindy Gerard, Brenda Novak, Carolyn Crane, & me.
The above pic is with Samuel Soloman. He was in the next murder mystery game.

I have more pics up on Facebook from not just this game, but from all the fun events we did. Check it out at facebook.com/IWantHerBook.

What about you? Have you ever done a mystery dinner or game before? This one was my first.

posted by Deeanne on 07/15/2010 - 11 comments - Post a Comment    RSS FEED

July 05, 2010

Baby Cardinals Outside My Window

A beautiful cardinal has been frequenting my backyard a lot lately. When my husband spotted a birds' nest right outside my backdoor--I mean right outside my backdoor--we put two-and-two together. The babies had already hatched--there were three of them.

I went on all-systems-alert and quickly spotted the mama cardinal. She's a lovely reddish-taupe color with a bright red beak, red feet and red feathers on the underside of her tail (kind of like wearing a red petticoat). I have a great close-up of her in my scrapbook. While she feeds the babies, the daddy bird flits this way and that being very protective of their territory.

I hate to let the dog outside to do his business, but fortunately he's oblivious to the family with their new little ones. They aren't oblivious to him, though, and after the dog comes back inside, the mama and daddy birds nonchalantly do a fly-by to check on their chicks. When they can't stand it any longer, they fly into the ligustrum bush where the nest is.  

And all is well.

Having them right there is very distracting. I'm constantly running to the window to see what's going on. I took all these photos from inside my house (looking through the backdoor window).

Pretty amazing, isn't it? I can't tell you what a treat it is to watch this young family. I can't wait until the day they learn to fly. I hope I'm not out of town!

I have more pics in my scrapbook. Click on Dee's Circle of Friends logo at the top, then click on the scrapbook.

So, what about you? Have you ever seen nature unfolding before your very eyes? Are you a birdwatcher? Do you know someone who is? Tell me about it! 

posted by Deeanne on 07/05/2010 - 3 comments - Post a Comment    RSS FEED

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