hesterj

Hi everyone,
I'm actually looking for someone to draw some cover art for my new fanfiction, "Grim Fate." Harry Potter has crossed paths with the X-Men and things are going to get interesting. If you are interested or would like to know more please let me know.
Cheers!
hesterj

Well, life has taken some turns lately.

My grandparents passed away six hours apart from each other. Grandma died on January 2nd and Grandpa died January 3rd. The funny thing my pastor pointed out was that they passed away on the 9th and 10th days of Christmas respectively. That is the Nine Ladies Dancing and the Ten Lords A-leaping days of Christmas. So I have this picture in my head of my much happier, healthier, and younger looking grandparents forgetting all their former earthly troubles and are now kicking up their heels.

I miss them. I miss them something terrible but I'm also glad they are no longer suffering. Grandma's cancer was beyond painful and Grandpa was slowly wasting away with each kidney dialysis session, a shadow of the man he once was.

Grandpa once put fatherly fear into the hearts of all three of his daughters' husbands, he was such a big man. I don't remember him like that. I remember a man who was good with his hands, who built doll houses and painted paintings. I remember a gentle, humble soul, who watched his grandchildren grow up and start having children of their own. I remember a giant of a man, gently holding my newest baby cousin with such joy. But I also knew him as firm but gentle. He received military honors during his burial for his service in the Army. I still have my birdhouse and his painting of dolphins playing in the ocean he painted me one summer for my birthday. (I had a thing for dolphins back then). I remember his stories of our ancestors. Samuel who served in the American Civil War for the Union, the one legged carpenter who built his home from scratch, the gravedigger who lived to be 103 yrs old. So many stories quietly told during visits.

And my Grandma, my Grandma was such a strong woman. She just had a knack of making everything look beautiful, even when there was little money to spare. I remember painting birdhouses that we made with Grandpa with her and playing dress up in her jewelry and clothes. I remember making spaghetti and cookies and her taking us to the library everyday during the summer. She's the reason I fell in love with the library and a big reason why I'm a librarian now. I was recently told that when my mom and her sisters were little they had two sets of neighbors who had very little they were so poor the children and their mothers usually had very little to eat. My Grandmother used to make sure that each family had enough food for dinner every day and gave clothes for the children to wear to school. She probably made quite a bit of the clothes. She was a good woman.

I guess you never really know how much people make you who you are until they are no longer in your life.
I hope they know that we will never forget them. I know I will never forget them.
Grandma, Grandpa, I love you. I hope you rest in peace knowing that.

Hello all,
Just wanted to wish you Merry Christmas, Happy Holidays, and a Happy New Year or if you don't celebrate this time of year may your random Mondays and Tuesdays be happy and enjoyable.
Much has happened this past year, some good, some bad, and some with possible repercussions in the coming new year. But as I'm watching the snow falling outside my window covering the ground in white for the first time this winter, I'm reminded of one very important detail. Despite all intentions, life goes on. Time to forgive old grievances and lay down old feuds.
Time for new starts and wishful thinking.
Here are my 12 hopes for the new year.
12. For continued health for my friends and family as well as for you all here on the interwebs.
11. To stay employed
10. To build at least one snowman before winter is over
9. To get along with my brothers
8. To continue to grow as a person
7. To control my temper
6. To be accepted into the program of my choice to start my Master's Degree
5. To stay a child at heart with the wisdom of adulthood
4. To move into my own house
3. To be there for my family and friends
2. To survive the imminent passing of my grandparents (Grandma is in the last stages of pancreatic cancer and Grandpa wants to quit  
       dialysis once Grandma passes so he can be with her)
1. To remain true to who I am while becoming a better person

I know this sounds a bit depressing but with all that has happened this year, all the tragedies and triumphs, well...it makes me a bit introspective. I hope that you all will remember that violence never solves anything and in the grand scheme of things only the villains and the heroes are remembered in history. The villains with hate and the heroes with fondness. Which will you be in the coming new year?

Well, I have a full time job now working at my local library. I love it. I'm a library assistant and the program coordinator which is a lot of fun. I teach technology classes once a week and am starting up career classes as well. My Teen Tuesdays program is growing which is awesome. My town is terrible about providing stuff for teens to do. That's it for me. Catch ya'll later.

Well, I finished my senior project novella. I got a "B" on it and received Departmental Honors. Sadly, my GPA was a 3.46 instead of a 3.5 so I didn't get University Honors. At this point I'm just glad I graduated. Graduated and got my bachelor's degree in English with a minor in Ethnic Studies. All that is left is to finish the other half of my novella for publishing, get my Master's Degree in Library Sciences, get a second part time job, move out of my parent's house, pay off $60,000 in student loans (I haven't even started graduate school yet. Sigh...why didn't I study in Germany where it is illegal to charge tuition?) write more novels that I might actually get paid for, catch up on my TV shows aka "Castle" and "Bones", travel the world, and visit all fifty states before I die. All in all not a huge list but I'm already going slightly crazy. However, my friends claim I went beyond crazy years ago. That's about it for the updates. Life is going to be really hectic and figuring out how to act like a grown-up after 20 years of schooling is going to be interesting. I really need to figure out how to do my taxes and finances. I hate math. >_< Well that's it from me. Catch you all later. (Not that anyone reads this anyways. ^_^)