Hello from cold and snowy Long Island!

The weather sure is wacky these days. When the weather is bad, I usually spend that time writing like mad, but lately, the writing hasn't been going well and even all the time from this awful weather isn't helping.

I'm working on a new YA novel, a rom-com called The Christmas Strike. What's a girl to do when her extremely competitive parents lose their minds each year over the town's Holiday Spirit Award and forget her birthday, which also happens to be Christmas? Strike against Christmas, of course. Elle's plan would have worked, too, if her brother hadn't brought Quinn Grant home for their mid-semester break.

I've been having fun writing this story but could use some help, if you're so inclined. I have a family dinner scene at the end of this story. Present are Elle, her parents, her siblings (two are younger (8 and 9) and one is older (19)), Quinn, and -- *cue ominous music* Quinn's girlfriend. Elle is falling hard for Quinn so learning about this girl is breaking her heart, but this scene needs to be funny, awkward, and somehow, competitive.

If you have embarrassing, funny, awkward, uncomfortable moments from around the dinner table, I'd love to hear them. Who knows? I could end up using it in the story.

Here's a scene from The Christmas Strike:

THE AROMAS OF VANILLA, SUGAR, and gingerbread assaulted me the second I stepped into the house and my heart sank.

Mom was baking.

I said a bad word under my breath as the chill skated down my spine. This was bad — very, very bad. Mom was baking. Once the Christmas twinkle appeared in my mother’s eye, nothing else mattered — up to and including my birthday, a fact made painfully aware to me every year since the town began the Holiday Spirit Awards.

This was not a drill — we were now at Elf-Con 3 and the situation was looking worse with every minute.

Slowly, I headed for the kitchen, stopping just outside the door when I heard my parents on the phone. The kitchen had been transformed into a factory. She had pans lined up, mixers standing ready, ingredients arranged. She was currently separating eggs and dropping the whites into a bowl.

“Ricky, honey, I’m not sure about this. I mean, we did promise.” That was Dad, his voice tinny on the speakerphone.

“Kevin, it’ll be fine. Noelle will understand. We’ll make it up to her. We’ll do a huge catered birthday party. She’ll love that,” Mom countered.

No.

I would hate that.

I only wanted a day at the museum with a couple of friends and maybe a nice dinner out someplace. Low key. That was me in a two words or less.

“…and I thought we’d put a new tree in that room, one he might like to trim himself,” she was saying.

“Okay, I’ll bring home a small tree. What else?”

“Well, Nick says Quinn’s never really had a family Christmas. As soon as I heard that, I checked the rules and learned Quinn is allowed to participate as a member of our family, because he’ll be with us for longer than three days, so could you bring home more flour and sugar for the gingerbread contest and eggs? Oh! And extra tape for the gift-wrap contest.”

“Done. Bye, honey.”

She pressed the end button on the phone and flipped on the mixer.

Tears stung again.

My mother’s promises were like the egg whites she was currently whipping into frothy meringue — filled with air.

I stepped into view and waited for her to notice me.

She wore an ugly Christmas sweater covered by a red apron trimmed in white. Little red bells jingled from her ears. Two trays of lasagna waited their turn in the oven. Cooling racks holding dozens of cookies waited on the long oak table like troops about to be inspected. On the counter, she fitted blades into a handheld mixer to whip buttercream while the meringue was going.

Mom’s dark hair was pinned up and streaked with flour. She measured cream of tartar into the stand mixer while operating the hand-held mixer with the other hand and finally caught sight of me gaping in the doorway.

“Noelle, good. You’re home. Start doing those dishes. I’m incredibly behind schedule and need to figure out dinner so we can get straight to decorating the sugar cookies as soon as we finish eating. The cookie contest is in two days so there will be plenty of time for do-overs.”

Dinner? Decorating? Do-overs?

No. No. No!

I swallowed hard. “There are two whole trays of lasagna right there.”

She flicked an impatient glance my way. “The lasagna is for Christmas week, not tonight.”

I didn’t know why but I still couldn’t believe what I heard. I mean, I had enough evidence in hand. Maybe there was still enough of the child in me who still believed in Santa who said, “You said we’d skip the contests this year and have a nice relaxing holiday for once.”

I flicked the power off for the stand mixer so I could hear her. She gave me a sharp look.

“Yes, yes, I know,” she waved a hand. “That was before Nick asked if he could bring home his roommate. Now that Quinn will be spending the break with us, I wanted to make sure Christmas is special for him.”

Special for him?

That was so nice, but what about me?

“Mom, we planned the museum outing weeks ago and—“

“Oh, the museum.” She wiped her hands on her apron and grabbed the calendar from its home on the refrigerator door. “The 26th won’t work, because that’s the day of the Christmas Lights Walk. You can’t go on the 25th, obviously, and the 24th is out because we have Christmas Eve festivities. The 23rd could work if it’s before three o’clock…”

The pang in my chest felt like my heart cracked down the center. “You promised we’d—”

She flicked the hand held mixer on.

I dug deep for the fury I felt and found it lurking just under that pang of disappointment. I grabbed the bag of flour just as Mom reached for it. I’d meant to toss the whole damn sack into the trash. Yeah, I know it was childish and immature, but desperate times/desperate measures and all that.

That’s when Nick walked in followed by someone…well, tall.

That’s all I could tell you about his roommate.

The rest of him was obscured by the cloud formed by half the damn sack of flour I’d somehow squeezed all over him.

Oh, boy. This was bad. This was very, very bad. 

Patty