My Favorite Things Tag!

I was tagged by Jesseca Dawn from Whimsical Writings for “My Favorite Things” tag! So excited! Thanks Jesseca for tagging me. ☺

So here are the rules:

Write down ten of your favorite things

Tag at least 3 people

Well simple enough, so let’s get started! I’m going to steal Jesseca’s line and make it obvious that my family, my friends, church, and Christ are of course on this list too but those are the obvious. ☺ So these are the less (or perhaps very obvious) things on my list.

1. Writing

Some stories on my drive. Hmmm I think I see some Mornelly stories in there... ;)

Ahhhh I could not LIVE without my writing. Writing is my life, my way of dealing with things. I write every day, be it journaling, stories, blogging, emails, etc. A day doesn’t go by that I don’t write something down. I started writing seriously when I was twelve and have written over eight books since then, not to mention the numerous short stories and drabbles. I think I counted my word count for last year in my projects and it was something like 400,000 words or so. For the last year. It was a lot. ☺

2. По Русски (Russian)

I got a Russian keyboard recently on my tablet and LOVE it. I was looking up a song with it. B-)

Russian is one of my favorite subjects, right up there with writing. I took a six week Russian class and I loved it! Oh and I passed the last class, I was so happy! Complicated and hard (plus I seem to be the only one who wasn’t already bilingual in the class), but sooo much fun. I enjoy the class immensely and I’m excited to try my new Russian skills on our customers at work. Our teacher was wonderful and she gave us lots of homework, which is great because I got to learn more. ☺ You can watch a video of myself practicing my Russian with Bodie here: LINK

Needless to say Bodie isn’t very helpful when I’m practicing. ;) 

3. Work

The farm I work at. Augghhh I love my work!

No list of my favorite things is complete without my work. I love my job and bosses. Currently we’re not in fruit season but it’s getting close, we’re about a month out until cherries. So far this Spring I’ve helped thin the peach trees, plant and fertilize Christmas trees, chop up tree branches, spread bark, weed and paint a wagon. We started thinning apple trees this week.

I love working on the farm and my bosses are the best bosses anyone could ever ask for. They are kind, thoughtful and caring, plus a ton of fun to work with. There’s never a dull moment at the farm, and when fruit season begins we’ll be back to the you-pick activities. The customers are wonderful and so much fun! ☺

You can see what sort of fun I get into by watching this video at the link here: LINK

Yes I may have been experimenting with videos lately. ;)

4. Books

My book collection. Hmmm some of those books may look familiar to some authors... ;)

Augghhh, books. I love books. I have so many books I love, so many that inspired me. I love to browse the thrift store for new finds, things I may have never read otherwise. Books are a huge part of my life and a big part of the reason I write. I used to read things and wish for a different outcome, so I’d make up my own ending and add things I thought would make the story better. My favorite books in my collection are:

A Rose for Sergei

Agent 146: A Nazi Spy in America

My Secret War

My Father’s World

Daughter of Grace

They Came to Destroy America

I don’t like espionage stories or anything. ;)

5. Washington State

Gazing on the prairie with my favorite boy. <3

I adore my home. I adore my area, my neighbors, fellow Eastern Washingtonians, etc. I am so blessed to live here in this area, I cannot even begin to express the loyalty I possess for this state. Not only do we have the privilege of having such beautiful scenery, but the people in Eastern Washington (and yes there are those in Western Washington that are wonderful too, like the Eddys and Megs, Kai, Tiff and my relatives. ;D) are kind and laid back and nothing compares to our expansive geography! Washington is the only state in the whole world you can visit a rain forest, the ocean, the mountains, scablands, prairies, desert and Palouse all in the same area. There is no where on earth quite like Washington. Though I must say, Eastern Washington tops all the rest of the state off. ;) It’s the best in my eyes.

6. Geography, History, Cultures

What happens when I play Legos with little sister R. I make flags. ;) From right to left- Denmark, Ukraine and Sweden. I took a little liberty in making Denmark because there were no white bricks for the cross.

I am a major geography, history and cultural nut. I could read textbooks on any of the above subjects for hours. One of my favorite things to do is study geography and topography of Europe, particularly Nordic and Eastern Europe. History and cultural differences go hand in hand with geography, so you’ll often find books on such topics strewn all over my desk. There is so much to discover about the world and I want to understand how other countries work, what their land is like, what their history is and most importantly, how I can make friends with their people. ;) Some of the most interesting facts I’ve learned in the last year from reading guidebooks:

Denmark, Norway and Sweden are the Viking countries.

Scandinavia is a loose term meaning Denmark, Norway, and Sweden. It does not include Finland and Iceland, though most people assume it does. The actual Scandinavian peninsula, though, encompasses Finland, Norway and Sweden and Denmark falls out of it. So the proper terms for these countries would be this:

Nordic Countries = Denmark, Iceland, Norway, Sweden, Finland

Fenoscandia = Finland, Norway, Sweden

Scandinavia: Denmark, Norway, Sweden

Estonia and Scotland both have shown interest/applied to join the Nordics. While the Nordic countries expressed interest in Scotland, they’ve rejected Estonia as part of their group. Who knows why. ;)

The Slavic countries are literally countries that host Slavics and Slavic languages. They include the Eastern Slavics: Russia, Ukraine, Belarus, the Western Slavics: Poland, Czech Republic, Slovakia, and the Southern Slavics: Slovenia, Croatia, Serbia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Monenegro, Macedonia and Bulgaria.

There are sooo many things I’ve learned recently that I can’t even begin to cover. This is one of my favorite topics ever.

7. Jokes

This. Bwahahahahaha! :D

I am a big, big time prankster and joke teller. I love jokes and funny things, particularly when it is about politics. Yes, yes, I do like political jokes, but not jokes that make fun of one party per say, more like jokes that make fun of everyone. ;) World political jokes are my favorite, I love those! Thanks to my family’s heritage (Irish-Mexican-Swedish-Norwegian-American), I’d have to say I’m in favor of all sort of nationality jokes so long as they’re not really racist. After all, you’ve got to have fun and make fun of yourself, right? So most of the jokes I know are Swedish and Norwegian jokes.

How do you sink a Norwegian submarine?

You send a scuba-diver down to knock on the door.

How do Swedes entertain themselves at birthday parties?

One Swede goes into a box and the others try to guess who’s in it.

Why don’t Danes play hide and seek?

No one wants to find them.

And of course you can’t forget puns!

In Soviet Russia, comedy is easy because you have captive audience.

In America you go to party, but in Soviet Russia party comes to you!

Don't mess with the Finnish, or they will Finish you!

8. Pets

So this happened... Ebony was in my drawer.

We love our animals! My favorites are of course my horse, Bodie, and my chickens. I adore my horse and chickens. We also are blessed to own three (and a half) cats, Whitney, Muffin, Ebony. Alexandr is our stray kitty and our “half” cat. Also at the McConells resides a chinchilla named Lilo. A cute fluff ball but very sassy and somewhat a brat. She’s pretty adorable though. Our animals are all well loved and all of them know one trick or another. The chickens come when called and are trained to follow me. Twinkie, one of my hens, sits on my shoulder and clucks on command. Our cat Whitney signs please when she wants something, Ebony jumps into our arms, Muffin… well Muffin is sweet. She’s lazy so she doesn’t do tricks. ;) She can meow hello, though, when she feels like it. My sister’s horse, Mia, knows a ton of tricks from spinning to jumping on command to even stretching like a cat. Bodie knows how to paw on command and back up when I pull his tail, as well as stretch. We have tons of fun with our animals and they’re all a part of our family.

9. Key Chains

I made these keychains to celebrate our family's nationalities. From right to left- Sweden (Sveirge), Norway (Norge), Ireland (Eire), Mexico (Mexico.). I am too lazy to put the accent marks on the description here right now over Mexico and Ireland. ;)

Number nine finds us at one of my favorite crafts—making key chains. Key chains are very easy to make and are wonderful gifts. I started doing this about a month ago and so far it’s gone really well. I need to order some more to start selling them, and my bosses offered I could sell my key chains in their shop. They are mostly fun little images with flags or quotes, though I plan to make some nature ones and Bible verse key chains as well. They’re relatively cheap to make and so much fun to put together. The hardest part is making the designs on the computer, but even that gets easy after you figure out what to do.

10. Pinterest

Hmm what are these? Are they... SECRET MORNELLY BOARDS? Yes they are! Sometime I'll post a public one when I'm far enough along to do so. ;)

Last but not least, we have my ultimate procrastinating tool on the list. Pinterest. *Scary music plays* I love pinterest wayyyy too much. You’re more likely to find me on that than any other social media website. I love looking at pictures and making boards for my stories. Not only do I have my several public boards but I have a huge list of secret ones full of not-released stories and private plot ideas. All my Mornelly boards are private because otherwise I felt like it would give a lot of the stories away. ;) One of these days I will make a public one, but this is not that day! Pinterest is my favorite writer’s inspiration tool and my greatest distraction from writing. It’s a gift—and a curse. ;)

So there’s my favorite things, folks! Whew that was a really, really long list. Hopefully I didn’t bore you. I hereby tag:

Rose French

Emily Miller

For the next round! Wahahaha! Not three but hey, I think everyone else got tagged. Tag yourself if you wish, in case you didn't get tagged! :D

Thank you so much for reading and God bless! Hope your weekend is beautiful and full of adventures!