Plotting, Writing...Re-Enacting?

So I am pleased to say that I have been doing some "writerly" things of late. I made a decision to start using my lunch hour to write on the various WIPs I have. A big thanks to those who encouraged me in my last post. I'm still not chomping at the bit to write, but at least I will have some time on a daily basis to put down some words and hopefully get everything finished out. I have been thinking about joining a local writer's group as well. I've wanted to in the past, but I never got around to it. I may need some distraction in the coming weeks as hopefully my husband will be getting back into law enforcement, which means he'll be super busy for 12 weeks for training so I will need to find something to fill my evenings!

I have done some re-plotting for my WIP that just will not die... As you faithful readers will know, A Convenient Misfortune has been with me since high school. I tinker with it every so often but something didn't feel right about it so I shelved it. I couldn't just put it away so I started contemplating moving the story to England (instead of the American Colonies--Charleston (Charles Towne to be exact). It was set during the American Revolution originally, but I've toyed with the idea of moving it back a few years to be set during the Seven Years War (French and Indian War for those of us who are stateside). It could go either way, to be honest. But so far, here is a very dirty version of my back cover blurb:

Arabella Westbury is sailing for England--leaving her broken heart behind in the South Carolina colony. She has nothing to her name save for a few trunks of books, relics of her father's time as minister at St. Michael's Church in Charles Towne, and her memories of a lost love for a planter's son. Her destination is Cornwall and the village she was born into some eighteen years before. Once there she will have to forge a new life as governess to Marianne Bennett, the youngest daughter of a wealthy baron. But it is the Bennett family scion that causes Arabella consternation.

Handsome and reckless, Jackson Bennett is a decorated British Navy captain who comes and goes as he pleases, breaking hearts in his wake. But when he returns home after being wounded in battle, there is a new urgency for him to marry and provide an heir to the vast Bennett family fortune. Arabella is an unlikely candidate but after his secret engagement to a local heiress goes sour, Jackson has no choice. He marries the governess out of convenience and hightails it back to his ship, leaving his new wife completely adrift in a new world of social niceties and betrayals.

When he returns, he will find many surprises, including his abandoned wife's hatred for him. Winning her back is no mean task and the situation is only complicated when a man from Arabella's past arrives in Cornwall. Can he convince his wife that he wants more than a marriage of convenience before he has to leave for the high seas once more?

Interestingly enough, I just made a few of those plot points while I wrote out the blurb. Talk about off the cuff! I keep thinking that the plot is just not complicated enough, so let's what other complications I dream up in the mean time.

Looking very tired, so not the best picture...but you get the idea!

In other news, I just attended my first Revolutionary War re-enactment of the year over the weekend. Well actually it was a living history event and was kind of boring without a battle, but not so boring if you count all the things I have to do in camp. It is times like this that I realize how hard women had it in past times...and I can see why the death rate was so high. Diseases of course, but how about just being plain worn out? You have to keep the fire going, cook, wash up...throw in kids and no wonder it was early to bed, early to rise! Nonetheless, I love history (obviously) and I love to dress up, so re-enacting is an amusing diversion for me, not to mention the best way to research for my novels. Nothing brings you closer to the past than re-enacting it!

So with the new year come and gone, are you keeping your writing resolutions? What do you do to get in touch with your characters?