#AlyssAlenko

[heroofshield]

List 5 things that make you happy, then put this in the askbox for the last 10 people who reblogged something from you! get to know your mutuals and followers ♡

In no specific order:

slow rolling thunder during a summer storm

2. when a fanfic I'm following updates

3. I get a comment on a fanfic I wrote

4. spending some time crafting

5. playing my favorite video game

[hawkeykirsah]

URL Music Meme

The lovely @alyssalenko tagged me to spell my username with songs (thank you!). You can find the last time I did this here.

Hallowed Be Thy Name—Iron Maiden Asche zu Asche—Blind Guardian Walk—Pantera Killing In The Name—Rage Against The Machine Egil Saga—Faun Yukon—Lindemann Küss mich—In Extremo Ich will brennen—ASP Ride On—Cruachan Snowblind—Aephanemer Awakening—Unleash The Archers House Of The Rising Sun—The Animals

As usual I’m going with open tags!

[alyssalenko]

Assan yawning. Very important. That is all.

[alyssalenko]

I feel called out...

[swtorsummerexchange]

2024 SWTOR SUMMER EXCHANGE

Welcome to the SWTOR Summer Exchange, where we celebrate the wonderful world and characters of Star Wars: the Old Republic.

Any questions should be sent to this blog or one of the mod team: @commander-krios, @finchmarie or @alyssalenko​​

Exchange Info- AO3 Collection | Tagset | Sign-up Form | FAQ | Exchange Discord

2024 Schedule

Nominations open: June 9th, 2024

Nominations close: June 23rd, 2024

Sign-ups open: June 30th, 2024

Sign-ups close: July 28th, 2024

Assignments go out: July 29-30th, 2024

Works due: September 22nd, 2024

Works revealed: September 29th, 2024

Creators revealed: October 6th, 2024

Minimum Requirements:

- 1000 word piece of fanfiction of a quality you would be happy to receive   OR - a clean lineart drawing, of good resolution, on unlined paper/digital and of a quality you would be happy to receive.

Reminder: This is an all ages exchange so no explicit sexual content is allowed.

[pikapeppa]

Year-End Writer's Roundup: 2024 edition

It’s that time of year, writer friends: time to take stock of what we’ve been up to this year! Tagging to literally ANY AND ALL WRITERS who would like to participate — seriously, if you write and you see this, please take this as an invitation to fill it out! — but I’ll throw down some tags from the top of my head: @contrivedchaos @iamcayc @midnightacrobat @elveny @johaerys-writes @crackinglamb @alyssalenko @vorchagirl @auntie-coagulant @sweetorangepoptart @himluv @mwasaw @varric-tethras-editor and GENUINELY anyone else who wants to join in!

Words written (published or not, WIPs totally count too!!): 882 674. A decrease compared to previous years, but there is a good reason for this (even though I need to keep reminding myself that it’s a good thing) — more details below.

Smut scenes: 44 — similar to the past few years.

New things I tried:

I wrote a fully-fledged poly ship for the first time with Halsin, Astarion and my Tav, complete with feelings and all! I’ve written sexual-only threesomes/moresomes before, but this is the first time I’ve had there be actual romance as well as sex. 

Significant M/M sexy time, including anal sex. I probably won’t write anal sex again for personal reasons, but I’m glad I dabbled at least.

I wrote something that I do not intend to post publicly, purely just for me. More on this later.

Fic I spent the most time on: 

My Astarion/Tav fic, just based on sheer number of words alone.

Fic I spent the least time on:

My Zoro/Reader fic, Relentless. These three chapters came together (HUEHUE) so quickly based on the sheer force of Zoro thirst. NOTHING LIKE THAT THREE-SWORD STYLE TO GET US WANTING HIS FOURTH SWORD 🤣

Favourite thing I wrote: 

This is tough this year aaaaaaaa. The Teia/Viago fic was one that I’d been wanting to write since 2020, and I’m grateful to the Veilguard hype for resparking that flame and making it happen. I LOVED writing all of my Halsin smut because Halsin just makes me SO CRAZY (I genuinely think he might be the one singular videogame boyfriend I’ve felt the most feral about). My Rolan/Tav fic felt like it was born from a very bright spark of inspiration, and I had a fun few weeks just blasting through writing that. 

But my #1 fave thing to write might have been the One Piece Sanji/OC fic that I am not planning to publish. Not publishing means there’s been no pressure to “make it good” or to figure out every detail of timelines/lore/OC backstory etc, so I can just do whatever I want. And that freedom to just make the fic mine, for me, has been really valuable this year. 

Favourite thing I read: 

Oh fuck, I read basically nothing this year HAHAHA. But I did read this one Sanji/Nico Robin smutfic that I REALLY loved. And I absolutely devoured a novel by one of my fave authors (Grown Ups by Marian Keyes) during our mini-vacay to Florida in February.

Writing goals for next year: 

My only goal for the coming year is this: to write only what I really WANT to write.

This probably sounds obvious, but it’s a whole thing that’s tied up with expectations of myself and self-worth and blah blah blah, so the rest of this post will be a bit of a personal essay that you can feel free to pass on HAHA.

I started therapy last year, and I’m in the part of my “therapy journey” now where one of the things I’m working through is the fact that I hold unhealthily high expectations of myself in basically every realm of my life. I force myself to suppress/compartmentalize/ignore my own feelings because I prioritize other people’s feelings over my own, and I spend a lot of my time focusing on things that I think I “should” be doing, at the expense of my own comfort levels/needs/physical or mental health etc. (ELDEST SISTER SYNDROME ANYONE?) And unfortunately, over the years, this way of operating has insidiously snuck its way into my writing.

When I first started writing fanfic in 2017, the writing was entirely born from an overwhelming desire to just get out this story in my head and make it a reality. I started writing for no other reason than because I wanted to. But as time went on and I gained a lovely following of readers, I started prioritizing my readers’ desires over my own. In particular, I’ve gotten too caught up by the idea of being That Writer™ who posts frequently and who finishes her fics: two qualities that I have often been praised for. This led to a habit of sticking to very strict schedules of always posting at least one chapter of something every single week — and if I was working on more than one fic, I would pressure myself to post a chapter of each fic every week. I would pressure myself to do this even when my back pain and migraines started flaring up in 2020, because I did not want to disappoint my readers.

To be clear: all of this was pressure coming from myself. Nobody was telling me I need to post every week or that I need to finish everything I write; I was the one holding myself to these insane standards. But for years, I’ve been able to meet these standards, and it hasn’t been a problem — or so I thought.

Then this year happened. Therapy stuff happened and health stuff got worse, and for the first time ever, I started having days where I just could not make myself write. I would sit at the computer for hours, unable to conjure any words. For some of my fics, this meant weeks or even months between updates. Sometimes when the words finally came, the writing felt like a struggle or a chore rather than an act of love, because I was doing something that I felt like I had to do rather than something I really wanted.

This has been absolute fucking torture for me. I felt so shitty about myself for not being able to do the one thing that I legitimately love doing the most in the world. This was especially distressing because I have given writing advice before stating that when you’re writing a long fic, you sometimes have to write shit you don’t want to write before you can get to the good stuff. And the fact that I’m struggling to do this now has left me feeling like a hypocrite and a failure for not being able to follow my own advice. 

To make things worse, some of the fandoms I’ve been writing for have been… unresponsive. The ratio of hits to actual comments has been pretty abysmal. The lack of engagement and encouragement just added onto the feelings of shittiness and inadequacy, as though I was failing to meet readers’ expectations somehow, and I can’t lie: it was part of why I stopped writing for one fandom this year, and I’ve never felt so bitter about finishing any fics as I did with a couple of the fics I wrapped up this year.

With time, a lot of tears and self-castigation, and ongoing therapy sessions, I’ve slowwwwwly realized that I am being unkind to myself by holding myself to such high expectations, and that I need to actively combat these expectations by refocusing on writing things that I want to write rather than worrying about disappointing my readers. I’m also working on writing only when I want to and when I feel good, i.e. not forcing myself to write when my head is throbbing or when I’m in too much pain to sit in my office chair. 

To this end, I have been writing some One Piece fic that I have no plans to post publicly: fic that is entirely self-indulgent fun. And it’s actually been the best exercise in returning to the hedonistic selfish joy of writing what I want, which is why I started doing this in the first place. Moving forward, I’m going to keep working on writing for myself first and foremost. I’ll strive to write what only what really sparks joy for me, and if that means my word count keep dropping year after year, I will try to remind myself that this is a good and healthy thing, since any words that I write should be a gift to myself first and foremost. 

[vorchagirl]

First Line Challenge

Rules: post the first line of your wip, the first line you worked on today, or any other “first line!”

Thanks to @hazelestelle for the tag! I'll tag @alyssalenko @silurisanguine @woundedsoul12 @seigephoenix @badwolf626 @amarmeme @bioware-bard @sarpndo @heroofshield @vela-ad-astra @wilvarin-chan @acciokaidanalenko @blueteaparty @ashenlavellan

This is the first line I wrote today:

Rook raised an eyebrow and curled a hand around the Crow's arm - as much a signal for him to ease off his weapon, as to show Ashur where her alliances now lay.

[alyssalenko]

Aw thank you for thinking of me, @thefrostyshepard. It's been kind of a rough day and this made me smile. I will pay it forward to @starsandskies @pikapeppa @schoute @vorchagirl @naromoreau @cipherninethousand @foofyschmoofer ❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️

(Sorry for tagging you guys twice. I had to delete the original reblog because it was kind of screwy)

Send to 10 other bloggers you think are wonderful. Keep this going to make someone smile. 💚 (no pressure)

Thanks moth!

@foxgirlwizard @stellathebracer ah fuck it @nebulaaaaaa you @mothheart (she needs it) @nuttybutseriousetash and everybody else in my Outpost (not the travelers one) @caprindo @sand-cat-void-vibes @taxfraudcatboy and @daniel-nerd

Please keep this chain going!

[hazelestelle]

This quiz is so cute!! @mmso-notlikethat kind of tagged me <3

The result is so lovely <3

But it's hilarious that pumpkin spice latte is my perfect match, because I think it's disgusting lol (But if you are one, hmu and we'll figure something out? XD)

Tagging @occhi-verdi-come-il-mare @spacerhapsody @larkawolfgirl @apiratefellinlovewithastar @onewhositswiththeturtles @septemberrie @vorchagirl @alyssalenko if you want :)

[alyssalenko]

I'd like to just take a moment to appreciate Emmrich's deer-in-the-headlights look when he realized what Rook said.

Just *ohmygodsheisthinkingaboutkids.* *kidswithme* *ohmygodit'shappening* *I neverthoughtthismomentwouldcome* *ohmygodohmygodohmygod* *sweats*

[forlornmelody]

OC Sense Aesthetic

Tagged by @alyssalenko. Thanks, luv!

Tagging: @naromoreau and @celestialcrowley

This is Clone Shep. Aka Jane Doe

Art by the lovely @tamarsart

SIGHT. ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)

small towns. big cities. six thirty curfews. lights that take the place of stars. blanket nests. light through the blinds as a wake up call. found family. finding a single star in the middle of new york city. window shopping. watching something terrible and enjoying it. growing numb to the sight of injustice. wilted flowers. faded caricatures. bright, bold colours

HEARING.

crickets and lightning bugs. car engines and a / c units. a phone call to mum / dad. laughing with friends. jokes that are so bad you have to laugh. the clicking of computer keys. noise cancelling headphones. the sound of silence. muffled music from another room. drumming fingertips on a table. clicking of pens. listening to a clock and swearing the ticks get slower. ringing in the ears. the voice of someone you love. pitch shifted songs.

TOUCH.

being held close during a long night. fleeting reassurances. holding hands when you’re scared. brushing fingers through strands of hair. freshly dried clothes. bruises on your knuckles. silk and satin. your favourite pet’s fur or feather. wringing your hands anxiously. snuggles. comforters in the dead of winter. nails against skin. cold metal. leather in summer.

TASTE.

coffee in the morning. tea in the evening. bubblegum that lost its flavor. alcohol burning the back of your throat. homemade cooking, no matter what’s made. blood in your mouth. stale air. mint. fresh vegetables. that processed taste of citrus candy. the first meal you cook by yourself that tastes good. foreign sweets. fast food. bittersweet. sour. spicy. sweet. bitter. too much salt on fries

[alyssalenko]

Thanks for the tag @hazelestelle! I have done this once before here but I changed my cat <3. They're just so cute! I will tag @sorchacahill @forlornmelody @foofyschmoofer @illusivesoul @catherea and anyone else who wants to play!

KITTY LOAF PICREW

np tagging @moronappreciator ofc, @kaleidoscopexsighs @veryinnovative @itsjaywalkers @rottin6 @plecotusauritus @kaaaaaaarf @casstration @divinerapturee @214lilacsky @sixlane <3

[minilev]

WIP -day

tagged by @simplegenius042 (thank you!)

torturing myself knowing very well that i can't and won't watch Saw movies🤡

tagging @teamhawkeye @starsandskies @alyssalenko @cryptcombat @red-nightskies @partialvolume @quietpainter @fadedjacket @beemot @xbaebsae @sidver @lobanhart @nightwingshero @radiojamming @vasiktomis @veinereastath @pebsterino @lavared and y'all

[kittynomsdeplume]

First Line Challenge

Thanks for the tag @sweetjulieapples

I will share the first line from the second chapter of the Rookanis fic I have been working on since mid 2024. It's made quite difficult to write, seeing as how I have not played Veilguard yet!

Most of my inspiration came from the Wigmaker Job, which remains such a good introduction for Lucanis.

“Blighted Venatori,” Rook grumbled, breaking the companionable silence that had fallen over them as they trekked through the gloom.

Tagging: @knuttydraws | @inky-does-art | @blackwallmancer | @alyssalenko | @vela-ad-astra | @spicywarl0ck | @lucien-lachance

[spacevixen2024]

Thank you @cat-in-a-tesseract @mcgeeki and @average-mako-enjoyer for the tags!!!

No pressure forwarding.

Get to know your mutuals Answer the questions then send this to your mutuals (at least 3)

1) What should we call you?

2) How tall are you?

3) What's your least favourite color?

4) How would you describe your clothing style?

5) Have you ever dyed your hair? And what color?

6) What is the worst film or tv series you've recently watched?

7) What film are you most looking forward to this upcoming year?

8) Name a fandom you are no longer part of and why?

9) What's your favourite animal from the country you live in?

10) What's something you're looking forward to?

Vixen

2. I am 5'7"

3. Probably red

4. I wouldn't say I had a style, I just wear whatever is comfortable. I'm not fashion forward unless it's for work.

5. Black, Red, Purple, Several Shades of Brown, Blue. I stopped dying it two years ago.

6. Dear Santa with Jack Black...like damn...it was awful.

7. the new Fantastic Four, people are sceptical but it can't be as bad as the reboot.

8. Star Trek as it just got way too toxic. If you don't like what everyone else likes then you get threats of SA from salty fanboys. I still love my Trek but I do it quietly.

9. Fox. We don't really have many native animals that aren't rats or pigeons.

10. What the new year has in store. Probably lame, but this has been the first year I have been well enough to work from start to finish and therefore do things that I was unable to do previously.

Tags with no pressure:

@alyssalenko @vorchagirl @n7chaoticbiotic @reallyquitestrange

[alyssalenko]

This is so cute! Thank you for the tag @heroofshield!

Apple Spice, reese's peanut butter cups, silk, hedge maze, my sister, cerulean, and wind chimes.

@vorchagirl @minilev @spacebunshep @hazelestelle @wickedwitchofthewilds @starsandskies @foofyschmoofer @hunnybadgerv @pikapeppa @schoute @charlatron

it's wholesome tag game time let's list the things that make us happy

pick a smell, a food, a texture, a place, a person, a color, and a sound then tag some blogs that make you happy too <3

here's mine: lavender, cheese, fluffy blankets, the waterfall, my little cousin, sunshine yellow, crashing waves

tagging: @faenarie, @avid-idiot, @inariezaki, @levithesewerrat, @urgemii, @truegoist, @junko-en0shima + anyone else !!