Tuesday, March 25, 2014

Baking with sour dough


As if I don’t have enough interests to occupy my time and energy I was given a sour dough start by my friend, Nikki.  Read her blog HERE.  I’ve been trying to market my new book, finish my taxes, clean out a few closets, study for my new Sunday School assignment teaching the Old Testament, and write a couple more books. Now I have another hobby to play with!  I’ve used it four times.  The first attempt was sour dough Focaccia Bread that turned out like this! 

Sour Dough Focaccia Bread
Here is a link to the recipe!

Then I made sour dough pancakes.  They are always a hit. I baked a sour dough coffee cake.  I thought I took a photo, but I must have deleted it.   The coffee cake was yummy, too!

When I sent Nikki this photo bragging about my sour dough bread bowls, she replied, “You are on fire!  I haven’t used mine yet.”


Bread bowls I created on my own!
What? I’m wearing myself out in the kitchen out of a sense of duty to make use of the start she gave me and she hasn’t even used hers yet! I bet she will after she reads this post!

Wednesday, March 19, 2014

The marketing roller coaster

Wouldn't it be grand if every great idea simply sold itself?  Better yet, if every fabulous phrase ever penned (Well, we seldom pen anymore.  I call it "plunk out.") found its way to the eyes of a reader and inadvertently to the change in their pocket, writer's would be free to create and plunk out to their hearts' delight!  Unfortunately for us creative types, to fund our habits, we must market.  Creativity and the inspiration that springboards it is best accomplished in quietude. Marketing, on the other hand, involves telephones and messages.  It involves networking, both personal and virtual.  It involves copiers and envelops. It requires busyness.
While visiting with my sister the other day about an upcoming event and the work required to schedule another, she said, "I thought you liked talking to people."
She is correct.  I do like talking to people, even large groups of people.  It's the asking for permission to talk to them that challenges me!
For instance, I have a friend with a lead on a possible event (That's all the detail you get at this juncture). She gave me a phone number and said, "They are expecting your call." I was excited, but I put it off for a little while and when I did call, the contact was not in.  I have to call back!  I am really resisting the urge to see it as a sign that the event will fall through!
I am beginning to understand why so many people hire others to do their marketing.  I can tell you all the great things about a friend's product, but I keep expecting my books to speak for themselves.  I think they do, once they are read, but they don't call to people from a shelf, or the box in my car!
I'm trying some new things - phone calls for one!  I am also going to implement a newsletter for those folks who don't follow my blogs or Facebook. I am going to keep plodding along, because it's the writing (and the talking) that I love!

Friday, March 14, 2014

The work of writing


Ahh, the writing life!
The work of writing is not nearly as glamorous as one might imagine.  There is a lot of cutting and pasting and discarding that goes on and that is just the first draft!  It can get quite messy. If creating were the only aspect of the “work of writing” then there might be more glamour.  Editing can be drudgery and marketing - well, most of us are not very good at it!  Both must be done before the writer can make a profit.  I use the term “profit” loosely!  For me it seems that as I focus on one task, the others get neglected.  I have been attempting to market my new book, Milk Cans and Quilt Blocks, at the expense of my blogs and other writing projects.  When I immerse myself in writing, I don’t sell books!  It’s a vicious cycle, but I love it and so I muddle through!  Here is an overview of some of the projects, both writing and marketing, that I am tackling.


*Two books are completed and available for purchase – Gold Pans and Iron Skillets and Milk Cans and Quilt Blocks. Both are available HERE.

*I have a luncheon date with the Union County Nile Club and a Meet the Author event at The Cove Library. I am attempting to schedule a third event during the same trip.

*Daily I look for new ways to get the word out.  This blog is only one of them!

*I am collaborating on a children’s book with my sister who will be illustrating it.  Watch for more info on this one.  It is going to be fun!

*I am working on a book about the pains of running and the life lessons learned.  I am still mulling over a title.

*I am still sitting on the novel. I am not sure where I want to go with this. Self-publishing may or may not be the answer.
*And lastly, just waiting to be discovered like every other starving talent!
So, if you think I have quit writing, think again!  I am just missing in action while I attend to other things.  Often, those other things are people.  You see, that's why I write.  I have time to do the important things that arise during the day.  As a wise man once counseled, "People are not an interruption of our work.  People are our work."  It was good advice then and it's good advice now.

Happy Reading!