Ringing in the year!

Ring in the New Year!

 

 

Here is to another year behind us and one of promises ahead!  I’m going to ring in the New Year at home, grateful for all the things with which I have been blessed. I plan to make some changes in the coming year.  They will be subtle, I am sure! I plan to continue to strive to take care of my health, so long as that effort is enjoyable.  After all, I do believe in moderation! I want to better tend to family relationships – just because. I am still defining my spiritual goals, but I am pretty sure they will have something to do with diligence and scripture study. I hope to publish more and sell more, mostly because I want to share what I write and because the best part about being an author is the positive feedback from readers!

Today, I celebrate New Year’s Eve because it marks a special anniversary for me.  I met my husband on New Year’s Eve.  Driven to traverse the Southern Idaho winter wilderness on this day 29 years ago, I met him at a social event – one I swore was never the place I went to meet someone special, rather to commune with friends I already knew.  One of those friends happened to introduce us that evening and it has been an adventure ever since!

Happy New Year to you all!



I did it! Just waiting on the review.

There is always so much to do!  I am grateful for the opportunities I have to pursue worthy goals.  Sometimes the prioritizing is what is difficult.  I have long been self-employed.  This has been a great blessing in my life as it has allowed me the flexibility to stay home and parent, participate in my children’s school activities and life pursuits, and go to lunch whenever my husband invites me.  The things that have been the most appealing about self-employment are the very things that can be the most frustrating.  Flexibility, or in my case, the ability to rearrange my schedule and put off those things that are good or necessary for those things that are better or more satisfying, has often allowed me to overschedule and delay some necessary things – like exercise and toilet cleaning!

Here is the good news!  Today I finished editing the second edition of Gold Pans and Iron Skillets and submitted it for self-publication.  Whew!  This book has proven a learning experience once again.  “Why a second edition?” One might ask. The reasons are plenty.

§  I am out of printed copies of the first edition.

§  I want to try my hand at self-publishing and a book I am familiar with is a good start.

§  I hope to sell more copies of Gold Pans as I build momentum for Milk Cans and Quilt Blocks.

§  I didn’t want to mess up Milk Cans on my first attempt at self-publishing.

§  And finally, the new cover design will be a better companion to the Milk Cans cover.

The best part?  It isn’t 2014 – yet!

I feel almost as good as if I were here!

Writing makes me crazy

Writing is for introverts.  Publishing is for perfectionists.  Marketing is for extroverts.  Either I really do need to have multiple personalities, or this process is going to expand my talents to a degree that not even I can stand myself.

Okay, that may be an exaggeration, but I have determined that the business of writing/publishing/selling is not for wimps.  Writers create in private and then expose their “babies” to the public with an invitation to validate, tear down, or simply ignore their beautiful gift.  Crazy?  Maybe.  How are we going to get rid of all those voices bouncing around inside our heads if we don’t write them down and share them?

The trouble with writing the voices down is that it truly makes room for more voices.  The more I write – the more I think of to write.  When I don’t write, I have fewer voices, but they are nagging and accusatory. 

Something Soothing

I wonder if writing makes me crazy, or if I write because I am crazy?  No … I think I write because I have so many brilliant ideas it would be a crime not to share them.  That’s it!  Writing makes me brilliant.  It’s the publishing and marketing that makes me crazy!

What talents do you have that you feel increase as you exercise them?