The Last Lily

I hauled the weeds down to the curb this evening once the backyard got shady and noticed the last flower on the Stargazer Lily. It's facing the neighbor's backyard so I had to creep around the fence to take its picture. I wish I had smell-o-vision because the fragrance is intoxicating.

One of the Downy Woodpeckers was back today helping to peck away at the suet pellets. I'm amazed at the dingy coloring of these fledglings. They don't have the high-contrast black and white of the adult Downies.

In keeping with my drawings of the last two days I used the cover illustrations on 20 Ways to Draw a Jellyfish as my examples today. I'm most pleased with the way the jellyfish, the crab, and the seahorse turned out but none of it displeases me.

Today was the monthly lunch of the St. Agnes Class of '65. We went to a sports bar and I had a burger and tater tots. Because I ate every morsel of it I skipped supper but since I was still pretty full from lunch that wasn't a hardship.

I just got a message from Book Publishing Solutions offering a 6-month or 12-month marketing plan. It all sounds very interesting but also very expensive even though he hasn't given me any numbers. I'm eager to get more chapters to review but suspect that I'll be getting more upselling "opportunities" before that happens. Oh well.

I got to be transportation for LC and OJ this afternoon. DS got a late start brewing so he asked me if I'd pick up the kids and bring them to the brewery. Of course I would. It's always good to see the kids even if it's just for a few minutes.

--Barbara

Now You See Them

I have some very enthusiastic weeds growing up on top of the retaining wall. They're so enthusiastic that I finally had enough, got out my gloves, snips, and a lopper, and went out to do something about them. It's been pretty hot and humid lately so I procrastinated about going out there to tackle the job but it was cooler today so I went and did it. Or did most of it. Here's what the area looked like before I started.

And this is what it looked like when I was done. The Black-eyed Susans were a little stunned by the sudden sunshine and wilted a little but I put on the soaker hose, gave them a nice long drink, and hope that they'll perk up by morning.

I turned to the next page of Seuss-isms and found this... creature with a topknot with a creature nesting in his topknot with a creature nesting in his topknot with a creature nesting in his topknot. The picture had another layer but I ran out of room on the page.

Then I had so much fun drawing little pictures yesterday that I thought I'd try it again. These are from the cover of 20 Ways to Draw a Tree. They're not as small as yesterday's pictures were but they were just as much fun to draw.

Late this afternoon a Cardinal landed on a crook and before I got the camera up he'd moved down to the ground. It's a good thing because there were Mourning Doves in the platform feeder off and on today so I'm guessing that the seeds there are pretty scarce.

I didn't do any writing today. Instead I added "romance" back into my categories and keywords after a week of few Impressions, no clicks, and no sales, talked to DD, then talked to cda, then I made a new Amazon Ad. Oh! I almost forgot. When I was researching books to use to harvest keywords from I put "mature love after loss" into the search bar and all three of my books came up in the "Products Related to This Item" carousel under the description of the book (not mine) that I was researching. That's so cool to see that the ads might actually be doing something. Now if I could only get more people to click and buy them. Patience. That'll come. Eventually.

--Barbara

Three At Once

I looked out at the feeders and saw three Downy Woodpeckers at once! One is on the suet pellets and the other two are on top of crooks. That's only happened one other time and that was just last week. I surmise that these are three fledglings hanging around together before they go their separate ways when they get a bit older. You know how teenagers like to hang around in gangs, I'm sure it's the same in the bird world.

There was another bud getting ready to open yesterday when I went out to rescue Dad's roses so I went out this morning to see how it was faring. Luckily I brought along scissors because the Japanese Beetles had been at the flower. If you look closely at the petals on the right you can see the holes that they'd chomped in them.

When I was pulling out a book to draw from I noticed the small pictures on the cover of 20 Ways to Draw a Butterfly and I liked them so I turned to the next blank page and started drawing. I drew much smaller pictures than I usually draw but I think they turned out better than usual too. Or maybe I'm just better drawing smaller.

I need to clear something up. Island Dreams, the manuscript that I sent to the online editor is not the sequel to The Seaview. Instead it's what I wrote for NaNoWriMo in 2021. One thing that they asked me to write this week was the blurb for the back cover of the book so I'm going to tack that on here so you can read what it's about:

Ella Thomas and Dan Martinson leave their families and friends behind and move to the island of Bonaire in the Caribbean to pursue their dream of owning a dive shop. Dan finds a job as a diving instructor immediately, but Ella can’t get a work permit and is reduced to cleaning vacation rental homes on the side for cash. His days are filled with the excitement and beauty of the coral reefs and her days are filled with cleaning up other people’s messes. They are dedicated to saving as much money as they can so that when a dive shop becomes available, they can jump on it, but an unexpected opportunity threatens to drive a wedge between them. Follow the ups and downs of life with Ella and Dan as they chase their Island Dreams.

I spent most of the day rereading and working on The Seaview 2. The first draft isn't done yet but it's closer. I need to finish writing it and then go through it a bunch of times until it's the best I can make it. Then I'll leave it alone for at least a month before going back through and editing and refining it some more. Then and only then will it be ready to publish. Depending on how I like this online editing thing I might do it again or do it myself the way I have in the past. Time will tell.

--Barbara

All I Saw Was This Squirrel

I kept my eye out for the Hawks today but no luck. The closest thing that I saw was this squirrel getting a drink. Disappointing.

But when I was out checking Dad's roses for Japanese Beetles (and picking off three of the little chompers) I heard the Hawk but didn't see it in the trees. As I said I would once the Japanese Beetles showed up on the roses, I cut the cluster of them and brought them in to enjoy them indoors. They are so soft and velvety and they smell terrific.

This juvenile Downy Woodpecker undershot the suet cakes and landed on the platform feeder first. It hung there for just long enough for me to snap this picture and then it flew over to the roof of the suet cakes feeder and finally managed to get itself onto the grid where it could peck away at the cake. Kids. I guess it takes a while to get things sighted in.

I went back to good old Things With Wings today and drew a pelican, a cockatoo, a cupid, and a vulture. That's a cheerful mix of things to draw.

 

I knitted on the foot of the Kestrel sock tonight at Friday Night Knitting. See how it stopped pooling and organized itself back into stripes? Crazy.

 

This afternoon I got the cover of Island Dreams to review. I was so enthralled that I didn't notice at first that my whole name, all three names, wasn't on it but when I went back to admire it again I contacted them to fix it. And they did. He also offered to make a website for me--for a price, of course. I declined but he sent me a list of examples all of which were very successful authors, way out of my league. I double declined. I suspect that over the next few weeks I'll be getting a lot more calls about other services they'd be happy to help me with--for an additional fee. But I can be strong and resist most if not all of that sort of thing. Right now I'm happy with my book sales and the way things are going. I just laid out a chunk of change to get book #4 edited, formatted, and ready to be published. I'm taking my time.

--Barbara

It Was a Hot One

It was hot again today. Humid too. There was a breeze but that was hot too. Of course it IS August so I have to expect summer-like temps. Thank goodness for air conditioning.

This morning the juvenile Red-Tailed Hawk was on the birdbath again. Dipping its feet and underside in the water again. It soaked up enough water that I had to go out later and refill the birdbath so there'd be water for the rest of the birds. Then after supper I got a text from my tenant saying that there were two Hawks on the fence. I hurried out to the kitchen and there they were. One of them was eating something and it stayed for a while but the other one flew off almost as soon as I saw it. I'm just glad that they're back. I just love looking at them, especially their eyes.

While the Hawk was in the birdbath the chipmunk came sneaking between the birdseed cans on the patio. I don't know what it was thinking but the Hawk did notice. Maybe what it was eating tonight was that little rodent it saw on my patio earlier. I caught sight of it up on the patio step after the birdbath Hawk was gone and snapped its picture.

Dad's rose is still blooming and there are three more buds surrounding the last flower. Still no Japanese Beetles. I check every day. If I see them I'll rescue the buds and bring them in to open so they don't get chomped.

First I got out the Chibi book and drew a Lion and a Monkey. I like the happy look on the Lion's face and I like the Monkey's banana.

Then I turned to the next page in Draw 500 Fabulous Flowers and found this big flower. It kind of looks like an opening zinnia or chrysanthemum but then I think it might look like a protea. It's a flower, 'nuf said.

I got a call this afternoon from Harry, my book publishing account manager (sounds pretty cool, doesn't it?), looking for ideas for the book's cover, my bio and photo, and a blurb. I sent cover ideas, the bio and photo, but writing the blurb will take time. I got a first draft done and am marginally happy with it. I'll keep working on it. He also asked why I hadn't published on IngramSpark and another self-publisher. I told him that I didn't know how and he said they'd help me with that. Interesting. Seems like I'll be getting quite a bit of help for my money. I thought I'd get another chapter to review but I didn't. He said next week. There's a lot of chapters in 85k words so I hope they don't dilly dally.

--Barbara

Big & Small

Or ginormous and tiny. That's the birds that I had this afternoon. I came out into the dining area after writing this afternoon (successfully, too) to see this juvenile Red-tailed Hawk perched in the birdbath. It sat there for at least 15 minutes so I could look at it to my heart's content. I took picture after picture but only saved a few of the best ones. My favorite part was when it stood up in the water and dunked its bottom in like it was taking a bath but it was too big for the basin so only the very lowest feathers got wet.

Almost as soon as the Hawk flew away I saw a tiny blur at the new feeder and there was a Hummingbird. I'm disappointed that the picture is blurry but I had to be fast because they just don't stay long. I was happy to see her at the new feeder. I was afraid that it'd take a while for them to show up.

The lilies are blooming like crazy. There's a whole line of orange ones up on the retaining wall...

...and a shorter row of red ones behind it.

Then there's the sole surviving Stargazer lily that grows along the lot line. This year it braided itself through the fence and by the time I noticed it was too late to thread it back through to my side of the fence. Maybe I should just take that little piece of fencing down one of these days.

Today was the last drawing Daily Practice and it was Telephones. We drew some old phone styles and some new ones but we didn't draw the candlestick kind. Oh well.

When I came back to write I decided to start a watercolor so that I could do both things at once, write while I let the paint from each step dry. I'm not patient enough to just sit there watching paint dry, I have to have something else to do. These are California Poppies. I like the way they turned out.

The scene I wrote this afternoon gave me a hint of the end of The Seaview 2. I'm not telling what happens but will say that I was surprised at the way it turned out and it paves the way for a nice ending of the book.

I got the first chapter of corrections/suggestions for Island Dreams back from the editor this afternoon so I sat right down and read through the 10 pages. They really tightened up the language and there was only one suggestion that I nixed. So far, so good.

--Barbara

Fur & Feathers

I was just finishing my breakfast when I saw movement out of the corner of my eye. The teenage bunny that lives under my ferns (I think) came hopping up on the patio step and stared at me. I took my time and didn't make any sudden movements and managed to take a picture of it. It's past the time when it zooms out and across the patio. Now it hops over to the spilled birdseed and challenges the squirrels for supremacy. The squirrels usually win.

Then captured a quick picture of a Chickadee on the round feeder. I was sure it would fly away just as soon as I got the camera up and ready but I lucked out this time.

The Daily Practice today was Bees. Five bees, to be exact, four cartoon bees and one more realistic bee. I even colored the yellow stripes to make them more cheerful.

I dived back into 20 Ways to Draw a Tree and the figures were in no particular order--an egg, a shell, a log, a star, and a nest. I like the way the egg and the nest turned out today. I've drawing so many pictures with the .03 ink pen that it ran out so I had to go to Michaels and get another one. Aw. 

 

A rather ratty looking Downy Woodpecker showed up on the suet cakes this afternoon. Usually they look all spiffy and well-groomed but this one looked quite disheveled and kinda dirty. I wonder where he'd been.

In the Interesting News Dept. I got an email from the rep of the online editing company today asking how I was doing. I emailed back that I was still thinking and he emailed back that they could do the complete package--content edit, formatting, adjust the layout to conform to publishing standards, proofreading formatting, front and back cover design, and author's introduction--for half of what he quoted me yesterday but the deal was only good for today. Now I know that was a ploy to get me to agree to buy the package but since I was thinking of doing it at twice the price, I was up for spending half and getting the same package. I did it. I signed up, paid for the service, and sent them my manuscript. I am looking forward to getting the first chapter(s) back from them to see what changes they suggest. P.S. It's part of Amazon which made me feel more confident signing up.

--Barbara