One Wildlife

I got lucky this morning and got the camera up and ready when a squirrel scampered across the patio. It was warm enough that a lot more snow melted today but not off the patio because the sun doesn't reach there. The house shades it. That's okay, it made the squirrel show up better. It jumped up on the birdbath but because it was still frozen the squirrel moved on. I hoped it'd leap up to the suet or square feeder but it didn't.

 

Because I rashly said out loud at Women's Spirit on Zoom yesterday that I needed to do the laundry because I was almost out of socks, I couldn't procrastinate, even though I have more hand-knit socks that I could wear. I told them I'd do it today, or maybe on Sunday, but when I said that people called me on it (you know who you are) so I was stuck. Here's the basket of socks, sports bras, and pants all clean and dry. There was another load of towels, more socks, and undies still in the dryer. And a clothesline full of hand-knit socks drying in the air. I'll wait until those socks are dry before carrying the basket upstairs and maybe folding the clean clothes. I don't want to rush into anything.

 

I sat down to draw today's flower but first I pulled the red colored pencil back out and darkened yesterday's poppy. It looks much more poppy-like, doesn't it?

 

Today's flower is a Bluebell. I like the way the leaves turned out on this one. The flower's okay but I like the leaves, both the shapes and the coloring.

 

 

I sat watching TV tonight knitting on the crown decreases of the Melt the ICE hat #2. It's pretty close to being done but I lost motivation. Maybe I'll pick it up tomorrow and finish it. Or not. If I finish it, I'll have to figure out something else to knit. Part of me wants to cast on a sweater with some wool and silk yarn I've had for years but then I think of how that's a big project and do I want to make the commitment?

 

A friend stopped last week and lent me a couple of paperback books by an author we both like. I started reading one of them and I'm so accustomed to listening to stories instead of reading them that I searched Hoopla and Libby. I found the one I was reading on Libby so I'm listening to that now and hoping that the other one is on there too. But I'll read a paper book if I have to.

I did a little manuscript reading this afternoon once the laundry was done. I made a few minor edits but didn't change much. I'm still trying to figure out how to end this novel and series. Eventually I'll get there.

--Barbara 

Forty-eight Degrees!

That's how warm it got today. 48 degrees is nearly unheard of in Green Bay, WI in February. Not to mention it's Friday the 13th. No black cats in view today. But there was a Sparrow or two at the feeder today. Not a flock but a couple of them. Also lots of snow melting happened today. I have no illusions about the temperature staying this moderate through the rest of the winter. We're bound to get another polar vortex screaming through to freeze us to the marrow.

 

The flower of today's drawing was Poppy. It was pretty simple to draw and I kind of wish I'd colored it darker but this is the way the picture was so I followed directions. I'm a good girl like that. Maybe I'll go back to darken it up.

 

 

At Friday Night Knitting I got to work on the crown decreases of the Melt the
ICE Hat. I'm about halfway to being done, I think. I like it because every other round decreases by four stitches so they get smaller and faster as I go. Pretty satisfying.

 

This morning I unpublished and republished the Open For Business paperback. I didn't have to unpublish and republish the eBook because I could just add the ISBN to the current edition but I decided to upload the re-edited manuscript and I'm so glad I did because it found three typos in one of the recipes I entered yesterday. And I thought I'd gone through them all and caught all the booboos. Nope. Now all of my books are updated with my own personal ISBNs. I found out something interesting on Amazon the other day after posting a question on Kindle Direct Publishing's Community site. It turns out that you can choose Extended Distribution on Amazon which will make your books available to bookstores and libraries without having to sign up with another distributor. That means I don't have to reformat all 8 of my titles to upload onto a different site. So I clicked on each title and checked that box. I'll do more research but I think this is a step in the right direction. Sometimes all the thinking makes me tired. One of these days I'm not going to do any writing work and have a day off. If I can manage it.

Oh, I got a phone call this afternoon from MW, a knitting pal who is a big fan of my books. When I said hello he asked, "Is the new book here?" "Yes," I said. He said, "I'm on my way." And he was here in about 15 minutes to buy a copy of Anneke's Legacy, the first one I've sold. Yay!

--Barbara 

Pretty Soup

I made pretty soup today. It's called Pulled Chicken Ancho Chili Black Bean Soup. A very long name for an easy soup to make. The hardest part was chopping 2 poblano peppers (flavorful, not spicy), a red bell pepper, and a nice big onion. Once they were sauteed and softened, it was just a matter of opening cans and dumping stuff in. Not only is it pretty to look at, it tastes great too. And a cup of it is zero WW points.

 

Birds came today! It was sunny but still pretty chilly but there were two Sparrows and a House Finch checking out the square green feeder. The House Finch isn't a closed feeder bird. They like platform feeders, which I don't have anymore since I'm trying to cut back on the rodent population.

 

Then a Downy Woodpecker landed on the suet nuggets, but by the time I got the camera up and ready, it flew over to the square green feeder's backside. Dang. So I took pictures until I captured one of its head peeking out. Just to prove it was actually here.

 

I did something smart the other day. I got a Mystery Discount email from Land's End so I clicked on it and my discount was 40% off. So I scrolled the website and looked at the swim dresses because my swimsuit is ancient and pretty ugly. I found a cute one and ordered it instead of waiting for when it's warm because then they won't have my size. It came today. I like it. It's got red on it.

 

The flower today is Passionflower. It wasn't difficult to draw but those filaments or whatever they're called were tedious. I was sure I wouldn't be able to outline them in ink and make them look right but I did. The coloring's good too. But like I said yesterday, drawing and outlining and coloring take way longer than painting a flower.

 

I had a Michaels $5 voucher expiring on Saturday so I stopped to shop. I bought a sketchbook because I can always use another one and a green watercolor marker because I didn't have that shade of green. And I managed to overspend my voucher by only $3.49. Pretty good shopping, if I do say so myself.

Last night I was so proud of myself because I got the Final Jeopardy! when none of the contestants did. (It was Boo Radley.) Not so tonight. Didn't have a clue. Can't win 'em all. 

I spent all afternoon reformatting Open For Business. I'd forgotten that I had to type in all of the recipes I put in the back matter. Copy and paste didn't work, so I had to print them off and type them in. And I didn't make too many typos. The most frustrating part was I'd get a rhythm going and Kindle Create would stop and flash "Do you want to save your work?" halting the cursor and forcing me to stop and Save. I agree I need to save often but not when my fingers are working and I'm getting things done. Sheesh. 

I mailed the pointy red hat I knitted off to a friend in Chicagoland today. She really wanted one and I've got another one on the needles so she gets the first one.

--Barbara

Melting Away

It was sunny today. That, combined with the milder temps the last few days has caused the backyard snow to really melt. It's supposed to get into the 40s in a couple days and maybe 50 next week. Bye bye, snow. I've seen a few squirrels run through the yard but none have stopped for either birdseed or suet. Don't know why.

 

I stopped at Zambaldi this afternoon to pick up OJ's library books and saw the cooler door propped open. DS was carbonating a tank of Brewer For a Day beer and didn't want to forget about it. I got to do the afternoon school run and OJ requested a stop at the library so I picked up his books to return and DS's library card. LC didn't want to come in but I told her I wanted to spend time with her. Instead she spent time in the stacks and found a book to check out. I had a feeling she would. It's hard to resist the lure of books.

 

The flower of the day was Lavender. It was harder to draw than I thought it'd be, or maybe it was just more putzy, but I like the way it turned out. Drawing and coloring take longer than painting. Go figure.

 

I knitted a couple more rounds on the Melt the ICE Hat after supper. I think I'll add a couple more and then start on the crown decreases. This time I'll follow the directions on the official pattern and knit one round plain between decrease rounds. That'll make it taller and even cooler looking.

 

At the grocery this morning I got the ingredients for making Pulled Chicken Ancho Chili Black Bean Soup. I know it's a long name, but it's really simple, has lots of ingredients, and tastes delicious. And as a bonus, is zero WW points per serving. I would have made it last weekend but CS can't eat peppers and there's two kinds of peppers in it, so I made the Butternut Squash soup which is also simple and delicious.

This afternoon I finished editing Open For Business so I can upload it to Kindle Create, fix up the front and back matter, add the recipe pages, and get it republished with my own ISBN number. That's the last one. I'll do it tomorrow. After I make the soup.

You know, I think that my daily (except Sunday) yoga practice is helping my knees. They haven't ached as much the last couple days. I can't sit here at the laptop all day though. I have to get up and move around or I'm back where I started. Getting old is a continuing challenge.

I had a Zoom meeting with my assistant, KM, this morning and we talked a lot about marketing, in particular she can make TikTok videos for me that I don't have to be in or make myself. Yay! She made a reveal video for Anneke's Legacy to put on Facebook and my website. She also showed me how to look at traffic on my website and FB to see that more people are looking at them. Maybe because they've downloaded my audiobooks? Could be. 

--Barbara 

Another Writer-ly Day

I'm in a rut. I can't stop working on writing stuff. Today I got on a chat with Kindle Direct Publishing (again) because I couldn't find Island Dreams on my Bookshelf which is where you publish or republish your titles. Once I had that squared away, I spent most of the afternoon reloading Island Dreams to Kindle Create (seen here) because it was one of the manuscripts lost when my original version crashed. So I had to redo the title page, the copyright page, the Dedication (to the dive guys who taught us to scuba dive), the "Books by this Author" page and the Acknowledgements.

 

Then I went back onto my Bookshelf page to republish it with the individual ISBNs and my name as publisher. Luckily I had this jpeg (photo) of the cover because that's the only one I didn't have GetCovers design for me. I hired an editing/formatting service which I ended up not liking because I didn't have control over things. But somehow I ended up with a jpeg so I could crop it for the eBook and use the whole thing for the paperback. This is the only cover that I can't change the blurb, author bio, or author photo on. I don't like that either, but it is what it is.

 

It was so warm today (38 degrees!) that a lot of the snow in the backyard melted. The snow and ice on the birdbath melted a lot too. You can see the sled tracks from the neighbors' fun sledding last night. They must start high up on the hill to get up the speed to slide all the way across their yard into mine. Well, it's actually one yard. There's their half and my half. It's a duplex, you know.

 

Before I started all the writing stuff this morning I drew a gratitude journal page for yesterday. I'm posting it because it has the final Freebie Friday totals on it. The free downloads total is 9,415 audiobooks! Takes my breath away.

 

The first shipment of copies of Anneke's Legacy came today. Twenty-five books in one carton is heavy. I gently rolled it from the porch into the house and then picked it up to carry it to the table. Before supper I sat with a pen, bookmarks, and "Autographed Copy" stickers and got them all signed, bookmarked, and stickered so they're ready to be sold. My book storage area is nearing capacity. I don't know where I'll put them if I write too many more books. Not downstairs, that's for sure.

 

Then I decided I wanted to paint instead of draw so I painted this Hydrangea. I like it. It looks kind of like the teacher's example and I like the leaves, especially the two in front. 

 

I had a phone call with GBB this morning about the Midwest Book Review. She's gotten reviews of her two books from them and uses them in publicity. I thought about sending in one of my books but then I read that they don't want your books if you don't have distribution. Which I don't have. Amazon doesn't count because bookstores and libraries can't order from Amazon because they only charge Retail. One of the reasons I'm republishing my books is so that I can widen distribution so they can be accessed by bookstores and libraries. I looked into a national contest too but shied away for the same reason. I'll keep researching.

While I watched Finding Your Roots on PBS tonight I knitted a few rounds on the Melt the ICE Hat but not enough to warrant a new photo. Besides I need to consult the pattern to see where I need to start decreasing for the pointy top.

Yesterday the light over the stove and two of the (many) clocks in the kitchen's batteries ran out. All on the same day! So I had to re-battery the clocks and replace the light bulb. I was happy to have spares so I didn't have to run out for supplies. 

--Barbara 

A Writing Work Day

I did a lot of writing work today. This morning while waiting for my critique Zoom to start, I got on
a chat with Kindle Direct Publishing because I'd unpublished Horizon and couldn't figure out how to republish it. I'd done it before but was just going about it all wrong. I chatted with a nice woman who told me that she'd try to help. While she was typing, I realized that in order to republish the book I needed to go back to the "Create" button and start all over. *head, slap* So I thanked her and went about my day. By that I mean, after lunch I republished Horizon paperback and eBook so they're linked on my sales page eventually. I also unpublished and republished Better Than Mom's while the correct way to do it was on my mind.

 

 

Then I copied and pasted the next pages for submission to cda for critique for next Monday. And I transferred the edited pages from today into version 2 of the manuscript. I also did some creative rearranging keeping in mind the comments that the "professional" made about the first 3 pages a couple weeks ago.

 

The flower of the day is Sweet Pea. As usual, I was intimidated by the challenge but slowed down, examined the example closely, and didn't do too badly. My Grandma Angermeier had sweet peas growing on the bank where the driveway curved around to the garage and I loved them. We could pick them without getting into too much trouble.

 

The snow plow and sand truck finally came by today scraping a little of the compacted snow off the street and into the end of the driveway. It wasn't much of a drift, more like a little hump, but I went out with the shovel anyway and shoved it all to either side of the driveway. It was heavy but not worth getting the snowblower out for.

I portioned out the rest of the butternut squash soup and put it into the freezer. There was a lot left for one little old lady to eat. Especially with the amount of butter in that soup. Although when I was looking for a soup recipe I found a WW one for pulled chicken with poblano peppers that might be calling my name. The chicken and poblano soup is very tasty, pretty simple to make, and zero points per serving. A much better deal.

--Barbara 

Still Going Up

Part of me hates to keep tooting my horn but another part of me is so gobsmacked at the success of my Freebie Friday promo that I can't stop. The totals today are 9,127 FREE The Seaview downloads, 649 Open for Business sold, and 636 Spies Don't Retire sold. Just wow. And there's one more day left. I get paid for the sold units, I don't know what percentage of the retail, but something, way more than nothing. Even if I only get half, it'll be amazing. Whew.

 

My butternut squash soup was a hit with my knitting friends at Zambaldi this afternoon. I will say that taking a hot slow cooker of soup down there was a trick. I padded it on the floor of the backseat with a big, thick beach towel so it wouldn't tip and I drove like I had fragile glass things in the car. CS made homemade, crusty bread that was still warm, and brought Kerrygold butter to spread on it. DM made cherry bars that were so delicious. Once again, we did not starve. I got some looks when I carried in the crockpot, but I didn't care. I know that they don't mind if you bring food so I brought food. One thing that surprised me was I bought Chinet bowls because I didn't want to haul breakable bowls down there. The hot soup seeped through the bottom of the bowls so we had to double or triple them. It was a good thing they came in a stack of 60!

 

I knitted the last inch of ribbing after the soup was eaten so now I can knit a couple rounds of stockinette stitch before I start the crown decreases. 

 

Instead of drawing a flower, I painted one. It's an Allium, a member of the onion family but prettier. I've been so consumed with writing and marketing lately that I've fallen down on the painting part of my life. I'll try to do better.

 

After supper, I drew a gratitude journal page for today. I was grateful for having the last slice of homemade bread from CS to have with another bowl of squash soup. I didn't have that fancy butter but the plain bread was almost as good, especially when I dunked it in the soup. Besides there's enough butter in the soup to make up for it.

 

This morning I printed off the three pages of comments from the Writers Helping Writers blog contest I won a couple weeks ago, read through her comments, and made changes. I'm especially grateful for her comment that my dialogue can be heavy at times and she said, since it's the fourth book of the series, I don't have to include all of the minute details of every day. That's going to streamline the story. It'll be better.

--Barbara