57 Degrees

That was the high temperature today. Sunny and warm with a little breeze. You'd better bet I had a window open so real springtime air could come in. Most of the snow is gone. All that's left is the bottom of the thickest piles of snow that the snowblower blew onto the lawn. The birdbath which was frozen solid yesterday morning was all liquid by noon today. It won't last but I'm appreciating it while it does.

 

I went down to Zambaldi to visit DS this morning. He was cleaning tanks and sanitizing hoses in preparation for moving the beer he was brewing into one of the huge silver tanks to ferment and turn from brown water into beer.

 

Today's flower is Oklahoma Redbud which I have never seen or heard of so I have no idea if this is what it's supposed to look like or not. This looks kind of like the picture in the book so I guess it's okay. It looks like a cross between a violet and sweet pea to me.

 

I drew a gratitude journal page for yesterday this morning and one for today this evening. Look at me getting one done on the actual day. Although I realize that I didn't include something I'm really grateful for and that's the dishwasher. I ran it after supper and should have drawn it on the page. Oh well. Next time.

 

Look at what I saw this morning. The other day I took the Christmas cactus that I repotted into the kitchen to water it in the sink so I could really water it good. I've noticed that it's perkier and today I saw that there are flower buds on it! This is the biggest one. I guess giving it a much bigger pot and new soil to grow in made it happy. Also it's now on a table in a south-facing window so it gets much better and more sunlight.

 

I read a blog post about Story Beats and came up with the idea that I needed to go back into the manuscript and look at Rose's feelings and inner thoughts. So that's what I did. I opened version 2 which is what I'm saving after cda gives her critique and worked on that. I've added a few little tweaks that bring the reader closer to Rose and I'll keep doing that. Writing was so much easier when I didn't have all this information, when I just wrote and it was what it was.

I emailed a consultant in town asking for help getting my books uploaded to IngramSpark which would give much broader distribution and allow me to apply for reviews from places like Midwest Book Review. They won't accept my books now because they're not available for bookstores and libraries to buy from Amazon and that's the only place to get them right now. Marketing is a whole uncharted aspect of the writing game, but I'm trying to figure it out. 

--Barbara 

Ouch

I got a call from the pharmacy this morning that I was due for my 6 month Covid booster. I didn't know there was such a thing, but since I've never had Covid I decided to take them up on the offer. I was going there anyway to pick up a couple of prescriptions so it made sense to do both things at once. Ever the smart one, I even wore a short sleeved shirt (under my winter jacket). The last couple times I've gotten a vaccine they've applied this target/bandage first and poked the needle through the center. I can endure a short, sharp poke so I don't get the disease. I hope.

 

They say the road to Hell is paved with good intentions. I intended to draw a gratitude journal page last night and didn't. So I did it this morning instead. My greatest gratitude was having to pick up LC from school. She's such a swell kid, um, young lady. Did I tell you she's taller than me? If I take off my shoes, she's about a half-inch taller. She loves that.

 

Today's flower is Magnolia. It turned out pretty well. The pink outsides of the petals are a little darker and more solid than the example but I try my best. I wish I could make it the same shade but lighter. Don't know how to do that. I always press too hard.

 

Tonight was writers' guild and I might have met a couple guys who want to start a critique group. One for sure. I gave them both my card and asked them to email me. One of them has a Substack that I subscribed to when I got home. His writing is very philosophical and kinda deep. I'm nervous that he wouldn't want to read my superficial writings. But then maybe I sell myself short.

Didn't see any birds today and only one squirrel that wasn't on a feeder. I saw a rabbit crossing the driveway just now. Ooh, the moon is very full tonight. It's called the Blood Moon because the shadow of Earth crosses it and gives it a warm, coppery glow. I'm happy seeing the bright, white full moon tonight and not get up at the crack of five a.m. to witness the lunar eclipse.

--Barbara 

Homework

 It occurred to me this afternoon that I need to brush up on my elevator pitches (descriptions of my novels that are short enough to be delivered on an elevator ride) and write and memorize one for Anneke's Legacy before my launch event on Saturday. Fortunately I have a sheet of paper with them on it so I could write the new one, print it off, and carry it around with me trying to learn and relearn them before Saturday. It has been a long time since I've had to memorize something and something this important. I will be taking the sheet along with me.

 

Today's flower was Orchid. Once again I might have made the flowers smaller than necessary but I like the way they turned out and I like the coloring even though pink is not one of my favorite colors. Despite pink actually being light red. Red being my absolute favorite color.

 

This morning I had a Zoom with cda then I spent the afternoon going over her critique comments and making changes. I also copied and pasted the pages of her manuscript that I worked on over the weekend and sent it to her. Then I made a new document of the next chapter of my manuscript to send to her for next Monday. 

 

I got to pick LC up from musical rehearsal this evening and take her home. I love having those few minutes with her and OJ too when I get to pick him up. I used the waiting time to work on memorizing my elevator pitch for Anneke's Legacy. 

This morning I also ordered author copies of The Seaview, Spies Don't Retire, and Better Than Mom's so I have enough for the upcoming sales this spring. 

Oh, and I got a haircut and went to the grocery this afternoon too. Not in the same place. And I read a couple chapters in a book.

--Barbara

All Indoor Stuff

It's back to being chilly and breezy so I didn't go outside and I didn't see any wildlife today. 

This morning I took the heavy cookbook off the stack of watercolor cards, folded them in half, paired them with an envelope, and slipped them into cellophane sleeves. Only one glued itself to the one above it and only one or two imprinted paint onto the one above. I can't figure out how that paint transfer happens because the watercolors are completely dry before I cut them up and glue them. Anyway, now I have a double stack of cards ready for any occasion.

 

The flower today was Daisy. It turned out okay. I think the angle of the main flower head is off but I like the little side flower and the leaves. I also like the faint blue of shadow I colored on the petals.

 

For the first time in two weeks, I drew a gratitude journal page. I didn't think it'd been that long but the last page was February 15 so, yeah, two weeks. I struggled to think of things to draw and ended up drawing my bed because I put fresh sheets on and everyone knows how nice fresh sheets are to sleep on.

 

After supper I went downstairs to fetch my rolling backpack for books and the book display rack. I loaded the backpack with books to take along to my book launch next Saturday at OtherWorlds Books & More in Sturgeon Bay. Yes, I know it's almost a week away but I'm excited and wanted to pack. I packed 10 copies of Anneke's Legacy and one or two of the other titles. The store has copies of most of my titles and I've got a box of them in the back of my car. Just in case.

 

Did I tell you that five eBook copies of Christmas at Seaview sold on Amazon in February? It shocks me that people bought a Christmas novella two months after Christmas but I'm not arguing. I took all my titles off Kindle Unlimited so I can sell them on other sites but I get most of my royalties from pages of Better Than Mom's read on KU. So I'm debating whether I should put that one back on. Probably since I can't argue with a source of revenue.

I finished the latest read-through of Seaview 4 this afternoon. Every time I read it I change little things. I wonder if I should rearrange some of it but then when I read it, I think things are in the correct order. This writing thing is a challenge sometimes. And what am I going to do when this one is finished? That's months away but I have to think ahead. I've got one more manuscript from long long ago that I might be able to make something out of. It's actually the first thing I ever wrote. One of these days I'll dig it out and reread it. I remember when I started writing it. I'd written the characters and the plot, then the guide I was using said something like, "okay, you've got the parts, now go write the novel." What was in my head was bright and lively and interesting. What came out in the first draft was a lot like unsalted oatmeal--flavorless and bland. Maybe I can fix it.

--Barbara 

Green!

The other day my writing friend, JB, posted a picture of her daffodil sprouts on Facebook. I was jealous. I'd been checking the bed in front of my house and had seen nothing. Until today. Instead of standing on the porch to check, I stood at the living room window, looked down, and there they were! Green shoots of daffodils poking out of the wood chips ever so slightly. Yay! Daffodils!

 

Just to make a liar out of me, a Junco landed on the square green feeder today. I've only seen them on the ground before and was confident that they were solely ground feeders. But no, one had to fly up to the perch and look around. I'm not sure if it pecked at the seed but it was up there where no Junco had been before (that I'd seen).

 

And a House Finch landed on the top of a crook. It didn't sample any of the suet or the seed, it just waited there for the female which was on the back of the square green feeder. When she flew away, he did too.

 

This morning I got out the good old Elmer's glue and got to work gluing the embossed painting pieces I prepared yesterday onto blank cards. But first I autographed each little painting piece with my official artist signature--bam. 

 

Once I got them all glued, I stacked them and gently put a heavy cookbook on top of them to make sure that they glued themselves to the cards and stayed flat. Tomorrow I'll fold them and tuck them into a cellophane sleeve with an envelope so I'm ready whenever a card-needing occasion happens. 

 

This afternoon the Avery business card blanks I ordered were delivered so I tucked a sheet into the printer, crossed my fingers, and printed some. It worked! Even though the blank looked the same as the one I had, the words stayed inside the boundaries of the little cards. Now I have sales tally cards to use this year. It only took me three days, a lot of strong language, and one Amazon order to accomplish the task.

 

I also read a book today. An actual, paper book. I haven't done that in a long time, but I had this book by a local author laying around, and finally got around to reading it, or at least starting to read it. It's pretty good. Feels weird though, not listening to it or reading it on my phone.

--Barbara 

All the Birds Came

This morning I looked out the patio door and there were all the birds! Sparrows on the square green feeder, Mourning Doves on the crook, a Goldfinch not changing color yet on another crook ...

 

and a Downy Woodpecker on the suet nuggets. It kept looking over at the square green feeder but there were Sparrows on both perches so it stayed on the nuggets. 

 

I didn't feel like doing much today but knew I'd feel guilty if I didn't do something so I spent some time sorting through watercolors and made a stack of them to cut up. After lunch and Zooming with some women friends, I grabbed about half the stack and started cutting. I got smart and carried the cutter into the kitchen to use the table which is a better height than the bed where I previously did the cutting. I've been sending out cards regularly, sent five of them this week, so inventory is running low. 

 

When I was done cutting I had a nice, big stack of rectangles. There were so many that it took two pictures to get the spread in but Blogger won't let me post two pictures side by side so you only get to see one.

 

Then I hauled out the embosser and ran all 40 of them through. At first, I tried to choose appropriate designs for the paintings but eventually just chose at random and cranked them through. I'll glue them onto cards tomorrow. I use a heavy cookbook to press them under while they dry so they glue to the cards and stay flat.

 

At Friday Night Knitting, I kept knitting on the Vienne cardigan back. In three hours I knitted 2 1/2 inches on my way to 11 1/2 inches. I reread the pattern instructions and it's very different. You knit the back, then put the stitches on a holder. Next you pick up stitches on the cast on edge and knit the fronts the other direction, so the back ends up upside down. We'll see how that works once I get there. All stockinette stitch rolls up so I had to hold the cast on edge so you can see how much I knitted.

 

I wasted a bunch of time scrolling on Facebook. I have to stop that. It's becoming a habit that I need to break.

I'm still doing battle with the business card template and my business card blanks. Evidently the blanks aren't created equal because they didn't print correctly, so I looked up the Avery number on the template and ordered some from Amazon. The ones I printed today have the top line above the perforations so the "Date" line is on the scrap edge on the top two, on the bottom on the middle six, and not on the bottom two. Why is this so hard? All I want is a nice, tidy card to use to tally sales. Is that too much to ask? Evidently.

--Barbara 

Yes, It Is

I knitted some more on the Vienne sweater swatch tonight, got within one stitch of gauge and
called it good. So I pulled out the swatch and cast on 94 stitches, putting markers where the pattern told me to, and knitted the first row. Only 11 1/2" more to go on the sweater back! This might be wearable next winter. Maybe. I'm a slow knitter but right now I want to work on it so I'll keep on keeping on.

 

Today's flower is Sweet William. It's another one with a lot of florets with lots of petals. It turned out okay, I think. I like the color of the leaves and stem and the tomato red of the petals with their white edges.

 

This afternoon I spent a lot of time trying to figure out how to print some sales tally cards using a Word template. Unfortunately they don't have a blank one you can fill in, they only have preprinted ones you can sort of change but you can't delete the printing in the box and replace it with what you (or I) want. After trying to set margins and make a text box that's the right size, and printing my effort only to find it wasn't right (see attached photo), I got frustrated. Then I got smart. I googled "business card template" and found a downloadable one on the Avery site. Hooray! All I needed was the boxes the correct size so I could fill them in with my book titles so I can keep track of what I sell when. 

 

Today I went to lunch at a new-ish hotel restaurant with two former neighbors. DIL1 is the meeting and catering manager there and I was hoping to get to see her for a minute but she was busy with a 100-person meeting so I didn't try to find her. The food was good and the talk was constant. I think one of them might come to the watercolor class at The Clearing with me and the other one bought a copy of Anneke's Legacy. A couple of hours later I got a text from her with a picture of her husband reading the book, saying she might have to wait her turn. That might be the first picture I've seen of someone reading one of my books. Thrilling.

No birds or squirrels today. I miss them when I don't see them. Leaves have been blowing across the patio snow and I see them out of the corner of my eye and nearly give myself whiplash turning my head to see if it's a bird. No luck lately. Maybe tomorrow. It's supposed to get up to near 50 degrees tomorrow--and then cool back down over the weekend to "normal" temps, which means cold.

--Barbara