Must Be Why I Stayed Home

Since Sunday I've been wondering why I stayed home instead of going to The Clearing for another watercolor workshop. (Aside from not needing that rich food for another week, that is.) Well, this afternoon I figured it out. I spent the afternoon working through the steps and designing a cover then submitting my novel, The Seaview by Barbara Angermeier Malcolm, as a Kindle eBook! It's out there! People can see it and decide to buy it. Buy it! I also worked through the steps to publish it as a Print-On-Demand paperback which means I don't have to lay out money to have a bunch of copies printed, they print them when they are ordered through Amazon. The Kindle eBook is available now and the paperback should be available on Amazon by the weekend, if all goes well in their in-house review which I don't know why it wouldn't. As soon as I got the email that the Kindle book was available I bought one and now I have it on my phone and my Kindle. Just like a real book. (You can't see me but I'm doing a happy dance.) Oh, I found a photo of the real Seaview I took years and years ago, cropped it, and used it for the cover art. It's exactly what I wanted even though it didn't scale up quite as sharp as I'd hoped.

This morning I took the tosses to Goodwill and then went down to Zambaldi to visit DS. He was brewing Maple Brown Ale so the brewery smelled great, like a neighborhood bakery. He's excited to have maple syrup from Bear Paw Boy Scout Camp where he went when he was in Scouts to add to the beer. He uses locally sourced ingredients when he can. Here he's getting a tank ready to have the raw beer pumped into it so it can ferment and turn from flavored water to beer. It's science.

Then instead of racing straight home I went down to the library and found a nice little table full of books to be sorted. They were mostly withdrawn from the library and mostly children's and young adult books so all I had to do was haul them down to the other end of the room where the children's sorting area is. There's a special crew that deals with the kids' books. I worked for about an hour and got them all sorted and the table cleaned off.

I didn't get to drawing until after supper what with spending the afternoon submitting my manuscript and mowing the lawn so I only drew a couple of the skill levels after the Blocks lesson and then drew one of the embellishments that made me smile.

When I was doing the daily art page in 365 Days of Drawing I used the markers and noticed that I hadn't done a gratitude journal page in a couple months so since I was feeling pretty good about myself I did one. I was surprised at how easily I drew the little pictures. I guess all this drawing practice is paying off.

I had a busy and productive day going to Goodwill, Zambaldi, the library, the grocery, publishing an eBook and POD paperback, then mowing. I even knitted a few rows on the washcloth while I watched a little TV. Whew, I'm bushed, but it was a great day. I spent the time mowing wondering if I have more novel manuscripts that I can tidy up and publish. Hmm.

--Barbara