My Personal Journey

I think it is quite apropos that my new music obsession (actually an old music obsession that has been rekindled) is with the rock band "Journey," because I have been on quite an interesting personal journey of my own. You might notice my lack of blogging the past few months.

Well, in a nutshell...here is what happened. I was blessed enough to enjoy a family trip to one of the most beautiful places on earth ~ Tahiti, in early Nov. 2010. When I returned to a gloomy, rainy California I had a bit of a case of the post-vacation blues. Okay, more the a bit, more like a lot! Just as I was trying to recuperate and get over it I received my first rejection note from my manuscript submissions. I was expecting this of course but nonetheless I was already feeling down and this just tipped me over the edge. After that I didn't get the urge to write at all for quite some time. Once my writing bug finally returned it took a turn for the personal ~ so for the most part I have been writing in a journal, which contains such inward thoughts, its hard to share them on a blog in such a raw state. Perhaps one day I will be able to or even turn it into a story.

By the way, upon further research, I revisited that rejection note I received and found that particular publisher does not typically respond if they are not interested in your work. Just knowing that, gave me a little glimmer of hope to send manuscripts to them in the future. I am able to think of it as less of the more final "no" to merely a "not now, not this project."

Query Time

I am so excited to have sent out my first set of queries and manuscript submissions for my first children's book, Iris the Colorful Spider in the past few weeks! If the query package process is foreshadowing the road I'm on it is going to be a bumpy one!

I spent several weeks researching publishing houses, manuscript submission guidelines, how to write query/cover letters and more! I also spent a big chunk of time on getting to know the books each publisher produces and whether or not it seemed like my manuscript would be a good match for them. Once I had completed all of these things I was ready to take a day to put together my packages and send them off.

And then the hitch...

Book Review: 2011 Children's Writer and Illustrator's Market

I have been absent from the blogosphere for about two weeks now, sorry Readers. It has been an insanely busy two weeks! I made it through the first two weeks of school and a weekend trip to San Luis Obispo for the Central Coast Writer's Conference (more to come on the conference soon!). Our drive for the trip was a total of 10 hours in one weekend. I have also spent this last week trying my hand at queries/manuscript submissions, which has been quite a challenging, yet enjoyable ride thus far.

Loving my new Kindle

A few weeks ago my husband bought me a Latest Generation Amazon Kindle for my birthday. I don't have any other kindle models to compare it to, but nonetheless I am very happy with it. It sure beats what I was using before. Last December my brother-in-law gave my hubby an itouch for Christmas. At night time, when he wasn't using it I hijacked it and instantly downloaded the Kindle application for itouch. From December 2009 until now I had been reading books off of the itouch. The screen was tiny and I had to turn pages every few seconds but it did the job. So in essence, in the contest of kindle vs. itouch for reading, kindle wins, no contest. I am also amazed at how much the screen text looks like an actual page out of a book. I'm all for authenticity. Now all it needs is to emit puffs of paperback scented air every few seconds and it will have completely replicated the sensory experience of reading a physically real book.

My Year 30 Epiphany- I want to be a Writer.

I had a milestone birthday recently. I am now 30 years old. You know it feels less weird to say that out loud than I thought it would. I’m genuinely surprised. Maybe it has something to do with the fact that I feel settled into my life or maybe that I am moving in a new direction in my life? It is likely a combination of both of these things and more. I finally feel like I’m on a new path.