0821-bakingDo you remember that episode of Gray’s Anatomy when Izzie’s terminally ill boyfriend dies, which sends her into a craze where she bakes muffins all day every day for about a week in order to cope? OK, I’m not quite there, but I’ve been baking a lot–brownies, cookies, zucchini bread, muffins, and these amazing black bottom cupcakes (recipe to follow) that I turn to now and then when things aren’t going so well. Truth is, nobody’s dying here. Everyone’s healthy, we have jobs (and frankly, I have too much work). And we have a roof over our heads–a nice roof, which covers a pretty darn nice house (time to be grateful!). But you know when you dream a big dream and it doesn’t pan out the way you hoped? It’s tough.



carson-chair

Hi my dears! So, my life is consumed with real estate at present–selling one house and buying another. I feel like I’m constantly fretting about pieces of lint on my carpet or the 2 year old who just messed up the bed and wiped his hands, which were covered in applesauce, all over the windows (that’s him in the photo–the bundle of energy that he is!). Oh, and ask me how I feel about the dog who is shedding.

Anywho, so aside from real estate (and in order to get my mind off real estate), I bring you the 11 other things that are consuming me at present. Drum roll …



blue-flowersI’ve been swamped lately–with work and baby and house and life stuff. In between all of it, I have a novel I’ve written, somehow. A really lovely little novel, if I don’t say so myself. Lovely and rough around the edges. My agent, bless her heart, has big plans for said novel and is working with me to help make it as presentable as possible before she takes it to publishers in the near future. For now, I have the job of polishing and fixing and tweaking–some relatively big changes, some really tiny ones. The novel needs a little work. Surgery? Not really. But maybe out-patient surgery.

Quick incision. A few stitches. Minimal scars.

Even so, I’m convinced that revising a book is harder than writing a book, because of the complexity. If you change one thing on page 29, you better carry it through on page 129–and that’s a lot to keep track of. But, I love these characters and this story (even after 392 reads–or at least that’s what it feels like!), so here’s what I’m going to do to get it in the shape it needs to be in (writers, feel free to take inspiration from this list–or just laugh at me!):