Goals for 2018

I’m going to make this short and sweet today, saving the longer post and explanations for tomorrow, the first of the year. Here are the total goals I want to achieve by the end of 2018.

WRITING     

1)    Start and finish editing “The Truth Beyond the River”.

2)    Start and finish editing “Finding Justice”.

3)    Finish typing “No Body Found”. I started this piece in the early 1990’s and have most of it typed already on paper, so just need to put it in the ol’ laptop.

4)    Start writing the next novel. Not sure which one it will be, as I have four ideas in my head. I’ll see which one comes to the top first.

5)    Continue posting three times weekly to “The Dino Chronicles”.

6)    Continue posting once a week here.

REACHING

1)    Find an agent.

2)    Publish “The Truth Beyond the River”.

3)    Submit twelve pieces.

4)    Have 40 reviews of “Where the Sky Meets the Sand”.

READING

1)    Read twelve books.

2)    Read an average of five other blogs per week, commenting on three of them.

REMAINING

                1)    Do a medical outreach in Kenya.

                2)    Write a Procedure Manual for Tumaini Volunteers.

                3)    Empty one box of old pictures.  There are three boxes and a stack of photo albums to go through, so this would at least make a dent.

                4)    Get in the best shape of my life. I’m not happy that this is so vague, but I will work on it, literally.    

                5)    Get my house in the best shape of its life. Again, way too vague, but too bad.

That’s it for now. It looks ambitious, but I have 365 days to do it. Watch for tomorrow’s post and the start of the weekly list of goals to tackle. I’ll keep the above list on the top of this file, though, to help keep me focused for the year.

Have a great day, stay warm and be safe. 

Never know what I'll find next 

Time for Christmas

If you read last Sunday’s post, you realize how busy I was this past week. Looking over the list below, I can’t even remember how much of this I did or tried to do. I’m tempted to not even both posting it, but here goes.

Green highlights mean I fully achieved what I set out to do, yellow highlights mean I at least attempted it, red letters mean I didn’t even attempt.   

1) Promote the new book, “Where the Sky Meets the Sand” two times. Gonna start out with this first goal by saying I don’t remember.  

2) Promote my two Christmas devotionals two times. Shared both of them on my social media once.

3) Write 2,000 words on the new WIP, “Now For Something Totally Different”. Did not think I would even get a chance to look at this all week, but yesterday morning, before leaving for the craft show, I pounded out another chapter, some 1,200 words.

4) Post three times to my other blog, The Dino Chronicles. Yup, finally some green.

5) Read five other blogs and comment on three of them. I know I did some, but can’t remember how many and forgot to write it down.

6) Non-writing things to do:

a.  Bake a couple batches of Christmas cookies. Baked two batches, only one of which turned out.

b. Scan a dozen old pictures into the computer. Again, I can’t remember how many and didn’t write it down right away, but I think it was only around 7 or 8.

c. Update that second email account for the state. Nope.

d. Do five things for the nonprofit, Tumaini Volunteers.

                        1] Work at the event at Basils Monday.    

                        2] Promote the sale on the 16^th.

                        3] Work at the sale on the 16^th.  

                        4] Make up an agenda for the meeting on the 17^th.

                        5] Set up a new Schwans Cares Campaign.

I also did not finish decorating my tree. The lights are on along with six ornaments. I think my only goals for the coming week are going to be to finish that along with:

1)    Bake some more cookies.

2)    Finish Christmas shopping.

3)    Wrap presents.

4)    Go to my cousin’s Christmas party on Saturday.

And that is it. Not going to put anything else on my list until after Christmas. And with that thought in mind, I don’t think I’ll be posting next Sunday (Christmas Eve).

Hope that all of your plans and preparations come together. Be safe. And take time to rest and reflect on your goals and your life and the things that really matter. And  have a very Merry Christmas.

Christmas morning, my sister Pat and I, circa 1967

and she's taken out be a simple cold

This past week, I worked until seven Monday night at the day job (day job til seven at night? Doesn’t that make it the evening job too?) and helped decorate our church on Wednesday night. But I had hoped to get more done the rest of the nights and days. As it was, a cold erupted in my system on Thursday morning. I never get sick – NEVER – as in, I’ll maybe get a tickle in my throat or runny nose for a day or two once every two or three years. I know that my immune system has been down the entire year of 2017, due to stress and it’s all a downward spiral. I’m hoping that 2018 finds me suddenly rejuvenated. I’ve decided that I’m going to try to take the entire week off from the day job between Christmas and New Year’s to really get myself back on track.

Anyway, as you can imagine, I hate being sick, so I pretty much shut down and have been a complete whiner the last three days. Hoping to get myself together by the end of the day today.

Here’s what I managed to pull off last week. Green highlights mean I fully achieved what I set out to do, yellow highlights mean I at least attempted it, red letters mean I didn’t even attempt.   

1)    Promote the new book, “Where the Sky Meets the Sand” two times.

a.     Shared the 99 cent ebook deal on all my social media

b.     Applied to be a guest on a podcast.

2)    Promote my two Christmas devotionals two times.  

a.     Shared the two devotionals on all my social media once.

3) Write 2,000 words on the new WIP, “Now For Something Totally Different”. I wrote 1,092 words (just over half of the goal, for those you who are more observant than I am).

4) Post three times to my other blog, The Dino Chronicles. Done.

5) Read five other blogs and comment on three of them. Read five and commented on four.  

6) Non-writing things to do:

a.  Bake a batch of Christmas cookies, coz, you know, it’s that time of year. With this virus in my head, I thought it prudent to avoid dealing with any food which others might ingest.

b. Take my Kinship kid Christmas shopping. She is not technically my Kinship kid anymore coz she has graduated from high school, but I told her a long time ago that she is never going to get rid of me and I haven’t seen her in probably six months. Took her and my daughter shopping. I love seeing them together, acting like sisters. Had a great time.

c. Scan a dozen of my mom’s old pictures into the computer. Scanned 14 of my old pictures.

d. Do three things for the nonprofit, Tumaini Volunteers.

            1] Promote the event Monday night.

2] Promote the sale on the 16^th.

e. Bonus points: I updated one of the email accounts that I monitor for a state organization I am part of. I need to do one more this coming week.   

Getting close to the homestretch of Christmas now. Two more weeks! Can I get everything on this list done this week, along with all the other things I need to do?

1) Promote the new book, “Where the Sky Meets the Sand” two times.

2) Promote my two Christmas devotionals two times. 

3) Write 2,000 words on the new WIP, “Now For Something Totally Different”.

4) Post three times to my other blog, The Dino Chronicles.

5) Read five other blogs and comment on three of them.

6) Non-writing things to do:

a.  Bake a couple batches of Christmas cookies.

b. Scan a dozen old pictures into the computer.

c. Update that second email account for the state.

d. Do five things for the nonprofit, Tumaini Volunteers.

                        1] Work on the event at Basils tomorrow.   

                        2] Promote the sale on the 16^th.

                        3] Work at the sale on the 16^th.  

                        4] Make up an agenda for the meeting on the 17^th.

                        5] Set up a new Schwans Cares Campaign.

Shoot, I’m looking at that list, thinking, what am I thinking? I’ll be at that event out of town on Monday until late. I have an Essential Oils party on Wednesday (again, what am I thinking? I don’t have time to get into Essential Oils). I have an appointment for an annual exam on Friday morning (this time I am thinking – let’s get all this medical nonsense taken care of now, so 2018 can be the year of good health, hence the interest in Essential Oils). After that appointment, I’m getting the oil changed and tires rotated on the car. I’ll head to my daughter’s first thing in the morning on Saturday, work that sale, then spend the night with her as we have a board meeting first thing Sunday morning. What am I thinking? When I should take it easy this week so I fully recover from this cold, right? Oh, well, tis the season for craziness.

How is your Holiday Season panning out? Finding yourself way too busy? 

My Kinship Kid Ciaara last spring at her art show. Disappointed that I didn't get a picture of her with my daughter. 

Family, Friends and a sprinkle of color

 I had a busy week again last week and when I wasn’t busy, I don’t know where the time went. Friday afternoon, as Hubby and I were Christmas shopping, my friend from Minnesota messaged me asking if she could come up for the weekend. Of course, I said, get in the car and drive on over! She didn’t get here til yesterday afternoon and is leaving later this morning. But between that and spending Friday with Hubby, I didn’t have much time left. But as I am sure I mentioned before, Hubby and Friends are both more important than any other goals.

Here’s what I did get done. Green highlights mean I fully achieved what I set out to do, yellow highlights mean I at least attempted it, red letters mean any attempts were a failure.  

1)    Promote the new book, “Where the Sky Meets the Sand” three times. Hmm? I think maybe once. I’m pretty sure. I had to, right? (So, you get no color at all for this one!)

2)    Promote my two Christmas devotionals. As we begin to cruise into the Christmas season, I may have an easier time getting these sold.

a.     Shared both books on my social media once.

3)    Speaking of the old books, I have only around a dozen of each of the three of them on hand. I ordered 20 of each of them from my publisher yesterday morning. 

4) Write 2,000 words on the new WIP, “Now For Something Totally Different”. Wrote 2,607 words.

5) Post three times to my other blog, The Dino Chronicles. Done.

6) Read five other blogs and comment on three of them. Hmm? I think I only read four and commented on two.

7) Non-writing things to do:

a. Decorate the house for Christmas. Did it last Sunday afternoon, except for the tree.

b. Scan a dozen of my mom’s old pictures into the computer. Only scanned eight, and they were actually only three of Mom’s class pictures and the rest were mine from school.

c. Do three things for the nonprofit, Tumaini Volunteers.

            1] Promoted Giving Tuesday on November 28.

2] Worked on last year’s finances with my son and last year’s rabbit project with my daughter. I’m counting this as one, because my daughter had an ulterior motive for doing the rabbit report which had nothing to do with the nonprofit.

3] Oh, hold it, just thought of something else. My daughter confirmed an event for us on December 11, so I plotted a little with her on that. (And both #2 and 3 get yellow because really it was my kids who did the work, I just tagged along.)

Bonus Point: I planned and finalized our first ever family vacation since the kids have become adults. Can’t wait to get away with them next spring.

I was a little heavy on the yellow, so was pretty pleased with myself when I remembered this bonus accomplishment.

Can I add some more color, hopefully green, next week?

1) Promote the new book, “Where the Sky Meets the Sand” two times.

2) Promote my two Christmas devotionals two times.  

3) Write 2,000 words on the new WIP, “Now For Something Totally Different”.

4) Post three times to my other blog, The Dino Chronicles.

5) Read five other blogs and comment on three of them.

6) Non-writing things to do:

a.  Bake a batch of Christmas cookies, coz, you know, it’s that time of year.

b. Take my Kinship kid Christmas shopping. She is not technically my Kinship kid anymore coz she has graduated from high school, but I told her a long time ago that she is never going to get rid of me and I haven’t seen her in probably six months.

c. Scan a dozen of my mom’s old pictures into the computer.

d. Do three things for the nonprofit, Tumaini Volunteers.

            1] Work on the event at Basils on the 11^th. 

            2] Promote the sale on the 16^th.

Hope you have a good week. As we power towards Christmas and the end of the year, let’s all get those goals out of the way so we can enjoy the holidays with Family and Friends. 

Speaking of friends, here I am in kindergarten. Too bad I don't remember any of these kids. 

That be me in the center, looking thrilled. 

Sure messed up these goals

 The past week, I accomplished a different, yet equally impressive set of goals. It was all about the home-front. I cleaned up not one, but two of the rooms in my house which were complete disasters. I even invited not one, but two people to come stay with me in my new haven. Now, I’m waiting for the night that my hubby’s snoring keeps me awake so I have an excuse to sleep in the new bed. 

This room has had more transformations over the years than Dolly Parton has had facelifts.

Here’s what I did get done last week. Green highlights mean I fully achieved what I set out to do, yellow highlights mean I at least attempted it, red letters mean any attempts were a failure.  

1)    Promote the new book, “Where the Sky Meets the Sand” five times.

a.     Umm, not so much. I found that my publisher is offering the e-version for 99 cents, so I have promoted that on my social media, but that’s really about all. (Not really enough to give myself the full yellow.)

2) Write 3,000 words on the new WIP, “Now For Something Totally Different”.  1,441 words, not even half. Again, does that really rate a yellow?

3) Post three times to my other blog, The Dino Chronicles. Yep, just barely, but I did it.

4) Read five other blogs and comment on three of them. Read six and commented on three.  

5) Non-writing things to do:

a. Scan a dozen of my mom’s old pictures into the computer. Scanned 24 of them.  

b. Pick up the spare room in the basement, now that I managed to remove the bed that was just taking up space. Yes, cleaned it, at least the top layer.

c. Work on emptying the spare room upstairs. Not only did I sell the bed from the basement, I sold the sofa sleeper in the spare room upstairs. I was so ridiculously psyched about it, that I cleaned the entire room. Then I went to the furniture store on Monday and ordered a bed! Got it set up on Friday and am pretty pleased with myself.   

b. Do four things for the nonprofit, Tumaini Volunteers. Only did three.

1] re-organize the art for sale at my daughter’s work. Didn’t have to, coz I guess she did it on her own sometime before I got down there. I guess what matters is that it got done.

2] Confirm our craft sale for December 16.

3] Start advertising for our sale on the 16^th.

I sure made a mess of last week’s goals, didn’t I? I mean, I did okay, but let’s try to actually either work on a goal or not. Here we go for next week:

1)    Promote the new book, “Where the Sky Meets the Sand” three times. I know I need to work on this more, but I think I need to take a break til the first of the year.

2)    Promote my two Christmas devotionals. As we begin to cruise into the Christmas season, I may have an easier time getting these sold.

3)    Speaking of the old books, I have only around a dozen of each of the three of them on hand. I should order more from that publisher.   

4) Write 2,000 words on the new WIP, “Now For Something Totally Different”. It’s time to be realistic. I had hoped to be finished with the rough draft by the end of this week and start editing the river story, but I see that is going to have to wait until the first of the year. 

5) Post three times to my other blog, The Dino Chronicles.

6) Read five other blogs and comment on three of them.

7) Non-writing things to do:

            a. Decorate the house for Christmas.

b. Scan a dozen of my mom’s old pictures into the computer.

c. Do three things for the nonprofit, Tumaini Volunteers.

Is the holiday season starting to derail your goals? How do you compensate for that? 

An anticipated failure of a week

As I mentioned last Sunday, I knew this week was going to be busy. Had two combined sales (my books and the nonprofit), one on Wednesday and one on Saturday. Had church service Monday night. Went to a Young Living Oil Party on Tuesday. Had a meeting at church on Wednesday night.

Then Thursday night, things really derailed. We had a murder in my small town. First one since March of 2008. I probably wouldn’t have been so freaked out by it (though no matter what, it sickened and saddened me), except it happened in the house less than a block from my work and pretty much everyone was gone from my end of the building except for the cleaning person and I didn’t know what was going on until I pulled out of the parking lot and drove by all the squad cars. So Thursday night was a total waste, as I made a bunch of phone calls and kept watching and listening for news updates. I slept okay that night, but got up at four am to write a post to my other blog about it and why I feel the way I do about guns. Stressful, stressful, stressful.

And then Friday, my day off, I powered through the house work and got ready for the sale yesterday. Speaking of the sales, on Wednesday the nonprofit did well, but not so well on Saturday. Sales of my books was opposite of that. Most exciting was that I talked to someone from a Bible camp who might want me to speak at a group there.   

So this is what got done on my list. (As usual, green is goal accomplished, yellow is worked on, red is a failure.)

1)    Promote the new book, “Where the Sky Meets the Sand” five times.

a.     Attend the book signing Wednesday. Sold ten books. Thought that was pretty good, then . . .

b.     Attend the book signing Saturday. Sold 19 books!

c.      Promoted those book signings before and after.

2) Write 3,000 words on the new WIP, “Now For Something Totally Different”.  Nope. Not a word.

3) Post three times to my other blog, The Dino Chronicles. Yep.

4) Read five other blogs and comment on three of them. I read three and commented on three.  

5) Non-writing things to do:

a. Scan a dozen of my mom’s old pictures into the computer. Nope, I don’t think I got to any of them.

b. Do four things for the nonprofit, Tumaini Volunteers.

1] Repack all the Kenyan merchandise, re-inventorying it as I go. 

2] Attend the craft sale on Wednesday.

3] Attend the craft sale on Saturday.

Mini-bonus: I sold the twin size bed on Facebook’s Marketplace. Nice to get it out of the basement.

I only work at the day job on Monday and Tuesday this coming week. And granted, Thursday is Thanksgiving, but Hubby is working, so I’m not going to cook and only my two kids will be home. I better get something done during those five days off.

1)  Promote the new book, “Where the Sky Meets the Sand” four times. As much as I know I should keep working on this, maybe it's time to back off. The book needs to start to find its own way in the world. 

2) Write 3,000 words on the new WIP, “Now For Something Totally Different”. 

3) Post three times to my other blog, The Dino Chronicles.

4) Read five other blogs and comment on three of them.

5) Non-writing things to do:

a. Scan a dozen of my mom’s old pictures into the computer.

b. Pick up the spare room in the basement, since the bed's gone. 

c. Work on emptying the spare room upstairs, even if it means putting some of that junk in the room downstairs.

d. Do four things for the nonprofit, Tumaini Volunteers.

The list continues to look much the same. I need to get these things done. And start fresh January 1!

Have a Happy Thanksgiving. 

With my lovely daughter, at the sale on Wednesday.

Pretending to sign a book at the sale on Saturday. 

A Colorful Post

As you know if you read my post on Wednesday, I started a new work-in-progress Tuesday morning. I’ve written 4,703 words on it since then. That is certainly not a bad thing, but kept me from staying on task as much as I had hoped. Looking over my goals for last week, however, somehow, I did pretty darn good.

(Green highlight is “I rocked that goal!”, Yellow highlight is “I gave it a shot”, and red lettering is “I just ran out of time!”)

1)    Promote the new book, “Where the Sky Meets the Sand” five times.

a.     Posted the back cover of the novel on my social media.

b.     Created a Facebook event for my book signing on the 18^th.

c.      Contacted my publisher’s media person and gave her the names of five more area book stores I would be able to visit.

d.     Updated my Facebook cover photo with all four of my books.

2) Work on the study guide for “A Time for Every Purpose Under Heaven”, which I had started in September. Na-da, but that’s coz I started a whole different story. (Which I thought deserved its own separate color.)

3) Update my website.  A very little update, but hey, I did something on it.

4) Post three times to my other blog, The Dino Chronicles. Done.

5) Read four other blogs and comment on three of them. Read five and commented on three (I think).

6) Non-writing things to do:

a. Scan a dozen of my mom’s old pictures into the computer. Actually, I fell down the rabbit hole of looking at my old pictures, but I did scan 20 of them.

b. Get another box of stuff out of that spare bedroom and take it to the second-hand store. Not a second box, but at least I took that first one to Goodwill.

c. Post things to sell on Craig’s List.  Posted four items on Facebook’s Marketplace and got rid of two chairs!

d. Do three things for the nonprofit, Tumaini Volunteers.

            1] Created a Facebook event for craft show on the 18^th.

2] I set out all of the merchandise I have that’s for sale, as my son wanted to re-inventory it in QuickBooks, but he never made it to my house yesterday. Hopefully will do that today.

Bonus Points: I sewed a skirt yesterday. (Am I overboard with the color highlights?)

This week I have two combined sales (my books and the nonprofit) on Wednesday and Saturday. We also have a new schedule at church, so services are Monday night now instead of Saturday night (along with Sunday morning, which I never even try to make coz I am usually on the computer all Sunday morning), so, I should get to church Monday night. Tuesday night I’m going to an essential oil party. Wednesday night I have a meeting at church. I think that’s enough!

Yet I’m going to do all this as well:

1)    Promote the new book, “Where the Sky Meets the Sand” five times.

a.     Attend the book signing Wednesday.

b.     Attend the book signing Saturday.

2) Write 3,000 words on the new WIP, “Now For Something Totally Different”.  

3) Post three times to my other blog, The Dino Chronicles.

4) Read five other blogs and comment on three of them.

5) Non-writing things to do:

a. Scan a dozen of my mom’s old pictures into the computer.

b. Do four things for the nonprofit, Tumaini Volunteers.

1] Repack all the Kenyan merchandise, re-inventorying it as I go. 

2] Attend the craft sale on Wednesday.

3] Attend the craft sale on Saturday. 

The first wrap skirt that I've sewn.
Even without a pattern it was super simple and I love how it turned out. 

when i spring out of bed

I woke up from another vivid dream the other morning. This one supplied me with several scenes and a premise. It’s not enough for a novel, but I can picture it as a novella and actually have two other stories in mind with a similar theme – strength in marriage when the odds are stacked against you, or something like that.

So I sprang out of bed yesterday morning and wrote close to 400 words, adding another thousand last night. Coz I just don’t have enough going on.

1)    First novel, “Where the Sky Meets the Sand”, released two months ago. I have two book signings for it coming up next week, but need to continue to promote it online and where ever else I can.

2)    Second novel, “The Truth Beyond the River” (or something, still not sure about the title). Finished the rough draft a few weeks ago. Will give it til maybe the first of December and then start editing it. Hope to start looking for a publisher (or even an agent) for it by maybe February.

3)    Latest work. A book of three novellas. I’m calling it “Now for something totally different” for now, as the feel of it is different from other things I’ve written. Not as heavy on the Christian theme, the characters even have some questionable morals. Of course, they are good people in the end, but – yea – we’ll see. 

4)    The memoir of my second and third trips to Kenya. That’s kinda passed the mellowing stage and is just plain fermenting.

5)    The study guide for my first memoir. I really want to throw that together. I know that it won’t make any money, so I may just make it available for free to anyone who wants it, but I still want to finish it.

6)    I have three more ideas for novels. Argh! Along with my sister’s story. And I’m sure there’s something else.

Anyway, just wanted to share that with you! Time to get back to work.  

From August of 1979, I would have been 17. It's my "take a picture of me and you die" look.
Or my "leave me alone, I have books to write" look.