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Day 17: Gratitude Michigan Style
It’s been a long day of revisions. I’m finally through that process although not without a lot of gnashing of teeth and tears. I wish I could tell you I’m being dramatic, but Liz will testify–it was arduous. However, she was throwing around terms like drama queen and big baby. Tomorrow, will be a final run-through edit and then it goes back to my editor. Liz finished the rough draft of her Christmas Town story with very little teeth-gnashing and no tears at all. We also have to spend some time talking about our library presentation that’s coming on Sunday. We do think we should try to prepare something that’s…
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Day 16: Gratitude with Liz
A Sum of Its Parts Hello! It’s Liz, hijacking Nan’s blog for today. It’s a glorious day in Michigan. The condo we’re in is walking distance from…everything. We’ve had great food, great ice cream, and a glass or two of wine, so it was good we walked. Although I don’t have the heart link with Michigan that Nan has, I do love it here. The World Wranglers have been trash talking the past few days about the Dog Days Kristi’s suffering in Ohio (I’m not sure she likes us anymore 😊), but we’re in mellow weather here and it is good not only for the disposition but for the soul…
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Day 15: Gratitude and We’re on Retreat!
It’s been a great day! Liz and I set off this morning in the rain, which, while dampening our hair did not dampen our spirits! Although the rain made Liz’s hair get big and mine to droop, like the ears of a basset hound. However, that’s why God made hair clips, right? We meandered up to Grand Haven. Took our time traveling through the the corn fields of Indiana and enjoyed a tour of the campus at Notre Dame in South Bend, which has changed a lot since the last time we were through. We took the back roads into Benton Harbor and realized that, even though lunch sounded good,…
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Day 14: Gratitude and We’re Off…
It’s actually early morning of Day 15, but I’m calling this one Day 14 because I fell into bed yesterday after a long, long day of work and then a chili supper over at Son and DIL’s cottage. I got quite a bit done, so that was a good thing. Son piled DIL and I into his bass boat and we took a quick spin around the lake before supper, which was quite lovely! Totally different boating experience than riding in Husband’s pontoon, but just as enjoyable. We’d all discussed swimming, but decided the lake was probably way too cold for Grandboy and actually for us, too, so the boat…
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Days 12 & 13: Gratitude and Yes, I’m behind
Do you remember me saying that I was determined to be grateful each day, even if the most I could say was that I was grateful the day was over? That’s where I was yesterday and instead of posting it, I let it slide. I’m glad I did because today is better and later last night, it was lovely because I got to put Grandboy to bed, read Dogman with him, and sing and cuddle until Mommy came home to tag-team with me. There is such joy in being with that kid–and don’t get me wrong, he can be a royal PIA and sometimes stubborn and sometimes a real pill.…
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Days 10 & 11: Gratitude and Remembrance
Gratitude for September 10 and 11:FamilyFriendsAll the people in the country who serve the publicAn enjoyable beer-30 with our lake pals last nightThe LakeI am able to workWritingWriting Retreat is just four days awayGoing to see Grandboy tonightFaith that our house is coming…
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Day 9: Gratitude and Happy Birthday to Tule!
It’s my publisher’s 6th birthday! Tule Publishing has officially released 600 books and been in business for six years! Here’s to many more years of publishing wonderful stories by lots of great authors (me, too!) and to me having a long career with Tule! Well, no new houses to see, although our portal keeps getting new ones posted. Just not our house. We looked at two that were not our house, so I’ve decided to try to adopt a zen attitude–if it’s the right house, we will know it when we see it. I just can’t spend too much more time with a house-hunting knot in my stomach. Edits on…
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Day 8: Gratitude and Brothers
Okay, one brother–mine. He’s turning 64 today and I’ve already texted him a greeting, to which he responded, “Next birthday is 64A. Love you.” I love him, too, of course, and I am intrigued at the idea of switching to letters for birthdays. All in all, it sounds like a good system to me. Thoughts? It’s a rainy day here at the lake–chilly and a little gloomy, but I’m working anyway, so who cares? I’m beginning to think that we may be done with swimming for this season and that makes me sad. I love to lake swim and right now, I don’t belong to a gym because we are…
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Day 7: Gratitude and Work
I often forget to be grateful for having work I love–the writing is work and I consider being a novelist my career, but I am also an editor pretty much full time, too. I love being an editor, polishing other writers’ books is incredibly rewarding. When I used to be strictly a nonfiction editor, my fellow general reference book editors and I joked that our job was to make the authors of the books sound as smart as they probably were. Sometimes it was a challenge, but wow, did I ever learn a lot of interesting stuff from working on those books. Editing fiction is a whole different ballgame, but…
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Days 5 and 6: Gratitude and I’m Trying…
So, I missed a day. Expect that to happen, okay? Life just gets in the way sometimes. I’m trying very hard to take each day as it comes. To stay in the here-and-now, as my mom used to preach. It’s hard. I’m worrying about everything, which is pointless, really, because none of it is anything I can control. So…onward to gratitude because that’s how we make it through the days of feeling completely untethered, right? Gratitude (you get 10 because of the whole missing-a-day thing):The lake, which has become too cold to swim in due to cooler temps, but is still perfectCool temps that make deck sitting and sleeping a…