with all my kids gone, that I’d have tons of time for things like writing in my blog. HA!  Double Ha!

The good news is that I’m about 2/3 done with the huge edit to my story.  I’ve added about 5,000 words.  It’s definitely a stronger story already and I’m really happy with the way the rewrite is going.

I’m planning on working on my synopsis for Keeper today and getting that turned in tonight or tomorrow.  I have a really terrible habit of putting things off until the last day and then forgetting to do them.  I don’t want that to happen this time, because I think I’ve written a really strong story.

I miss my kids.  Tons.  I talked to Ruby yesterday and she was telling me all about her grandparents taking her to the zoo, and how she found a peacock (only she calls it a he-cock) feather and how the snake opened it’s mouth and showed all its teeth and scared her.  And I was fine.  Until she said, “can I come home now?”  Man.  We’re picking everyone up on Sunday morning.  I’ll be more than ready for my break to be over by then.

My dad and one of my brothers are going to be here in a little bit.  They’re stopping on his way to Idaho to visit my sister.  He’ll stop on his way back, too.  Yay

Ruby found a lady bug in the garden today. This was after she sat with me at the table on the patio with a pencil and some scratch paper, working on her ’story’ while I worked on a hard-copy edit of mine. So, here you have it: the aphid-eater and the baby writer.

I posted the prologue to Devil You Don’t, the story that is being considered by a publisher right now. I’d love to know what you think.

I’m 11,000 words into my short story for the Pink Petal anthology. I was struggling with it, but finally came up with a solution to my problem that I’m really happy with. For some reason, working in my garden always gets my creative juices flowing. Today I built a raised bed for a Three Sisters garden (corn, beans, squash.)

I should have the first draft (I’m tentatively calling the story ‘Keeper’) done today. I want to get some more done on Gaia’s Redemption before we leave out of town on Thursday morning.

I went last night with Kevin and Nick to see the new Indiana Jones movie. It was really hard to enjoy it, because there was a gaggle (for real–at least 30) middle- and high-school kids sitting right behind me. They were so freaking loud. Normally, I go with the flow. I’m way laid back. For some reason this really pissed me off, so I couldn’t relax and get lost in the movie. It wasn’t nearly as good as the first three anyway. I did like the kid who played his son (I don’t know how to spell the guy’s name, so I’m not going to try. It’s the kid from Holes.) I’d like to see a sequel series based on him.

I think what I need is a break. My kids are all going to be in Las Vegas for the next week (the big kids for two weeks) and as much as I miss them when they’re gone, I really think I need a minute without them.

I have this very strong memory of my mother.

Every summer, from the weekend after school let out until Labor Day, she took us to the beach or the park nearly every day. She’d sit under a huge red umbrella and read trashy romance novels and let us play until we were literally wilted with exhaustion. She’d bring a big cooler filled with lemon Kool-aid and grapes and cheese and crackers and hard boiled eggs. She never rushed us. I can’t ever remember wishing we could stay longer.

Today was the opening day party at our county’s watering hole. It’s the only public pool within 200 miles–a little man-made lake, fed by a warm springs, full of diving boards and slide. And a concrete island called the Cat Walk that kids can jump off of.

I took my kidlings, but not a red umbrella. For one thing, even if every family in my county came to the pool, there wouldn’t be 1/10th of the people as there were at the beaches and parks were I grew up in Los Angeles. Also, no tide to pull them down the beach where they’d need to look for the red umbrella to find me. And instead of reading trashy romance novels, I brought my little notepad and a pen and worked on writing one.

Anyway–here are some pics.

The real Sandy Cheeks…

Shovelin’ it in, before she realized I really had turned into my mother and was going to make her wait twenty minutes before going back in:

My girls (and hello…look at that view!):

My guy:

If I close my eyes and let myself go there, I can picture exactly what it will feel like when I get The Call.

My heart will stutter, but not completely stop. I will remember the next breath that I suck into my lungs as my first breath as a writer-who-will-be-read. A writer-who-will-have-her-name-on-a-book. I’ll call my dad and he’ll say, “What? Are you serious? That’s fantastic.” I can hear those words coming from his mouth. My husband will probably be all practical and say something more like, “when will the book come out, because I don’t know if we can trust those publisher types.” That’s just how he is. I know that inside he’s doing the happy dance with me.

My oldest daughter, the aspiring writer, will be as excited as me. Maybe more, because, you know, her mama’s gonna have juice by the time she gets her first novel written. My son will be shocked, because I don’t think that it has really entered his universe that his mama is actually doing something at the computer that doesn’t include the words ‘video’ and ‘game.’ The baby–well, she’ll just grow up without ever remembering a time when her mama wasn’t a-writer-who-will-have-her-name-on-a-book.

I can feel it. Every word I write is bringing me closer. I write a lot of words, so I guess I’m taking the slow boat to get there–but that’s okay. That’s okay. Come along for the ride. It’ll be fun.