My Platform

Last night at writers group we learned more about blogging. One thing that was drummed into everyone .....if you are going to blog......then keep it up. Not like me in the past. A day here and a day there, like myself. Let's see if I can keep this up then.

I will be blogging every Tue about my latest adventure. You ask yourself "What is your latest adventure?" Well read on.

I've heard it over and over at all the conferences I've gone to. "You've got to have a platform". I've pondered it over and over. Ran it through my feeble little mind. What IS my platform!
What DO I like to write about, talk about, am obsessed with, or even like to do?

Then it hit me like a frying pan up side the head. I'm into looking for my dead relatives. Yes even trapsing through the cemeteries, looking at old head stones, reading who the people were lying beneath those stones, and wondering who they were. What did they do with their lives? Were they married? Did they have a family? Did anyone care about them, dead or alive?

I like writing about people, people who lived before me and the things they had to go through to survive. If you think about it we have it pretty easy, but people who lived just one hundred years ago had it much harder. OOPS........I'm nearing that mark......well soon enough anyway.

So if I had to my platform is.....well it's Ancestry.....History.....People! Watch for my next blog on what I've done with history.

Jesus My Lord and Savior

What do I title this for today? My fingers have been flying over the keyboard with words coming from my Lord and Savior. I cannot do anything without Him. I pray my words bring glory to His name.

The book about Katie is coming together and I can't get the words out fast enough. Katie has so much to tell of her life. I wish I had known her myself but through my findings maybe I will know her.

Now back to the writing.

Dallas Conference

Last week end I went to my first American Christian Writers Conference in Dallas. Instructors were Gail Gaymer Martin, Lin Johnson, Jerry Hopkins and Frank Ball. I highly suggest to anyone to go to a conference with any one of these professionals. I walked away with brain over load because of all the information I was given. There was also personal time with Gail and Lin. I was given an abundance of great helpful information for my novel. Now the big job takes place! I have to put all the information to good use and get it done right!

I look forward to my next conference by ACW. Reg and Eleanor Forder put together a wealth of books for the bookstore and with their choice of instructors. Thank you Reg and Eleanor.

Deadly Wilderness

I started reading Kelly Irvin's new book "Deadly Wilderness". Her prologue got me going so much I had to read on. The setting is San Antonio, Texas and is about murder and romance. One page will lead to two and on and on. I haven't finished it yet (slow reader) but can't wait to pick it up again. Great book Kelly........keep them coming.

Reading New Books

This is long overdue and I apoligize to Mary DeMuth. Her memoir "Thin Place" was very intimate and gut renching. I highly recommend this book to anyone that has been physicial abused, mentally abused, or verbally abused. Mary described her deepest feelings and how she has overcome and she has done that through Christ Jesus. Pick up her book and follow her adventure from a child to adulthood. You won't regret it.

The Last Friday of February

I can't believe February has only two days left of the month. Well three if you want to count today. I've made the copies of my manuscript to give to an editor to give it the once over. Find all the mistakes, boo boos, and then to make it right before looking for a publisher. That's the big one. How do you go about finding a publisher? Going to conferences is one of the ways but what if you aren't scheduled to go to a conference for a few months or more? I've thought about self publishing but that takes money and I really would not like to put out a bunch of money. Not that I don't believe in what I've written, it's just that I'd rather not pay to have it published. I have no problem in promoting my work. Let's face it in todays world money is short, for everyone. If you self publish you tend to have to charge more for your book. I'd like every woman to be able to pick up a copy without it hurting her bank account. And so it goes...........

New Year and New Resolutions

This is the year to finish my projects. I will finish my novel and get it published!
I will finish my genealogy book on my great grandfather Nathaniel Green!
And I will get the next novel up in full swing.

Haven't we all made our resolutions for the new year only to fizzle out by the third month? I, too, have done that. But if we don't make a vow to ourselves we would go aimlessly through life having no direction, nothing to look forward to, nothing in our life to say we accomplished anything.

Sometimes it's hard, really hard, to put aside the house work, yard work, baking, visiting with neighbors (do people still do that?), of course the household bookkeeping, and do what you really want to do for yourself. Like write. As I drive down the street scenarios play out in my mind and I can't wait to stop and write it down for future use. My friends have told me to keep a small tape recorder in my car so I can just take notes. Well that would help but I forget to take it and when I have taken it I forget to turn it on. I know you have to get in the routine. Well that's like making a new year's resolution.

Then, of course, there is the grandchildren. Yes those darling little people God has entrusted to grandparents to play with, guide, and take off parents hands when they've had all they can take of snotty noses, whinning, crying, and fighting amongst themselves.

I must trust God in giving me my free time to do what He wants me to do. Until then.........