EXCITING NEWS!!

Many of you know I've written a book and have been trying to get it published, which is not an easy process. I sent out query letters in June and received 100% rejections. But that was probably a good thing because it got me to do some more research (which I should've done in the first place! Hey, live and learn, right?) and I completely revamped my query letter so that it was kick-butt awesome compared to the last one I did and last Tuesday I submitted it to about seven more agencies.

I was having internet problems and finally Friday morning I asked Mom to check that email account for me and she sent me this.....

"Thank you for submitting your query to $%^&@. We read it with great interest and would like to see the full novel as well as a 3-5 page synopsis describing the book."

An agency in New York wanted my full manuscript!!! I nearly fell over! I did a lot of screaming and a weird kind of surreal, happy crying and I called Duane to read what she'd sent (she sent me their actual words) and I was so muddled he could hardly understand me, but it was an exciting day!

Usually agencies only ask for a few sample chapters, so I was a little blown away that they wanted the full thing up front, and they said they read my query with "great interest." WAH!! Anywho, I finally got everything exactly as I wanted it and sent the manuscript and a synopsis Sunday night. So now it's just a waiting game. They said it'll take up to 12 weeks to review my work, and that I was welcome to check with them after 8 weeks. What am I going to do for 8 weeks? JK

Needless to say, I've been very excited. I know it doesn't mean I'll get my book published. It is possible that they won't like what they read and I'll get the rejection later, but it's a step in the right direction in any case!

Watch out world, here I come!

Busy Busy Busy!

Okay, so Zach attack has been having tons of fun lately. It was his second birthday on the tenth and we had a little party for him. He couldn't quite figure out what to do with the lit candles on his cupcake, so he picked it up and tried to shake the flames off! It was hilarious.

He also carved his first pumpkin and that was fun. He has to go out onto the front porch to say, "Hi pumpkin," and take its "hat" off (the lid).

And last night we had a Halloween party at my mom's house and Zach got to wear his costume. He made such a cute little caveman. I suggested we all play the caveman game where you grunt instead of talk (I just made it up, can you tell?) Anna's kids loved it, but it got a little out of hand. Still, Zach was a cute caveman. We looked everywhere to find a little bone or something for him, but didn't have much luck, so I squished a piece of aluminum foil and spray painted it white. It didn't last long, Zach kept wanting to play with it.

Okay, sorry, caveman pictures to come later. As I've said before, I'm not a pro at blogging!

Leaves

Long time no blog! We moved down the street to our real estate house and not only is the space great, but we have an awesome backyard. Zach has a book where the skeleton rakes leaves and then I saw a little rake at the dollar store, so he was ready for the leaves to begin to fall. And we went out into the backyard and made little piles, he with his tiny rake and me with the regular one. And he loved to run and flop himself down onto the little piles. It was so cute.

The Zoo

Mom and I took Zach to the zoo about three weeks ago and his favorites were the tigers, the bebas (zebras) and especially the kangawoo.

We went at a really bad time of day though--right at lunch--so practically all of the animals were asleep. The monkeys, the tigers, a lot of the animals. Bummer.

Mo-Cycle!

Holy bananas, it's been months since I've posted. Sorry everyone!

The first thing we hear from Zach in the morning is "Mo-cycle" (motorcycle) and that's all he talks about the rest of the day. yak yak yak mo-cycle. It's so funny. Our neighbors all know when he's outside because he goes nuts walking past the three motorcylces parked in our parking lot and he always asks, "Sit on it? Sit on it?" whenever we pass.

Duane used to have a motorcycle but he sold it a few years ago, but he borrowed his dad's for a few weeks this summer and has taken Zach on a few rides and I take Zach out to it at least once a day to "sit on it." And he has a little red motorcycle that he carries with him everywhere we go.

Yes, I am ALIVE!!!

Here is little Z in his Easter suit (he actually got it for Christmas and it's just barely fitting though I had to hem up the pants). His legs are so short! It's not the best picture, but I still think he looks so scrumptious. Sigh. I love my little boy.

Whenever I take Zach to the park, all he does is go up and down the stairs, since we don't have them at home. It's funny. And he likes the slide. And the swings, actually. The first time I put him in one of those diaper swings he just giggled nonstop.

And here is Zachary and his cousin Heber (whose dad joked about the fact that he had a pink bucket). These boys are so cute together. Zach was taking his eggs out and when he wasn't looking Heber took them and stashed them in his :).

Holy Bananas!! It's been about three months since I posted! Sorry ya'll. The screen on our laptop went kaput and would've cost like $500 to fix. Thank goodness for those plan thingies you can get when you purchase a new computer, we didn't have to spend a dime. It turns out the screen was completely shot . So it's been gone for about a month. My mom has wonderfully let us borrow her laptop, but then we've had internet issues, and then blogging just takes so much TIME!! I know, I know, excuses, excuses.

So Happy Easter. We had tons of fun yesterday. We had plans to go to the egg hunt in Sugar with my sister in law and her little boy Heber who is about eight months older than Zach and it ended up being so crazy! We got the parks mixed up and then when we finally found the right one it was too late, so we had our own egg hunt at the park in Sugar, and my sister Anna's kids were all there too, so it was fun. Zachary is in nursery now (hooray!) and they did an egg hunt in there today too, so he's had lots of candy. And then tonight we went over and had dinner at Anna's house with everybody. I love having family so close; I feel very blessed.

Duane has been working with his friend Jason laying tile at one of the humongous houses up on the hill by the temple. They've also started a band and are set to compete in Battle of the Bands on July 4th. Duane is pretty excited.

I (drum roll please) have been writing writing writing, and I think I've finally finished my book. It is adventure/sci-fi/romance, and I've had a few people read it and really enjoy it, so that gives me hope. I've been doing some research (I need to do more) on finding literary agents and writing query letters and such so that I can hopefully get it published! WAH!!

Zachary is adorable as ever. He is a little parrot, learning new words every day, and I'm amazed at how quickly he is learning to speak and learning other things. He says so many words, I can't even count them, he speaks really well for his age. He already knows all of his shapes and loves to play with the shape-o ball, the one with red on one side and blue on the other and you stick the little yellow shapes in their spots. He walks around going "circle? square?". He loves it. I took him to Wal Mart the other day and he kept pointing and saying "star star" and I finally figured out he was talking about the star between Wal and Mart. He blows me away, just so observant and so cute. And he especially loves the warmer weather. He'll hand me his shoes and say "play outside?" It's so nice to live so close to the park! We're two blocks away from Smith Park so that's awesome.

Anywho, this is turning out more like a journal entry, but life is good! We make life a perpetual spree. :)

Swimming!

Last Saturday we went swimming with Duane's cousin and his wife and it was so fun to take Zach! I bought him some cute little swimmy trunks with fish all over them last summer, and he only wore them once when we went to the splash park, so I was glad to have another excuse to pull them out again. And he LOVED the pool. I was a little uncertain because he was crying while we were in the changing room, but once he got in the pool, it was hard to keep a hold of him! He also loves his baths, so I guess it wasn't that big of a surprise for him to have so much fun in a really big bathtub ;). So Duane and the guys went off and played basketball while I sat in the shallow end with his cousin's wife and Zach Attack, but it was great.