The Beginning of the Journey ~ circa 2007

OK so I'm starting this blog "thing" to chronicle my experience into the publishing world. Many words to describe the publishing world...but I'll keep it clean. I CAN say that I am having a lot of fun thus far! Of course there are many frustrating moments, but it really is worth it in the end when you see your book begin to come to life.

So to recap (or catch everyone up), let me go back to THE BEGINNING of how this all started (me writing books and all). It was July/2007 and I was one month out of closing my law practice. For nearly 10 years I was in the legal world...Arguing - Examining and Cross Examining witnesses - Arguing - Power lunches - Power deals...you get the picture. But now I found myself at home. The first month as a quasi stay-at-home mom, cooking, cleaning, picking up kids from carpool...and quite BORED to death. I had been so busy for nearly 10 years, now I just found myself in a big house, alone, bored, and on the verge of an anxiety attack because I didn't know what to do with myself.
I remember sitting at my computer one night and staring at it blankly (awww my computer, what once had been so busy and filled with Briefs, Appeal docs and letters, now flashed pics with words of the latest celebrity gossip, and new and interesting ways to cook a chicken). I checked my email for the 100th time that day and saw that I had a new email from a friend regarding book publishing.

I thought to myself "Huh" wouldn't it be interesting to publish a children's book...a Christian children's book. Since the world at that time, and actually still is, obsessed with "dark" themed stories, I wanted to publish something more positive to feed into our children.

I remember asking and praying to the Lord that if He would just give me some words...stories...I would write them down and go from there...
Well that night I couldn't even sleep. My head was FILLED with so many words and stories!!! I had to get up and write down what was filled in my head. I honestly couldn't write everything down fast enough!! Within a few weeks from when I prayed for stories, I had a total of 3 stories completed (Frog on a Log, The Beetle & the Sun~ which would later turn into Baby Beetle & the Sun, and Hello Lord ~ which would later turn into My Forgivefullness). I also had many more stories in my head that needed to be put on paper.

I sent the completed stories to several publishers. Received many rejection letters, HOWEVER I did receive a contract on one of my stories (My Forgivefullness)...a 21 page contract for a two-book deal! I was excited at first, but after reading the 21 pages, and discovering many unfavorable commitments, I decided not to accept the publication deal. There's actually more to the story, but that's all I'll elaborate on for the time being...

After that, I decided to step back and breathe a bit, everything was happening so fast. It had only been a few months since I even started writing!! Thereafter I put away all of my manuscripts and ideas, and did not look at them or think about them again for another 2 years...that year would be 2009.