WE HAVE TRAVEL APPROVAL

DEPARTURE FOR CHINA: NOVEMBER 20, 2014

GOTCHA DAY: NOVEMBER 24, 2014, Nanjing, Jiangsu Province, China

Nanjing

Happy Halloween! So many things are happening. Good things.

-On Saturday I finished writing my next book.
-On Monday I read through the whole thing, fixing, tightening, improving, and rolling my eyes as I deleted.
-On Tuesday we got our travel approval for China. We freaked out a little, which is time-consuming. I helped a friend at the dialysis center, and I helped Maren with her costume. I continued to edit. We carved pumpkins. It was hard to concentrate!
-On Wednesday I spent most of the morning talking to family about helping with the kids when we go to China. I edited more. We had our church Halloween party. I didn't bring chili and I forgot the trunk-or-treat, but the kids and I did dress up and in my writer-haze I finished the edit. The party was awesome. Maren danced the Thriller with her Young Women group. I sent out the manuscript to a couple author friends for critique at about 11:00 pm.
-On Thursday we confirmed out travel itinerary for China and bought tickets. I also added the title page, dedication page, author bio, and cleaned up the whole manuscript. Firsts drafts are messy. A friend came over to pick up all the smaller clothes we'd saved for Sara, because we have her sizes now and knew she wouldn't fit in them. I tried to talk to my friend and we were laughing because apparently I used all my words for the book. Writer-haze. Me can't speech. We went to Jacob's last football game of the year in the pouring rain.
-Today I looked around my house and cringed. Writing hazes tend to blind you to things like laundry and dishes and trimming your nails. I got the critique notes back from my alpha readers. I trimmed my nails. We did the dishes. We made our traditional pumpkin donuts. The guys took over answering the door to trick-or-treaters so I could incorporate my reader notes into the manuscript.
-Tomorrow my submission is due to my publisher. We are cleaning the house and making the "THINGS TO DO BEFORE CHINA" list.

I AM SO DANG EXCITED AND TERRIFIED AND HAPPY.

20 DAYS.