Well, the finished new book is on its way. It was a big job, partly because it was the longest one yet and partly because things kept getting in the way, like our long camping trip and my coming down with Covid last month. Now it's done and will soon be on its way to me. Here's what the front cover looks like. The Doll's Storybook belongs to Veronika (the doll), but she's happy to share with children and doll collectors everywhere.
I had to redo the back before submitting the cover, because one of my wonderful editors recommended adding something to one of the stories that inspired me to add Nico to the book, and of course, that meant he had to be in the group photo on the back. I hadn't changed the text to include Pam, another new character since the last book, so I didn't need to fix that. They are all introduced by name inside the book.
Here's the table of contents. Now you will know which stories are in the new book. This is the biggest book of the series so far: 92 pages.
I didn't actually operate the press––Book Baby does that––but I feel a little like Gutenberg by doing the layouts, at least. Fortunately, publishing has been modernized since he printed his first Bible.
The proof copy arrived late in the day on Tuesday. I found some layout issues I wanted to change, like enlarging the margins at the top. I don't notice everything until it's printed, which is why I get a proof copy each time. I found another odd apostrophe and a couple of things I wanted to reword. It's easy to fix things at this stage. I just upload a new "inside pages" to Book Baby.
I included the links to the free knitting and sewing patterns that appeared in the last book, but just as a list in the back. This time I included the links along with photos of each one, perhaps a bit more useful.
Regarding the last book, I had a couple of medical appointments this week, including one with my dermatologist. She told me she had given a copy of "Our Favorite Verses" to a friend who had a preschooler. She said it was the little girl's favorite book. She knows all the names of the characters. I'm glad I added some Reader's Challenge sections to some of the poems. That way, the book can grow with her. Some of the words, especially in "Veronika's Vocabulary Verses," will be difficult for her, like echinoderms and maritime, but when she encounters them later in life, she will remember.
Elizabeth, our new priest at Trinity, has three children. I thought the younger two might enjoy my books, so I gave her a copy of each of the first four. She told me last week that her daughter (age 10, I believe) loves them. She finds them on her bed when she goes into her room. I love to hear that!
You might wonder why I'm self-publishing. Well, when I wrote the first book, I looked into submitting it to a big publishing house and decided against it. I would need an agent ($), and then I would have to submit to one place at a time and wait. I decided I didn't want to wait and perhaps have the first book come out when I'm 105 years old, so I started to look into self-publishing. I realized that I could do the layouts myself and hit up family members for proofreading and editing. So here we are with book number five. Book Baby handles the printing and distribution, and they have it available in the Book Baby Book Shop. I realized the royalties wouldn't amount to much unless I paid for advertising, and the money I would receive would have to be reported as income, which would complicate our taxes. I'm not in it for the money, so I arranged for the payments to go directly to St. Jude. That way, we don't have to declare it as income...because it isn't, and I don't pay for advertising. I also can't deduct the printing and distribution costs, either, because there's no income from it, but I could be spending just as much money golfing and have nothing to show for it. Besides, I suck at being a golfer.
We had our Madroña Vineyards pop-up meeting on Tuesday, the day the proof copy arrived. It's always fun to visit with these online friends. Everyone toasted the new book. Several other people had things to toast, as well. (We always use "Nebbiolo," a wonderful grape variety, as the word to toast with.)
During the meeting/party, Charlie and I had the TikTok Pasta, but with gnocchi instead of pasta, and I added chopped greens to it instead of the salad olives, which is what I usually put in it. It was delightful that way, too, and with the feta cheese, it doesn't really need more salty ingredients. We had some freshly baked whole wheat sourdough bread and a Madroña Merlot with it.
Later in the week, I made apple crisp, because we had some apples that needed to be used. We had it topped with Butter Pecan ice cream. It's also good with a dollop of plain yoghurt, I found out.
We've had a fire about twenty miles to the southeast of us for several days putting the air quality in the hazardous range for much of the week, but Saturday we finally had an acceptable level of pollution, so we went for a walk.
We didn't have much notice, so we just took our regular route.
The next day the AQI was in the hazardous range, so it was good we got our walk in when we did.
Sunday we celebrated the Feast Day of St. Francis, including the annual Blessing of the Animals. It was a week later than usual. We sometimes have other animals, but mostly of the canine persuasion, and this year the only felines attended in absentia (as photos), because they tend not to care to share the room with dogs. I didn't see any other animals, but a few people had photos, and it was hard to see what they were. Dusty likes to sing when he's in church. You can hear him through most of the service if you care to watch here. He's a boy soprano, or as Charlie says, a castrato.
Sandy was calm and quiet throughout the service. He made friends with the other dog sitting in the front row with us on the "Gospel side," as well as the people sitting close to us and behind us.
Elizabeth, our new priest, often sings part of her sermons, and she led the offertory song, "The Butterfly Song," by Bryan Howard, assisted by some of the children. Most of us sang along once we heard the melody.
Here's the song, if you don't want to listen to us sing it in the link above and/or don't know it. It was a lot of fun.
Some of the poodle people came to greet our pups after the service. Our organist has a minipoo who is about the same size as Sandy, so a bit big for a mini. Another person has a standard, but I didn't see the dog. He wants to get another poodle, maybe a mini, to keep the older one company. He wanted to know what breeder our dogs come from, so we told him about Ash's Mystical Poodles. It didn't bother him that Marie is in Pahrump, Nevada. He says he has a trailer. Someone else from the church has a standard poodle puppy from the same breeder. We saw a toy poodle at the service, and I know of at least one "doodle." We almost have enough for a poodle club just at the church.
I finished the audiobook I was listening to while knitting a few rounds on my Oregon Autumn Cardigan. Here are the two sleeves side-by-side, so you can see how close I am to starting the border motif, right after the next dark rounds. I'm excited to get to that part. Then it will be time for the cuff and on to the neck and front bands.
I hope to hear later today or tomorrow that my books have shipped, as they were "in production" on Friday. I think the date the book will be available is December 5th in the US, but it will be available for preorder before that, so plenty of time for delivery before Christmas.
Whew! Time to start on the next one!
I have a lot of difficulty responding to comments to my blog posts because of technical issues beyond my control (my lack of understanding of how things work). Message me on Facebook, Ravelry or Spoutible if you need information.
What's in The Doll's Storybook: This week's story from #TheDollsStorybook is A Different Kind of Challenge, which first appeared in January 2020, but has been updated.
<a href="https://www.bloglovin.com/blog/7365001/?claim=kkvctsdtf4n">Follow my blog with Bloglovin</a>
