Niko's Test Result!

The pulmonary blockages are gone. Utterly gone. They were there when he was young, and they aren't there now. Happy day! His aorta is still narrow, but not severely. We're not looking at surgery; we're just going to be aware. And the best part is that he doesn't want to traumatize Niko, so we'll come back in a year. A year! We've never gone a year between heart appointments! I'm so happy!

Also, I had three pieces go up yesterday. A flash, a prose poem, and a regular poem. Three pieces in one day! I was pretty excited. If you're interested, you can read them here. I've decided that I'm interested in joining either the Horror Writer's Association (HWA) or the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America (SFWA). It gives me another goal to work toward. Anyway, I was updating my Published Works page, and it made me sit back and smile for a second. Hooray! They're mostly small markets, but I'm getting better. I'm learning and I'm not giving up. And this makes me happy. :) Take a quick peek, if you'd like. I'd love it if you would. http://abrokenlaptop.wordpress.com

All is well here.

A Lethargic Yay

Tomorrow I'm scheduled to go to the heart center and discuss the results of Niko's hellacious echo. Luckily Luke is supposed to be off, and can watch the kids so I can jet down there alone. I'm always nervous. Niko's heart has been looking pretty good lately...at least, according to whatever picture they've been able to get, which hasn't been fantastic. This is his first accurate picture in quite some time (like since we moved here three years ago) so I'm hoping it'll only give us good news.

Fingers crossed.

Niko's playing with his toys, and Nina is "reading" a book to her doll. What good kids. They've really been getting on my nerves lately (augh! SUMMER!!) but they're such sweet children. They want to be good and do the right things. They're pretty special.

I'm wiped out today, but I'm trying to press forward on the writing front. A lethargic yay! I think that I'm going to dedicate July to rewriting my second Ray the Vampire novel. I like the first one quite well, but the second one jumped the shark in a big way. You can bet that I'll be listening to this music while I write. This is the official Ray soundtrack. :)

Good news!

Good news! Good news, good news!

So I've been working so hard on getting my novel shopped out to agents. It's really...I don't know. Grueling. Time consuming. It's a little disheartening at times, but I tend to bounce back really quickly because I know that's just how the business goes. And I'm not afraid to work hard, so that helps. But anyway!

You write your novel, and then you have to write a short query letter saying, "Hello, carefully researched agent! My novel is about .... and would you like to read it?" It's hard. And I struggle writing queries anyway, so that doesn't help me. But!

I won a short essay contest, and my prize is that a major agent at Writer's House (they put out Twilight) will critique my query for me! She'll make it as strong as it can be. I've been very lucky to have other people help me with it, and this is just ultra fantastic. I'm so excited! Now I can feel confident about my query. :)

Anyway, I wrote about it here and linked you to my essay, if you're interested. Hooray!