I may be a goal addict...

I've always done best when setting goals for myself. I find it's a way to overcome my attention issues at least to a certain degree. It's not just about setting some big seemingly unreachable goal. Nope, its about breaking that down into manageable steps, that will steadily progress toward that goal. It's a process that I honestly love.

Every year I buy a daily planner, one that has both days and month sections. I write my big goals in the note section so that I can check them often and stay focused. Then I break those down to monthly chunks, and yes write those in too. After than then divide it out by day. Not counting chores I can't get out of, I make five or more goals for every day. They aren't big things at all. But in no time at all they add up and change my world.

One of my bigger goals is to finish the championship on two of my Cocker girls this year. The small steps for that is something like...

weekly: brush Ari, bathe Ari, trim Ari.

That is three small goals that I can check off in less than an hour, usually. 35 of these goals a week really add up. And yes, I do offer myself rewards for a job well done. If I get more than 35 goals complete in  a week, then I buy myself an iTunes song. I'm pretty cheap so I'm not willing to make my reward very expensive, but even I can spend a buck here or there. As a bonus, I often play my hard won songs while working on the next goals. :)

This week's goals are mostly focused on the house. I must be working up to spring cleaning. Oh! And I've been working on a cafepress site with a bunch of possible designs.

And I'm working on writing too, Amethyst  is my focus. I'm not going to let my writer attention wander until I can finish up the Amethyst trilogy. For those who didn't know, Amethyst 2  has been finished for a loooonnnng time. When submitted to Carina, it was turned down, massively revised and still turned down.  So it has been sitting on the sidelines (holding my broken heart) until now. I'm slowly working up to a whole new version for book two, even a new name. So if there is anyone still thinking about Toni, Ben and Amethyst, hang in there. This time if it won't work at Carina, I'll find some other way to get it out there to the readers.

Until next time,
Shannon

NEXT POST:  Is  anybody out there?

Beyond the Bio

I promised to talk more about the real me, so now, where to start?

Well my bio talks about my dogs and dog showing. I've been breeding and showing AKC Cocker Spaniels for nearly 35 years. I started showing with my parents when I was around eight. (Don't do the math!) I love my dogs. Each and every one that I've had has been special in their own way regardless if they were a winner or a rescue. You can learn about me and my life with dogs on our website www.barrelvalley.com.

I probably should have started with my name. *grin* Goes to show how important my dogs are to me.  The name L. Shannon is not exactly my real name. As is common for writers I decided from the beginning to use a pen name. I have a degree in teaching special education and just in case I ever decided to use it again I wanted  to keep the two worlds separate. My real name is Shannon. Married name McCracken. So there you have it, its fine to just keep calling me Shannon. :)

Another amusing tidbit, I have a day job as a sales associate at Tractor Supply. *laugh* They have taken plenty of my money over the years so 5 years back I decided to take some of theirs too. It was my first job in retail and in the beginning I found it a bit difficult. But now I usually enjoy it more than is fair for a "job".

Until next time,
Shannon

NEXT POST:
I may be a goal addict.

I'm still alive.

In case anyone reads this.... I'm still alive.

It has been a long while since my last post and I'm sorry to have been missing so long. I feel bad for abandoning my readers and characters but I had my own story line that I had to follow through to the end.

I don't usually talk about my personal life very much but I'm  going to try to change that bad habit and learn to share a bit more about me and my life.

For the past two years, my husband and I were trying to expand our family. Unfortunately, even with specialist help, pregnancy isn't going to happen and once I faced that reality I found it to be a rather crushing blow. Getting past that is proving difficult even as we are considering our options, including adoption.

Now that children are looking to be less possible, my friends, family and even my characters are even more precious. With that in mind, I am planning to stay in touch better. If I disappear again, feel free to give a yell at me.

Until next time,
Shannon


NEXT POST:
I'm coming out of my writer closet... More about me beyond the bio.

Life, Death and Rewrites

Wow. And wow again.

My writer buddy, Moira Reid was looking over one of my current projects. She made it sound like she was just enjoying my story, but the truth is she quickly found several problems and helped me find solutions. In a matter of a couple hours we hashed out nearly half of the story.

I have been struggling over this story for quite a while. Some of my readers may remember the book, Amethyst Bound? It was planned as trilogy of novellas. In the beginning it felt like a cohesive story line that could carry the characters through the three novellas with ease, but with some  interference from real life in the middle, book two became the harbinger of doom for all my writing. I fought and fought with it and finally got it to a point where it felt close to where I first intended.

Unfortunately the editor in charge of the series did not feel it could work as it was and offered some suggestions to improve it. Back to the editing I went, still wrapped in a thin layer of hope, I reworked the story to address nearly all the editor's concerns. Many of which made sense and I was sure improved the story. As a side effect of the edit, the story twisted further from my original vision. I could accept the changes, even embrace them if it let  my characters breath life into their world...  Or so I thought. With nearly all the changes made (I kept one character that I was asked to cut), I sent it back again and once more it did not meet with the love I had hoped.

Part of me had already given up on this story. It no longer felt like my baby. Sadly even an ugly baby can be loved too much.

Some  might have  noticed, I can at times be pretty stubborn. I was determined to finish this story before jumping into bed with another. I really try to be that kind of gal. So with this one acting like a blockade none of my other stories could see the light of day.

Still, I am stubborn, so here I am again. This time I gutted the story and found my original notes in order to rework it from scratch.

If this doesn't work, I'm afraid Amethyst 2 will have to be put aside until I can find the love again. Wish me luck.

Is anybody out there?

After not posting here for so long I doubt anyone even reads these posts anymore. But if anyone does read this, I'd be so tickled I might just give something (or a lot of somethings) away.

In the meantime, how about a little sneak peek into my exciting life?

Did I mention that the day job is a sales associate at the local Tractor Supply? So yeah, my day consists of helping old farmers pick up chicks and get their engines revving... Or something like that. *grin* This was my first retail job and now I've been at it for about five years now. Most days I find it very entertaining as well as often physical work. So anyone out there fond of their local TSC? I ended up applying there because its been my favorite shopping site for ages, and now I get an employee discount? How awesome is that?

In addition to TSC I also started a small business that is well, not really making me much money yet. Part of it is specialized pet groomer that does house calls. I also help run some smaller dogs shows or at least I handle the paperwork and record keeping for them. Oh, and I do some specialized house sitting for animal breeders and boarding kennels. So I guess you could say my business is sort of a jack of all trades in animal care.

Have I bored anyone reading? If you read to this point I think you definitely deserve something.