April Highlights

  And another month bites the dust...

  It does not need repeating, but man, the year is going by so fast. Wow.

  I'm partially freaking out cause at the time of posting this I'm getting married in 111 days...that's scary. In three months I'll be an old married lady. Super weird.

  Well, what did this almost-old-married-lady accomplish this month you ask?

LIFE EVENTS

• My friend MacKenzie came home from seven months overseas at European Bible school. It's definitely been good to have her back as she is one of my best friends and was dearly missed. We threw her a surprise party with root beer floats and the two of us took a trail ride as friends who love horses do (especially when one said friend hasn't ridden in seven months). 

• Another friend Lisa and her little boy Obsidian (Sid) came over and stayed with us for a few days, so that was interesting and kinda neat having a baby in the house again - it's been awhile since that was a thing around here. :P

My brother holding Sid.

• Crazy stupid Alberta weather literally went from the top picture to the bottom picture in a day and back and forth for pretty much all of this month. There is so much mud here right now...

Literally a day apart.

• I started working on wedding decorations, my last sort of part of things to do besides logistics. Ironically that was the part I thought would be the worst, but so far it's just made me more excited. Maybe because it's getting closer...
• Lots of jumping this month. I even got brave enough to raise them quite significantly, now that my lower leg is properly positioned to hold me on. 

• I was in charge of an art display at our local homeschool convention which involved sitting around a booth and reading Ender's Game while eating junk food most of the day.
• The farm is filling up with baby animals, especially new calves and also some new kittens. What I really want is a puppy!

This one has the coolest leaf marking on its cheek

• Wrangler Training has officially begun out at camp which involves training new wranglers and working with all the lazy horses, also all the new slightly crazier ones. We are having to put down one of our horses, Spec, due to him having lost most of his teeth. It's very sad as he has been with us a long time, but I'm glad he's getting laid nicely to rest.

Spec's last picture. :(

• We had a Potential Staff camp weekend as well for all the new guys wanting to be staff this summer, those are always pretty wild. I got to hang out with two of my favorite staff members in our cabin, break a jaw-breaker with a trailer hitch, eat some larva and a whole host of other weird and wonderful things. 
• Jonathan and I got to hike again today! Finally! I took a lot of pictures cause it was super pretty but unfortunately I forgot my camera in his car. Le sigh. 

WRITING LIFE

  I don't know if I can say I got much "writing" specifically done this month. I wrote one chapter from The Wandering and have been working slowly and steadily on Thin-Skinned as my school project. Speaking of, I am so excited to be able to finish that next month and have my certificate - and no school ever again unless I feel like it!

  I also have pretty much completely finished my edits on The Sorceress and the Squid. I am just reading through it once more while I wait for my cover art to be completed, then on to formatting! This has been such an exciting process. I loved working with my editor Erin Lodes and seeing how my book changed and grew and got better over this past month. I've been planning out a launch for the book (tentatively June 4th) and am super stoked to get this story into more hands. So far I've had some pretty amazing readers, but I'm always always eager for more - and of course eager to be a published author!

READING LIFE

Still sicking to my goal of two books a month. This month's picks were both very excellent choices.

ENDER'S GAME by Orson Scott Card
Once upon a time, a younger me picked up this book and tried to read it but found it way too dry and slow-moving. I'm not sure what younger me was thinking. This time around it was AMAZING and I was racing through to finish. The characters were very interesting and the world-building was great and the plot engaging and all around it was just great. Space battles, guys. Space battles. 5/5

THE WITCH OF BLACKBIRD POND by Elizabeth George Speare
I picked this up at the homeschool convention in the used book section for a couple dollars (while reading Ender's Game). I have been looking for it for awhile and was super excited to come across it in the mosh pit that is the used book stall. I began reading as soon as I'd finished Ender's Game and loved it as well. To be honest, one of the most satisfying parts was that the main character's romance played out exactly as I wanted it to. So nice. 5/5

BLOGGING LIFE

  I've more or less been able to keep up a regular Sunday once a week blogging schedule (surprise surprise). This month I talked about my favorite fictional friendships, the worst things people say when you get married young, and some thoughts on 13 Reasons Why and suicide.

  Blogging stats:

• Followers: 17
• Pageviews: 5,845
• Posts: 63

GOALS

Goals for April:

• Get to chapter 20 in The Wandering? // This didn't happen as I expected. :P But I did write one new chapter, putting me onto chapter 18. 
• Read 2 books // Yup! See above. 
• Finish my read-through of The Sorceress and the Squid (hopefully before the end of the month) so I can send it back for the proof-read // Not only did I finish the copy edit review, I also finished the proof-read review. Huzzah!
• I'm working on Thin-Skinned for school starting this month, so we'll see what happens there I guess...hopefully some new chapters? // I do indeed have almost a whole new chapter...I have been rather busy unfortunately and done less actual writing than editing and rereads. 

Goals for May:

• One more chapter in The Wandering (I *think* this is a realistic goal).
• Get The Sorceress and the Squid ready to send for formatting and prep for release (more info on this stuff COMING SOON).
• Definitely get as much done in Thin-Skinned as I can since I have to have a certain amount of pages finished for the end of my course next month. 
• Read 2 books 

I think that will be all...I think. Better keep stuff short and sweet - so much else in my life to do! 

  Anyway, before I wrap-up here, I just want to let you know that yes, The Sorceress and the Squid is headed down the publishing road and will hopefully available for purchase on Amazon by June 4th. This is me being optimistic and determined, lol. Hopefully y'all will go an check it out when it's ready! :D Also, if you're interested in being part of the launch team and/or blog tour, keep an eye out for sign up info coming soon. 

  Super excited for this, guys!!

  How was your April? Are you in shock like me that it's already May? Yeah, it's nuts. What sort of things did you get up to this month? Let me know below!