New Year's Resolutions...

Happy New Year, everyone!

Sorry I haven't posted in nearly a month, but I decided to take a few weeks off of everything. The second week of December I got sick with a very bad sinus infection that turned into bronchitis, so I slept and didn't do much at all that week (including blogging). And, the last two weeks I decided to make into a true vacation. I didn't write or do much work at all (or any work for that matter). It's just as well, though. I've had writer's block for the last few weeks anyway, so it was kind of nice not thinking about it and playing the video games I got for Christmas.

Still, it's time to get back to the swing of things. I should be blogging once a week as usual. I've already taken down the Christmas decorations and cleaned up the house, and now I'm getting ready to attempt to write again--wish me luck.

Still no word from that agent, so it appears I'll be sending out the next wave of agent letters later in the week, or early next week. I'm going to go ahead and send new letters to the original agents I sent my work to last year. Since I was just getting started, I made the mistake of querying an epic tome of almost two hundred thousand words, not realizing that they would pretty much stop reading the letter after finding out how many words the novel was. Now that I'm sending them the first in a trilogy of much shorter novels, I think I'll have better luck. (And, hopefully, since it's been a year they won't recognize my name.)

I haven't really gotten around to making any New Year's resolutions, so I guess I'll make some right now. By publicly announcing them on this blog, that kind of makes me accountable...

1. I'm going to try to go to church every Sunday (unless I'm sick, or we're out of town, or emergencies, etc.) and to try to pray at least once a day. This is my most important goal, and I need to strive to reach it. I think doing this will help me achieve all of my other goals. "Commit to the Lord whatever you do, and all of your plans will succeed." Prov. 16:3 (I know this to be very true, because without His help, I would've have even gotten this far.)

2. I'm going to get at least one agent to read the entire novel before rejecting me (I think this goal is realistic. I have no control over what agent finally decides to represent me or when, but I want at least to have one agency decide to read my work before the year is out. I think if I send enough letters to enough agents, at least one will.)

3. I'm going to get at least halfway finished with a new novel or finish one of the others I was working on before the break. (I have a novel that's almost finished, a spin-off from the vampire trilogy that I've completed, but I just got to the spot where I'm not sure where to go with it, so I might start something fresh to change gears a little while.)

4. I'm going to keep the weight I lost off, and attempt to lose even more this year. I'm also going to start lifting weights to firm up my arms and doing sit ups for my stomach. (What I do now is mostly cardiovascular, and working my legs, I mostly exercise on my exercise bike for nearly an hour each day.)

5. I'm not going to sleep in unless I'm sick. I'm going to get up and stay up when my husband leaves for work everyday so I can make use of the full day ahead of me. (So far I'm doing well on this one.)

I think that's enough for now. Sure, I could add more like, "I'll learn at least one new recipe," or "I'll start painting again," or "I'll start practicing contact juggling again" or "I'll learn to play the piano," but, I like to make goals that I know I can achieve. I never know what the new year will bring so I try not to make lofty goals, and then if I do have spare time, I do whatever I feel like. One day, I do plan to do all of the examples listed, but I think I'm satisfied with my five resolutions for this year.

(I kid you not, this is the kind of strange stuff I do in my spare time--I'll pick up a new skill just to learn it. I can already make balloon animals, I know how to juggle--but contact juggling would be way more impressive and would require a great deal more skill, and I love expanding my cooking recipes.)

Anyway, I'll try to stick to it. Next week, I'll probably write my review of Ted Dekker and his novels as promised. I'm on the last book of "The Books of History Chronicles," so I should have a lot to write about. Talk to you then.