As much as I dreaded it, 35 has been surprisingly good to me so far. It seems to have provided the motivation I needed to actually spend a lot of energy on writing. I have never been more prolific. The most I've ever submitted, whether for publication or to contests, was 11 submissions in one year, in 2000. This year, I've already hit 19 and have at least 4 more things I plan to send out by the end of the year. (2 have been accepted, a lot were contests, and I'm still waiting to hear about quite a few.) And there are still 3 months to go!

In the past week alone, I finished a silly short story for grown-ups (probably not marketable, but I still wanted to finish it) that I started years ago--I'm not sure how many, and also a more serious story for grown-ups that I started at least ten years ago! I also drafted a story for young readers (maybe ages 6-9) that I hope to send out next week, and I'm polishing a picture book manuscript and have written some notes for a short non-fiction piece.

Other things aren't going quite as well as writing, and I've been feeling sick a lot lately, but I'm so happy about the writing that it kind of trumps everything else right now.

Good news today! Guideposts for Kids is buying one of my poems! Here's the acceptance envelope I got in today's mail, minus my address: