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I suppose some families have conversations about school that go something like this: Parent: How was school? Kid: Fine. Parent: That’s nice. That’s not the way it goes at our house. A month or two ago, the conversation went something

It’s actually kind of pretty…if you don’t have to go anywhere…and no one you love has to go anywhere…and you’re one of the lucky ones who manages to keep electricity throughout the whole thing…and you haven’t lost any big branches

So, I finished my “outline” of T.J.’s Story (such as it is), and guess what? Just because I list things like “listens to Sam’s message on the answering machine” in chapter 1 or “visits Gram in the nursing home” in

I feel like a third grader, all giddy and excited about my new friend. She’s a guitarist and she takes lessons from the same guy I take mandolin lessons from. Our teacher is all about bringing people together to play,

This was a question a reader asked me in an e-mail a couple weeks ago. And yes, it really did take me two weeks to get back to her. I read fan mail when it comes, but I answer it

I feel like I should celebrate….this is the worst first draft I’ve ever written! In fact, it is so bad that I declared it “done” at 42,000 words, even though I didn’t actually write the final scene. I actually CAN’T

Wow! I heard back from Pelican Press already on that picture book. They like it…but they’d like it better if it had 400 fewer words. So I’ll be working on that this morning. I’m further away from finishing my draft

We’ve got one tech week down and one to go on the Best Christmas Pageant Ever….and everything is going well. It’s a great show…and I’m not just saying that because Junior High Kid is in it. All the other parents

I’ve always wanted to keep a “writer’s notebook.” Ever since I was a kid (I LOVED Harriet the Spy!) And I’ve been given beautiful notebooks through the years specifically for this purpose…but that’s sort of been the problem. They always

Deborah Wiles was in town this past week. I went to hear her at one of the local elementary schools and O.M.G., look at this! We made her blog! If I had known I was going to get my picture

I set up my own NaNoWriMo write-in with fellow children’s book authors yesterday (since I have been strongly discouraged from attending the official Iowa City write-ins…though College Student tells me there actually were a couple of “old people” there last

We all know people who are “difficult,” right? People you have to tip-toe around because no matter what you say or do they’ll assume the worst rather than the best, people who love to stir up trouble, people who complain.

My writer’s group met last night. I gave them a picture book manuscript that Pelican asked me to write, but I don’t have a contract for yet (in fact, the editor e-mailed me last Friday to see how I was

Today is day 7 of NaNoWriMo. Everyone in my family is still in. My fantasies of all four of us sitting around the kitchen table writing together are starting to dry up. We get two at the table quite often,

That’s what the “official” NaNoWriMo book says. I’m not good at “just writing.” (I NEED TO TWEAK!!!!) But I’m getting better… I had a great writing day yesterday. I actually got caught up on my word count and forged ahead.

I needed to write about 2400 words yesterday to get caught up with my NaNoWriMo word count, and I only wrote 1697. But that’s okay because something else happened over the weekend. Something amazing! T.J.’s Story is the aftermath of

Today is my favorite day of the year! Yes, I like the day we return to standard time better than Christmas, Halloween, Thanksgiving, Valentine’s Day and my birthday. Even though it’s going to get dark an hour earlier today than

Junior High Kid and I are off to the theater before long…we’re working in the light booth for the local children’s theater company’s “other production” (the one that he’s not in this fall). This production is in the Englert theater,

It took me until 9:50 last night, but I did actually manage to write 1627 words on T.J.’s Story yesterday. Actually, I wrote a lot more words than that (including 482 words on a picture book), but I deleted them

I’m lucky my publishers are willing to continue publishing me, given how many changes I always want to make to my books at the last minute. About the only thing I haven’t tried to change in The Truth About Truman

Halloween seems a little anti-climactic to me this year because this is the first year in sixteen years that no one in my household is trick-or-treating (unless that changes between now and tonight). We’ve made some really fun costumes…Junior High

Gee, I feel like such a conformist coming up with my own Friday Five…I don’t normally do memes or anything else that everyone else seems to do. But, what the heck? It’s a Friday Five kind of day… 1) Today

I’m an obsessive rewriter. If I am asked to do a reading somewhere, I always hope no one has a copy of the book I’m reading from in front of them because I edit as I read aloud. I can’t

I had several days of school visits last week. It was close enough that I was able to drive back and forth every day, which was nice…I was able to see my family every day (not to mention my best

So, I think I’m an “author” this week rather than a “writer.” Writers write, and I haven’t been doing much of that. I have three days of author visits tomorrow, Thursday and Friday, so I spent yesterday getting organized. Today

I’ve thought about participating in NaNoWriMo for a while…I thought about it a lot the last three years because College Student has participated (and succeeded!) the last three years. I thought this would be something we could do together. Though

Two days ago I went to hear Libba Bray speak at the Iowa City Public Library. I almost didn’t go because the event was supposed to be for teens, and when I asked the librarian whether she was going to

I got an e-mail from the Director of Advertising and Promotion at one of my publishing houses last week. She said she had room for about 70-80 words after their blurb in the catalog…did I want to write something about

It is entirely possible I have gone just a little bit overboard with my author packets. Each one will have 23 pieces of paper inside! Yowza. I’ve got: a letter, a letter of agreement, a biography, an annotated bibliography of

So…apparently American Studies is the class to watch out for in eighth grade. The teacher doesn’t coddle. He actually expects you to LEARN something in his class. (What a novel idea…that one might actually LEARN something at school…) Mr. C.

The tornado sirens were sounding when I came out of my Toastmasters meeting last night. It wasn’t really doing much outside…there was a little thunder and lightning, that was about it. And despite the fact that there is now a

I’ve spent most of the day creating materials for my author packets…well, that and writing out the Toastmasters speech I came up with on my bike ride this morning. So far, I’ve written every one of my Toastmasters speeches on

I turned in my “final” final revision of The Truth About Truman School today (so unless there’s something my editor wants me to tweak, I’m done tweaking…I promise!). I spent part of my weekend revising a script for the local

My editor likes my compromise for the beginning of the Monkey Man sequel, too. In fact, I get the impression she likes the compromise idea better than what I originally turned in. (So do I!) I feel very lucky…I’m never

Okay…I heard back from my agent. She likes my chapters. She says I have “turmoil” (believe me, there’s been more turmoil in my head these last couple of days than there’s been on the page!) and she likes the idea

So, I e-mailed my editor yesterday…she’s still not crazy about my starting over and beginning this book at the point where T.J. and Sam meet. She really doesn’t want me to repeat scenes…even though it’s only three scenes that would

My cleaning service was here today. I have a new “team,” and my team lead is a GUY! I don’t leave when they come. They don’t clean my office (NOBODY cleans my office…not even me!), so I just stay in

So I’m back from another fabulous retreat with some of my writer friends. (Hard to believe we’ve been doing this ten years already!) Contrary to what my family probably thinks, we don’t just eat and laugh all weekend…we work, too.

Last night, Junior High Kid asked, “if you had a friend who swore a lot, what would you say to get them to stop?” Personally, I thought, “please don’t talk like that around me” was a good choice, but he’s

Last night I was supposed to present the “Thought of the Day” at Toastmasters. I had a really thoughtful thought all prepared…I was going to talk about my big picture project and how I finally organized and labeled eight years

I was a very good girl this morning. I didn’t putter around with the newspaper, e-mail or LJ…I went on my bike ride as soon as my husband and Junior High Kid left. Then I came home and got right

I’ve got 10 pages to go on my revision…plus that section back on page 31 where my editor noted that a character (teacher) disappears forever and she needs to be brought back. Back when I lived in Minnesota, I visited

Okay, I stole that subject header from the chapter titles of Moxy Maxwell Does Not Love Stuart Little by Peggy Gifford and Valorie Fisher…which is a fabulous chapter book and you should read it! But anyway…I was in the Stringtown

No, that’s not a trick math question…I’ve been checking the UPS website obsessively since Tuesday. I just about have my tracking number memorized. Apparently it takes one week for a mandolin to travel from Tempe, AZ to Coralville, IA. It

I had a couple of school visits during the past year where they didn’t sell any books. I don’t mean nobody wanted any…the school/organization that invited me didn’t offer any of my books for sale. I didn’t know they weren’t

I don’t think it’s cheating to say I met my goal yesterday. I did get to page 101 on my editor’s marked up version of my manuscript. However, truth be told, I am at the very bottom of page 99

I’m on track! I am as far into my revision of The Truth About Truman School as I said I’d be this morning. I’m on page 75…which, considering I started last Friday on page 13, is a big improvement. I’ve

I made it to page 31 yesterday (both kids were out last night, so I just kept going when I got to page 25). And I’m on page 54 right now. (Though there’s one thing…a big thing…I need to go

A couple days ago, a friend of mine implied that I “over-analyze” things. Can you believe that??? Well, if you know me at all, I’m sure you can! I DO tend to over-analyze. I prefer the spin another friend put

Junior High Kid has to do volunteer work somewhere in the community for his personal development class. I figured he’d volunteer at the library since he’s been volunteering there already, but no…he decided he wanted to volunteer at the animal

I did read The Truth About Truman from start to finish (no interruptions) yesterday. I just barely made it before I had to go and get Junior High Kid after school. And since this is my last chance to really

Today is the day I told myself I would be getting back to my “real” life. Whether I finished going through all those photos or not, today was the day I was going to start back to work on my

I am a woman possessed. It started when I decided to organize, label and post the best 589 photos from our Alaska/northern Canada trip on my website for all our friends and family to see (because, you know, there’s nothing

I love when I get free money (i.e. when I get a check out of the blue for a story I had published several years ago and now it’s been picked up by some testing company). I hate, hate, HATE

Last Thursday: I went to visit my dad in the nursing home, which means I left here at 7:30 a.m., drove 4 1/2 hours to get there, spent 4 hours there, then drove another 4 1/2 hours home. I had

This is the longest break I’ve ever taken from LJ. It’s the longest break I’ve ever taken from my writing, too…I haven’t written a word (well, that’s not entirely true…I have journaled. I just haven’t done any “real” writing) in

I think my mandolin study is going better than my writing right now. I feel like I’m making more progress there. For one thing, I’ve got calluses on my fingertips now! (I’m very proud of these calluses!) I know all

I’m reading Carolyn Wheat’s How to Write Killer Fiction, which looks like a pretty good book so far. She talks about the difference between mystery and suspense right at the beginning of the book. She says a mystery is like

Okay, I started the ghost story over. I got to the end of the chapter (these chapters are longer than the YA murder mystery chapters) and realized that while I was going for “mysterious” as a tone, I ended up

So, the new middle grade novel I’m sort of playing around with is actually a mystery, too. (A ghost story is a mystery. Well…this one is, anyway.) It’s just not a MURDER mystery. Junior High Kid really wants me to

I’m still wading into two brand new novels, unable to make a commitment to either one. I woke up at two o’clock in the morning last night and couldn’t sleep. When that happens, I usually lie there and think about

Two copies of Harry Potter #7 have been in this house for a full 24 hours and I have not read either one (though two people in the family have finished it). I’m trying to save it for my vacation.

I’m still moving forward on two new novels…still not ready to commit to either one. At first I thought the middle grade ghost story was going better, but now I think the YA murder mystery might be going better. I’ve

I turned in my Truth About Truman School revision a couple weeks ago and my Boxcar revision last week, so I’m between projects again…and feeling a little lost. There are sections of The Truth About Truman School (I think that’s

Today was the last session of my summer teen writer’s class at the library. Boy, did THAT go fast! Today was the “publication party.” Everyone was supposed to bring their revised story and read to their family and friends. And

Boy do I have my fellow Toastmasters fooled! I did speech #3 last night (entitled, “Serious Bike People…According to Dori”….yes, I really can talk about something other than writing! It was kind of a humorous speech on what serious bike

Hooray! My Boxcar Children revision is done! It wasn’t a difficult revision…I knew what I needed to do at every step of the way. And I understood WHY I needed to do it. There was just more to do this

Yesterday I worked in the Coe College library while Junior High Kid attended College for Kids. And while I was there some freaky guy came and stood right behind me and watched over my shoulder as I revised my Boxcar

I’m so excited! I had my first mandolin lesson yesterday afternoon. I was, of course, holding both the mandolin and the pick all wrong. In fact, the lady who sold me the mandolin gave me a couple of really lousy

We spent the 4th of July with my in-laws. They live on a lake in northern Minnesota. We don’t actually go anywhere to see fireworks when we spend the 4th of July with them – we don’t have to because

If you are a woman and you have never taken a self defense class, I would strongly recommend that you do so. If you are a woman and you have taken a self defense class, but it’s been a while,

I think all the chipmunks on my 14-15 mile bike loop must have gotten the memo: beware of the woman in the blue shirt and black shorts. I did not see a single chipmunk on my ride this morning…and that

Last night, College Student asked me if I would “have a problem” with him getting together with a group of friends to do Airsoft. (My understanding is Airsoft is a military live-action role playing game — i.e. the point is

Hmm…I suppose technically, I’m the one who did the attacking. I was riding my bike along the Clear Creek trail this morning…I’d just passed the muddy stretch of trail that you have to watch out for (muddy from last week’s

So, how do you blog about meeting your editor when you know there’s a better than average chance that said editor will actually read what you write about her??? Fortunately, I don’t need to worry about it because I really

Good timing! I turned in my Truth About Truman revision a couple days ago and then the same editor returned my latest Boxcar Children manuscript to me for revision (something to keep my mind off Truth About Truman while I

What can I say about the new Nancy Drew movie? I really did want to go see it with my friends (in fact, it was MY idea that we go), but about an hour before it was time to go,

I’m teaching a 5-week writing class at the Coralville library again this summer. I’ve been doing this the last several years. I taught the first year, then did an informal critique group kind of thing after that (since it was

I turned in my revision of Truth About Truman this morning. The only reason I did was because I was assured I’d get it back to work on one more time. There are several sections I’m still not happy with…but

It seems I’m running a day behind this week. Yesterday I posted about something I did on Tuesday; today I’m posting about what I did yesterday. Will I post about what I did today tomorrow? Not likely…in fact, I probably

Yesterday was the Junior High Kid’s first day of summer vacation, so he and I got up early and drove to Des Moines for our tour of the Great Ape Trust facility. Actually, we tried to get a tour of

Junior High Kid is having his birthday party/last day of school party today. His birthday was actually a little over two weeks ago. And it even fell on a weekend this year, so having a party on his birthday would

I was interviewed for a podcast for The National Writing for Children Center today. The podcast should be up on their site sometime next week. I’ve never done a TV interview before (I’ve only been asked to do one once

I’ve passed some “characters” today while I was going about my life and they were going about theirs. First, I was on my bike ride this morning and as I approached the tunnel that goes under the freeway, I heard

So, my face-to-face writer’s group told me I did indeed have a climax in Truth About Truman, and they showed me where it was. I’ve revised the manuscript up to that point now (though there’s a section in the middle

So, if I wasn’t going to spend the entire three-day weekend writing, I would’ve liked to go geo-caching…or maybe even canoeing. At the very least, played some games. But instead we spent Saturday shopping for a new dishwasher because the

When I picked up Junior High Kid this afternoon, the first thing out of his mouth was, “I get to write and write and write tonight. And then when I’m done with that, I get to write some more. And

I gave my second speech at Toastmasters last night. I cheated…I took sections from my school visit presentation and reworked it into a 5-7 minute talk entitled, “Where Do Authors Get their Ideas.” (Which means I was able to get

I found out yesterday that Do You Know the Monkey Man is on children’s choice award lists in New York (the Charlotte Award) and Wyoming (the Soaring Eagle award). I don’t think I have a prayer of winning the Soaring

There was an interesting article in today’s newspaper. It was about the TV show, Heroes (which I do watch). It said that “what Heroes teaches us is that villains aren’t necessarily evil — sometimes they just believe too strongly that

Now that I think I know how the climax of Truth About Truman is going to go (I’m still working up to that in my revision…), I decided I better check out the situation with a few school people to

Preteen became an official Teen yesterday. So now I have to figure out what to call my kids when I blog about them. I was thinking Teen 1 and Teen 2, but neither of them likes that idea. One of

Preteen’s language arts class (7th grade) is starting a publication unit. As part of the unit, everybody in the class will be submitting an article or story to a magazine for publication. The teacher told the students that some of

If there are any school counselors (preferably middle school counselors) out there who wouldn’t mind answering a couple questions for me on my WIP, I’d love to hear from you!

Today is “wet and muddy day” at Preteen’s school. Which means a group of kids have the PRIVILEGE of going (yes, it’s really a privilege — they had to “apply” for this. They had to say why they wanted to

My face-to-face writers group met last night. Two of us are illustrators and three of us are novelists (well, T. might not call herself a novelist since she’s published picture books, but she’s WRITING novels!), so we have a number

I got my hopes up last month when one of my publishers said they would be discussing my new picture book manuscript at their May aquisition meeting. But they’ve had their meeting now and they’ve decided not to publish this

So, here I am at the Cedar Rapids Public Library. Teen has a real job interview for a summer internship (i.e. we actually bought him a suit for this interview! And let me tell you, it’s not easy to find

I turned in my Boxcar Children book this morning; now “all” I have to do is revise Truth About Truman. I actually told myself I would work on Truman in the mornings and Boxcar in the afternoons until they were

I just got an e-mail this morning from one of the co-chairs of the Maryland Black-Eyed Susan Award Committee. Trading Places with Tank Talbott WON this year’s Black-Eyed Susan Award!!! I’ve always told people that I’m never going to win