If you’re a regular reader of our blog, you may have noticed we’ve seemingly dropped off the planet lately.
If you were wondering, we’re still here. We’ve just been expecting company.
You know what it’s like when people are coming over. You want everything to be perfect. You want everything to reflect your best side. And it takes time to shove all the children’s toys under the beds and cram all the skeletons in the closet.
I mean . . . never mind.
Now imagine this: Imagine your visitors are going to bring professional camera equipment to photograph your home (or in our case, our gardens, mostly) and publish those photographs in a book that will be sold by the thousands (well, hopefully). It ups the ante even more.
You may even go a wee bit insane.
You may find yourself phoning your blog pardner from garden centers. “I’m looking at annuals. Have you ever heard of purslane? What do you think of coleus? Does lantana make my butt look fat?”
You may neglect your blog.
We have neglected our blog.
But, our book, Little House in the Suburbs: Backyard Farming and Home Skills for Self-Sufficient Living, has been being pampered. I’m sure the blog is jealous, and rightly so. Ric Deliantoni (pictured in these photos), Photography Director for our publisher, F+W Media, and our photographer for the book, is making sure the photos look great. Our terrific editor, Jackie Musser (also pictured), was here making sure everything was just the way it should be.
It’s over now. We lived to tell the tale. And the visitors were LOVELY. Couldn’t have been more wonderful.
And they never even looked in the closet.
Dodged that bullet.
Daisy
Yay! I can’t wait to read it!
You crack me up! Sooo happy and excited for you. Now you can open the closets…
Congratulations on dodging that closet bullet! I think the blog will get over it when it gets more traffic from people reading the book. Congrats on that book. Hope everything works out well and we can read it soon.
Very exciting! Can’t wait to read it!
That is such an inspirational thing to be doing – me sitting here midwinter getting ready for another day at the office – if only I could get off my butt and get started I would do the same things!
I am very excited for you! Can’t wait to hear about the final launch!! So glad you made it through the process unscathed. 🙂
Something tells me you aren’t sitting on your butt. I bet you keep busy.
….you have been missed.
When is the book due out? Or is it a secret? I wanna request it from the library asap! (preferably before anyone else does…..hehe)
Amber–I believe it is coming in Jan or Feb of 2012. I’ve heard both. We will let everybody know when they can get it as soon as we know the exact date!
Congratulations! I never thought I’d say I can’t wait until January!
Congrats Deanna!
Greetings and felicitations!
I have spent a delightful weekend creating the index for your fabulous book. It has been such fun for me, because I went through many of your same adventures 30-plus years ago (BEFORE it was cool!) Suburban garden, check, fruit trees and bushes, check, problems with neighborhood association, check, beekeeping, check (until we discovered that one of my daughters and I are allergic to bee stings!), no chickens but instead ducks and geese. Still gardening like mad, 5 children all grown (and no worse for the simple living experience!), one son an arborist, no more neighborhood association problems because we gave up and moved to the country! (But DO miss the convenience of the suburbs…) I also grind my own grain for homemade bread. Do you need recipes for homemade clay and/or crystal dish gardens for the kids (using charcoal briquettes and laundry bluing)? Can’t wait to see the finished book!
Best,
Meridith
Meridith–How fun! So glad to have a kindred spirit on the job of our index! Love to see your recipes and we can’t wait to see the book, either. Thanks for sharing your adventures, funny how things just keep going around and around . . .