Happy Birthday Weekend to Me!

Today, May 17th, I turn 56, which still takes me by surprise. In kind of a, "holy cow, I'm more than half a century old?!"

The older I get the more I realize that age truly is just a number. This month has been full, and will continue to be full, and all weekends are booked with activities. My life, my heart, and my home(s) are full as well. And I figured I was overdue for a post and update, so here it is.

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Short-Term Rentals

As many of you know, I've been running a short-term rental for around seven years now. Cottage West, our $25 house (yes, it really only cost us $25 - read about it here), has been steadily chugging along. And it has become my personal source of income.

And while managing a short-term rental is nice and requires very little from me, I didn't have a nest egg to count on, and I really wanted the space and energy to focus on my author business.

After all, my favorite podcaster Joanna Penn often advises, multiple streams of income means you can be more versatile and withstand the winds of economic hardship. And having come from a time of bleak poverty, let me tell you, I'm definitely not interested in going back.

I was overjoyed to finally call the project done (or nearly so) a month ago.

Now Cottage East is thriving, occupied by my son, and co-managed by us. It has been one hell of a hike, but we are finally seeing income come out of it, not a money suck. I'm pretty sure it has been worth it, as the guests seem to really like it.

Soon we will add a storm door, level the front and back yards, landscape, and add a fence. By mid to late summer, the place will look stunning!

If you are passing through Kansas City, I hope you will consider staying with us. You can book directly and save money, by going here.

German Translations and More

Last year I used DeepL to translate my 17 books into nine different languages. Now I'm going through and evaluating their accuracy using a different AI and in-depth style sheet. Currently, I'm working on the German translations. Once I double check accuracy in translation, I'm uploading them to the Amazon Germany store as well as everywhere else, including direct with Tolino. That's been an adventure, as I had to learn enough German to navigate the site. The Google translate function causes errors in uploads, so I've taken detailed notes on the different screens as I move through the upload process. I am nothing if not persistent, lol!

I hope to have all German translations out by mid-summer. Then its on to French, Italian, Dutch, and so many more!

Audio Edits

Despite having taken the time to narrate the book, and how much I really want this project done so I can move on, editing the audio has been a slow, arduous slog that I've allowed to be interrupted over and over. I'm currently on Chapter 29 of G581: Zarmina's World, and have just two more chapters after it, plus a bunch of short bits (Author Note, etc) before it will all be done. Then it will be on to Plague Tales II. I'm hoping it won't be as tedious as ZW was, but hey, I get a lot of short story ideas during these audio edits, and take plenty of notes, so there's that.

The outline for a related series, working title The World After that would consist of two books - The Book of Bree and the Book of Z, is bouncing about in my head. When that will find its way into a solid beginning, I truly have no idea.

Garden

Now, keeping in mind that due to a failure in being able to duplicate myself, I found almost zero time to garden in the past two years - the work has now begun to whip it back into shape.

My standard response to weeds is to plant more plants. And to that end goal, I planted 60 hostas and 100 ferns throughout the yard. We will cover over a section between the mulberry tree and the Airstream and turn that into a mulched area for a swingset for our kiddos. I hope to get that installed by mid-summer.

We have plenty of areas that feel like a secret wilderness to me now. And those areas are typically shaded and where I've put most of the hostas and ferns. This fall (and beyond), I plan on putting dozens of iris, allium, clematis, peony, and baptisia into the ground. I want a riot of color from the beginning of spring to the end of autumn!

The garden, in all of its wildness and abundance, is my happy place. I'm still trying to balance co-managing the second property, build my author biz, and just recover from all of the effort renovations took on our finances and lives for the past 30 months.

That said, I look forward to crafting a truly stunning experience for visitors, and a daily dose of beauty for me and mine in the years to come.

Pool League

I love shooting pool. I mean, I love, love it. It is one of those activities that makes me push past my introvert tendencies. Whenever I join a new team, I'm a wreck for a season, maybe two, or even three, before I feel like I fit in and begin shooting well. This was never more obvious to me than when I joined a new team for one season and had a win rate of 13% and 17%, respectively. Meanwhile, over at the team I'd been with for over two years, I had a win rate of 87% and 79%! When I feel comfortable, I play better.

And I couldn't help wondering about what kind of win rate I would have if I was captaining my own team. I had tried once to form one, but simply didn't have enough players. And when the chance came up to try again, I cobbled together the teammates I had with a team that was ending, added a teammate I had played with in the past, and added two more new faces.

And the new team Go Shuck Yourself played its first Tuesday session last week. We lost on both 8ball and 9ball, but I have a good feeling about our chances in the future. And I managed to win both of the matches I played, which was amazing considering I was also trying to balance which player to play on which side, troubleshoot scoring issues, and more. We were lucky enough to land a strong player who is excellent at coaching. He's really going to be a great resource for us.

I've even been playing around with tshirt designs!

The black and dream one is pretty appealing, although I like the cornshucks in the red one better. And I'm playing with the bylines of "Zero Shucks Given" or "Shuck Around and Find Out."

Got any others for me to consider?!

Gorgeous "New" Furniture

Once we were finished with renovations, we got our big red trailer in to be worked on. We needed the lights fixed and the axles greased before we took it on the road to go pick up these amazing pieces from my friend Dani.

I estimate their age at early 1900s. They still have the remnants of the Victorian influences and yet also show the slow rise of the Arts & Crafts movement that was right around the corner.

There were the dining room table, china cabinet, two buffets, and six chairs. The china cabinet needed some fixing, we turned the glass around, carefully reattached a couple of pieces, and I cleaned it thoroughly. We bought bun feet on Amazon to replace the more ornate wood feet that had split and broken apart on the long table. I still need to attach the chair pads to the chairs with screws, but we'll get around to that soon.

My husband was a little sad that we were moving the "drink station" which was a hollowed out console tv. We had brought it over from Cottage West during those renovations more than ten years ago, removed the old tv, and strung color changing lights inside above bottles of liquor. However, he perked up when I suggested it go in the future man cave in the basement. He loved that idea!

Birthday Plans

I will be treating this like a normal day until dinner, when my husband takes me to Affare for dinner. We love the curated, fine dining experience and choose it for most of our special dinners out (Valentine's, birthdays, anniversary). I don't order, I just go with their planned menu and they roll out amazing food that combines flavors in unique and wonderful ways. It is always a fantastic experience. We even took my son Alex out to try it when we wanted to celebrate finishing the renovations. He was key to our success - watching the Littles while we worked our butts off over at Cottage East!

In any case, I'll turn over the properties today, then take a leisurely shower and relax before dinner. Who knows, maybe I'll walk through our gardens and make a list of everything I want to plant in the years to come.

The Month of May as a Whole

From Mother's Day to my birthday, pool league, the garden in bloom, and just having the short-term rental renovations DONE, May feels like my month to just truly and deeply enjoy. Spring is my favorite time of the year, after all.

And if I were to describe my greatest joys, they would consist of family/home, garden, shooting pool, reading, and writing books. How lucky am I that I get to do all of these? My days and my life are full, and I plan on enjoying every minute of it!