Cora Seton's Blog, page 21

First Baby Chick Movie – Baby Chick Goes to Sleep!

We finally got our baby chicks today! They are camped out in my office, which is now well over 80 degrees. I’m sweating, but they love it. They were exhausted when we brought them in, and kept falling asleep. Just like human infants, they get tired to the point where they can’t fight it anymore, and they sag…until they’re conked out.

I’m just learning to make movies with my ipad, so this one’s super-short!

Tell me what you think – what else would you like to know about or see. I’ve taken a ton of pictures, too, and will continue to do so each day so we can all watch them grow together.

Check back tomorrow for another movie…..

Clearing Brush

When we bought our acre property, it was about a third wooded, with 60 – 75 foot tall trees lining either side of it. I love trees, but a fully shaded lot doesn’t make for good growing conditions. Some of them had to go.

We got our friend Richard in who’s handy with a chain saw and he got to work. At first I was on the side of the trees. I really didn’t want any of them taken down. But then one day as I was at my desk writing a book I looked out my window and one of those 60 foot tall trees on the border of our yard just keeled over while I watched, missing one of our outbuildings by mere feet. I have never seen a tree fall over on it’s own before, and as I pictured one of my kids or my husband under it when it went, I changed my mind about this tree-knocking-over business. Like a bunch of people had been trying to tell me, these are trees that should have been trimmed years ago – they’re at the end of their lives and they’re going to go one way or the other.

As if to drive the point home, a few weeks later, another tree – a beautiful cedar near the house we meant to keep – split in two and the chunk that fell off missed our truck by inches. In the end we took out almost all of the side border trees, several in the middle of our property where the berry beds and orchard will go, and some off the back “forest”. That’s a heck of a lot of trees. We’ll replant the sides of our property with a cedar hedge to give us some privacy eventually. We kept a bit of the forest in the back (much to the disgust of my husband, but really – you have to have some trees!), and soon enough we’ll have an entire orchard out back, so we’ll get the rural feel back over a number of years.

Once they were all down, we had to get to work chopping them up. My husband took over the chain-saw wielding. My youngest son is in charge of splitting logs. Thankfully, we were able to trade some cedar for the use of an electric splitter for a number of months. Otherwise my son would’ve been out there for years. I’m in charge of clipping up branches and hauling them into piles. The city banned us from burning those, so we ended up having to haul them away. We filled three of these containers to the top and we still have more.

Here are the piles of brush we made while getting ready for the bin to arrive:

After we hauled everything away:

Like I said, we’re still cutting, clipping, hauling and clearing, but we’re making progress. Our poor, beat up, barren lot does not look its best but this is a long-term project. I can’t wait to see where we’re at five years from now!

The Cowboy’s Designer Bride – First Draft Done!

Okay – that cover still says, The Cowboy’s Designing Bride instead of Designer Bride. The Critics didn’t like Designing. Originally, the novel was called The Cowboy’s Guide to Style and a writer acquaintance let me know today that she prefers that title to either of the others. Sigh. Luckily I have a few more weeks to nail it down.

Whatever the title, I finished the first draft on Friday. This week I’ll edit it and next week send it off to my favorite critique partner to help me whip it into shape.

Book 2 of the Cowboy’s of Chance Creek series starts off the day Book 1 ends, and follows the story of two of the characters from book one – Claire Cruz (Ethan Cruz’s sister) and Jamie Lassiter (Ethan’s partner in the ranch). All the other characters in Book 1 are involved in the story, as well. I love that about series – getting to spend more time with characters you like instead of saying good-bye to them forever at the end of their book.

I’m actually starting to write the first draft of Book 3, currently titled The Cowboy’s Imported Bride, tomorrow. Rob Matheson stars in that one, along with a character introduced in Book 2. I usually don’t write back to back novels – that’s 100,000 words in one month! – but I want my writing blocks to be at the start of the month and my editing/formatting blocks at the end of the month, so I’m doubling up.

I love it when I’m on track!

Great Review for The Cowboy’s E-Mail Order Bride

Just got a terrific review from Single Title Reviews. You can read the whole thing here.

The best part? This line – “Delightful story, I thought this was inventive and refreshingly new”

Just what I’m aiming for folks!