So no sooner do I finally get my working life in order--you know, the area that was causing me the most stress and anxiety--than my family life explodes YET AGAIN in multiple ways.  Not husband, son, or me, but just about everyone else.  Yesterday was one of the most stressful days of my life, and if it weren't for my husband I might have had a nervous breakdown.  I'm not going into all the Jerry Springer-esque details, just suffice it to say that I'm barely managing to stay afloat right now when it comes to family issues.

Hopefully, I'll get everything worked out soon, but...Lord.  At this point I'm just emotionally and mentally exhausted.

By popular demand, here are gratuitous pictures of our new puppy dog, Nikki (La Pup Nikita)!  So far, she is a VERY good dog, which is awesome since she's the first dog I've owned as an adult and will be my responsibility.  =)

( Isn't she just the CUTEST PUPPY EVAH? )

So today is my last day at my "day job" and I am completely excited!!!  While I love my firm and will miss the people there greatly, I am so thrilled to be starting this next chapter (hee) of my life.  I have dreamed of writing full-time ever since I can remember, and now that dream is coming true!  I feel so incredibly blessed.  Just remember--if I can do it, so can you!!!

And P.S. blog posts should get more frequent from me now.  Really!

...AKA Nikki...at least, that's what I'm planning to name her once we get through the adoption process (assuming our one-week "rent-a-pet" visit with her the first week of June goes well).  Her name right now is Dena but I'm not crazy about it, and for some reason I kept thinking she's a Nikki.  I tried a million other names out but nothing else seemed right.  I didn't want to name her Nicole, though, so I looked up the meaning of Nikita and decided it was perfect.  It can be traced back to "Nike" from Greek mythology and one of Riss's Amphisbaena (her serpent kinda-sorta "familiars") is named Nike, so that just seems perfect!

She's 6 months old and a little bigger than in this picture, and just absolutely gorgeous.  She'll be the first dog I've owned as an adult and I'm so excited.  I hope she and the cats get along because I really want a walking companion and watchdog since I'll be working from home most of the time now!!!

Okie, shamelessly promoting one of my new freelance gigs, mostly because it pays per click (hee)...If you get bored please feel free to check out my articles at examiner.com and I will of course be eternally grateful! Also, anyone who wants me to interview them or blurb their book has but to ask! =) While I plan to focus on St. Louis related books as much as possible, I can't possibly post 4-5 times per week on just St. Louis authors/books. At any rate, just thought I'd throw that out there!

So...I took the plunge and gave notice at my day job yesterday so I can focus on expanding my writing career and developing my budding college instructor career. I have been scoring freelance writing jobs left and right and also am in the training process to each a research and writing course with University of Phoenix. I may have a lead on a job teaching writing for an area technical college, and I applied to several community colleges in the area. I may also have a part-time nanny job lined up just to make sure I have a steady income, especially for the first couple of years I do this. I have butterflies in my stomach and I'm nervous but SOOO excited!!!

This means that I will definitely have more time to post regularly again soon. I also plan to unveil a complete website and livejournal re-design soon, so stay tuned!

So I'm making a go of the whole freelance writing thing now. I've scored my first paying gig writing HR articles for an insurance agency, another paying (but much more sporadically) freelance job, and am currently being considered for several other jobs (hooray!). Needless to say I'm excited and lord, I forgot how much I love researching and writing. Ideally, I hope to be able to make my living doing this at some point (the growing anxiety disorder pretty much demands it), supplemented by teaching writing courses at some local community and technical colleges. More on THAT once I actually get hired (I'm 99.9% sure at least one is going to offer me an adjunct faculty gig for a research and writing course...hooray!).

With that all said, for anyone who is interested I am unveiling the second, more sporadically-paying freelance job...my position as the new St. Louis Books Examiner for www.examiner.com. Of course, I just HAD to make my first post on St. Louis's most famous urban fantasy author, Laurell K. Hamilton. And yeah, that's my "real" name...I've decided to stick with Kasey for my fiction and Heather for my non-fiction/legal writing. Just to confuse you all! At any rate, please feel free to check it out if you get a chance!

(I am hoping to get my life back under control soon. Been dealing with some stress/anxiety stuff again along with a packed schedule so...please be patient with me!)

Just picked up Cindy's Pon's GORGEOUS Silver Phoenix and have pictures of it in its natural habitat. The first is a bit fuzzy, but I took them on my iPhone so that's to be expected. I am so proud and awed by Cindy's amazing talent and the fact she is so amazingly beautiful both inside and out!









Okie, past my bedtime!!!

This is from Chapter Five, and Jazz's POV. She has just magically squatted in a fancy house for sale and is calling home to the Djinn realm. And, of course, parents are the same everywhere! =)

( Behind the Cut for Those Interested )

Ginger agrees that Jazz's voice in Subtle Fire is much more on target now. Thanks to you all for helping me whip it into shape, and I'll be posting more as we go along until I feel 100% confident I've got it down. Thank you, thank you, thank you! =)

*speaks in a whisper so as not to spook her as-of-late super-shy muse* I've actually broken out the YA Djinn UF again so as to tinker with the voice, which didn't fully work for my agent when she read it, and you know, actually FINISH it so I can polish it up all nice and pretty and lob it Ginger's way. Cause sadly, she did not fall in love with my psychic/angel UF. Ah well, you can't win them all! Darn the luck!

I'll hopefully have more exciting stuff to post later, including a re-cap of my day trip to KC to hobnob with two friends from Absolute Write's Purgatory thread *waves madly to Bryn and Kari* and stalk watch the uber awesome Jim Butcher run a Q&A session and book-signing at the KC Public Library. A great time was had by all, and I really enjoyed hanging with Bryn, Kari, their lovely friends, and Kari's adorable daughter.

Oh, I WILL go ahead and post a pic from the event because HELLO...I'm standing right by JIM BUTCHER!!!




Double oh--I have info on the imprint and date my book will be published! Red Hot Fury will come out as an Ace book in August, 2010. Later than I originally hoped, however it is well worth the wait as it will be a lead title. Eeeeeeee!!!

I should have several exciting tidbits to share soon. But for now, a snippet for Teaser Tuesday dedicated to all my Purgie Peeps. I love you guys!!! From Subtle Fire, the WIP that is not really a WIP... (YA Djinn urban fantasy)

( Behind the cut to spare those not interested. )

...but just wanted to get a quick post up before I lay back down. I have been busy working on some writing-related stuff lately (a group blog I am absolutely excited about, along with a customized design of my website by a talented writing friend/designer of mine), plus I've been really busy IRL, so I haven't been posting as much as I wanted to. My goal this week is to get back on a regular posting schedule...honest!

I also want to start doing more substantive posts. But today is not the day for that!

Okie, just because I'm so excited that it's starting to look like a blanket finally, and because I'm so proud of myself, I decided to share some pictures of the baby blanket I'm knitting for my co-worker's baby shower Wednesday. Obviously, based on what I have done so far, it will NOT be finished by then! Fortunately, her baby isn't due for another month. =) At any rate, this is only the second real project I've done (the first was a basic scarf), and the first I pieced together like this. alg taught me how to cast on and do the knit stitch, but I taught myself how to cast off, purl, and do the whip stitch which is connecting these squares. This blanket is all knit stitch--I need to practice the purl a LOT more!

At any rate, ( pictures behind the cut if you're interested )

Okay, back to knitting! Trying to finish two more knit squares between now and Wednesday morning so I have two rows completed.

...just to get back in the habit of posting regularly. I have not been writing much lately (despite the new office) because I am knitting a baby blanket for a co-worker who is having a baby next month. Her shower here at work is in, oh, a week, and I am about 1/10th of the way done. Hahaha! First, I had to get back in practice of knitting again, which meant a lot of false starts and do-overs, and then I had to pick the right pattern for my skill level (beginning, but I didn't want anything TOO plain). So now I've got two squares done out of 20 and am started on the third. I am getting a lot faster now so I hope to have at least half of the blanket done by next week. I will take a picture of what I have done and give that to her with the other gifts I got, and hopefully finish the blanket well before her due date.

My plan is to knit every night between now and then, and as much over the weekend as I can stand, though I REALLY want to write for at least an hour Saturday and Sunday, more if I can. Just to dip my feet back into a regular writing schedule. The urge to write is definitely starting to get strong again, which is a very good sign.

Enjoying the gorgeous spring weather here, although the crazy allergies--not so much!

Just a quick post to say that I thoroughly enjoyed the panels I took part in over the weekend, both as a visitor and as a panelist. Unfortunately, my crappy hotel wireless prevented me from participating in all of the ones I signed up for--hopefully nobody holds that against me! I was also dealing with some familial issues, which have been completely cleared up but which also made it hard for me to make it to all the panels. A hundred thousand apologies and hopefully the panels went on smoothly without me (which I am sure most of them did--I'm more worried about the one where there weren't a whole bunch of panelists signed up).

Okie, have to run to work soon.

Okay, so this is short notice, but I just learned about it yesterday and signed up for it. I will be participating in a bunch of panels this weekend on a free online con (Flycon 2009). It's my first con, and my first time as a "professional" panelist (okay, first time as ANY sort of panelist), so if you have time and the inclination, please feel free to stop by to support me! You can see the schedule here: http://www.awritergoesonajourney.com/index.php?option=com_wrapper&Itemid=286

Hope to see some of you there! =)

So I went on a couple of shopping sprees over the weekend, courtesy of our tax refund. Got new clothes for husband (who rarely buys clothes for himself) and some new, smaller shirts for me, and then a couple of new tops today, a new handbag, and wallet...we also bought a new camcorder because the old one completely crapped out, and I got a cute Canon Powershot to keep in my purse so we always have at least one with us. Oh, and I did a bunch of market research yesterday! Er, that's what I'm calling it when I go on a buying frenzy in bookstores now. ;)

Here's the list (what I remember off the top of my head anyway):
White Witch, Black Curse by Kim Harrison (LOVE HER!!!)
Need by Carrie Jones
Ink Exchange by Melissa Marr
You Are So Undead to Me by Stacey Jay
A couple Mercedes Lackey books (love her, too!) I was missing
Hands of Flame by C.E. Murphy
A Knitting book so I can teach myself more stitches
Um...I know there were others but I'll update this list later...

Hoping to do some writing tonight! I am also teaching myself to crochet now, too. Wonder if I can teach myself enough to crochet a co-worker something for her baby shower by March 25th? HAHAHAHAHAHA AS IF!

Contracts have been received and signed--and of course the obligatory pictures have been taken! =) We even got enough of the "new" office finished to take the pics in there.

Hooray, my first book contract--but hopefully not last!



( More pictures behind the cut! )

It all feels a little more real now. Yay!

Okay, a quick post so I don't find the entire month of February getting away from me before I know it! Writing news: Lovely Rockstar Agent Ginger emailed today to let me know that the contracts are in the mail. Soooo I should be boring you all with pictures of me signing the contracts for my first (but hopefully not last) book deal! Hooray! =)

In other news, I have not been writing much lately due to exercising more (up to 50-60 minutes at a time on my bike and LOVING that my fitness level is returning...also down 6 more pounds since last month's doctor appointment and my BMI is down 5 points total since November--woot!) and...horror of horrors...scraping painted-over wallpaper off the walls of the former guest room which is now becoming my dedicated office. The horror part is just for the wallpaper. Even though we bought the supposedly "proper" tools, scraping that stuff off has been a slow and annoying process. Still, it will be worth it when I have my gorgeous office complete with the chair rail and two-toned effect I've always dreamed of. *grin*

And of course I am looking forward to more regular writing soon!

Now...to bed!