or trying anway, including finishing up Kim Young's Divided Highway and copies of Melissa's Fire-Wife. I managed to get the webpage for the latter up before I headed out, but I still need to finish assembling the first batch (not counting the few I whipped up in time for the reading)...I am still tweaking the cover design for Kristi Maxwell's Elsewhere & Wise, but otherwise it's ready to go. Which just leaves two more behind schedule projects, books by Danielle Vogel and Claire Hero, which I hope to get wrapped up in September. I just keep telling myself it will all get done eventually. They will be ready when they are ready. Somehow I lost an entire summer of productivity to dayjob hell, daily drama, and autopilot mode...and yet I'm always working, but it seems I am always behind. I will be humming along on schedule and something else will need more immediate attention, and that will get done but four other things fall by the wayside until they become more pressing. It's like putting out a string of endless fires. put this one out and another flares up. Now, it's fall again, and the Wicked Alice inbox needs to be emptied before we open for submissions again (I decided to bypass the summer issue when it's harder for me to work on it and just do three issues a year--Fall, Winter, Spring.) And of course, dgp submissions, which I will be diving into very soon. I've been remarkably good about not peeking until now. Next year, I think I'll be taking a little break after our January release until May, but I'm still undecided on how many books I want to take after that.
I was thinking earlier today how absolutely insane the last year has been. I just extended the studio lease another year, all of which was barely a random thought even just a year ago. Now, a year, 15 titles, a handful of workshops/events, and a rather thriving shop later, things are even better than I imagined. (I had initially thought we might make the rent by charging for workshops, but I'd prefer them to be free and open to the public, so the etsy shop definitely picks up the slack, plus finances more books, more projects, more art-making...) And of course, maybe, one day, god willing, I might be making anough to do all this full-time, or at least that's the two year plan of attack...imagine getting out of bed and going to work at something you're passionate about and not just the usual day-job doldrums. I may die trying, but it's worth it...
