I can't believe how long it's been since I've posted! I went on a bit of a hiatus from my website due to being very sick and so tired at the beginning of my pregnancy. I continued to write as much as I could muster the mental energy for during that time, though. I can't tell you how exhausting creating a tiny human can be!
I am including a photo of my new book cover for my poetry and short fiction collection, Embrace the Beauty. I started a blog entry several times to update about my cover change, but I never finished them. I loved my original cover; it definitely has more of my personality in it. However, in today's digital world, people view a tiny thumbnail of a cover on websites and immediately make assumptions about book genre without taking the time to click on the image if it doesn't "fit" with their idea of the type of book they're looking for. So after studying more poetry and short story book covers, I decided at the end of last year to redesign mine to better fit in with what readers expect from the genre to hopefully increase my click-through rate (basically, that's marketing talk for increasing the likelihood that someone will click on your title and read more about your book, possibly purchasing it). So I went back to the drawing board (actually, Canva!) and reworked my cover to make it more "literary" in style. Though I am fond of the original cover, I think the second cover turned out beautifully.
In addition to working on my blog, I also just sent out my first newsletter to my website subscribers detailing all the projects I'm currently working on. So if you have signed up for my mailing list, thank you so much for your support! I hope you enjoyed by first newsletter. If you haven't already, please sign up to my mailing list at the top of the homepage. I promise that I don't send out a gazillion spammy emails. I probably will only send out one per season, so long as I have something relevant to share.
As for now, I am working on my novel series, getting a children's book illustrated, looking forward to some time off from teaching to spend with my husband and daughters, and waiting for Baby Girl #3 to appear and join our little family! :)