My five-year-old son had a mark on his back Saturday that resembled a mosquito bite.  Although he had scratched at it heavily, it was no cause for concern, and my best girlfriend and I boarded a plane early Monday morning and went to Las Vegas for the Romance Novel Convention.  Although I’ve greatly enjoyed the last two days and today started off with smiles of anticipation for the beginning of the convention, I am now a frazzled mother wishing I were back home holding my son in his hospital bed.

It seems his rash has grown, and my husband took him to Urgent Care last night.  They did not know what the rash is from, so they gave him medicines to fight both viral and bacterial infections.  Today my son got a second rash, and my husband thought it was an allergic reaction to the antibiotics he started last night, so he took little John Isaac to his pediatrician.  Now my son is admitted into the hospital with IVs, and my husband is way out of his element.  He also has my 11 and 9-year-old daughters with him at the hospital.

My entire family is spending the night in the hospital, and we don’t know what is wrong with my son just yet.  Meanwhile, the convention just began, and all I want to do is be with my little one, who has never been in a hospital.  My mind is in two very different places now, but I’m taking a deep breath and waiting to find out more from the doctors.

I guess I now get the full effect of being a working mother.

Melissa and I have now been in Vegas for two days, and although the Romance Novel Convention doesn’t start until today, we are tired.  We got here Monday morning after a night of very little sleep and last minute packing on my part.  We then spent the day walking around Fremont Street, which was quite interesting and very different.  By the time we went to bed that night, we had been up for over eighteen hours, and we were exhausted. Yesterday, we spent the day walking the main strip of Las Vegas, and with the weather being over 100 degrees, we were drained of our energy very quickly.  We drank lots of water, did some shopping, and although Melissa doesn’t like spicy food, she agreed to eat at Emeril’s New Orléans Fish House.  Cajun food is one of my weaknesses, and I devoured a Caesar salad, bowl of gumbo, and the largest piece of banana pie I’ve seen in my entire life. We then went to see the musical called Menopause, where we cried with laughter.  By the time we got back to our hotel room, it was well past midnight, and we were exhausted to the point that we did not leave our room until after noon of today.  We were starving and needed a buffet.

The convention officially begins today, and authors are beginning to pour into the hotel.  Tonight is the meet and greet party, and we are looking forward to meeting many of the other authors.  I got to see my banner for Unexpected Metamorphosis for the first time, and I’m very pleased with how it turned out.  Jera Publishing has done an amazing job with working with Canton Walk Publishing in designing my book cover and marketing materials.  I can’t wait to see how the next book cover turns out.

I’ll continue to post updates and pictures as best I can.  Thanks for all my supporters and followers.  This has been an amazing year for me.

This restaurant on Fremont Street boasts of unhealthy eating.  The diners wear a patient’s uniform while being served by waitresses dressed in nurses’ uniforms.  No, I definitely did not eat there, but it was quite interesting.

In the evening, a light show begins in the tunnel of Fremont Street, and things begin to get a bit lively.

This is how Melissa started her Tuesday morning, all perky and smiles.  It was a different story on the way back to our hotel.  We were exhausted, and our feet and back were killing us from all the walking we had done that day.

This is inside one of the hotels on the strip of Vegas.  They all have a different theme.

This hotel and casino was filled with shops, and the ceiling was painted to look like clouds in the sky.  It has a strong Italian theme, and I did not want to leave.

Paris in Vegas!

Jera Publishing did an amazing job with the designs I use for my marketing and cover.  I highly recommend their services.

Just two more days until I leave for Vegas for the Romance Novel Convention.  My dear friend Melissa will be with me, and you may recognize her name from the front section of Unexpected Metamorphosis.  Not only is she like a sister to me, but she helps to keep me in line when it comes to writing.  Once I’m finished writing for the day, I always email her a copy of what I have typed.  Then, I wait patiently (not) for her to respond.  Although I do the writing, she always has a say in what gets deleted, and a LOT gets deleted.  There were many times I typed away all through the night, only to delete the entire night’s work since it did not meet her standards.

It also helps that she is from the North, and I’m from the South.  She continuously lets me know if I’m typing southern, which happens a lot.  Here’s an example of some of our conversations:

Melissa:  “You can’t type that.”

Me:  “Why not?”

Melissa:  “It’s from the South.  People from the North won’t know what you mean.”

Me (a little defensively):  “That’s not southern.  Everyone knows what that means.  It’s universal, Meliss.”

Melissa:  “I never heard of it until I met you.  It’s southern, and you can’t type it.  You can say it this way…”

Me (more defensive, but I make the changes):  “Now it sounds northern!”

Those were the easy conversations.  The hard ones were where I had to delete an entire night’s work, because it did not pass her inspection.  I can honestly say Unexpected Metamorphosis would not be half of what it is today without her.  She keeps me in line.

So now we are packing for Vegas, and she will be by my side at the convention.  Although we don’t live in the same state, she’s flying out of Atlanta with me, so her family is here for the weekend while we get ready.  That means our husbands are watching the children while we go shopping for new clothes, and my bedroom is covered in women’s clothing as we empty our shopping bags and sort through my closet.  Kids are laughing throughout the house, and our husbands are enduring.  Life is good!

I plan to blog while in Vegas, so stay tuned.  I’ll post pictures and try to give details of what it’s like to be at the Romance Novel Convention.  As for today, Melissa and I plan to take the children to the pool while the men go mountain biking.  Then, it’s off to more shopping and having our nails done.  At some point, we really should finish packing.

Although I love to write, I could never teach a writing class.  Even when I home schooled my children, I sent them off to creative writing classes instead of teaching them myself.  I did follow the guidelines in their grammar books and forced my way through the chapters on outlining and the writing process that everyone should learn.  I believe everyone should know how to use a topic sentence and know how to write a proper paragraph.  It’s the planning process that I disagree with.  It’s not wrong.  It’s just not for everyone.

I’ve always had a problem with outlining and planning, even in my early school years.  Most recently, my husband got me to realize how much I truly hate the process, as we are complete opposites in our personality, and bless his little heart, he tried to help me when I started writing Unexpected Metamorphosis.  It did not end well for him.

I still remember that night perfectly.  I was telling him my ideas for the story and where I was taking the main characters.  (It was more of a moment where he was supposed to listen and not try to fix anything, but he noticed I was not following the “proper” process and felt that he needed to help with that.)  As I was rambling on while trying to get the story placed properly in my mind, he pulled out his laptop, pen, and paper.  It seems he had taken an interest in my writing and had read articles online about how to write, and I was not following any of the steps (NONE).  He needed to fix that because, surely, that would make my writing and life better.

The moment he started talking about outlines and the planning process, I openly cringed, and he lost me.  I did not want to hear about it or even talk about it.  An organized planning process stifles and suffocates me (as do most lists of rules).  My poor husband took my distaste personally, and that is how the night ended.  He has not offered to help me again when it comes to how I write, and I believe he is one step closer in understanding my random personality.  (He’ll never truly understand.)

After reading the comments on a post about outlining, I now realize I’m in the minority (as usual with how I do things) when it comes to writing.  Most authors depend on outlines to keep their stories from getting away from them.  That’s the opposite of how I think.  I let the characters take me to new places I had not planned.  In fact, I did not plan most of the scenes between Alissia, Grady, and Luke.  I did not even come up with Luke until the night I started typing about him.  If I had outlined my story ahead of time, I doubt one of the main characters would have come into the story.  I did not have a clear plan when I created Luke, but he soon took center stage in the story.  (He does seem to have that strong personality.)

If you are an author reading this post, I’m curious to know what writing process you choose to follow.  Does the mere thought of an outline scare you, or are you a strict follower of the use of an outline?

My adorable little five-year old crawled into my bed this morning to snuggle, and he started the conversation with, “When I grow up, I’m going to be a publisher.”  He continued with talk about book cover design and that he wants to change his name in case he ever decides to write a book.  He then decided he would write one about robots.

In the end, I was quite amazed at how much he knows about the publishing industry.  As the day has progressed, I have begun to think about how much change this family has endured now that I have become an author.  Before I became consumed with the life of Alissia Roswell, I home schooled my children and was a full-time mom.  Now, I spend the majority of my time at my desk typing at the computer, and this fall will be their first year in a public school.  My oldest daughter is a bit nervous about this, but I believe she will adapt.

Then there’s my husband Daryl.  He is doing more around the house and is having to get used to less homemade desserts.  Although I still love to bake, my time is more limited in the kitchen.  Luckily, I have two daughters that share my passion of cooking, and I can sometimes talk them into cooking dinner or baking something sweet, yet healthy.

Social media has become a necessity in my life for marketing and networking, and I now find myself answering emails, tweeting, and checking my Facebook more often than I would like.  I’ve got to learn time management when school begins since that is when I plan to focus on book two of the Alissia Roswell series.  I have a time limit and plan to stay on schedule.

Although our lives have drastically changed now that I have become an author, I’m pleased by these changes in my family.  My children are becoming more independent, and my husband is getting more involved with running the house.  I never planned to write a novel.  In fact, I did not know myself until the week I started typing.  The story came to me, and it had to get out.  I was driven to write, and at first it was for myself.  I did not plan to try to have it published until about halfway through, when my friend and I realized it was a great story worth sharing.

I believe a lot of families go through changes like ours.  You may not have become an author, but it could be something else.  I would love to hear about it in the comments section if you would like to share your version, and I look forward to the discussion.