Gleek’s birthday party: It takes place one week from Saturday. I’ve got to figure out how to plan it without spending any money beyond what was already spent acquiring gifts for her.
The Schlock Mercenary book: I really wish this were a done deal rather than a pending one. Failing to get out a book asap spells the end of this cartooning endeavor.
The garage sale list: I’m not making any progress accumulating it, but I keep thinking that I should be.
Homework time: Link and Kiki both have heavy loads tonight. I wish their homework didn’t add stress to my life.
Bedtime: This is looming too.
All of that and a myriad of loose thoughts fill my head and prevent me from composing a satisfying journal entry. Sigh.
How old is she?
make your own cupcakes from start to finsh takes a lot of time and is fun. And kids can take home an extra or two.
http://www.stretcher.com/search/SearchResults.cfm?keywords=birthday
may allso help
if you dont know this website its pretty good at thrift if you get past the hot dog meals etc.
Ash
Have you and Howard given any thought to taking preorders on the upcoming book? You’d have working capital a lot faster, and it may give you a healthy buffer in which to not have to worry about getting by until the book comes out.
I can’t speak for all the readers, or even all those who plan to buy books, but I know I’d happily pay now for a book forthcoming in a month or three.
what’s the hold up on the book and who’s he in negotiations with?
Pre-orders are definitely part of the plan.
hold-ups on the book: creating bonus material and laying out pages while still maintaining a buffer. Having to publish over-seas because it’s the only way to get a full color book at a price people are willing to pay. Making sure that the distribution channel is arranged so that we don’t have to manage inventory or shipping. Steve Jackson Games does our other merchandise, we’d like them to distribute the book as well. Everything is still on schedule, we’re just feeling frustrated at the speed of the schedule.
I understand this happens to most everyone, particularly with their first book. It’s the limbo (I hate limbo) that so often happens in a project such as this. You keep working at it, but for a while you keep hitting roadblocks of one sort or another, and feeling like you’re spinning your wheels.
Then, just as you’re about to go mad from the frustration, something opens up and huzzah! For me at least, it doesn’t particularly matter that the roadblocks are reasonable ones, or even that they’re expected ones.. when you want to GO FORWARD NOW!, they’re just maddening.
Of course, worry over the financial thingy doesn’t help either. The good news is that you’re still on schedule, and I’m sure it’ll be a great success. I want a copy, for sure – and I’ll happily pre-order.
Amazon.com thinks they are set up for pre-orders. They’ll even charge you and them turn around and give the money back. You should see if they have a number on how many people have tried to pre-order already. (psst… when he’s done with that, we need more shirts.) 🙂
Birthday party
I used to use home made playdough as a party prize. If the budget can take it, go to the dollar store and buy a package of animals or bugs and hide one inside each ball of playdough. Put 1-2 balls in a zip-lock bag for each child.
Give each child a lunch bag to decorate to take home treasures in–such as home made playdough.
http://www.thetoymaker.com/3WORKSHOP.html There are patterns here for paper toys. Many of them do require a color printer. If that is a problem, let kids decorate them themselves. For example, there is a pinwheel pattern. Trace it and let kids color the pinwheel.
Paper bag kites. Give each child a lunch bag. Decorate it. Add paper streamers and tie a length of yarn on it. Kids can run up and down the sidewalk or the hill to fly their kites.
Make paper airplanes and have an airplane flying contest.
Play lots of games.
Let kids fold their own hats out of newspapers. Or fold the hats ahead of time and let kids decorate them.
Make potato candy. Mix mashed potato and powdered sugar (add a little vanilla or lemon flavoring and cake coloring). When candy is the consistency of playdough, roll into balls and flatten. Put in fridge to harden slightly. Kids love being given a piece of this to model with (after washing hands, of course) and they will eat it as they go. If there is any left, it goes into a plastic lunch bag and gets tucked into the decorated lunch bag to take home.
Little kids aren’t hard to please. Their fun often doesn’t have a price tag attached.