Tag: family (Page 1 of 3)

Summer Writing Update: Elixirs, Witches, and Pirates!

June 21, 2018 / Katie L. Carroll

The kids have been out of school for a week and summer break is in full swing here! We’ve made out lists of activities we’d like to do and places we’d like to go this summer. Some we’ve already done or have planned (like going to the zoo and strawberry picking), while others are probably not going to happen this year (like visit NASCAR’s Hall of Fame).

As for my writing, I’ve got a couple of things going on. I’m working on getting my YA fantasy Elixir Bound with the new cover back up for sale. Right now you can get the ebook of Elixir Bound from Amazon and that’s it. I’ll post when I get it up in paperback and on ebook for the other vendors. Plus, I finally created a book trailer for it, which was a lot of fun. It was nice to work a different set of creative muscles for it. (The map it features is part of the map of the Great Peninsula, which can be seen in full in the new version of Elixir Bound.)

I’ve been on something of a roll with drafting the companion novel Elixir Saved. I’ve been drafting this novel for years…yes, I said years! So long, in fact, that I’ve been calling it my perpetual WIP (work-in-progress). But I think I’m finally crested the murky middle section and can see the far side of the hill. I’m hoping to keep that momentum going over the summer and get it ready for beta readers before the end of the year. I’d like to publish this one some time next year (fingers crossed!).

Research for my next middle grade book has been going well. I’ve been doing a bunch of reading about the witch trials that took place in Connecticut (mostly before the more famous Salem Witch Trials) and what colonial Connecticut was like. I checked out a local history book from the library and mentioned it to my dad because he’s a history nerd. He was like, “Is that the book where I helped write and edit the updated history in the 1980s?” Turns out it was! And my grandfather, who was there when I mentioned it to my dad, was like, “My father, your great-grandfather, helped with the version that was written in the 1930s.” So that was an interesting serendipitous moment.

The witchy middle grade book–which in my mind is pitched as Mean Girls meets The Crucible–doesn’t take place in history, but it will be a contemporary middle grade that delves into history and ties it to the present, much like Pirate Island does with Captain Kidd’s history being woven into Billy’s story in the present day. I hope to start drafting this story soon, but I need to focus on Elixir for now.

Speaking of Pirate Island, the ebook is on sale for $1.99 for a limited time, so scoop that up if you haven’t already (links for Pirate Island on Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and Kobo). I’ve also got an exciting announcement coming up for Pirate Island once my local library makes it public…just to give you a little teaser there. 😉

And I always have stuff I’m waiting to hear back about, so there’s always the potential for good news (or devastating rejections!). Thus is the nature of the publishing biz.

Anyway, I’m excited for the summer weather and hanging out with the boys and family day trips. And a certain writer/mama’s birthday is coming a few days before a certain gentleman’s first birthday. Oh, and I’ll be going to the big SCBWI conference in L.A. this summer. I’m so excited (I won the trip, so the airfare, hotel, and conference fee were paid for!), but super nervous about leaving the baby. I keep telling myself it’ll be fine. Busy times, busy times.

What are your summer plans?

Fall 2017 in Pictures and Looking Toward 2018

December 20, 2017 / Katie L. Carroll

The hustle and bustle of the season is in full swing here at chateau Carroll. The boys have been making out their Christmas lists for Santa, we’ve been baking, and I’ve been fitting in a few words here and there on Elixir Saved. So that means it’s time for a picture post!

But before we get to that, I’ve been thinking about what I’ll be blogging about next year. I’d like take some time to feature some books and authors I’ve been enjoying, but in a way I haven’t done before on the Observation Desk. I also haven’t officially introduced The Gentleman here on the blog, though he’s now 5 months old (sorry third kiddo!). So I might try and get a feature on his birth story up here, ya know, before his first birthday. 😉 I have some fun news in the works that I’ll be sharing soon. And I think I’d like to talk more about creativity in 2018, particularly as it fits into my life as a writer/mom.

And now to look back on fall:

November #InkRipples: Shaped but not Defined by our Heritage

November 7, 2016 / Katie L. Carroll

Our heritage is where we come from, what we’ve inherited from our ancestors and family. It can come in the form of physical traits, property or monetary assets, titles, traditions, and many other forms. Heritage often has a big role in determining who we are when we are born and how we grow up.

A person is born a prince, another in poverty. A person is born to be classically beautiful, another with an inherited physical deformity. A person inherits a great wealth, another a debt left behind by a loved one who passes away. These are the hands we are dealt, but they don’t have to be the sole thing that defines us.

One of the most interesting things about human nature is that there is no one things that makes us who we are (kind of like those masks we talked about in last month’s #InkRipples). Sure, there are some things about our selves that we can’t change, but we don’t have to let that one thing be the only thing about us. I’m short…I’ve inherited that trait, but that never kept me from playing basketball, and I ended up being quite good at it.

To put my writer mask on for a moment, that’s one of the most fun things about writing characters. No character is one thing. “Good” characters have faults and “bad” characters have redeeming qualities…at least they should in order to be well-rounded. I love a hero who has deep-seeded flaws, and an antihero can be so interesting to read. And villains who have nice sides to them or who have somewhat justifiable reasons for their actions are so much better than purely evil characters.

How has your heritage shaped who you are and what aspects of yourself have nothing to do with your heritage?

#InkRipples is a monthly meme created by Katie L. Carroll, Mary Waibel, and Kai Strand. We pick a topic (November is all about heritage), drop a ripple in the inkwell (i.e. write about it on our blogs), and see where the conversation goes. We’d love to have you join in the conversation on your own blogs or on your social media page. Full details and each month’s topic can be found on my #InkRipples page.

That Day Your Baby Starts Kindergarten

August 29, 2016 / Katie L. Carroll

I often said to The Boy, my first-born, “You’ll always be my baby.” He very sweetly indulges me in this dialogue that usually ends with a snuggle and a kiss. Of course The Boy isn’t a baby anymore. He’s off to kindergarten today, and his baby days feel like a million years ago. So I ask you to please indulge me–the nostalgic mama–as I reminisce on this milestone of a day.

Five years and one day ago The Boy arrived in grand style during Hurricane Irene. He was 17 days early, and his daddy and I did not feel ready at all. In fact, not knowing that hurricanes can make you go into labor, we hadn’t even gotten the nursery fully ready. (Big surprise–not!–I blogged about it in “A Beautiful Life is Born.” Seems I was a little more leery of posting pictures then…still cautious now but more open to sharing.)

That’s my tiny little nugget on his first night “home.” We didn’t actually spend the night at our house because we had no power, but we did take a picture of him in his crib before heading to my in-laws for the night.

A little over one year later, I left my full-time job to do freelance work, focus on my writing, and be a stay-at-home mom with The Boy. Though I had already been working from home a few days a week, the new freedom I had in my schedule allowed for more bonding time with my little buddy.

We started going to toddler story time at the library, hanging out at the cafe for a snack and to watch the trains and trucks go by, and went on lots and lots of walks. That’s what I’ll miss the most about him not being around all day long, our fun yet simple daily adventures, exploring and learning about the world. And being able to do it pretty much whenever without having a million other things on the schedule.

Shortly after The Boy’s second birthday, we found out baby #2 (dubbed The Prince by one of my lovely blog readers!) was on the way. That lead to a very challenging year for the family. It was the year I questioned my decision to become a stay-at-home parent, the year I questioned the decision to have another child, the year I questioned my very ability to be a good mother, and the year I pretty much questioned every other life decision I had ever made to date. (Yup, I blogged about all that, too, in “How Does a Mother’s Love Grow?”.)

All the while my sweet baby was turning into a wonderful, smart, stubborn, sweet, sensitive, curious, perceptive, expressive little boy. Sometimes the emotions felt too big to handle (for both of us!), but we were learning and growing in our roles as mother and son. And preparing for big changes to come.

Fast forward to the next year when The Boy was not quite three and The Prince made an equally exciting, albeit very different, entry into the world. (You are probably not surprised to hear there’s a blog for that as well with “The Precipitous Birth of Baby Boy #2.”) And boy has time flown since then. Forget about fast forward, I’m talking super-fast, lightning-quick, warp-speed ahead kind of time.

There were times when I thought The Boy would never see the Prince as anything other than this thing that took up a lot of Mommy’s time. I worried (among a million other things) that they’d never have that special sibling bond I had with my sisters and brother. But mostly the days were filled with the daily grind of making it through to the next day, and all the little things that filled my life as a mommy. The Boy and I managed to go to the zoo just the two of us on his birthday. We still went to story time and the cafe, we just had an extra little guy in tow.

The Boy started three-year-old pre-K one rainy November morning. There were holidays, more birthdays, and pretty soon I had toddler and a little boy who seemed so far away from being a baby. I often wondered where the days, weeks, months, years had gone.

Always we had our trips to the library, walks downtown and to the beach, treats at the cafe, and playtime at the park. The milestones, the big moments continued to come and go, a million little ones filling all the in-between moments. I tried to remember each one, I took a lot of pictures, and I wrote in the boys’ journals I keep for them.

Year four brought a new school, new friends, new interests, new challenges. New fears. Somewhere along the way, that bond I had worried would never happened blossomed. The Boy and The Prince were brothers, friends, combatants, partners-in-crime. My little nugget–the baby who always had a quick smile turned toddler who could always tell when mommy needed a hug turned pre-schooler who tried my patience to the very end and beyond–was not so little anymore.

I hope he never grows out of speaking his mind (even though it can be sooooo annoying for me as a parent) and being passionate about his interests (no matter what they end up being in the future). I hope he continues to love learning and reading. I hope he never tires of The Prince looking up to him and copying him (even though it can be soooo annoying as an older sibling–I know from experience!). I hope he keeps working on expressing his emotions and figuring out how to do that in productive way (a lesson I’m continuing to learn as well). I hope he continues to challenge me to be a better mom, a better person. I hope he doesn’t drive me crazy!

Most of all I hope he knows how much I love him and how proud I am of him. The Boy. My hurricane baby. My 5-year-old. My kindergartner.

Fall 2015 in Pictures

December 7, 2015 / Katie L. Carroll

First thing’s first…ELIXIR BOUND is on sale today as part of my publisher’s 12 Days of Christmas event. Please help spread the word, and feel free to grab the banner and share it (and also, ya know, pick up a copy of the book).

And…on to the post…

It’s a busy time of year. That means you get to have the super cuteness of a picture post (because most of my pictures are of the boys!). One thing before the pics. Mary Waibel, Kai Strand, and I have been thinking about #inkripples in 2016. We’ve got a whole new set of topics for next year, and we’d love any bloggers to join in the conversation. Full details coming next week!

Now on to the pictures: