Crazy Life + Freedom's Release || September Recap

IT'S FINALLY FALL, YOU GUYS. I AM HYPED.

Also this is late again, but can I even help it at this point?? Nope.

|| Trip to See Friends

• My fam went to visit friends a few hours away the first weekend of the month. Sometime I'm going to do a post about these Nameless Friends that we hang out with every other month or so. But until then... *photo dump*

"I love ripped denim and I cannot lie"

• While there, we went riding up on the Blue Ridge Parkway. It was a gorgeous day and the scenery was breathtaking. <3

oh hi tall kid

|| Random Life

• A super sweet customer brought flowers to work for the employees to enjoy!

• We had an employee dinner a few weeks ago, and I took the opportunity to dress up and look nice. For once. xD

• I was house-sitting/dog-sitting the last weekend of the month, with these sweet pooches.

• BeFunky has, like, changed a ton of fonts since I last used it and they GOT RID OF the font I used to ALWAYS use for blog post graphics?? #rude

• And I guess that's it?? I basically spent the entire month at work. Or so it seemed. xD

• The only book I finished was The Judgement by Beverly Lewis, book two in the The Thorn trilogy. I've been inching my way through this series since early in the year, but I'm over halfway through the final book now, so yay. :D

One book looks so lame, but I've already read 3 books this month (October), so that's good??

|| Freedom

• Oh my goodness, where do I start? Y'all, my precious book baby that I've laughed through and cried over for—legit—years...is available to the world. It's a crazy, but special, feeling. Especially since the book has been, for the most part, readily accepted and adored. <3

• The blog tour, 13 Reasons Why, with the lovely Kaitlyn Krispense, was an absolute blast. The vast number of people who hopped on the bandwagon and shared their own Reasons to Live (R2Ls), either daily or sporadically, made me smile so much. Not to mention, we all had a lot of fun during the almost-two-weeks too. ;)

• There was also a fundraiser connecting to the release of Freedom. In preparation, I wrote up a few paragraphs, explaining that I would be donating profits from Freedom during the month of September to Cover Me Veterans, a non profit organization that's fighting against veteran suicide. And I prayed about it. And I waited to see what would happen. Um guys... Combining paperback sales, ebook sales, and a couple anonymous donations, we raised $420.28. Given that the original goal—and one that I wasn't even sure would be reached—was $100, I was utterly blown away. Thank you all so, so much. God is good. <3

|| Chasing a Dream 

• Now that Freedom is out in the hands of the world (wow that's scary), I'm trying to re-immerse myself into the wonderful world of Chasing a Dream. Right now that means some plotting and outlining, as well as working out minor timeline details and figuring out exactly how it fits in with Dandelion Dust. I'm really excited for this story. It's gonna be good, y'all. :D

|| Final Days of Recaps 

• So, uh, I doubt I'll do anymore monthly recaps after the end of the year. When writing a recap post is something that I literally dread doing and put off for days... yeah, that should be a dead clue that something is wrong. At the beginning of the year, I thought I needed to organize things more. So I revamped the way I did recaps—ironically making it take more time+work—and I don't even really like the format now. I'll finish out the year with this type of recap each month, just because I don't wanna leave things undone, but after that, I'm going to switch things up.

• I've been thinking about maybe doing something like "Life as of now: October 11, 2019" every 4-6 weeks, with an update of what's going on in my life. Same sort of content as the recaps, with less organization and formality. Just bulleted highlights, probably some rambles, and snapshots of life. Maybe writing snippets and/or new story announcements. Thoughts on that?

|| My Posts

One ~ Two ~ Three ~ Four ~ Five ~ Six ~ Seven ~ Eight ~ Nine ~ Ten ~ Eleven ~ Twelve ~ Thirteen 

|| September Goals

• Rock the world with the 13RW tour.     CHECK.

• Release Freedom.       YESSSS.

• Mail all preorder paperback copies.      *thumbs up* the post office people love me.

• Keep up with social media.      EHhhh, not so much...no...

• Clear my inbox.     *maniac laughter*

• Figure out what to do with myself once I'm not spending every waking moment freaking out over anything and everything Freedom related.          Did I seriously think I'd be bored...?

|| October Goals

• Outline Chasing a Dream + do some minor related research.

• Read 5 books.

• Catch up on blog post scheduling, book reviews, and marketing plans.

• Start planning 12 Days of Christmas. (Anyone interested?)

how was your September? are you excited for fall? best book you've read so far this year?