1. I’m already beginning to think about publicity for my picture book, ME WITH YOU, that will be out with Philomel in May 2009. (It’s up on Amazon, though there’s no cover image yet and they’re supposed to change my name to Kristy from Kristin Dempsey.) This book celebrates grandparent/grandchild relationships (well, really it celebrates ANY wonderful relationship, but it will be illustrated by the wonderful Christopher Denise as a grandfather bear and granddaughter bear.) I’ll be in the States for six months out of 2009, perfect timing for publicity, but at times it seems quite overwhelming. One step at a time. I need to come up with good plans and then take it one step at a time. I should have another picture book out in Fall 2009 (MINI RACER, Bloomsbury) too, so hopefully I’ll be able to do a little publicity for it too before I head back to Brazil in January 2010.

2. The Olympics are over. The sheer variety of sports was very pleasing to my kids. My son is already thinking about London 2012. He says we’ll just have to be satisfied with watching ball games between now and then.

3. I don’t really have a third thing. But if I’m making a list it seems like I should have more than two things. Actually, if I’m making a list, the first thing on it should be CLEAN UP THE KITCHEN. So that’s what I’m off to do now…

Yes, it’s been far too long since my last post. I was derailed as a blogger over the past month or so by a trip to the States that included a writer’s retreat (time spent with amazing women, all of whom are writers I admire deeply, and a lot of work accomplished to boot; also, met my oh-so-smart, oh-so-savvy agent; she is a joy!), two weeks of vacation (where almost no writing was accomplished — other than three articles for an upcoming FACES issue on Brazil — but much relaxing and playing and lounging and eating and attempting to surf *was* accomplished. That surfing thing was a blast, even though I’m not quite the expert yet.

Once back in Brazil, we entered the sick bay and have each been through colds and such, the strangest of which was endured by my youngest, with fever, hives and seemingly uncontrollable swelling, especially in her face. Luckily, she had no problems breathing but it seemed like a classic allergic reaction, only we can’t figure it out. I managed to stay well through all the other sicknesses, until today when I am decidedly coughy, achy, sniffly and sneezy. I’d like to take some Nyquil and go back to bed, but it doesn’t look like that’s in the cards. It’s a back-to-work-week in many ways: back to a novel I’d like to finish, back to a house I’d like to organize (can you say simplify?), and back to a habit of daily exercise.

Zzzzz.

Okay, so maybe the exercise can wait till the achy-ness goes away.

I’m in an airport in the States at the moment but if I’d been in Brazil yesterday, here is where I would have been:

Every Friday afternoon in our city there is a flower fair, cut flowers and potted plants, trees and pottery. I don’t go every week, but I always love it when I go.

It’s a one pic day because we’re headed out the door to the airport for a trip to the States. Today’s pic is of Praca do Papa (Pope Park), a park and monument that was erected when the Pope spoke to the masses of Belo Horizonte in 1980. It’s at the top of a huge hill (one that I do repeats on when I’m training for a marathon) and there is now a playground. It’s a great place to take pictures and eat popcorn. My kids love to go there.

See you when I get to the States!

Two very typical Brazilian images today. This first one is the Pista de Cooper near our house. A pista de Cooper is an exercise lane, usually along a busy city street. Brazilians are a fairly active population, and this pista de Cooper near our house sometimes gets so crowded that it’s difficult to jog because you continually have to cut back and forth between people. There are juice bars along the route too, so often Brazilians stop for a juice or coconut water and sit and chat a while before resuming their daily walk. (And “Cooper” is what Brazilians call exercise, specifically walking or jogging, after Kenneth Cooper, the American credited for bringing the benefits of aerobic exercise to the masses.)

This next picture is not completely typical of Brazil but the reason for the little signs is typical. Every single day a truck, or more than one truck, comes by to see if we’d like to buy gas (we have gas stoves and some people have gas water heaters, so we use the bottles, or what do you call it, tanks (?)of gas that need to be replaced every so often.) Rather than go through the daily process of answering the interfone a million times a day, one building has come up with the ingenious idea of each apartment being responsible to use one of these tags to let the gas trucks know if they’d like to buy. So each of those “nao” (no) tags has a reverse that shows an apartment number so that the truck guys know which apartment would like gas and they don’t have to ring up to each one to ask. We answer the interfone at least twice a day, sometimes five times a day, just to say we don’t want gas all because we don’t have one of these handy little signs.

Oops, sorry, I missed yesterday! I’ll make it up to you though with two pics today.

Moving in a bit closer…

My street sign:

My mailbox:

The door to my apartment building:

What a great idea cynthialord has for us all to share photos of where we live. I thought I’d start with the broad view and move closer as the week goes by. Here’s Belo Horizonte, my city of choice for almost 10 years now. I live in a building just outside of the picture in the lower right hand corner. It’s a city of 4.5 million people and spreads much further in all directions than this picture can show. The pic was taken from the southern end on top of Serra do Curral, the mountain that runs along the southern edge of the city.

1. It’s worth repeating again. I finished the first draft of my novel this week. Then, I took one day off from writing, and jumped straight into a second novel, a YA. Only three thousand words so far, but it’s a start!

2. I leave in less than a week for a trip to a working writer’s retreat! I’ve got some research to print out for the YA I’ll be working on, have to pack for myself and my three children (who are so excited about staying with their grandparents while I go on retreat). My husband will join us a week and a half later and then we’ll have a couple of weeks of vacation on beaches in South and North Carolina.

3. Today was the last day at work for one of the San Diego editors who worked with me on Surfer Chick at Harcourt. My fingers are crossed she finds another job in publishing because I’d love to have the chance to work with her again.

4. There’s nothing on tv, except an old Sex and the City. I’ve never watched an episode of Sex and the City. Have I actually missed anything?

5. I only had four. Whatcha gonna do?

As of 3:42 pm, this very afternoon, I am a novelist. Albeit not a published novelist. But a I-have-completed-a-first-draft-of-a-novel novelist. In fact, it is so far from being something publishable that I’m not sure I’ll ever choose to revise it. But I didn’t give up on it. I finished it. I’d started others. And there they sit, languishing in their files. But not this one. For the first time in my life, I gutted it out and finished the whole story.

Making it publishable it what revision is for, right?