Missus Edit-pants

So this week I've been hustling around working on my two editing projects. Okay, mentally hustling around. Most of this editing stuff I do with my bum firmly planted in my office chair, and I haven't gone to the gym since Monday because I had RS meetings Tues morning, my visiting teaching Wed morning, and my own being-visiting taught Thursday morning. So, yeah, I supposed I could have gone to the gym this morning . . . but the kids are off track and I slept in until 8 (thanks hon for getting up with Wyatt at 6:15--3,000 calories worth of brownie points right there) and then took all four kids to get haircuts, bought pumpkins, and then went to Payless with those same four kids and 12% of the population of South Jordan because there was some Oprah 50%-off- everything-in-the-store promotion and my kids all simultaneously grew out of their church shoes last Sunday.

So I haven't gone to the gym. But I have been hustling.

Hustle-job number one has been Irreantum, which is finally all typeset and ready for last-minute proofing. I'm really proud of this issue and think it's going to be the best one yet--all 220 pages of it. Here's the cover. Isn't it gorgeous? It's a window in the Boston temple. We have a great collection of other black and white photography from sacred places around the world in the interior of the journal:

I've also been busy working on Dispensation, finalizing ideas for the cover and working with Chris at Zarahemla on copyedits. Here's THAT cover:

We went back and forth on a number of different designs (39 in all!) and there were a few at the end I really liked. But I decided this one would be best after we changed the background from black (which I thought was too stark) to this rust color. I think it's bold and memorable and pretty cool.

And tomorrow's Halloween! Then (drumroll) in November I'm going to do something called NaNoWriMo. Yes, some of you might think I'm crazy, but Irreantum is all but wrapped up, Dispensation is close, and I've been editing instead of writing for way too long. This is a way to jump start the whole process. You commit to writing 50,000 words during the month of November. I'm not planning to have anything but a messy first draft (or the beginnings of a messy first draft) of the novel I've been tinkering with now for almost a year--but I'm excited to jump in. So during the month of November, Forrest will do his first full marathon and I'll try to write a novel :-). Sound ambitious enough?!?!

Should be fun.