A Cherished Valentine Celebration

This Valentine weekend we celebrated in a small town in Belgium called Brugge. If you need Chocolate Therapy, like the poem I wrote months ago, then Brugge is the town for you. I think every other store is a chocolate store, which makes sense since Belgium is known for their chocolates. This is a romantic town, so I made some changes to my pictures to give them a romantic nostalgia feel although I’m still tweaking the pictures.

The first one is of two masquerade lovers. Carnivale is big in Europe.

As we were walking toward the stores and Market, I took some pictures along the way.

Here are some pictures of the Market Square and the Belfry Tower. I put the day pictures with the night pictures.

Here’s a picture of a sign I thought was cute.

Then we took a boat ride on the canal to see the city from a different view. 

While we weaved through streets and stores, I took pictures of things I found beautiful or interesting.

At night, a restaurant advertised their place by using a turning spotlight of a bat beaming down on the sidewalk and I happened to get a good picture of it.

This is a night picture taken of one of the many bridges.

We had a nice dinner and drinks, a few too many, and then stumbled back to our room to head out early the next day to a town called Zoutelande. For about four miles to Zoutelande, we drove through a tunnel under the sea.

I took a picture of this windmill as we drove into town. I didn’t make any changes to these pictures.

Our intentions were to take about a four mile walk down the beach, but the wind was wicked and we quickly changed our minds. Here are a few pictures of the beach and a couple riding horses.

This tree was laying in front of someone’s house with the branches holding coffee cups.

Then we went to a nearby town, Westkapelle where they had a museum with a dedication to the U.K. and U.S., who rescued them from German siege. 

A few more pictures from this area of the sea.

On our way home, I had to take a picture of a few German bunkers left from the war.

And that was our weekend adventure. How about you? What did you do? Do you plan on letting your loved one know how much you love them this Valentine’s Day or do you plan on letting someone know you’re in love with them? Or maybe you plan on buying yourself something special? Let us know. Hope you have a nice day and a great week.

I don't see a resemblance.

The other day we went to the Neanderthal Museum where in 1856 they found the remains of the Neanderthal in this area. We went into the museum and then walked the trails to see some artwork and animals.

This is a statue based on how the artist depicted Neanderthals. 

This is a sand table that explains each granule being a year, and with one stream, we already have been born and died. It was a visual to demonstrate 35,000-40,000 years ago. 

A time table of evolution, which states we are Homo Sapiens Sapiens. At first I thought it was a grammatical error and they accidentally typed Sapiens twice.

I was going to post a picture of a brain and a jaw with teeth, but thought I’d spare you the pictures. I don’t want to ruin anyone’s appetite.

A picture of a mammoth—and it doesn’t really show the true size of this animal.

This is the nature walk of art and animals. The first picture is of a stream near the entrance.

I’m not quite sure what this is doing in the middle of the trail or what it signifies.

This isn’t a horse, but I forgot the name of it. 

We walked in this area and climbed up the hill to see the ancestor of the cow. 

When we were halfway around the trail, I took a picture of the fields. As you can see, it was a beautiful day with temperatures around 52 degrees.

The location where they found the relics of the Neanderthal.

After the museum, we headed over to a nearby town, Wuppertal, so I could be a dorky tourist and ride the elevated train that runs above the river. It’s sturdier than riding the EL. Here are some pictures when I was on the train and while we waited for it.

We walked around the city for a little bit, so here are a few things I found interesting.

I hope you enjoyed the tour. You can leave a tip by pressing the button to the right. No, your other right. ;)

If you’ve got time then you’ve got Dustin Time!

I just finished reading Dustin Time by June Kramin and I’m here to say get your butts out there and buy it…or keep your butts home and buy it. In today’s times of war and violence, Dustin Time will take you to a place where love exists. It’s a romance—perfect for the upcoming Valentine’s Day weekend. Whether or not you’re in a relationship, this book reaches out to all women because it speaks the truth about what we all want—true love. Here is a blurb from the back cover:

“A successful veterinarian, Kaitlyn thought she was content with her life. That is, until she turns thirty and realizes that her current ‘boy toy’ is simply not the father material she was looking for. As her biological clock ticks loudly in her ear, both her ‘toy’ and fate strongly disagree.

But something happens and over the next several days, she starts traveling between her birthdays of an altered present and those of her past, leaving her more confused than ever. With the help of a kindly old custodian named Frank, Kaitlyn comes to terms with her feelings for Dustin. And can Dustin Time quiet the ticking she’s trying to desperately to ignore?”

So if you don’t know what to get your love for Valentine’s Day, or YOU want to treat yourself to a ‘sweet surrender’, then Dustin Time is the thing for you.

A Quickie and a Query!

Yesterday I completed my second revision of my novel AND I also wrote an alternative ending—then sent it off to my editor. I will be sending it to some beta readers to get some more eyes and feedback.

The next step is querying agents. I’ve gone back and forth about whether or not I want to go through traditional publishing or self-publish. I decided I will ‘try’ the traditional route first and if that doesn’t work out then I’ll self-publish. If I self-publish, all control is in my hands, which includes finding someone to do the cover art, binding the book, distribution (won’t be in stores), sales, and marketing and publicity. If I go the traditional route, I need to get an agent (receives 15%), the agent finds a publisher and they do the cover art, distribution to stores, but I’ll mainly be responsible for marketing and publicity. The publishing world that existed when John Irving and Stephen King started their writing careers is long gone.

Since I am going to attempt traditional publishing I need to get an agent first, which means I need to write a great query letter. A query letter is a letter that pitches your book idea. Agents receive hundreds of queries a day, so they don’t have time to shuffle through words to find out what my book is about. I’ve been doing some research about querying, such as  writers with similar books, who their agents are and how to write one. Hopefully, I can start practicing now and get some drafts done.

That’s it for now folks! What’s going on in your part of the world? I hope my family and friends dug themselves out from the Chicago snowstorm.