A Post and an eBook for You

Did your team win yesterday? Mine wasn't playing. But I live where everyone is a 12th man and the number 12 flags fly everywhere. Fireworks and shouting were going on like it was New Year's Eve. I felt so bad for Chaos. She doesn't like noises like that!

One of my critique partners, Lisa Creane, who is brilliant and doesn't let me getaway with much (okay, anything) when she reads my chapters, wrote a great blog called House Tone that combines Harry Potter and parenting. Worth a read!

Lisa is a mom-extraordinaire, a psychologist and writer, a woman who wears many hats. I'm honored to work with her and more importantly, have loved getting to know her. Click here to go to her blog.

If you happen to be a Harry Potter fan, you might be interested in the link on Lisa's post that sorts you into the four houses from the book.  If you take the test, I'd love to know how you were sorted.

As part of my Valentine's Giveaway (click here to enter), I'm doing random contests on the blog and Facebook between now and Valentine's day. Today's prize is an ebook from my backlist. To enter, post a comment. I'll randomly pick a winner and post the name on Friday so if you'd rather not leave your email where I can contact you, just check back on Friday to see if you won.

Good luck! And have a great Monday!

Top 10 Posts

Busy day in the McClone household. Soccer begins and we officially end the summer season of swimming!  I'm also busy trying to write a manuscript and the youngest two starting their school year on Monday, so I decided to do a Top 10 Posts on my blog for this weekend.

 I used the stats from google to determine this list and recycled the top LOLcat (from the #2 post) above. So here they are:

10.  Rulers of the World - 390 Views

9. Best Mom Ever - 440 Views

8.  Being a Writer - 441 Views

7.  I think I want to marry you - 474 Views

6.  CATvengers! - 487 Views

5.  Reading - 723 Views

4.  Mr. and Mrs. Harder - 743 Views

3.  Crossfit - Lynne - 1819 Views

2.  Hunger Games - the Day After - 2019 Views

1.  Norwegian Elkhound Puppies - 8145 Views


What does this list tell me?  Just because I don't get a lot of comments doesn't mean people aren't reading posts. Not one post about my books made the list. My blog readers like cats especially LOLcats. Movie posts are popular. And I should be doing lots more posts with Norwegian Elkhound Puppies! LOL!

Does that list tell you anything I should know?

Have a great weekend!

Stylish Blogger Award

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I received the Stylish Blogger Award from my friend Dru.

The rules for accepting this award are:

1. Thank and link back to the person who gave you the award.

I don't think anyone has ever called anything I've been associated with stylish before. Thanks so much, Dru!

2. Share 7 things about yourself.

1 - I love cats. Big surprise, huh? But I'm proud to be a Crazy Cat Lady and visit icanhascheezburger.com every morning.

2 - I hate being the center of attention. I much prefer to hang back and observe.

3 - Though I love all the books I write, the stories set in Hood Hamlet hold a special place in my heart.

4 - To go with #3, I really want to climb Mount Hood even though I'm scared of heights. Just need to heal some more from last year's accident and get back in shape!

5 - I want a puppy. A Norwegian Elkhound puppy. Trying to convince hubby this is a good idea and I haven't totally lost my mind.

6 - If I could live anywhere, I'd moved to Bend, Oregon. Mount Bachelor for skiing and Smith Rock for climbing, need I say more?

7 - I have the greatest family a writer could ever ask for. I'm so blessed and extremely lucky to have them!

3. Pass the award on.

Everyone I would award this too has already won it!

Photobucket Problem

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I can so relate with the pic above! Have you ever felt like that?

The blog is a mess right now due to images I use being hosted on Photobucket. They keep saying it'll be fixed, but so far nothing. And there's nothing I can do about it.

Thanks for the comments yesterday. I slept in late and got an hour nap in the afternoon. Still had a bit of running around to do, but I feel better this morning! It's my busy day today, but the rest of the week isn't so bad!

Hope you enjoy your Wednesday! We had sun yesterday. I'm hoping it's back today!

Change is in the Air

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My cats, Rocket and Spirit, used to sleep like this when they were little. It was the sweetest thing that would warm my heart. Now it only happens once a year and usually ends in a fight. How things change!

Speaking of change, this blog redesign is pretty much good to go. There are a few links on the booklist I still need to do and a few things that need to be rewritten, but everything on the navbar should have content now. Melissa's Diary will soon be my website once I transfer the www.melissamcclone.com domain name over.

Why am I making my blog my website?

I've been wanting to get my blog on the homepage of my website like my friend Elizabeth has for a while now. I only update the website when new releases come out while I blog regularly. But I couldn't afford a redesign. Instead, I opted for something I had the money for—a blog redesign after I saw the great job Julie from Zip.Zog.Zoom. did with the Girls' Weekend in Vegas blog.

I mentioned to Julie I was also thinking of eventually making my blog the website. She told me a lot of things were now possible with blogger so just let her know what I wanted. I told her I'd think about it, but was in no real rush.

About this time, Delle Jacobs, a historical romance author, posted on our RWA chapter loop about using her blog as a website. I knew this really was the direction for me to go. It made (and continues to make) so much sense when I looked at regularly updated blog content and the money I'll save each month. Maybe I'm missing something in my thought process about what a website offers that a blog can't. If I am, please clue me in! I do tend to get tunnel vision about some things, and this might be one of them.

As soon as I saw my new blog design (and absolutely loved what Julie had created. It's so me!), I no longer wanted to wait. I asked her to take the blog she'd just designed for me one step further. A few days later, this blog website was the result!

If you are looking for a blogger designer, I highly recommend Julie and Zip.Zog.Zoom. I found her via a link I clicked on a google search when we were looking for someone to do the Girls' Weekend blog! Talk about getting lucky!

Please have a look around. I'd love to hear what you think of my remodeled home on the Internet. If you see any errors, typos, etc. or something you would like to see, please let me know. Thanks!

Under Construction

I'm adding some new features to the blog. Nothing is quite ready yet so if you start clicking on the navbar you may or may not find content. As soon as it's all ready I'll let you know! Sorry it can't be just a clean transition!

Thanks!

Release Day!

This is one of my shameless self-promotion posts that appeases the hubby as to why I need to have a blog!

Memo: The Billionaire's Proposal hits the shelves today!

This is the book I wrote last fall so there's a lot about it in the blog's September thru November archives! The hero was inspired by Ioan Gruffudd in King Arthur after I saw a YouTube video with scenes from the movie set to a song I liked. The story received 4 1/2 stars from RT, but I still don't have a copy of the actual review.

If you want a peek of the story you can go to the excerpt on my website or here.

Not all the blog readers listed below comment any longer so I have no idea if they still read the blog or not, and most of the "blog readers" never commented so I have no idea if they're/you're still around, either, but this is from the book's dedication page:

For my blog readers, especially Amy, Brandy, catslady, Dru, Jane, limecello, Nathalie, Rottie_mom, Sarita, Tori and Virginia whose daily comments kept me smiling while I finished writing this book!

Special thanks to Robin Barrett M.D., Roxanne and Brian Coyne, Greg Taylor, Virginia Kantra, Terri Reed and my family.

If you want to check out the actual page, go here. Just hit the forward arrow three times. If you keep going you can read an excerpt of the story!

Writing is such a solitary endeavor. I appreciate all my blog readers, whether you comment or not. You do make a difference. At least to this blogger. It's so nice to know someone is stopping by to read what's going on in my little corner of the world. And the eleven readers mentioned above with their faithful commenting during such a difficult time really kept me smiling and writing when my hands wanted me to stop! Thank you so much, ladies! Thanks to all of you!

Hope you have a great day!

Love,
Melissa