What's It Take To Self Publish A Book? Problem Needing HELP! Animal Wednesday And Happy Thanksgiving!

Not sure if this is cheating or not, but I am using this post from earlier in the week for Paint Party Friday. I get into the challenges of Self Publishing my book of art done over the past year at Taco Jalisco. Good news is some of the problems I ran into have been ironed out thanks to blog friends who came forward with wonderful information and know how advice!  Thank you so much!

So I will be busy working on said book this weekend and not sure how much blog hopping I'll do; but will take breaks and do as much as I am able! Thanks for following me and all this; I am ever so grateful.

I promised a blog giveaway for reaching my 200th follower earlier in the week, and in fact got one more making 201! The giveaway will be a copy of my book once it is finally published! I hope the winner will want that! If you want a chance at it just leave a comment at the end of this post to that effect and I'll put you in the draw. I'll pick a name by next Friday and post the winner then. Of course the winner has to wait until the book is published. I hope it will be worth the wait! ;-)

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This is not the turkey in my story below. This is another turkey we saw in someones yard the other day! We have lots of turkeys around here.

Before I start my Book STORY below I have to tell you that on my way to work today I drove down our suburban street only to stop when ONE LONE TALL TURKEY was crossing the STREET in front of my car! I'm used to seeing them in fields, in a yard but never crossing a much traffic'd street!

 

That is my Happy Animal Wednesday Post

(Henry Sends His best, he is fine!)

 

 

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Now about self publishing a book:

 First you thank the people you  know in blog land who sent you lots of suggestions and those who answer on going emails with tips, and help, and support, and encouragement, and know how!!!!!

Then you gather all the drawings/paintings/art you want to put in your book and you scan them into your computer! No small task as in my case so far I am working with 86 drawings/paintings. (I know some of you have made books with hundreds of photos, but I am trying to keep the price down on this book to as low a roar as possible).

You scan each picture at 300 dpi.

  And then I chose to edit my scanned paintings in my Picasa program, which does a good enough job, I hope, of brightening the color and cropping the size.

From there you send them to the Publishing Program you have downloaded onto your computer.
I have chosen to go with BLURB. I wanted something that had a template/format to follow. I thought that would be the easiest way to go with so many pictures involved.

And it's been going smoothly for several days (many, many, many hours of work)...to get this far; and plus time spent writing the text that goes along with the pictures in the book.

I will not bore you with the hitch I ran into last night, well, maybe I will, as maybe just maybe someone out there can help me solve the "hitch"/problem.

I deftly added pictures and text to 32 pages, when I decided I needed a dedication page and an Introduction page at the front of the book. I saw how to "ADD A PAGE" after another already in place page. Well this was fine but all of a sudden I noticed that that MOVED all the other pages so what was page 5 now was page 6 and page 6 now was page 7 etc. Still okay even though it upset the flow of my layout. Oh well, I can deal with that.

But THEN!!!! I notice some of the text was sliding from one page to a different page and was no longer matching the picture I had written it for. OY VEY! What the HECK?

Huston, we have a problem.

So tonight I hastily sat and copied and pasted most of my text into a WORD document so I would not lose it entirely. But when I try to go and put it back where it belongs the "moving text keeps moving to other text boxes. And it does NOT want to STAY where it BELONGS!!!!

I am not screaming. I am just a tad frustrated as I really want to get this book to the Publishers and back to me asap. Was hoping for before the big December Holidays. But not looking good right now for that.

This problem is solved for now!

And I am wishing you who celebrate it a happy Thanksgiving Holiday,as I have no Idea when I will be back here. I have much to be grateful for!