Why put my book out on a blog rather than publish traditionally through a print house? I realized in high school that I wanted to write. I had a love/hate relationship with my eleventh grade English composition teacher at Eureka High School. Mrs. Collins would read the writing assignments that scored the highest every week to the class. Most weeks, my paper was on the list. Some weeks, she would read my "A" paper to the class right before I got kicked out of the class at least once being a class clown. She found it was more productive to wait until after I got kicked out of class to read my paper. It was when I was taking college courses that I realized that I still liked to write. Since then, and I've always wanted to write and publish a book. Almost 20 years ago, when I first saw my own writing on a web page, I knew that the future was going to be different. Traditional publishing where a small cadre of operators decided what the masses would read, listen to, and watch, for the first time, had a short shelf-life. Newspapers, magazines, music companies, and Hollywood were no longer in control. The script was about to flip. Industry gurus like Guy Kawasaki and Seth Godin are my biggest influencers in my decision to go strictly digital with blogs and social media platforms. Kawasaki's book APE and Godin's daily offerings have empowered the masses. Gary Vaynerchuck reminds his audience that these things in our hands - this phone I'm typing these words into right now - are never more than six inches away. This is true even when sleeping. So that's the thinking behind launching this book-blogging project. I've put it on the Medium platform because I love the built in social and sharing features. It's simple to use as a digital self-publisher. Viewer statistics are built right in so I can see when you love me and when you hate me. Here's the thing: you can do this, too. Pause and let that sink in. You found this blog post or read our story because you found it through our mutual social media relationship.   Why do we need to put a traditional publisher between you and me? You're the one I'm trying to get my message to. You're the one I have to impress. Here are the next two posts in the book-blogging project: Post 10

Post 11

We have friends that are trying to adopt children from Ethiopia. We've followed their story for years, literally, and it has been grueling for them. We're friends with two other couples — both amazing — that have adopted multiple children while also having many of their own, natural born children. One family has a total of twelve kids and the other sixteen!

I have friends that have traveled to China, others to Russia, some who are empty-nesters starting over in mid-life with adopted kids, and still others who open their homes as foster parents to provide emergency care for children from families in crisis. Many children are rescued by a foster family that becomes a forever family.

As I think through the roster of moms and dads that make room in their homes and hearts for children, they're not super heroes. In most cases, they don't have above average resources or incomes. They just want to make a difference one kid at a time. They find that it's possible and they learn that it is the most rewarding

"God decided in advance to adopt us into his own family by bringing us to himself through Jesus Christ. This is what he wanted to do, and it gave him great pleasure." —Ephesians 1:5

In this eighth post from my book blogging project, I write about the early steps of our adoption journey. The Charming and Beautiful Susan and I have never looked back.

Read post eight here.

I sat down the other day to make a list of all of the angels God sent our way in our journey. I couldn't do it. The list is too long. I know I'll miss some.

But, to the best of my ability, I will introduce and name our angels by name. In the fifth post of my book blogging project, we meet our first angel couple.

Read the fifth post here.

post 1 | post 2 | post 3 | post 4 | post 5 | post 6 | post 7 | post 8 | post 9 | post 10 | post 11 | post 12 | post 13

In this post, I mention a movie sequence. Here's a short video you can watch to get some perspective.