Secret Agent Josephine

The time has come! I finally finished SAJ Numbers and now I get to schedule a little virtual book tour. You might have thought I was going to come to your town and set up a little table and hand out cupcakes. I wish I was. Bug has perfected her signature and everything. I might do that locally but I’m not big enough to travel quite yet. But it could happen. I just need your help.

What I need right now are 26-30 bloggers who would be willing to host a little book tour for me. Just one post. There will be prizes, crafts and even a secret clue game. It’s going to be fun and don’t worry, I’ll do all the hard work for you. I will have a press release ready that you can just copy and paste blurbs from or you can interview me OR you can host a little craft that I will set up for you with printables!! It will be fun! You’ll be part of a tour with some other big bloggers (I’m calling in favors from all my old-school blogging buddies from way back) so you’ll get a lot of traffic to your site (at least that’s my evil plan anyway) because everyone will have to find the secret clue in each blog post.

Is this a mission you would like to accept? Email me and we’ll set up a date.

Numbers will drop November 15th just in time for the Kindle Fire (so you can see it in color!) The other books are already out but don’t buy them or pimp them now because I want everyone to make a big fuss on the 20th so it will get a better chance to rise to the top of the book charts and hopefully stay there if it gets good exposure. This is the strategy.

But between you and me, it’s my next book I’m excited about. The one I haven’t written yet: SAJ goes to Paris. I’m giving myself a year to illustrate it and it’s going to be full scenes instead of just illustrations on white. I’ve got a taste for this book-making business and I’m really excited about it. Maybe you’ll join me?

You guys all know my neighbor, Boo, right? She’s popped up a time or two on this blog. She’s a super cute girl who lives across the street from us. I love her. Anyway, she turned ten and her mom (my friend Wendy) threw her this fabulous circus-themed birthday party. It was awesome.

I may be a tiny bit biased because there was FACE PAINTING!!!

Done by ME!! I know. You’re rolling your eyes because I have to brag about every little thing but seriously, I have wanted to be a face painter since forever. I have gone to carnival after carnival and paid the five dollars or one dollar to watch some mediocre painter paint some kind of blob on my daughter’s face and call it a butterfly. I have been holding myself back from grabbing the paintbrush right out of their hands and taking over on the spot. You don’t know the willpower that requires! It was painful!

Bethany bought me this kit (I added my own paintbrushes) probably a year ago but I haven’t had the chance to break out until now. I didn’t even get a chance to practice. But guess what? I didn’t need to! It was totally easy and kids are such great sports about things. They were thrilled with everything and if a bit ran or looked funny, mistakes wipe right off with a baby wipe. It was the most pleasant experience ever. I’m going to hire myself out starting tomorrow. Need a face-painter? Call me up. I’m serious. How much do face-painters charge these days anyway?

So right. This party was about Boo, not me face painting. I hope she loved her party because it was super sweet.

Her mom (that’s Wendy on the right) is the best game-inventer ever. I might need to tap into her talent and start a company or something. Too bad we both have plans to move out of town next year.

There was hot potato.

Musical chairs.

Freeze Dance.

You might wonder why Bug is dressed up as a lion. She was part of the show. She was the ferocious lion that Wendy (the lion tamer) led out on a (necklace) chain. You should have seen Wendy play-acting that the lion was growling and giving her a terrible fight in the bathroom before she brought her out. Then this little pip squeak in a tutu came out and everyone rolled on the floor laughing. Bug ate up all that attention of course.

There were a ton of other games too, all carnival style but due to privacy issues and some funky bright lighting, I didn’t get any photos of those. She had tic-tac-toe toss games and a spider toss game that Boo made up herself. It was so cute. You had to throw a spider onto a giant web and if you got it in the middle you won. And of course there were prizes.