Sunday, January 02, 2011

Happy New Year!

It's hard to believe that another year has come and gone. It's been a good year overall, although one dominated by work--good thing work has been rewarding! But it hasn't been all work and no play. Here are a few highlights from my 2010:

work:
-Grace Lin's Where the Mountain Meets the Moon, won a Newbery Honor
-Peter Brown won the Children's Choice Illustrator of the Year
-The Curious Garden won the E.B. White Read-aloud Award
-Karen Healey's Guardian of the Dead was named a Morris Award finalist
-Where the Mountain Meets the Moon, Shark vs Train, and Children Make Terrible Pets were all NY Times bestsellers
-I attended two ALA conferences, NCTE, and three SCBWI conferences (FL, SC, and NY)
-I was able to promote my assistant, and now have a new editorial assistant
-I hired two fabulous editorial interns who have gone on to great editorial assistant positions
-I was promoted to executive editor

Life:
-I moved to Brooklyn!
-I became the step-mother of two cats
-I took a vacation to the SF Bay Area, and then to Lake Tahoe for a family reunion
-I took a two-week vacation: CA for a week, then CO for another week
-I played golf, tennis, pool, and softball, went bowling, and jogged regularly in Prospect Park
-I biked over 50 miles in the MS Ride, and raised over $1,000
-I sang a ton of Karaoke, learned the harmony to the Jason Mraz/Colbie Caillat song Lucky
-I took a bunch of trips to CT to hang out with the Blue Rose Girls
-I went to the NATWA conference in Toronto with my mother, and we took a train to Montreal to visit friends
-I went to the beach three times and to Disney World once
-I learned how to shuck oysters, and make chocolate fondue, ravioli from scratch, and icing chrysanthemum flowers
-I attended three weddings, four baby showers, two wedding showers, and one bachelorette party
-I saw Lady Gaga and Bob Dylan in concert
-I saw President Obama speak in person
-I saw a bunch of plays and musicals, including West Side Story and Time Stands Still
-I watched too much reality television (Project Runway, Amazing Race, Top Chef), became addicted to Glee, and watched some movies, too (the Stieg Larsson trilogy, Inception, etc.)
-I met, visited, and played with my friends' kids
-I became entrenched in the cult of Apple (iPad, iPhone, iTunes, MacBook)
-I ate a ton of delicious food
-I lived!



Happy New Year, all. May 2011 be the best year ever, a year filled with laughter, joy, peace, growth, and, of course, bloomabilities.

6 comments:

Jewel Allen said...

Happy new year to you, too! What a year indeed!! How do you top all that? :-)

Anonymous said...

wow. What a great year for you!

Here's looking to a fantastic 2011. Best wishes to you.

yamster said...

Congratulations on your promotion!!! Did I miss this somehow? Nice how you just kind of sneaked it in at the end of your work list... :)

Anonymous said...

Congratulations on the promotion!

Quick question: I asked my agent to send my MS your way. Are you still the right editor for that, or are you delegating acquisition type stuff to the new underlings?

alvinaling said...

Amy--it became official in mid-December but was just announced in Pub Lunch this week.

Anon--I'm still acquiring!

Anonymous said...

Awesome! My agent says he's now submitted it to you. :-D