Stand As An Example

If any of you are frequent readers of Jim's Facebook you may have heard that I have a book/calendar with my name on it. I can't really say I wrote it because I just put together what other people have written.

It all started last year when I was looking for a Christmas present for the Young Women in our ward. I have been the Young Women's President for the last 7 years. We had given the girls socks, candy, Cd's, Christmas ornaments and all the other usual presents. It was time for something new.

The girls had used President Hinckley's book "Stand a Little Taller" for our opening exercises. It was a little bit hard for them to understand sometimes so I thought a book like that on their level would be a great gift. I thought I would just whip one up in time for Christmas. I could copy it on colored paper and put the plastic spiral binding on it. It wouldn't be as nice as President Hinckley's book but you can't do too much on a limited budget.

It didn't happen. I started, but it took way longer than I thought it would. The girls got socks again, but they were cute fuzzy ones this time :)

I decided if I gave myself enough time I could get the project done by the next Christmas. This time I started in February. After looking at quotes until my eyes went blurry, I decided that I didn't want some cheesy looking book to give to the girls. I just didn't think they would take it serious. I had looked for something like this in the LDS bookstores before I started and I knew there wasn't anything like it out there. I had this bazaar thought that somebody might just be interested in publishing it. I called and e-mailed Deseret Book but they didn't ever call or e-mail back. (I recently saw a quote book for Young Women published by Deseret Book so that is probably why they were not interested in my book.) I contacted Cedar Fort Press and they actually took me serious and sent me a contract to write the book but they wanted the completed manuscript in 30 days. A negotiated a little bit more time and finally sent them the complete manuscript in the middle of July. I didn't hear back from them so I wasn't sure if they were going to publish it or not. They weren't obligated because I didn't have the manuscript done in time but I was still hoping they would be able to at least print enough books for me to give to my Young Women for Christmas.

Last week I was checking my e-mail and had a message from UPS. I wasn't expecting a package so I thought is was a junk e-mail and almost deleted it. I thought twice and opened it up to find out I was getting an 8 lb. package from Cedar Fort Press. Could it be my book??? I went to their website on-line and there it was under new releases. I hadn't seen their version of the book at all and it was different from mine but I thought it was kind of cute.

The title is "Stand As An Example" so I wanted to have girly shoes on the cover and on the background in the book. I also wanted to have quotes from President Monson and Sister Dalton but Deseret Book has exclusive rights to publish anything from living church leaders. It's not exactly what I dreamed of but I am thankful they published it and I don't have to worry about what I am going to give our Young Women this year for Christmas. Oops, hopefully none of our Young Women read my blog :)