I love my family. In November, during a holiday meal with my mother, she shared with me how much she loves my cooking.

She shared with me how she has bragged all of my life to people about how she had a “gourmet cook” at home when I was living with her.

But somehow I missed all of that. My mother’s and my constant miscommunication has colored my entire life. It also is very indicative of my neurodivergent brain.

People all too often assume I have no issues communicating because I have acquired skills and used my talents to achieve a high skill in writing.

But my writing accomplishments in school have come about because I have constantly sought to become better at communicating. Because I have constantly felt I have failed to do so.

That feeling of failure began at home. Most of my life I have failed to communicate to the people around me what is going on in my brain. At the same time, I have also failed to understand what they were attempting to communicate with me.

Like my mother’s pride in my cooking.

Once I understood that, my plans for Christmas gifts were set. The hardest part of the gift idea was the fact I wanted to keep it secret until they were given.

I had a few co-conspirators: My current and former caregivers. Also having been fans of my cooking, they were easy to sign on to my plan.

What was my plan?

Although I’ve been working on my memoir for years, hoping to head to a traditional publishing outlet, I decided to self-publish a collection of my favorite family recipes.

I know I’m not going to live forever, and neither is my mom. I wanted her to see her mom’s and her daughter’s recipes in print. I wanted to show her how much her pride in my accomplishments meant to me.

I’m writing this as I’m still keeping the secret. I can’t publish this yet because my mom follows this blog. I’ll update it soon! (I told her!!)

My good friend (and former caregiver), Harper, offered to perform the editing needed to make this book a reality. With her co-conspiracy, I was set to get it to the final copy ready to publish on December 25th.

Or somewhere around that date. You see, the way that Kindle Direct Publishing works, is that you have to give them about 72 hours for the first edition of your book to be live. I figured out 72 hours before Christmas Day and set my final copy date and time for that time.

When I sent the draft to Harper for editing, I also ordered a copy of the draft as my draft from KDP.

My idea was to perform all of the final edits at the same time, and then submit the final manuscript for publication.

At the last minute, knowing that many of my followers are like me and finances are challenging, I added a black and white edition. Although I love sharing photos of the prepared recipes, I also knew I could share the information for a simpler price. Therefor, the fourth version of the same book was born.

Another decision about layout at the last minute was to add a section to the books that would allow people to add their own saved recipes. In this way, the book can become an indispensable tool for people’s kitchens.

It was a challenge to get this book published in time for the holiday. But it was a challenge that enabled me to deep dive into a couple of my special interests at the same time. And it gives me the opportunity to share the things I love with the world.

All editions are now live.

I really appreciate any clicks and purchases of my book through these links. I am now a part of the Amazon Associate program, so I will receive compensation for your purchase if you use one of these links. I appreciate both clicks and sales of the book; it will help me be able to finish my next project.

I know many of my followers are in my same financial paradigm, so I created a way for you to get my book for a reasonable cost. Right now, the ebook is FREE and I created a budget version of the cookbook and recipe diary without the fancy photos. The budget paperback has only a couple of greyscale photos, but all of the recipes, stories and pages to collect your own recipes remain intact.

For those who are anxious to download the ebook: Get it quick! The free book promotion is going from Christmas day until the 29th!

Thank you all for your love and support.

Have a wonderful holiday season and a fabulous year ahead!