I’ve been working on my backyard book ever since I finished the workshop nine days ago. I’m very absorbed, but I’m not making much visible progress. I’ve been writing down my thoughts about the backyard and I’ve organized all of my pictures. I’m almost finished putting the signatures together. But I’m stuck on the first page. I decided it should be movable–a picture of the backyard with a blind that opens and closes. I’ve seen these things many times: you pull a tab and the picture changes. I’ve spent at least three, maybe four days on it, and I’m still not happy. I collect pup-up books and books about making pop-up books, so I went looking for instructions. I found some, but they are not for exactly what I want to do and are not very clear in the trickiest part. Now I think I will proceed with the rest of the book and come back to the venetian blind effect later. But it’s very difficult to let it go.