A lot happened last week, and I feel like my brain is exploding. Let’s get into it.

Last week, I was finally able to get my Apple App Store developer payment to go through, (still not sure what was going on) I just kept trying it every day until it worked. Weird.

The bummer was right as I was fist pumping for getting it done, I realized I probably need to change the name of my developer business name.

You see, what I didn’t realize, is your Developer name is displayed by your App name. To be approved as an Apple developer you either use your legal name or use a true business, like an LLC. I had used my author/book biz, Laura Wifler Creative, Inc. by default. Which means, “Laura Wifler” would be right next to any apps I post, and I didn’t want that. I’m hoping to build most of my products to not need my personal brand long term. I think it’s fine if they leverage the community I’ve spent nearly 20 years on the internet cultivating to lauch, but ultimately I’d like them to run autonomously.

Plus, as my husband and I started talking through the logistics of the different platforms I’m building, we realized that it probably made sense for these projects to have their own business structure. We talked with our accountant, and the recommendation was to go ahead and open a separate LLC.

So much of my week was spent doing very glamorous founder things like applying for an LLC, getting an EIN, setting up a bank account, etc.

So now that I’ve done that, I need to go back and adjust my Apple Developer account name to the new LLC. Ugh.

Sword Drill

In terms of Sword Drill, there weren’t a ton of app improvements this week because it’s mostly sitting there, waiting for me to get everything sorted with the Apple App Store.

I did work on the App Store screenshots and started making sure all the information was ready.

I will say: every time I tell someone I’m trying to get an app into the App Store myself, they respond with some version of: “Wow. Good for you. That’s really hard.”

Which is both encouraging and deeply unsettling.

To be clear, I do not have some grand confidence that I am the best person for this job. I don’t even know if I’ll be able to get it all the way across the finish line myself.

If I do end up needing to hire someone to help me, I don’t think that’s a failure. So I’ll let you know!

The larger Sword Drill update is really the content.

We’ve now created around 5,000 Bible trivia questions.

Yes. Five thousand.

I’m using a Claude project I built a couple weeks ago to generate questions, and then a seminary student I hired from Reformed Theological Seminary is editing through each one for quality. The slowest part is that I hit my Claude data limits very quickly. So every few hours, when my limit resets, I go back in and generate more.

At the very least, I’m staying ahead of the editing process, and the question bank is starting to feel substantial.

Parlor launched to The KidLit Lab community

Parlor had a big week.

I launched it first to The KidLit Lab students inside Circle, and then to the broader KidLit Lab email community.

And it has been so fun to watch people come over and start building their author websites!

That was the whole point of Parlor from the beginning: to make a polished, professional author website feel simple and doable instead of like one more tech mountain to climb.

So far, I’ve had a lot of interest, a lot of people starting sites, and a lot of good questions. Which means: customer service.

We haven’t had major bugs so far, which I’m very grateful for. The questions have mostly been general:

What can the site do?
What can’t it do?
How do the fees work?
Can I add this?
What happens if I’m not published yet?
What if I want to change something later?

Most of this is answered in the FAQ, but I am learning that people will often email a human before they dig around on a website.

So I spent some time this week making the website and the builder clearer. I updated some language, highlighted the most common questions, and added screenshots for each section of the wizard so people can better understand what information they’re entering and how it will show up on their site.

Parlor launches next to the broader Laura Wifler Creative community tomorrow, and after that, it will be public for anyone to use!

SADIE surprised me

My last current project is SADIE: Source and Discovery Illustration Engine, and she is essentially a Christian research assistant.

Originally, I built SADIE to help writers gather research in a more organized, useful way. My first vision was that she would produce an Excel document full of quotes, sources, studies, examples, and references around a topic.

But this week, something fun happened: A writer friend asked me for help thinking through the positioning for one of her children’s books. The book was in some ways, about the sovereignty of God, and she was trying to figure out how to talk about it clearly to parents.

And then she used SADIE in a totally different way than I originally intended.

Instead of only asking for research and quotes, she asked SADIE about market positioning. She asked how the book might be framed for different publishers and about hooks, taglines, angles, and ways to communicate the idea more clearly.

And the results were incredible.

She Voxed me about it, and when she shared the output, I thought, HOLY COW THIS IS AWESOME.

So I went back into SADIE and expanded her purpose.

I updated the homepage and the agent and I made sure that when someone starts interacting with SADIE, she explains more clearly what she can help with.

Now, instead of thinking of SADIE only as a source-gathering assistant, I’m thinking of her as a research and communication assistant for Christian writers, authors, pastors, teachers, and communicators. Honestly it’s so exciting.

And because you guys are here on my lil Buiding in Public thread of my newsletter, I’ll share with you a first look at SADIE. Like I’ve mentioned, she’s totally ready, but I don’t want to overwhelm people with the rate that I’m vibe coding….eeek!

Alright, that’s it for this week! See you next week!

Laura

First - a note for full disclosure: I decided to use Claude to help me write these. I know, I know, I know. But these posts are not designed to be “art,” to me, they are more transactional communication, and frankly they won’t happen if I can’t speed these up.

So I built a skill in Claude around my voice + writing, and spoke this post into it. I asked it to preserve as much of my tone, voice, language, humor, etc. as possible and just organize/smooth it for you.

Next, I’ve came in and overwrote (aka heavily edited) the post to make sure it all sounds like me and is accurate. I want you to know this so if you see anything “AI-ish,” you’re aware and don’t feel like I pulled one over on you. I included a smaller disclosure in posts going forward as well.

Here’s the deal: I figure if you’re in this crew, you’re okay with it.

Let’s not clutch any elitist-writer pearls here.

Okay, to real content. First, let’s discuss the term “Vibe coder.” Literally every time I say it, people either giggle or look at me like I grew horns.

I get it.

I even came across a thread on reddit this week where people were talking about not wanting to call it “vibe coding” anymore because no one takes them seriously. The general consensus was calling it “Agentic Coding” or “Agentic Engineering,” and many people said “we might as well just call ourselves developers, because honestly, that’s what it means to be a coder in 2026.”

I don’t know if that’s entirely true — I have a couple of actual developer friends and I am a far cry from what they do. But I do like having a term that takes the work a little more seriously. So perhaps we’ll just go with that. Developer. FANCY.

Alright, project updates:

1) I got approved as an Apple Developer!

The best news of the week: I got accepted into the Apple App Store as a Developer!

They say it takes one to two business days, but it took me seven. My theory is that Apple is getting absolutely flooded with the previously-termed “vibe coders” submitting apps, and the whole process is backed up. Anyway — I went in, accepted the terms, discovered it costs $99 a year to be a Real Developer Who Can Publish Apps, and then tried to pay—but it wouldn’t let me.

I tried every method I could think of. Nothing worked. So I currently have a help desk query in to figure out why Apple won’t accept my money.

But we are one step closer to getting Sword Drill in the App Store, and I’ll take it.

2. Sword Drill: Beta Testing / Waiting On Apple

Sword Drill is a Bible Trivia web app I built on Lovable. I’ll get into the full backstory of why I wanted to build it another time, but for now, here’s where things stand:

• I’ve been doing a lot of beta testing with friends on the web app, because my understanding is that once you move into the App Store, you have to reupload every time. Right now on Lovable, I can make a change and it’s near-immediately live. So I want to work out as many bugs as possible before we make that move.

• I’m also building out the trivia questions. Long-term goal is 10,000+. Right now I’m at about 1,500. I built a skill in Claude to draft the first version of the questions, and it’s actually quite good at getting the facts right. The two problems are that it produces a lot of duplicates and it’s not great at categorizing what a question is about.

• To help make sure Sword Drill is the best it can be, I hired a seminary student to do a light edit on them. Ultimately, my hope is that the app will be somewhat peer-reviewed—meaning if someone disagrees with a question or answer, they can write in and we can double-check it. That makes the big Q Question goal actually feel achievable.

3. Parlor: launched and in beta

Parlor is a website that helps authors get beautiful, done-for-you websites. (Backstory: later.) Here’s the update.

• The Parlor website is totally live and has been through a solid round of beta testing. (I can’t believe how much it catches!!) Right now it’s only open to my paid KidLit Lab students—I’ve given them free publishing, so they only have to pay for hosting. The idea is to work through any questions or bugs with a smaller, familiar group before I open it wider.

• Next, I plan to open it to the KidLit Lab email subscribers—about 2,200 people—which is still a contained enough audience that I can actually be helpful if things go sideways. If you’re not on the KidLit Lab list, and want a website, feel free to check it out here! If you have questions, email me at hello@authorparlor.com and let me know you’re a subscriber.

• After that, the hope is to open it to the public. I’m still working out how exactly it will get exposure. Currently I’m thinking of using an affiliate campaign. Obviously, it’s every developer’s (!) dream that an app takes off with word of mouth, but it’s never a guarantee and I don’t want to rely on that.

4) SADIE: ready, but waiting it’s turn

I have a tiny web app called Sadie. SADIE is an acronym for Source and Discovery Information Engine to help Christian authors and writers do research around their topic.

SADIE is actually completely ready. I’ve already sent it to a handful of friends, but I’m not planning to release it publicly until Parlor is out first just to try to stay organized. I don’t plan to monetize it at all. It was more of a pet project. There’s a really fun backstory to it which I’ll share later (sorry for all these “later” comments) but while there’s a great front-door web page I built on Lovable, she’s actually a ChatGPT agent under the hood.

The agent was my first stab at making something that could serve other people and wasn’t just for my own work.

Final Thoughts

I keep seeing the same style of IG reel pop up in my feed (which is allllll about vibe coding right now) Basically it’s this: Vibe Coders launching apps that are supposedly going to make them a million dollars, and then, nothing.

No one sees them. No one uses them. They make exactly $0.

And while it’s funny (because it’s easy to want to believe the idea that you can vibe code your way to a being a billionaire and very few every will) it’s an idea I want to be careful of.

Basically, best practices/advice would say that you should vibe code stuff as fast as you can, release it out into the world as fast as you can, then iterate as fast as you can while random ppl use it.

You see what sticks and drop the rest. Some people are launching new apps every single week.

And while sometimes that makes me feel behind, ultimately, I feel like my reputation is at stake and I want to make sure I do things slow enough that I can do them with as much excellence and thoughtfulness as possible.

I’ve worked hard to build a community online, and I want to respect every single person that has given me their valuable attention.

Sometimes I wonder if the reason why some of the vibe-coded apps don’t take off is because they were released way too fast and it’s annoying for users to deal with all the bugs.

I have a few other projects I want to build—things I think could be as useful as Parlor or Sword Drill—but they’re bigger lifts. So for now, the goal is to get what I have out into the world before I start anything new.

I’m not out here trying to make the most amount of money. But I do want whatever I build to actually be helpful and usable for people.

I know naturally some things will land better than others, and I’m okay with that. SADIE is a good example—I built her mostly to help one specific friend, and I never really saw her being used at massive scale (hopefully she helps a few writer friends).

That’s fine. Not everything has to be.

Back next week with another update.

Laura