My writing journey continues
My writing journey continues.
As I started this post I realized it had been exactly a year, to the day, of my very first post. I also lost a good friend last week who was the reason I started this blog. Julia was an incredible friend who I worked with for nearly 5 years and who became a good friend. She was a social media and online content whizz, and was the person I looked to for advice when I started this site. I found a whatsapp audio message from a year ago where she had told me to do at least quarterly blog posts, and so here I am. Thanks Julia for the continued advice, I will miss you immensely.
It’s been a wonderful writing year and yet much slower than I’d expected. As those in the writing industry know, it’s not as easy as writing a story and sending it off to get published. I did, however, try that. When that didn’t work I continued to write new stories, found some great critique partners to give me feedback (who weren’t just supportive friends or my mom) and I enjoyed reading and critiquing other people’s work through the 12x12 Picture Book Membership forum. I also got involved in Twitter pitch contests and other online contests put on by fellow picture book writers.
As I’ve worked to write new stories I’ve found it harder to get those first words down on paper since I now know much more about the “rules” of writing. But what hasn’t been hard is getting outside and being active with my daughter, which has brought even more story ideas to my mind. Some gorgeous autumn walks at sunset this past fall inspired OUR AUTUMN WALK, and the sledding last winter (and toddler resistance to bedtime) inspired SLEDDING BY MOONLIGHT. We had bike rides, more trips to the desert in Utah, and days at the beach in Northern Spain. All that time outside has brought more inspiration to my creative writing and I can’t wait to get some stories down and polished.
For now, this is me checking back in, saying what an interesting hobby this is starting to become. I’ve learned that perseverance is going to be key if I want to see my stories out there for others, but I am enjoying the learning on this journey too.
