Confession

I'm going to admit two things:

1. This year, and probably last year too, I've been a really crappy writer. I haven't written regularly at all. I've started 3 manuscripts and finished 0. I've had a few spurts of productive writing time, but mostly my focus has been on other things.

2. I don't feel bad about it.

I had a reflective moment the other day as I looked back over the year and some of the struggles we've been through, and overall I feel really good about where I've put my focus. My family needed me and I was there for them.

Sometimes I feel like a lazy bum when I see how much writing some of my friends do. Several of them have written three books in the time it's taken me to write half of one. I have to remind myself that this is not a race.

Writing is important to me, but it's nowhere near family on my list of priorities. I know the day will come when my babies will be all grown up, and I don't want to look back at my life and feel like I wasn't able to enjoy their childhoods because I was so wrapped up in my own pursuits.

Still, I don't think it's impossible to be a good mom and a good writer, (plenty of people do it!), and a shift in our schedule should make it a little easier to get some quiet time. On Monday two of my four kids will be headed back to school. My preschooler will start school the next week. They'll be filling their little brains with knowledge, baby will be napping, and I'll be writing up a storm. Hopefully.

Do your priorities sometimes push your writing to the backseat?

A Life

My 91-year-old grandmother passed away last week. She lived a long and remarkable life, and she will be very missed.

She raised six children in a two room log cabin without indoor plumbing. They were poor. My dad tells stories of Christmases when the only gift for the kids was a bit of hard candy.

All of Grandma's kids learned to work hard, and as a result all six children graduated from college.

It's impossible to think about Grandma's life and not feel a little ungrateful. We have so much, and can't imagine life without television or Internet, much less flushing toilets or air conditioning.

I am grateful for Grandma and all the people who've gone before us to make this world what it is. It's not perfect, but darn it, at least we can pee inside.

The Writing Bug is Contagious

Yesterday morning my eighty-seven-year-old grandpa called me to tell me he'd written a story.

My older brother is half-way through his first novel.

My younger brother started writing his book too.

My seven-year-old daughter carries a notebook around with her and is constantly writing things down. She wants to be a writer when she grows up, just like her mom.

The stories they write make me happy, and I wonder if they'd all be writing now if I hadn't tried it first. I'm glad I did.

Do you have friends or family who have caught the writing bug?

Just Write Something

Sometimes I get busy.

When this happens I'm often frustrated that I don't have enough time in my day to write a respectable 2-4 pages, so I don't write anything.

That's dumb.

I should just write a page, or a paragraph, or a sentence, because writing something is better than writing nothing.

This month will be crazy with family visits, back-to-school stuff, birthday parties, and appointments, but I WILL write something every day.

Do you have days when you don't write anything? Do you want to join me in August and write something every day?

Inspiration

I'm currently working on a book about pirates.

One of my struggles has been describing their fictional world because, before now, I've never written a fantasy setting.

So, for the last couple months and I've been taking a pictures of otherworldly things. Like this:

And these:

And these too:

Pretty inspiring, no?

It's a lot easier for me to describe something I've seen rather than something I've only imagined. I love having pictures of the real world to inspire my pirate's fantasy world.

Do you get your settings straight from your imagination or do you base them off things you've seen?

Recharge

I just picked the winner of Heather Dixon's ENTWINED using Random.org.

And the winner is:

Alexandra Shostak!

Congratulations Alexandra! I'll email you soon.

We just got back from the Oregon Coast. It was AMAZING. We go every couple years, and it is my favorite vacation ever. I love everything about the Coast. The cool weather, the amazing landscape, the ocean. But mostly I love this:

We talked. We played. We rested. We made memories. And now we're refreshed and ready to get back to real life.

And revising.

How do you recharge?

The Writing Community

I've been thinking a lot about social networking lately, and particularly about writers supporting writers through blogging, twitter and Facebook.

My husband started an experiment in January. He's an entrepreneur, so he thought it would be fun to blog business ideas. He'd never blogged before but, not one to do things half way, he decided to post every single day of 2011.

I told him how to make friends through blogging, (visit other similar blogs, follow, comment, start a conversation, etc.), but he hasn't had a lot of success. After 200 posts (more than I've written in the 2 years I've blogged), he still has less than 10 followers and rarely gets a comment.

I tell you this not because I want you to pity my hubby and follow his blog, (though you can if you want, it's here), but because I think his experience has shown me what a unique and supportive community we writers have.

It's easy to make friends in writer-land. I'm grateful for that.

Have you felt welcomed by the blogging writer community?

Have you left a comment on my Karen Book Deal Celebration post yet? I'll choose the winner of ENTWINED by Heather Dixon next Monday.