Oh My Goodness!

I have not written in this blog for most of this year. Not that it is a bad thing... just been busy with everything. Whether it was with my ANWA responsibilities, family, or writing don't have time to do anything else... it was something.

So I will try and be better about this. I got a new faster computer this fall and I'm enjoying it. Still transferring stuff from the old one to the new one and all that fun stuff. Go me!

But I'm still writing. In fact, I did NaNoWriMo this month... half the month was great. Then I hint a block... not sure if it was because I was trying to make the text too perfect or I just couldn't find my happy place? For about a week, I suddenly was too tired to do anything by time the evening rolled around I wanted to just go to bed. And I did. Then Thanksgiving hit and I had guests at my home and I think worry and a racing mind killed the muse there.

SO, NaNoWriMo... the point is to make you write and to develop good stable writing habits right? So it was a success if it got me to write 10K words this month. And that makes me a happy camper.

This evening I opened a twitter account:

twitter.com/writtenvein

Yep, I tweet now.

And at the end of this year I will no longer be the President of American Night Writers Association. Yep. My two years is over. I'll be back though. It's been fun! I've learned so much and it really helped me to gain the confidence that I was lacking at that point in my life. I can say with confidence I feel more like a writer today then I ever have been in my whole life. And I'm certainly writing more than I ever have before too. All thanks to ANWA and attending conferences!!

Which reminds me... LTUE anyone? Gonna be here in February! And then of course the wonderful ANWA conference the following weekend! Yep that's right readers, February is gonna be really crazy fun with conferences and stuff!

The ANWA Conference "Writing at the Speed of Life" is a two day conference this year with pitch sessions and a workshop the Friday before. You can register for the conference here. It's gonna be really fun so register now all the details are at the website. You can also follow the conference tweets as well at:

twitter.com/ANWA_LDS

ANWA Conference 2011 is also on facebook too!

Okay well, now I gotta go write.

My Stages of Writing:

CREATION STAGE:
Where I contemplate plots, characters, what the point of the story is, what drives it, why should I care, why other people should care, and why it's worthwhile to write it if at all. I may in fact write a chapter or two and then lose interest. I may write out long background on each character, getting down every little detail so if I actually decide to sit down and write the story someday, I'll have all of my notes and summaries to fall back on.

Up until 4 months ago... this was where I honestly went to. I really never got past this stage until now.

SPEW STAGE:
I'm actually writing my first rough rough draft. IF I have more than 20,000+ words dedicated to this story by this point, I am now officially spewing real work, potential publish-someday-material, and I'm not just thinking and making IDEA STAGE fodder. The work is consistent. I can even say how many words I'm writing on a week to week basis. YAY!

EDITING STAGE:
rewrite, rewrite, rewrite, rewrite, rewrite, rewrite... everybody now...

(A stage I have not had to privilege to really KNOW as of this day in 2009. I've had my brush with a rewrite but it isn't a real rewrite for me, in my mind, unless I have a complete story to rewrite. That is all 80K to 100K completed size of it. And that mile mark is yet to be accomplished in this amateur writer's list of accomplishments. Don't worry I'll get there... It's on my bucket list of things to do before I die.)

PUBLISH STAGE:
I've heard other people talk about this stage... It sounds cool... I have no idea what it will be like. SOOOO, I oogle at it, raise an eyebrow in its general direction, consider myself at pre-published stage, and contemplate what I will do when I actually cross this finish line. How will it feel? Will I cry? Will I scream?! Will I buy a huge TUB of ice cream and celebrate brain freeze style?

Will my kids still consider me their mom and not that "strange person who talks to herself sitting in the corner, in her pajama attire writing" by then?????

That will definitely be a confession time...

Maybe even therapy?

LOL!

*****

AND... that is about the extent of my writing "stages" at this point. I'm sure as I actually write and write and write some more, move on in my knowledge and experience of writing I'll have more stages. I'm just enjoying the point in my life where I'm writing consistently. As in, every day I look forward to the kids being in bed and having 3 to 4 hours of real writing time. I look forward to it EVERY day!

There is so much about writing I have not yet experienced. The whole journey and repeating it.

It's a ride!

Make Myself!

I have honestly NOT intended to ignore this blog as much as I have. It's the fact that summer has been here and I've not had much alone time to think and reflect except when I was at Retreat the first 2 days, and in the evenings when I'm trying to make myself write.

"Make myself?"

Yes, that's right. I'm pushing myself to write. You'd think that I'd be more than happy to do it. And I am, but some times I am tired or I'm not in the mood and I'm trying very hard to get in the habit of writing. In fact, right this very minute I should be writing on my story, especially so since I've come up with a few more ideas to write on again, but I am posting to my blog instead! Those wonderful ideas keep on rolling in when I feel like I've hit a wall and I'm SO grateful that my brain continues to figure stuff out even when I'm not devoted to the written task.

I kinda attribute the concept that its hard to do one thing continuously when you aren't used to doing it often. Just like when you start to exercise you don't go run a marathon to begin with, you have to train yourself a head of time for months. Yeah, I'm in my training stage. I'm writing more than I have in years and I'm happy about that. But I'm not at a point where I'm going to say I can sit and write 1000 words a week or something like that. Do real accomplished writers write that much? Maybe somewhere in my brain I'm completely jaded as to what accomplished writers do? So set me straight.

Honestly, I can't make that type of commitment today or tomorrow or next week. But I know that eventually I will, especially if I keep "training." Just not until all my children are in school full time. Right now I have little ones at home and I absolutely have to supervise them or things will fall apart in so many ways it's not funny. Night writing is my only option right now and whatever else I can squeeze in during the day.

There are a few things that have helped me to get more writing time in and I'm slowly getting better at it. 1. Learning to write while in the midst of distraction. Yes, screaming and running children under foot counts as EXTREME distraction. Need I say more? 2. Eliminating activities (distractions) you are willing to sacrifice for the greater benefit of writing. I am a freakoid television watcher, especially in the evenings. So of course, I am trying to eliminate watching so much tv, so I can devote more time to writing. Hulu has helped... maybe just a little.

How am I doing on this path? Well, my goal to begin with was to write at least 2 pages a month. Pretty low goal, I know, but I figured it was lofty enough to motivate me without making me feel so terrible if I couldn't reach that goal. And the results are that I've been writing at least 10 pages a month instead. So I feel really accomplished. Setting goals is fun! YAY!

It's probably time to up the ante. And I think I will. Just not yet. I like the fact that I have my 2 page goal and I'm hugely jumping further in my target. Is it selfish of me to want to see myself doing so much more and reveling in it? Okay, maybe I'm not reveling in it as much as I could, but secretly in my heart, I feel like I'm getting somewhere and that is a really great feeling.

Every journey begins with the first step. So I am making my journey worthwhile by the steps I'm taking.