Pumped After Stalling: ROW80 Check In

For someone who stalled on the writing front this week, I sure do feel pumped.

First, I am blogging daily in May as part of WordCount's Blogathon. I'm enjoying some old blogging friends while finding new ones.

In the last few days, I bookmarked several writing-related posts to print and keep. So now it's time to share what I found:

The ABCs of Web Content Writing
By Sara Lancaster, No 2 Pen Blog

From A to Z, Sara gives helpful advice for web content writing. But I thought it could be used for any kind of writing. Some of my favorites...

• Stop BORING yourself. Write content you would want to read.
• Never let a good idea escape you. JOT it down!
• READ Web content out loud. (My note: I edit everything this way)

Novel Writing, Three Ways to Keep Going When You're Stuck
By Kathryn Lance, Books and Musings Blog

We've all been there... staring at a blank page. Kathryn had some wonderful advice. My favorite: write a scene you know you can do.

From Writer Granny's World

Keep Your Passion for Writing Alive
By Nancy Julien Kopp, Writer Granny's World

Would a poster of four good looking men keep you focused on your writing? Nancy inspired me to keep on writing by reminding me why I write and what excuses I use not to.

8 Mistakes to Avoid When Designing Your Book Cover
By Laura Orsini, Marcie Brock, Book Marketing Maven

Some great advice with example covers. My favorite tidbit...The bottom line is: Design the most professional cover you can afford. After editing, it is the most important part of the book!

Also check out her Author Blog Challenge. I hope to sign up sometime this week, although June will be interesting with travel and kids home from school. Hmmmm.

Please take some time to stop by and read these posts.

I promise you'll come away inspired!

Now for my A Round of Words in 80 Days (ROW80) check in...

Writing: Yep, but not on my WIP. Sad face. The fact that Mom has the chapters right now is no excuse. I have a YA book in the works and a new short story. Write. Woman. Write.

Blogging: Daily. Keeping up with Blogathon commitments.

Reading & Editing: Sluggish. Sunday was Mother's Day and yesterday was my oldest daughter's birthday. And, yes... I did wait until the last minute to get gifts, make a cake, make cards, etc.

Social Media: My husband has been out of town, so I've stayed up way too late catching up. But catching up I did.

Exercise: Fist pump. Too bad sugar reared its ugly head in the shape of my daughter's birthday cake!

How are my fellow writers doing this week?

As You Grow, My Wishes for You Grow

Today is my oldest daughter's 12th birthday. Every day I pray for my children. For her birthday, I wanted to reprint the wishes I posted last year... with a few additions.

Love: I hope you concentrate on loving yourself before trying to love another. I want you to find your soul mate without too many “sole” mates (my version of the boyfriend equivalent to the crap on the bottom of your shoe or smelly, rotten fish!). May you find yourself before you find him. If he’s THE one, he wants an authentic you as much as you should.

Mom and Jackie 2000

Dreams:

“Dreams are illustrations . . . from the book your soul is writing about you.” ~Marsha Norman

Keep a notebook for dreams. Jot down everything your imagination considers. Later, another dream may replace it, but don’t simply disregard anything on your list. (And for my sake I hope your dreams don’t include inspired tattoos, too many men on motorcycles, collection of Mardi Gras beads, or anything to do with modeling or casting couches).

Faith: There’s a reason it’s called a “leap of faith” and I hope you take that leap. In a world where religion is often distorted and used for evil, remember grace, mercy, forgiveness, and love. Let your faith guide you and be your shield without it ever being armor against good people.

Stumbling Blocks: Life is full of them. You can’t avoid them. I just want every pothole in the road to teach you something you needed to learn in order to reach your destination. I hope none leave scars that cannot heal. Know your father and I (and sisters and grandparents, Aunts, etc.) are here to catch you if you fall or throw you back in the ring if we think you can handle it!

Technology: May Facebook, Twitter, and email lose their social allure and good old-fashioned letter writing, kind conversation, and phone calls come back into vogue. Or, at the very least, may you understand the power of social media. Just because you have a thought for a few seconds does NOT mean you should blast it out to all your friends. Once you hit send, you can't take it back.

And a final list of what we’ll both need:

· Patience – for each other and in life

· Prayer – but know unanswered prayers can be the sweetest gifts

· Resilience – for when patience and prayer need a helping hand

· Humor!!

And know all the things we want for you could not possibly be compiled in a list.

God lent us one of the sweetest angels when He gave us you!

What are some of your wishes for your loved ones?

Mothers, Daughters and Listening: Guest Post

Please welcome Kate from Teaching What is Good. I met Kate during last year's WordCount Blogathon and was immediately drawn to her. Her blog has become a must-read for me, and I am thrilled to have her here today.

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Mothers, Daughters and Listening

I have had the joy and privilege of getting to know Tia this past year through our meeting at Blogathon 2011. I have come to have a real delight in her life: her writing, her heart for her family and her faith in God. I am very excited to guest post on her blog today.

Being the mother of four daughters, I have often contemplated how to build a strong relationship with them. My #1 goal is for them to be strong in their faith and to walk mightily before the Lord and with grace, love and a passion for God.

Having that as a goal and seeing it come to fruition are two different things, though.

Over the years I’ve listened to older godly women, watched their lives and searched the scriptures. I have come to the conclusion that there is no formula, no perfect solution to raising daughters of integrity, honor and faith.

I have four very different daughters. Some are more open than others. Some are affectionate, some are verbal communicators. But all of them enjoy spending quality time with someone who loves them and wants to focus on their lives. I purposed to be that person!

• I’ve tried to make time with each of the girls.
• I’ve tried to find out how they communicate best and encourage that.
• I’ve tried to be open and honest about my failures, fears and flaws (like I could hide them anyway).
• I’ve tried to find out what they like to do and do that with them or make opportunities for them in it.
• I’ve tried to make being with us at home fun and enjoyable.
• I’ve tried to show a loving relationship with their dad.
• I’ve tried to encourage and build strong sibling bonds and friendship (this has had success and failures at varying times in their lives).

It has always been a blessing to me that my children love to be with us when we talk. When we have company and several different conversations develop around the house, our girls get frustrated because they can’t be in all of them at the same time!

I spent time sharing topics from my mentoring. We discuss the biblical principles behind all of these problems and how to find what is wise counsel and what is worldly counsel.  Part of my training them in the “way they should go” has been to give them opportunities to respond to an issue and then go back to the scriptures with them for instruction and guidance.

It has been such a joy to me that as they’ve grown older, it has become easier to make that jump from Chain of Command (as the authority in their lives) to Chain of Counsel (as the one they seek out for advice) than I expected. I was always afraid it wouldn’t work, but when you spend years and years DIALOGUING rather than DICTATING, that dialogue continues into their teen and adult lives. Learning to listen to your daughters is one of the most worthwhile disciplines you can cultivate!

How can YOU grow in listening to your daughters? How can listening strengthen your relationship with them?

Kate Megill is a follower of Jesus, first and foremost. She is also a wife and homeschooling mom of 8 with a passion for older women teaching younger women in the manner of Titus 2:3-5. She blogs at Teaching What Is Good and shares her life, her faith, her family and encouragement to other women seeking to walk with God.

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Please take a moment and visit my post on Kate's blog today, Faith & Family: The Journey of Love.

Happy Mother's Day: ROW80 & #writemotivation Updates

I had a wonderful day today that began with breakfast in bed. Instead of eating alone, my baby decided to join me, too. Perfect start to a wonderful day.

Being a mother is such a part of who I am as a person and a writer. Everything I've learned from being a daughter and a mother is in my characters, my stories, and part of this blog.

When you are a mother, you are never really alone in your thoughts. A mother always has to think twice, once for herself and once for her child. 

Sophia Loren, Women and Beauty

Guess that works out well... since as a writer, I'm rarely alone in my thoughts anyway.

Please visit Happy Mother's Day, The Gifts of Mother and Daughter... this is my Mother's Day post from last year, and very special to me because Mom and I wrote letters to each other.

I have brief writing updates today...

A Round of Words in 80 Days (ROW80)

Writing: 848 words since Wednesday. Nothing to write home about, but it's been a busy few days, so I'll take it.

Editing: Behind a bit, but determined to catch up. I completely took off Mother's Day weekend.

Blogging: Every day here as part of Blogathon, and three times last week at Mom in Love with Fiction.

Social Media: Way behind. May not be able to go back and catch up, but I plan on doing better going forward.

Reading: Finished two books last week and wrote two reviews.

Exercise: Keeping up with my 3 runs a week goal and eating less sugar (except today, but Mother's Day doesn't count).

#writemotviation

1. Write a minimum of five days a week for a total of 2,500 words on my works in progress.
Wrote five days in some capacity or another and added 1,451 to my YA novel.

2. Get current novel, Depression Cookies, up on Smashwords by month's end.
Ran into some formatting difficulties. So bummed. Still hoping to have it up soon.

3. Read a book every 10 days, plus at least one craft book in the month of May.
Finished two books last week. Just started another. Ahead of goal.

Happy Mother's Day to the mothers out there!

You ARE Mom Enough

The best type of mom you can be is YOUR type of mom.

This Mother's Day, we should reflect on the importance of mothers. A mother is a woman responsible for the welfare of a child. There are no tiers of mothers. It doesn't matter whether you gave birth, adopted, had a child through a surrogate, and so on.

This week's TIME featured a cover of an older child, age 3, standing on a step stool breastfeeding with the title, Are you Mom Enough?

The audacity.

I whole-heartedly believe in breastfeeding. But more than that, I believe a woman must mother their way. If something makes you unhappy, it will not make you a good mother. Nobody should suggest a mother's choice makes her a success or failure, especially based on parenting style. 

I have three daughters ages 12, 10, and 7. I breastfed each one a minimum of 15 months. It was a good choice for me as a mother, but I often joke it was simple laziness. In the wee hours of the morning, I only had to find my boob. I didn't have to mix formula and just-right-temperature water.

I also was blessed to be an at-home mom. One of my dear friends pumped every day at work in order to breastfeed her son. I tried pumping once, and I felt like a cow and never did it again. I also went breast to cup, never using bottles. It was my choice, and I respect the choices of others.

Regarding the article... I have no problem with attachment parenting, but I have a huge problem with any suggestion that it is the one and only right way.

As women, we should come together and support one another. It's like all the arguing over stay-at-home versus working moms. When will we stop fighting each other?

What did you think of the TIME cover?

5 Ws of My Writing

Writing is my passion. It always has been. I can't pinpoint an exact moment when I knew it. I just knew.

One of my daughters came home with an assignment to analyze a subject with the 5 Ws. My brain started firing. How would I analyze my writing with that criteria?

5 Ws of My Writing

Who: Female Teenagers
One, I'm female. Two, I was a teenager. No matter how much my daughters might argue, it wasn't that long ago. My teenage voice and my adult voice really aren't that different. The teenage me has grown, but she will take over at the oddest times. Some good. Some bad.

I love writing teenagers. They have so much room for growth, they crave knowledge and understanding, they often trust the wrong people in their search, and they are equal parts child and adult. With each passing year, more of the child-like side is relinquished to the budding adult.

Also, and no insult to men, I find women better character studies--their emotions and outlooks more complex.

What: Novels, Short Stories, Blog Posts, Journal Entries...
Heck, I like writing to-do lists. I can smell the fresh scent of a writing assignment as soon as my kids walk in from school. They look at me sheepishly and consider running, but I ask for the assignment. They love brainstorming with me, but they fear my red pen. I wield it responsibly, but use it often.

When: Whenever I Can
But I find I write best first thing, before other things can overtake and clutter my mind. I love Twitter word sprints (where Twitter friends set a time to write, everyone checks in on Twitter, and they check in with the number of words they've written). They keep me focused, and I have built in support and encouragement.

Where: In Quiet Places
I've recently discovered I write better when I leave my house. Starbucks is my new best friend, and I hate coffee. Otherwise, I'll write at home. I take my laptop to different rooms in the house just to mix it up. I do stay out of my girls' rooms for fear the need to clean would strangle the life out of my muse.

Why: Because I Must
It seems a cop-out answer, I know. But I can't imagine a day without writing. If I couldn't write to process life, I'd have to talk a lot more. Quite frankly, I'd like to stay married, so I think I'll stick with writing.

Why do you do what you do?
(That question looks humorous to me, but it's exactly what I want to ask.)

7 Random Facts: Fun and Sharing

Blog tagging is a nice concept when used to a) share blogs you really love and b) share facts with new people to your blog. Since there are a lot of new people in Blogathon this year and I truly do love Lisa's Mom blog, I'm participating.

My 7 Random Facts

1. I love books so much that I will read any genre. My only requirement, a strong lead character. I prefer female leads, but I'm always willing to make an exception for a well-drawn male character. I just posted about this on my book blog, Mom in Love with Fiction: Let's Hear it for the Girls.

2. I am afraid of horses, much to my 12-year-old daughter's chagrin. I think they are beautiful and love to watch them, but I do NOT want to be on one. This Saturday, I am spending three hours at volunteer training so my daughter can be certified to work with horses at a local horse rescue. It's her passion, so I support it. From the sidelines.

My daughter, in all her glory:

3. I want to be athletic. Notice the word want. I was Captain of my tennis team in Colorado (I miss it SO much), and I play at running. I have to put in a lot of effort to be halfway decent at sports or anything athletic. In my dreams, I'm ripped and able to do some Black Widow moves. And, yes, I did just see Avengers.

4. Which leads me to #4. I love superheroes. Always have. I was one of the few girls on my block growing up who read comics. It probably helped that I had all boy cousins. Now my girls love them.

5. I'm obsessed with Food Network. The more I try to cut back on food and lose weight, the more I watch Cupcake Wars, Chopped, Iron Chef America, and my very favorite, Diners, Drive-ins and Dives.

Actually, I reimagined Chopped as a writing challenge in a post last year: Food Network-Style Writing Challenge: Exposing my Food Obsession.

6. Speaking of food, the older I get the more foods I like. That's not working in my favor. I was such a picky child, and am cursed with have picky children. I hope they will experiment more with food when they grow up, too. I learned, the hard way, that forcing it doesn't work.

7. I hate computers, and I hope Heaven is free of them. (We'll go with the assumption that Heaven is my path.) I don't trust a machine that can't do something faster than I can. Maybe I just have a slow Internet connection, but I type faster than words appear. So frustrating, especially for a writer.

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I hope you enjoyed getting to know me. If I bored you to tears, please accept my humble apologies.

I've met so many wonderful new Blogathon bloggers, and I hate to choose. So, if you want to share 7 Random Facts with us, please consider yourself tagged. (Or, if you are desperate for a post to finish out May!)