MM i: Counselor/Letter Monday

From Here

It's Monday.  Whip out the caffeine, I can't say coffee because I don't drink it.  I'll let you all in on a little secret of mine: counselor-ing an orchestra camp for beginners=death.  I'm dead on the inside.  The children had just learned how to play their instrument with a bow and are moving on to more difficult things, which makes for a lot of complaining and whining and headaches.  On the bright side there is great food, and a really cute counselor ;)

For the first ever Motivation Monday, I will be sharing one of my methods of getting motivated/back on track.

Stop reading this blog.  Shut the laptop top down, get out of the chair, lock your phone, whatever you need to do to stop reading this post for a minute, do so.

Actually, wait!  Read all of this before you do that!  When you leave the computer go get a piece of notebook paper and a pen/pencil.  Take those beautiful writing skills that you own  and write a letter to yourself.

Write about what you want to gain from writing.  Write about where you see yourself at the end of the writing.  Put little details that you want to remember to include.  Add a little joke.  Write a quote that makes you happy or feel good.  Tell yourself about what you'll do once your done.  Write whatever you want to write, just make it fun and upbeat.

Take that great letter, fold it up, and put it in an envelope.  Put a picture of your dog/cat/husband/wife/anyone doing something silly in the envelope for extra fun!  Grab a silly sticker or boring piece of tape and shut it closed.  I like to write a statement on the front like, 'Only Open When In Dire Need of Motivation' or 'Intruders Will Be Feed To The Wolves of *insert the name of the writing*'.

Now put that envelope of motivation in  a place that you won't forget it.  Take it out when you need something to get you moving.  I love looking at the reason I started something.  It makes it seem like the whole thing isn't so bad if I accomplish what I wanted.  This may not be your way of motivating yourself, but I like it.

What's your way of motivating?  Do you write a sticky note?  Have a certain song?  Tell me:)

P.S. I have a Special Coupon Code for all you people for my Etsy Shop!  It is:
COUNSELORMONDAY

Spontaneous Saturday i: Videos

Fun Videos For You:)


I was going to write the Teaching Thursday, but everything I wrote fell to pieces, and it was getting late, and I had to get up early on Friday to go to the zoo.  So, yeah I'm sorry about that.  I really need to get on top of things because my s, o, r, and y keys are being hit too often.

I was going to post some really thought provoking video, but then I saw some video that was highly liked on there.  I looked it up and I absolutely fell in love!  So, I watched all his other videos too, and now I'm sharing them with you all!

5 Historical Misconceptions:

My eyes were filled with tears laughing!  Vikings!

10 Misconceptions Rundown:

Yum, free protein.

8 Animal Misconceptions:

My father and I were bent over laughing with the bats.  I really love this one!

Me being a history buff and animal lover, I instantly fell in love with these videos!  Go ahead and look at some of his other ones too.  The Santa Claus and Groundhog videos are pretty great too.

That's the first Spontaneous Saturday:)  Hope you enjoyed!

I'm Sorry

Uh, it's been almost two weeks hasn't it.  I'm so so so sorry.  I've been doing so much, that time has seriously been flying.  This post isn't going to be anything spectacular, just a few updates and what to expect... Again.

What have I been doing lately?
~Making jewelry and selling it on Etsy.
~Volunteering at the zoo.
~Cleaning, I have found more dust deposits in the house than people have found any other kind of deposit.
~Writing (not as much as I want, but still writing)

Yeah.  That's it.  It is sad isn't it.  Not much I've done, but I'm still tired from it.

. Looking at what I had made my schedule out be last time looked a bit weird.  I mean who needs motivation on Friday?  OK, some people do, but the majority of us need it on Monday and Motivation Monday sounds better than Motivation Friday.  I also don't want to do two blog post in a row so Teaching Thursday will come into play.  All those changes will move Spontaneous Sunday to Spontaneous Saturday. You've got to love those alliterations!

Now I'm going to shamelessly show

you some of the jewelry (look at the sides) in hopes that you'll eventually click the link I'm going to put at the bottom of the page to go to my shop;)  I'm hoping to catch this betta fish that I've been after for a while, and they cost a pretty penny, but that's just my reasoning, and after I accomplish that then I'll begin donating to WWF, which is my favorite organization.

Those are my fabulous bracelets that I am selling.  To be honest, this post is just a huge "I'm Sorry" post.  I'm so ashamed that I forgot to post for almost two weeks.  That just makes me a bit sick to my stomach.

I know that these writing blogs are supposed to be about writing, but I think on Spontaneous Saturday I will include some recipes and crafts because I love cooking and crafting as well.  Plus, I sort of want to combine my blog with my Etsy store.

 Heads up: my Etsy store has a different name than the one on here.  I have two reasons.  One, that's my mother's name because she owns the account.  Two, on here I use a pseudonym because I don't like people knowing that I write, and so I do not get any disrespect from the people who actually do know me because I'm not the person that people would pick out to write.  (i.e I hate English class and adore my sciences)

http://www.etsy.com/shop/KnottedBracelet?ref=si_shop

Check out the Page I created (up at the top of this page) and get a discount at my Etsy Store!

Housekeeping

I hope that you all had a wonderful 4th of July!  I know mine was hot and tiring... Heat+Zoo+People+No Lunch= Emotionally and Physically Drained Elizabeth.  Nonetheless it was still fun.

From Here

Today's not much in the substance side of things with the blog, I just want to put down some kind of schedule and hammer out some things.  Housekeeping, I guess we can call this.

From here out I am enacting a brand new schedule!  I shall be posting 3 times a week.  The days shall be Tuesday, Friday and Sunday.  Tuesdays will be 'Teaching Tuesdays' when I go through bits and pieces of the writing process that are sometimes sketchy or need to be looked at.  It will be a very informing day:)  Fridays will be a day for writing motivation, such as writing prompts, general motivations, and other things that are lurking in the back of my mind for these.  I eventually want to have this become a kind of editing day, so that your WIP can be edited.  I would love give some of my assistance to others with the editing process, and there may be some tips there.  But I am going to wait a little while to see if this would work out and to stimulate any attraction from you all to it.  And finally Sundays will be a hodgepodge of different things, for example I may read an awesome article that I will share, perhaps there will be a book review, recipes, and random junk!  That will be the fun day of the week!

From Here
This is the fish I'll be getting and once
I breed some other fishies:)

Another random bit that I'd like to point out is that I have set up an 'About the Author' page so you all can go stalk me.  And yes, I actually put up a picture of myself.  No laughs!  That picture is from a year and a half ago...

Also I'd just like to add this for my own happiness: I'm back to aquarium keeping!  Like full out again.  I'm working on breeding some of the fish:)  They're so cute my little fishies!

JulNoWriMo

It's July and that means that it is time for JulNoWriMo!  Let me just say that this will be my first time attempting to write 50K words in 1 month, and let me tell you that it seems daunting.

For those who don't know about JulNoWriMo it is a competition to see if you can write 50K novel in one month.  The JulNoWriMo stands for July Novel Writing Month.  The webpage is http://julnowrimo.com/.  

The home page says:

     Welcome to the July Novel Writing Month web site! Your goal, should you choose to accept it, is to write 50,000+ words during the month of July. Do you have the courage and the drive to attempt such a feat?

     If you love to write and NaNoWriMo just isn't enough insanity for one year, please consider joining us in July! To sign-up, just head over to the forums and register a username.

      We also have our own Twitter account and a user-runchannel on YouTube - feel free to follow both to keep up with any announcements and tips from other participants as they attempt to win!

     Confused? If you have no idea what in the world I was just rambling on about, please visit this dandy page right here. It should help answer most of your questions. Good luck!

      Happy writing,
            Robert Watson

Sounds inviting doesn't it, so go on there and sign up, try writing a novel.  It isn't too hard, just start typing today.  You have 30 days (including today) to write your heart out. I will be doing it, so find me on there!  I'm PurplePenguin.

I will be writing about different ways to stay on track this month with writing, and I'll be giving little writing tips that are sure to help with any kind of writing.

Sorry that this is short.  It's Monday and I've been unpacking all day, give me a little break.

Tell me what you're planning on writing.  Do you have any ideas?  If you need any help at all feel free to email me at eliza.a.gallagher@gmail.com and I'll try to help you to the best of my ability. 

Write What You Know???

Arg, almost a whole week without blogging!  Next time I go on vacation I will make sure that the place I stay has wireless internet.  Sure I could have taken my laptop out with me, but I was a tourist in Chicago from a smaller city (Columbus) and I wasn't to comfortable with carrying it around, there was no leaving it in the car 100 degrees? Probably not the safest for electronics...

Even though I wasn't able to post on here I was able to create some great topics for blogging, so be warned: awesomeness will be a reoccurring event this week.


One of the most controversial topics when it comes to writing is the statement 'Write what you know.'  I find myself in the middle of this argument.

Some people say that you do not have to write what you know because how boring would that be?  What would you write about? Sitting in a room typing stories while eating Doritos?  That would be boring, and I'm not sure how long that I would be reading that novel before my drool would wash away the words.  Plus if you're writing sci-fi how are you supposed to know what cultural habits there are in the galaxy of Gungro if you've never actually been there.  Perhaps that knowing how things work around you can help you with knowing how things work else where.

From Here
When I went it was like this, but imagine trees with leaves and temperature
around 100 degrees F!

The others state that you have to know what you're writing about because how would you know about the place.  I can see there point on this.  You would want to know everything that you're character would know because it would make them more believable, plus you wouldn't want to make the people who live in the place you're describing to be mad(unless they're in Gungro).  If I were to write about Chicago before I left I probably would have written about some office worker who lives in a nice house with a dog, and goes driving around town on the weekend.  If you would ask me now?  Well crazy drivers that honk to much, pedestrians that think that they own the sidewalk and the road, the man that plays a saxophone on the corner of Delaware and Michigan, the lack of parking spots, the price of parking spots, the one way streets and $5 burger at McDonalds would all be included now.  See the difference?

I'll tell you where I stand on this.  I think that we need to know certain elements for writing, not everything.  I think that if you're including some place that actually exists then you need to know it.  Find someone who has been there or worked there.  Do some research.  I don't know much about lifestyle of people in Botswana, but I can find that information out.  Google some things, read some books, talk to people who have been there, just find a way to grab a taste of their culture and ride it.  Everything doesn't have to be exact.  As a reader I don't need to know about the giraffe statue that is at the bottom of the street that your MC lives on, unless it holds magical powers or if that is where you're MC met their true love.  Writing what you know doesn't have to be about what you do, but how you feel.  Everyone has felt something at one point in their life, if not be scared because they may be a robot.  But seriously, at one point in time you have probably been embarrassed, sad, happy, loved, scared, etc.  And guess what?  You're character can too!

Here are some great website articles that I found you should check them out!

“Write what you know” – the most misunderstood piece of good advice, ever

Writing Tips: Write What You Know

Write What You Know -- Because You Know More than You Think!

So here's my tip to you: Writing is 50% research, 50% experience, and 100% trying.  So go on now and research, experience and try!