Thursday

WHAT HAVE YOU ACCOMPLISHED THIS SUMMER?

A great thing happened to me this week. A fellow writer gave me the Liebster award! Woo hoo. I’d like to thank Ruth Schiffman for thinking of me for this award. Now I’m happy to nominate five more worthy blogs to pass it along to. The goal of this award is to spotlight upcoming bloggers who currently have less than 200 followers.

The rules of this award are:


1. Thank the giver and link back to the blogger who gave it to you.
2. Reveal your top five picks and let them know by leaving a comment on their blog.
3. Copy and paste the award on your blog.
4. Have faith that your followers will spread the love to other bloggers.
5. And most of all - have bloggity-blog fun!

So my picks for this award are:

Cat’s Blog, The World Crafter’s Inkspot http://www.katrinadelallo.blogspot.com//
Angels of Inspiration, http://www.angelsofinspiration.blogspot.com/
Stacy S. Jensen’s blog, http://stacysjensen.blogspot.com/
Marie’s Poetic Bloomings blog, http://poeticbloomings2.wordpress.com/
Legacy's Blog http://onceuponatimelegacydevine.webs.com/apps/blog/entries/show/8321530-believable-fantasy

Congratulations to all these well deserved bloggers!

Being nominated for this award couldn’t have come at a better time for me. I’ve been feeling a bit depressed and stale about my writing accomplishments this past summer. When I set my goals at the first of the year, I sure intended to have more things published by now so I’ve been quite hard on myself. So I went back into my submissions spreadsheet and discovered I just don’t have much out there at present.

Then I saw a post from a fellow writer (Kelly Hashway, yey Kelly) where she just announced that in the next two years, she will have seven books published!! When I read that it was like getting shock treatment.  Seven books published!!! First off I truly congratulate, Kelly, because that is absolutely awesome. Secondly, I have to thank her for opening my eyes to the fact that I simply must get on the stick and dig myself out of whatever “funk” I’ve gotten myself into and submit more stories! I keep reminding myself that you can’t get published if you don’t submit so Kelly’s news just opened my eyes to that fact once again. Therefore, I hopped right up, polished up a few stories I had on hold, and got out four more submissions.

So I’m feeling much better today. I feel like I’m back on track after a long summer of being in a writing slump. Although I haven’t actually written that much this summer or submitted much, I have been busy. I had my first picture book published, had three readings and three book signings, and have another book signing scheduled in October. I’ve signed up to attend a book workshop in Baton Rouge in October and another one in New Orleans. I convinced a local gift shop to carry my book, sold numerous copies of my book to friends and co-workers. Done several interviews on other authors and had several interviews on myself.  And I signed up for the advanced ICL course and am ready to begin my third assignment.

Other things on the horizon for me are:

  • Today thru Saturday, you can go on the “Read For Relief – a writing community auction to find Hurricane Irene relief” website at http://readforrelief.blogspot.com/2011/09/day-4-item-2-signed-copy-of-pea-in.html  to bid on an autographed copy of The Pea In Peanut Butter plus a doggy bag containing a bookmark, magnet, stickers, reading journal, and some goodies from Louisiana. You can also bid on other items like free query critiques, or 50 pages of a manuscript critique. 
  • A popular website called Peas and Thank You is going to be posting a review of my book. I’ll announce it when it comes out.
  • The CBI Clubhouse will be posting an interview with me in their December issue.
  • On October 10, Raphaels Village, an online children’s magazine, will be publishing my story The Not So Lady Like Ladybug.
  • In February, 2012 Stories for Children will be publishing my story One Measly Pillow.

So I guess I haven’t done so bad this summer after all. What have you accomplished this summer? Do you have anything on the horizon? I’d love to hear about it!


15 comments:

  1. Allyn, I can totally relate to the writing slump. Life has been crazy busy, which makes it easy to let writing slide. And I find hearing about authors who have 4 or 7 books coming out makes me happy for them but discouraged for myself. But school has started, I hope to have a bit more time, maybe things will turn around a bit :)

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  2. Sounds like you HAVE been busy! I feel like I had a successful summer. I got lots of great feedback on stories submitted, and even got a few promising nibbles! May we all have happy falls--er, autumns! ; )

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  3. Allyn, your list of accomplishments doesn't sound like you were in a slump at all! You've done pretty well, so good for you!

    For me, happy news are I've published a puzzle collection, worked on our next picture book, connected with fellow writers on SheWrites, Writers' Retreat and Book Blogs, and read nice feedback on our blog =). (I see you're on Book Blogs, too. I'll send a friend's request ok?)

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  4. Allyn, I think you are doing really well. And congrats on getting four more submissions out there. I love having a lot out on submission. It really helps keep you from stressing and sometimes it can mean good news comes in groups, and that's really great. As far as my books I have coming out, you should ask me how long they've been on submission. ;) Nothing happens over night. My goal is to see my work published--no matter how long it takes.

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  5. Thank you for stopping by angels of Inspiration, and thank you for the awsome nomination!

    Dawn
    Angels of Inspiration

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  6. Susanna,
    It is a bit depressing to hear when someone gets published and you've worked so hard but what it does prove to us is that it's possible and childrens books are still being published! We just have to keep working hard and submitting. I hope things start to turn around for you!

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  7. Good for you, Katie! Nibbles are great and so is feedback whether good or bad. It means at least they were impressed enough to say something! I 2nd that wish for all of us to have a good fall...er autumn!

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  8. Sure, Claudine. Send me the friend request. I'm also on writers retreat and have checked out SheWrites. Writers retreat is fabulous, you will love it. Sounds like you've been busy this summer too. Congrat's on your puzzle collection and goodluck with the picture book!

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  9. Yep, I agree with you, Kelly. The goal is just to get published no matter how long it takes. But it sure doesnt hurt to get 7 acceptances in a short span of time, huh! Now you have definite proof that the wait is worth it.

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  10. Dawn,

    Your welcome! Your blog is wonderful.

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  11. Thanks for the nomination, Allyn. You are such an angel!

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  12. Hi Allyn,

    Sounds like you've got lots going on. But I know how you feel. I'm in a bit of a slump myself. I usually write short stories and articles so I usually am writing and finishing things all the time, and can have lots of submissions out at once. Since I started work on my YA novel, I've hardly written anything short so there's lots less going on in the way of acceptances and rejections. Makes me feel like I'm not being productive.

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  13. Sounds like you're not in a slump at all from what you say. You've got a lot going on. Congrats to all your submissions and published stories.
    My major accomplishment is spending way too much time finding the right illustrator for my children's book "Annie's Special Day" that my pub gave me the ok to for. It's hard to specify other significant ones this summer. Spending time with my grand son but no big news with the writing scene. I feel like I'm being unproductive for nothing to show for my summer. lol

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  14. I know exactly what you mean inluvwithwords. I am taking the advanced ICL class and am learning to write chapter books so I've been concentrating on that and marketing my book so haven't wrote much of the short stuff either. Those short stories for magazines don't pay much of anything, if at all, but they sure keep us going don't they!

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  15. Clarbojahn,
    That's wonderful about your publisher okaying your illustrator. Goodluck with it! Doesn't sound like you've been unproductive at all but busy checking out illustrators. That can be so time consuming I'm sure! Plus you've been spending time with your grand son so that's one of the most important things in ones life anyway, right!

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