Rule #20 – Draw inspiration from anything and everything.
We turned the page on the calendar. It’s now the end of December.
November flew by too quickly, but not without some productivity. Ok, so I
haven’t really blogged in a while. November was rough for me emotionally with the
first year of Hub’s passing under my belt. People keep reminding me to be good
to myself, take care of myself. And I’ve been trying to do just that. It’s time
to add a few things to the daily mix of stuff to do. To get my head back in the
writing game a bit more, so to speak.
I got a fantastic opportunity to do just that on October 27.
My regional SCBWI chapter hosted a local event for authors to kick off PiBoIdMo
and NaNoWriMo. We got together in Annapolis
and psyched each other up for a 30-day romp through creativity. We practiced
some exercises to change a POV of things, people and animals.
Teacher-brain alert – define the acronyms. Self, you’ve hung
out with military and federal workers way too long.
PiBoIdMo is Picture Book Idea Month. It’s the brain-child of
Tara Lazar, blogger of “Writing for Kids while Raising Them” and author of “The
Monstore”. The challenge for authors is to come up with an idea a day for the
thirty days of November, then spend the next eleven months developing these ideas
into picture books. It’s a great chance to raise some of those ideas from the
dust pile of my desk (or brain) and play with them. Just what could these ideas
become?
NaNoWriMo is National Novel Writing Month. The goal here is
to write your novel’s first draft in thirty days. Then you are to spend the
next eleven months polishing, editing, and pitching the novel for publication.
SCBWI is the Society of Children’s Book Writers and
Illustrators. This group is a professional organization for writers in the very
broad children’s literature field. I say it’s a broad field because it covers
everything from “Pat the Bunny” to “Twilight”, fiction and non-fiction, picture
books, graphic novels, and some young adult work.
POV is – here, at least – point of view. In some circles
it’s also a privately owned vehicle. But for our purposes, a change in POV
means to take our brains for a drive down different roads to see sights from
another perspective. For instance, one exercise we did was to pull an item out
of a box. We held it for a few minutes and imagined what we could do with it in
a story. I pulled out a mustache… then imagined my 5-year old boy character and
the people he could become if he put the magic muzzie on his mug or on his dog.
I found out I have an imagination that maybe shouldn’t be
allowed out in public without a chaperone.
Thanks to Sarah Maynard and Lisa Perez for getting the
creative juices flowing. Together they hosted a PiBoIdMo kickoff event at
Annapolis Public Library. There were about twenty other children’s authors and
illustrators on hand, all trying to get past the holidays and get into
inspiration. Some are already published authors. Some of us are not. But we all
tried to come up with ideas for picture books or novels for kids that could be
morphed into manuscripts or illustrations…. That could morph into published
works and money.
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| Sarah Maynard signing in participants for the Kickoff |
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| Lisa Perez, ready to help NaNoWriMo participants |
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| Lisa and Sarah get the Kickoff under way |
Both writers share their writer inspirations, from Corey Rosen
Schwartz to Roald Dahl. We all participated in conversations, when, after a
specific time period, we were asked to pull inspiration from what we discussed.
It was amazing how many of us took the question “Where are you from?” and let
it run wild with ideas.
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| Participants come up with ideas on the fly |
We also discussed a variety of organizations schemes for
this project. Many of us have files, notebooks, notepads, and sketch books. But
we were challenged on how accessible are our ideas. Can we reach an idea and
let it take hold? Do we even open the file drawer? What gets us started? What
do we do when writer’s block sets in? How long is too long to rest a draft?
When is enough rewriting enough rewriting? How can we be inspired by the
internet? So many questions - and so many different ways to answer those
questions!
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| Time to share some inspiration |
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| Items in the hand inspire creative ideas |
That’s when I made up my mind that this was the year. I was
going to sign on to the Facebook page and join in the challenge. I found some
index cards, thanks to my good buddy. The color coding fit my organizational
scheme, too. If I pull out a yellow card, I am developing a character. Blue
cards are story lines… and so forth.
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| What organizational style works for you? |
The crazy thing about this challenge is how successful it
was. I have more than 30 ideas now. I got inspired by some unusual things.
There was a YouTube video that gave me inspiration on how children feel safe in
their environment. There were old character friends that I revisited and
punched up their back stories. There was an idea a garden club buddy gave me
about light and darkness. My little buddy, David, now has some more wild and
wonderful adventures to enjoy. Plus my traveling… where can my beloved coffee
mug rest this time?
Sarah closed the event with a fantastic quote from Roald
Dahl’s writings. The participants swapped business cards. We all committed to
the month of ideas and seeing it through.
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| Sarah shares a closing quote |
But… the ideas are only the beginning. What we do with those
ideas will be the payoff. We all have each other to help bounce ideas back and
forth. We are our own support group. Add chocolate and it becomes a therapy
session. We can do this. We know we can. We know we can.
So now, on the brink of 2014, the commitment is made. Ideas
will become manuscripts. Manuscripts will become books. Books will always be
timeless and our personal gift to the future.
All photos are the property of Marge McGugan and may not be
reused or copied without written permission.
