JOIN: Celebrate This Week - Progress and Puppy Love

Every Saturday, join me as I CELEBRATE This Week 

with Ruth Ayres from Discover. Play. Build.

I did lots of writing in November and December! I have 16,597 words written in my middle grade novel and that feels awesome. But I've spent the last couple of weeks focusing on rewriting my query for my young adult novel. I've sent some queries out and haven't had any luck so I decided to rework my query. And now I feel so much better about it! It was definitely a long few weeks stressing over it...trying so many different combinations of words and sentences. It was hard. 

Living a writing life is wonderful and exhausting at the same time. It's more than just sitting down to write. It's writing and then coming back to the writing, determination and perseverance, revising and revising and revising. And still revising. I'm reveling in all the work I've put into my writing and how far it has come. I have no idea where my writing will go but I know I get to share my blog (this one and Teach Mentor Texts) with so many friends near and far and I get to hang out with writers, some who are just getting started and others who have been writing for a long time, and I get to live the life of a writer in this way. I love to write. As much as it can be tiresome, it can be exhilarating at the same time. And what I've learned most is to just keep going. 

So I've got this sweet puppy living in my house now! We've had her for about two months and she just turned four months old this week. She's been to six weeks of puppy training and she has learned so so much. And I've worked with her so so much. I spend time everyday practicing what we learned in class: sit and stay, leave it and follow me, down and okay come. Over and over. Just like writing, it's tiresome and exhausting...especially when she's distracted or just not excited to listen to what I want her to do. But I've seen an amazing difference in her behavior from when we brought her home to now. She's learned so much in such a short time. She's a super sweet, cuddly puppy, playful and full of energy, but she can also calm down and listen to our commands. We still have a lot of work to do with her but when I think of the difference between now and the first week she was with us, I can see the tremendous difference.

And when I look at my writing in this same way, I can see how my words, my stories, my understanding of what the process looks like for me, has changed over time. Maybe there is still so much for me to learn about writing and weaving words into stories, but I can see how much I've grown and that feels awesome.

Today I'm celebrating the progress I've made with my MG, the revision I've made with my query, and also the fact that I'm ready to start revising the YA novel I drafted over the summer. It feels weird to take a break from my MG because it's not done...but at the same time, when I opened up my draft and starting reading through it, I felt at home with my characters and excited to work on their story to make it better. I'm keeping on!

I wish you the best with your writing life this week! Stop and celebrate any writing you have done - the big and the little - it all counts!

Thanks for stopping in to explore with me!