Celebrations and Do You Have Goals Mixed Together

Celebrate The Small Things and Do You Have Goals Mixed Together - The Insanity Edition

Many thanks to Lexa Cain, LG Keltner, Katie, Misha, and Beth for these two positive hops!

I realized that my goals might be slightly insane. In fact, I decided around March 10th, that I might tear out all my hair need to slow them down a bit for sanity. But here is a glimpse of the work I've been doing. (Beware, although I am celebrating, there's a bit of a vent in here, too.) Hit bold highlights if you need to run . . .

Dynamic Writing 1 ground me into my desk and gave me formatting for e-book nightmares. I struggled and decided to put out a "sample" book with the first 15 lessons . . . on a whim. Not sure it's the right move, but it's available via kindle for 99 cents. 



After looking at curriculum prices and noticing that most curricula don't come via e-book and that they usually cost over $25, I thought I might split Dynamic Writing 1 into two different e-books, for first semester and second semester. Then, I decided to "improve" a few of the lessons by changing some of the order around. Formatting nightmares ensued. I had first semester out for kindle and Smashwords for a few days and was happy that no copies sold because it didn't pass the Smashwords Epub check and I can't figure out why. Is it because it's in 2.0 spacing? I need at least the writing samples to be in 2.0 spacing because that's the required spacing for my students when I teach the class. It's either that or the numeric lists of questions and answers for the sentence variation practice problems. I don't really want to pay an exorbitant fee to get the formatting done, so currently I'm planning on finishing the paperback in late May, and if I can fix the stinking e-book formatting issues by then, I'll re-release the e-book version.

Dynamic Writing 1 contains 185 lessons in writing that cover journal practice writing, sentence variations practice, and a multiple draft process for essays, poetry, and short fiction. I've been using a "casual," private print version for a year now with one of my classes. It's basically all the notes that I had for class bound into a book. And, I have Dynamic Writing 2 and 3 drafted out that way as well. However, taking it to the "public" and formal level has had me banging my head on my desk. I think I should have avoided the idea of an e-book and just gone for a print format first.

Celebration point for that mess: Progress.

In my tiny, experimental, "crazy" writing, things have been going much better.

Ashes Burn Season 2: Ashes Stirred has been merrily airing three times a week for a few months now, and I just compiled it all into it's own little e-book. Today is release day for Ashes Burn Season 2: Ashes Stirred! The first five official (with a comment) visitors here, at the Ashes Burn blog and at the Wings of Light Publishing blog can get a free download via a Smashwords coupon, if so desired. It's available for 99 cents at:
Kindle
Nook
Smashwords
Kobo

And Ashes Burn Season One: Ashes Away is #perma-free since it is a strange experiment in tiny writing form.
Kindle
Nook
Smashwords
Kobo







Other writing goals for 2015 have received a paring down to size that will allow for some sanity. Dynamic Writing 2 and 3 may or may not be released this year. Champion's Destiny and some short stories are my next top priorities, along with surviving A to Z as a Commando Muffin. (Oh, and finishing at least the paperback of Dynamic Writing 1 before June. Agh.)

Exercise: I'm back to it! I can walk 1 mile, bike 30-40 minutes on an exercise bike without much tension on it, and I can do yoga.

Prayer: every day, all the time, as much as I can. Bible study: some days, yes. some days, less.

Relational: the invitational attitude idea kind of suffered when my kids were sick earlier this month and I was tearing my hair out over projects. We did invite friends to see a movie with us. Our niece came to dinner one night. And, I had some guests and spotlights here at my blog, including Shelly Sly, Elizabeth Seckman, Lori L. MacLaughlin, Emma L. Adams, and Nick Wilford. I'm planning to celebrate them again, along with a few others, for A to Z!

Write 1 Sub 1 goals: I wrote and subbed a flash fiction story to Brilliant Flash Fiction's photo prompt contest and . . . the results of that are below. (Happy dance)

Lexa Cain, awesome leader of the Celebrate the Small Things hop, requested some pics of the kayaking and canoeing race from last weekend, but the wind came up, the rain came down, and my girls both had a really rough day (falling in, broken rudder on the kayak, etc.) so I'm going to wait until I have a cheerier pic to show.

On a last, and unexpected, celebratory note:
I had a fun-to-write-but-quirky flash fiction story, "The Biggest Waterslide," short-listed at Brilliant Flash Fiction's last photo prompt contest. It's the seventh story on the page. I was in stinky armpit mode the day that I wrote it - hard to explain, unless you read it.

And I have a couple of tiny twitter stories up @7x20 this week: "Buzz" went live yesterday and "almost spring" will air later today.

What are you celebrating today? Are you staying sane in pursuit of your Dream Goals? 

And, if you can, please check out that story for free, or pick up a free copy of Ashes Burn Season One, or a 99 cent copy of Ashes Burn Season Two. :)