I thought I’d return to my blog here with a simple update. Life has certainly been strange and unpredictable with a baby, so last year was definitely just a survival year. In fact, “survive” was my word for the year. But this year, my word is “thrive.” My daughter is entering toddlerhood, so while I have to walk over piles of books she’s ripped off the bookcases and consistently brush crumbs off the bottoms of my feet, I have a lot more bandwidth for my writing career now.

In a few months time, I will be self-publishing my debut novel, so I am stoking the fires and greasing the gears to get myself and my writing career in a place where I can use this as a booster to my career rather than just something-I-did-this-one-time-that-everyone-will-soon-forget-about. All I have to do in order to get my book published is 1) finish the final edits, 2) market as much as I can for it, 3) buy an ISBN number for both paperback and ebook, and 4) get all the nuts and bolts sorted on the KDP and IngramSparks websites. And that’s just for getting my book out into the world.

In addition to all that, I’ll also be joining the DFW Writer’s Workshop and going to meetings every Wednesday to meet new writing friends and get my works-in-progress critiqued. Not only will this allow me to grow as a writer, but it will help me get ready for the DFW Writer’s Conference where I will pitch a book idea to agents and editors. It’s about a thirty minute drive to the conference, so while it will be a huge chunk of my Wednesday evenings gone, I’ll be using that time to listen to books and podcasts about writing.

All of this is already on top of being a mom, an English teacher, and leading a team of teachers as a Department Head, so I have to make sure I don’t launch back into things at a full sprint. I’m not a good runner… I get tired easily. One big thing I have to keep reminding myself is to keep the momentum going. All these starts and stops through out my life have been exhausting. I just need to move at a steady clip and everything will start falling into place.