#MFRWAuthor 52-Week Challenge: Family

It's week 2 of Marketing for Romance Writers' 52-Week Blog Challenge. I love that we have topics. So much easier to write when someone else comes up with a topic.

HOW MY FAMILY SURVIVES MY WRITING.

When I first started writing over twenty years ago, I was embarrassed to tell my family. My kids were in high school, and I could feel them rolling their eyes if I told them I was writing a romance story. To my surprise, they thought it was great. Hubs thought it was a nice hobby until I told him I was serious about this, that I was writing to be published. This was my business.

He supported me when I said I wanted to take a class at our local library on starting a small business offered by the Michigan State University Extension Service. In fact, he’s supported me all along. While he prefers reading nonfiction, he will read my books. I’m not sure he realizes how interruptions can be very distracting. But every morning (my best time to write) he’ll go downstairs to his office, leaving me in peace. When I buried or on deadline (my own, since I’m self-published), he’ll make dinner. Now that’s support!

My kids, now grown with children of their own, say they’re proud of me. But it’s got to be uncomfortable for them to read the sex scenes knowing their mother wrote them.

When the 3 “Moms”—my mother, mother-in-law, and her sister—read my first book, Switched, that had some quite sensual scenes, it made me uncomfortable. They told me they skipped those parts. LOL Unfortunately, they passed away before my other books were published. I think they would have enjoyed my PI mysteries a lot better than the science fiction romances. My sisters enjoy the mysteries better, too.

My grandchildren are too young to read my books. But they write their own stories with me. I found this wonderful program, My StoryMaker, from the Carnegie Library at Pittsburgh. The kids choose the characters, setting, tools, etc. and tell me the story, which I type for them. At the end of the story, I print it out for them to show their parents. We’ve been doing this since before they started school. Five years later, their stories are now longer with more depth. It’s great combining something I love (writing) with fun time with the kiddies.

I am truly blessed by my family’s support.

Here's the link to the others participating in the challenge: http://mfrw.blogspot.com/2017/01/join-us-its-week-2-mfrwauthor-52-week.html

Life Happens

Life happens while you’re making other plans. ~ John Lennon

That quote accurately describes last week. Opportunities popped up and . . .  squirrel! I wrote my monthly post for Insecure Writers Support Group, and love connecting with so many contributors. Their responses to the question—what writing rule do you wish you’d never heard?—were so varied. Interestingly, point of view flipping and commas (my responses) were quite popular. Of course, those writers had different takes on why they disliked those rules. The only “bad” part with IWSG is the time it takes to visit so many posters. I never make it through all 218 posts.

Then, I read about the 52-Week Blog Challenge, sponsored by Marketing For Romance Writers (MFRW). Another “squirrel” moment. I hadn’t finished visiting the IWSG posters when I started visiting the 52-Week bloggers. Each week, we’re given a topic to blog about. Favorite Things was last week’s topic. I loved it. Too bad I discovered this after the sign-up had closed. But I mushed on and wrote my post. And visited the others. So far, no responses. Darn, I forgot to advertise the post.

In the midst of all this blogging, I missed the Weekend Warrior blog hop. Not good. I love reading the snippets from the others’ books. On top of that, I put out a call for guests on the Paranormal Romantics blog. Wow. What a response. But you know what that means? Answering questions, scheduling dates. While I’m pleased that so many responded, that all takes time.

While I was writing and visiting blogs and scheduling, what wasn’t I doing? Writing. I managed to write 1,500 words. That’s it! I can write that much on an average day. At this rate, I won’t finish The Case of the Meddling Mama until June.

I’ve forgotten my focus--writing my story. It’s so easy to do. Social media demands our attention. What if I miss something? The world won’t come to an end if I do. In the flurry before Christmas, I signed up for an online class (offered by Kiss of Death RWA chapter) called Everything You Thought You Knew About Cops—research for the Alex O’Hara PI mystery series. Never mind I could have invited over my friend who’s a retired police chief and picked his brain (as I’ve done in the past). I’m saving the lessons and posts to read later. I can't keep up.

Bombarded with email, Facebook, Twitter, I lost my goal to write. Promoting my books and my name recognition is essential but not at the cost of swallowing up writing time.

Last week, I said I’d keep you apprised of my progress on writing a business plan. Zip, zero, nada. That’s how far I’ve gotten.

And on the personal front, we’ve begun taking down the Christmas decorations. I hate that. The decorations are so cheery. After all the work putting them up, it seems too soon to take them down and pack away. Ah, well . . .

I hope you’re doing a better job than I am on your goals for 2017.