I Did It! ~ 2015

Another year has galloped by and it's time for the annual  I Did It! list (hat tip to Lisa Romeo).

Writing I Did Its!

I wasn't feeling the love writing-wise in 2015. Too many ideas, too little time. But let's take a look and see if I accomplished anything:

      Submissions: 8

      Rejections: 6

      Acceptances: 1

      Publications: 4

  

This is supposed to be a positive post, so I'm not going to make any comment on those numbers. The one publication was my first post-MFA published fiction piece, so yea for that! Plus three short pieces published on other blogs:

       Write in Your Car, Literary Mama, August 3, 2015 

       The Twins and The Pendulum, Brain, Mother Blog, February 2015 

       Two Takes on AWP, Literary Mama Blog, February 2015

I completed a small book of short essays and illustrations about a nearby natural area for my naturalist class, a book I hope will be printed and made available in 2016.

I've also continued to volunteer as an editor at Literary Mama, which has been such a fun, rewarding thing to do. I love helping writers bring out the best in their essays.

Finally, I taught three nature writing and nature journaling workshops, with more scheduled for this year. These have gone really well and I'm looking forward to the next round.

Throughout the year I also exchanged work with an email-based nature-writing group, which has been just fabulous. I've generated a lot of material--stuff that now could use revising and submitting--and learned a lot both from my fellow writers' comments on my work and from reading their work.

And, finally, I wrote 116 blog posts and my blog turned eight!

Other Life I Did-Its!

Of course life isn't all about writing, and I accomplished a few things elsewhere in life:

Travel--We sent on a road trip to Colorado with three kids in a 21-year-old black Volvo with no A/C or cruise control. And it was awesome!!

Nature--I completed the training to become a Maine Master Naturalist (the booklet I mention above was part of this program) and started my volunteer work (nature writing and journaling classes I also mention above).

Craft--I didn't have a super crafty year, but I did make a sleeping bag, which is a little kooky. I also planned to knit one thing a month all year and managed to knit a total of nine items, which is pretty darn close. And I needle-felted a bunch of gnomes for Christmas.

So that's that! Another year gone by and time to look forward to the next, think about goals, and make plans for 2016's list.

Do you keep an I Did It! list? How do you celebrate your accomplishments and stay positive in the face of slow progress?