Showing posts with label i did it. Show all posts
Showing posts with label i did it. Show all posts

Friday, December 29, 2023

I Did It! 2023 Edition

It's time again for the annual pat-myself-on-the-back post. Past years can be viewed here: 2022, 2021 (Apocalypse Year 2) 2020 (Apocalypse Year 1), 2019 (including decade-in-review), 2018, 2017, 2016, 2015, 2014, 2013. Let's jump right into 2022's I Did Its! Shall we?

Andy Goldsworthy landscape installation at Alnoba in New Hampshire, here for no reason
other than it's a place I visited this year and never got around to writing about it. Also it's cool!

Writing I Did Its!
Travel & Adventure I Did Its!
  • We went to Europe!!! Can't really top that.

  • Went on some local adventures to museums and other sites of interest around Maine, and one in New Hampshire, with family, friends, and on my own.
  • Did *some* kayaking, but much less than in recent years.
Arts & Crafts I Did Its!
  • Knit *one* pair of mittens!
  • Took up mosaic-making (mosaicing?), and made three projects, including these two:


Other I Did Its!
  • Got my older kid graduated from college and the younger two from high school. (Is this really my accomplishment? I don't care--I'm taking credit for it!)
  • Got the younger two kids off to college.
  • Hosted my parents for a couple of weeks in the spring (around those grads) and my sister for a few days in the fall.
  • Created a true space of my own in the vacated bedroom.
  • Maintained pretty regular yoga and walking routines (not-quite-daily).
  • Kept a daily journal and a fairly regular morning pages routine.
I have some ideas about what I want to accomplish in 2024, writing-wise, and otherwise. But for now I'll just bask in the glow of self-congratulation for having written a novel and traveled to Europe and learned a new craft.
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Tuesday, December 27, 2022

I Did It! 2022 Edition

For the past nine years, I've tracked my annual accomplishments via an annual I Did It! list, originally inspired by writer Lisa Romeo. Previous posts can be found here: 2021 (Apocalypse Year 2) 2020 (Apocalypse Year 1), 2019 (including decade-in-review), 2018, 2017, 2016, 2015, 2014, 2013. Let's jump right into 2022's I Did Its! Shall we?

Writing I Did Its!

My first book--Uphill Both Ways: Hiking toward Happiness on the Colorado Trail--was published, hurrah hurrah!


To all those people who say that publishing a book doesn't change your life, I say pppppbbbbttttsssttt! Almost nothing could be better, except maybe holding your newborn baby in your arms--I don't know, it's been a while since I did that ;-). Anyway, Oh, happy publication day and month and year!

Book Publicity Activities in 2022:

(See all past and future events here and read/watch/listen to interviews and recorded events here.)

I also did some more revision on Book Two, which I mention having completed drafting in last year's I Did It! post, and I decided to illustrate it (I was wavering for a bit) and began work on those illustrations, basically, teaching myself how to draw in pen. I'm still a bit wishy-washy on how I feel about the results so far, but I'm making progress. I also drafted a book proposal for Book Two, which I haven't sent out, due to working on getting enough illustrations done to my satisfaction first.

I began Book Three, meaning I outlined it and began the research, which is really just a LOT of reading. I've also drafted a very sketchy intro and part of Chapter 1. It's a book I've been dreaming of putting together for nearly two decades, so I'm excited to finally be making progress. 

I started the year with a plan to focus on writing short pieces (essays, stories, etc.), since I couldn't wrap my brain around the idea of a big book project while working on promotion of Uphill Both Ways, but obviously I overcame that block and ended up working on two book projects after all. My plan was to write one short piece a week, in addition to a flash piece on this blog ("Flash Friday"). That did not exactly come to pass, but in a file labeled "2022 Short Works," there are 15 documents, 11 of them complete pieces. In addition, I wrote 5 "Flash Friday" posts, for a total of 20 partial or complete short works, or just shy of two per month (and one of those "short" works is nearly 10,000 words).

This practice probably led to an improved submission and publication rate over last year:

  • Submissions: 16 (double last year's rate)
  • Acceptances: 3
  • Rejections: 8
  • Publications: 9 (so much better!). They are:

(As always, the submission/acceptance/rejection/publication numbers don't add up due to carry over from year to year, not everything published having gone through a normal submission process, etc.)

Other Writing I Did Its!
  • 11 Newsletters (so far)
  • 44 Blog Posts (including this one)
  • I continued working as Literary Reflections editor and senior editor at Literary Mama
  • The writing group I started in 2021 (Maine Writers and Knitters) got together in person about three times and once over zoom, including one fantastic field trip to a local historic author's residence/museum
  • I applied for two grants (and was rejected for both)
  • I completed just over half of a (self-paced) book coach training program
  • I gave a presentation and taught a workshop at my grad school alma mater
  • I taught a nature writing workshop to two different groups 
Travel and Adventure I Did Its!
  • I spent 10 days in Mexico (and didn't write about it much here on the blog; but I have an extraordinarily long essay about the trip that's in my rejections pile).
  • We went on our annual family camping trip 
  • C and I went on a 2-day backpacking trip, kid-free
  • C and I spent a weekend in Bar Harbor for alumni weekend, also kid-free
  • I took some small trips on kayak and on foot here and there
It took me a minute to remember that I went on a BIG trip at the beginning of the year, which tells me I'm either ungrateful or I need to go on big trips more frequently. I definitely need to work harder to make adventure a priority. And keep a list!

    Arts and Crafts I Did Its!

    My focus was on writing more than making, and my sewing machine spent most of the year tucked away on a side table under a dust cover. But I got some things done:
    • Finished knitting the gigantic poncho I started early in the pandemic
    • Made some tiny shoes and knitted a tiny sweater (and deciphered an Elizabeth Zimmerman pattern!) for my niece, who was born in September
    • Knitted a runner hat for Z (and then the weather was warm through cross-country season, so he never had an occasion to wear it, officially, but he has worn it some since the weather has gotten cold)
    • Made a new duvet for C's and my bed
    • Made a fleece skirt, plus two more for gifts
    • Made a silly little (and totally impractical) bird feeder, just for fun



    Household I Did Its!
    • Deep-cleaned the kitchen in anticipation of Thanksgiving and houseguests
    • Cleaned and organized drawers and cabinets in the bathrooms--long overdue
    • Moved several boxes of books and bags of clothes to the used bookstore and consignment shop, respectively
    • Finally made inroads on cleaning the basement (the perennial to-do list item, which I claimed to have done last year--the inroads part--but this year I really made some progress)
    • Tried to be more systematic about menu planning and shopping so that figuring out what to have for dinner every night isn't such a chore; this doesn't make me excited about cooking dinner any more than I was before, but it makes it slightly less stressful
    • Worked on maintaining my houseplants in a healthier, less neglected state than usual (battling some pests like scale and spider mites), even moving a few from the sunroom to the living room to enjoy them more (and because they seemed to want warmer weather conditions)
    • Expanded my pollinator garden, fed it a few rounds of duck mulch, and largely stayed on top of the weeds
    Nature I Did Its!
    • Bird-Watching: 132 checklists and 114 species for the year (in eBird) as well as several new species sightings in Mexico (around 25)
    • Did a little butterfly and dragonfly wildflower watching
    • Taught a nature writing workshop to 3 different groups
    • Made 25 nature journal entries
    • Continued to serve on board of Maine Master Naturalist Program and helped organize their conference
    All-in-all a pretty good year (can't really complain when you've published a book)! It's occurred to me, for the first time after ten years of these posts, unbelievably, that in planning my goals from this year, I can think about what I want this post to look like next December and reverse engineer it so that I aim for what I'll have wanted to accomplish. For instance, I want to see more travel and adventure in my life, so I can set a goal of X number of hikes/kayaks per week or month and X of overnight trips and X real big expeditions. And then make it happen!
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    Thursday, December 30, 2021

    I Did It! 2021 (Apocalypse Year 2) Edition

    For the past eight years, I've tracked my annual accomplishments via an annual I Did It! list, originally inspired by writer Lisa Romeo. Previous posts can be found here: 2020 (Apocalypse Year 1), 2019 (including decade-in-review), 2018, 2017, 2016, 2015, 2014, 2013. 


    This year has felt strange, like suspended animation (or, perhaps, like college friends and I used to joke, animated suspense). Part of that has been the ongoing (never-ending) pandemic, of course, but also the limbo phase between having a book accepted for publication and actually seeing it in print (for all of you who keep asking me, "Isn't it published yet?" believe me, I feel your pain). Book work over the last year has been marked by long periods of waiting punctuated by brief flurries of activity (copy edits, proof review, etc.), which makes it hard to feel like I've accomplished anything at all. Let's review the last year and see if that's actually true.

    Writing I-Did-Its!

    There were the aforementioned layers of review of The Book, as well as inroads into promotion, reveal of the cover, and corresponding updates to my website and various profiles. (Do go here to pre-order if you haven't already.)

    I also finished drafting a second book, a collection of essays on nature and motherhood. For some reason finishing this book felt anticlimactic. Maybe because three-fifths of it had already been written and published, so most of "drafting" it involved revising words already on the page. Or maybe because I expect the road to publication to be steeply uphill. But none of that means I don't deserve a little pat on the back, so here it is: pat, pat.

    As far as short pieces go, I'm still struggling to both write and submit/publish. My submission stats for the year:

    • Submissions: 8
    • Acceptances: 0
    • Rejections: 6
    • Publications: 1

    "A Review of World of Wonders by Aimee Nezhukumatathil" Literary Mama, May/June 2021

    I know this is supposed to be a positive post, but oof, that's painful. Possibly the worst since I started this tradition. 

    Other writing accomplishments:

    • 11 Newsletters
    • 36 blog posts (plus this one, which puts us one ahead of 2020)
    • I worked on a novel (a different one from the one I worked on last year), getting to 14,000 words before deciding I can't stand it. One day I'll make it all the way to 60,000.
    • I continued editing the Literary Reflections department at Literary Mama as well as being a senior editor, helping to bring each issue to publication.
    • I started training to become a book coach. I didn't get as far into the program as I would have liked due to time management issues, but it's my goal for 2022 to complete the training and start bringing on clients.
    • I got back into teaching nature journaling, with one remote workshop and two in-person, including one at a nature journaling conference in Acadia National Park, which was a delight.
    • I gathered a group of Maine writers I know (some of whom I only knew from the internet), who all happen to be knitters, and formed a writing group called Maine Writers and Knitters. I hosted our first get-together in October, which mostly involved getting to know each other and eating, but also included a fun and slightly woo-woo writing exercise. We clicked really well and had a second get-together early this month, this time with actual writing workshops, and we have a third planned for February. It feels so good to have some actual writing community.
    • I (virtually) attended a poetry festival and a crime writing conference.
    Travel and Adventure I Did Its!

    Again it wasn't much of a year for travel, but I got out a bit more than I did last year.
    • We resumed our annual Hermit Island camping trip after a two-year hiatus (one year because of the pandemic and one because of work), and I resolved to never let a crappy job get between me and my family again (ultimately quitting that crappy job).
    • We went on a fair number of kayak and canoe trips on local lakes and ponds (some of which I did solo).
    • I swam across a nearby pond with a friend once or twice a week during July and August.
    • I went on a solo hike to a tiny cabin at a nearby nature preserve.
    • I drove all the way to Colorado and back, all by myself, to help out my parents for a couple of weeks in November.
    Arts and Crafts I Did Its!

    My word for 2021 was "finish" and I had a list of 21 things I wanted to finish this year, many of them craft projects (some of which were WIPs and some of which were mere ideas). These are the crafty things that got finished:
    • Some handmade dollhouse furniture.
    • That '70s quilt
    • Wavy charms quilt
    • Chalk painted furniture
    • New bedroom curtains
    • Birds & blooms quilt
    • Little bird embroideries
    • The endless knitting project that I'd started at the beginning of the pandemic I put down sometime last spring and didn't pick it up again until October. It's nearly done, but I'm at a stumbling place and not quite sure how to go on, so it will have to hold off until next year's list. I also have another needlework project that's so close to being done, but not close enough to make it onto this year's list.
    • Finally, I started doing illustrations for my second book (mentioned above). I'd hoped to finish them up this month, but all of my time got sucked up by holidays, child transporting, and pandemic/ democracy anxiety.
    Household I Did Its!
    • My big accomplishment here was my bedroom refresh and reading nook. 
    • I also deep-cleaned the living room and finally replaced our 1990s college student decor with a real couch and two swivel/glider chairs (I can't believe I don't have any photos or a blog post of these--probably because they are not the beautiful midnight blue velvet couch and orange patterned chairs I dreamed of but rather boring tan, gray, and beige). 
    • I made some more inroads into basement cleaning (two steps forward and one back in that department, always--E moved out of the room he shared with Z to the basement; and lives sprawled between the main area and M's room; then this month M moved all of his stuff home from college in preparation for a semester abroad. And everyone throws anything they don't want down there.)
    • I continued to expand my Fiesta ware collection, but at a more sedate pace than the previous year (I think this is a topic that deserves a blog post).
    • I cleaned up the sunroom, repotted several plants so now almost everything is in a pretty, non-plastic pot, and repainted two ugly plant stands a lovely bright turquoise (again, gonna need a blog post on this!).
    • I expanded my pollinator garden and kept it semi-weed-free.
    Nature I Did Its!
    • I did a lot of birding, especially in the spring (110 eBird checklists and 118 species), and C and I did the Christmas Bird Count for something like the seventh year in a row. I even got a couple of life birds right here on our own property, as well as one in Colorado.
    • I did a little bit of butterfly-ing and dragonfly-ing, but not as much as I would have liked.
    • I kept track of all of the wildflowers (starting with tree flowers) as they emerged in the spring and early summer (falling out of the habit in July/August) with a photo on Instagram.

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    Thursday, December 31, 2020

    I Did It! 2020 (aka Apocalypse Year 1) Edition

    For the past six years, I've tracked my annual accomplishments via an annual I Did It! list, originally inspired by writer Lisa Romeo. Previous posts can be found here: 2019 (including decade-in-review), 2018, 2017, 2016, 2015, 2014, 2013. 


    Let me just start this year's list by acknowledging that 2020 was a real sh*t-show of a year, and if all you managed to accomplish was doom-scrolling Twitter and binge-watching Tiger King, that's okay. I'm not here to judge or make anyone feel bad. In terms of hours devoted, streaming TV was probably my most productive activity of 2020. Nevertheless, traditions are traditions, and my tradition is to take a minute to celebrate my wins for the year, big and small.

    Writing I-Did-Its!

    My big win for the year is, of course, finding a publisher and signing a contract for my book. This was a four-year-plus-long process to get to this point, and I'm not going to let 2020 take that away from me.

    My stats for this year:

    • Submissions: 16
    • Acceptances: 3
    • Rejections: 7
    • Withdrawals: 4
    • Radio Silence: 2
    • Publications: 4

    "The Quilt" Willows Wept Review, September 2020 

    "A Review of The Beginning of Everything by Andrea J. Buchanan" Literary Mama, May 2020 

    "Faith in a Seed" Spire: The Maine Journal of Conservation and Sustainability, April 2020  

    "Sled Dogs and Search and Rescue" Maine Wilderness Guide, Winter 2020  

    As  was the case for the last few years, while I've been working on The Book, I haven't been producing as many shorter works for submission. Some day I'll have to figure out how to keep short pieces going on the side while working on longer works. 

    Other writing accomplishments:
    • I re-reinvigorated my newsletter, moving to a monthly schedule and sending out 11 issues.
    • I only wrote 35 blog posts--my lowest number ever--but I didn't abandon the blog entirely.
    • I mostly finished drafting a second book and I did a fair amount of research on a third.
    • I started a novel and got pretty deep into characters and plot, but had to shelve it at the point when I needed to delve into historical research, just when all the libraries shut down for the pandemic.
    • I continued to edit for Literary Mama, both as a department editor in the Literary Reflections Department and as a Senior Editor (I suppose you could call another publication my letter from the editor in the July/August issue).
    Travel and Adventure I Did Its!

    Well, it wasn't much of a travel year for anyone, was it? Weeks went by in spring when I barely even left our property, let alone the county. What I did manage:
    • Several local kayak trips, including one night paddle among the bioluminescence. I had fun making journal pages for some of these trips
    • An overnight at a cottage on the beach, courtesy of a friend.
    • A November hike with my family (who are usually impossible to drag out of the house) up a mountain not too far from home.

    Arts and Crafts I Did Its!

    Likewise, this wasn't a very crafty year, although it seems like it should have been what with all the stay-home-ness. What I did do:

    • Made a cute little table topper thingy.
    • Made a table runner.
    • Made a billion face masks, starting with these.
    • Finished C's fair isle vest.
    • Remodeled my old dollhouse (phase 1, phase 2, phase 3).
    • I've been working on one, long, endless knitting project most of the pandemic. It's been a good TV-watching knit, since it doesn't require a lot of attention-paying, but I've fallen out of the habit the last few weeks. Time to pick it up again.
    • I did not do as much art as I would have liked, other than a little nature journaling and a couple of watercolor paintings. This is an area of my life I'd like to reinvigorate in 2021.
    Household I Did Its!

    2020 was the year of dealing with deferred maintenance, from repairing little things (bracelets and wind chimes that have been broken for years) to finally, finally repainting (most of) the house trim and the exterior doors. (See above. How much do you love that purple and green together?) Not that anyone other than the UPS man has seen the results, but it makes me smile every time I come home. I also:
    • Finally cleaned up and organized the basement, starting with the "jar room." Other areas that got tidied up were my arts and craft supplies, three big bins of hand-me-down clothes that are all now either in kids' drawers or at the thrift store (or waiting till spring to go to the consignment store). I would still like to do a better job of organizing the camping gear and my fabric stash (maybe either burn through or get rid of some of it), and I finally threw out stuff I was waiting for recycling opportunities to open up for--old floppy disks and vinyl bags, that sort of thing. What I'd really, really like is for C to finish off the corner of the basement where all this stuff is stored and put in better lighting and shelving so I have better space to work with. Maybe some day...
    • Expanded my Fiestaware collection...by a lot. I admit, I got a teensy bit carried away, but I'm pretty happy with my purchases (it all started with Goodwill but after the pandemic began, I turned into eBay, Replacements Ltd., and Fiesta Factory Direct for my fixes). Okay, so maybe buying stuff isn't exactly an accomplishment, but Fiestaware was invented during the Great Depression to cheer people up, so I feel like I'm carrying on that tradition--of cheering myself up with colorful dishes. All the new dishware necessitated reorganizing kitchen shelves and cabinets to create storage and display space where there was none before, so that's something
    • In this same vein, I continued on my never-ending (and vain) quest to get the house so clean it stays clean by reorganizing and decluttering various book cases, cabinets, closets, and rooms.
    • I spread topsoil and grass seed in front of our house, something we neglected to do after building, resulting in a bald, weedy lawn (don't get me wrong; I'm okay with "weeds" and even planted violets and bluets in the new lawn, but more green growing things than brown dirt was my goal).
    • And I planted a butterfly garden, where I long ago put in an herb garden and then neglected it.
    Nature I Did Its!
    • I co-coordinated the Maine Master Naturalist training course for 2020, with three other terrific leaders. We pivoted and retooled with the pandemic, and were able to continue carrying out a complete and robust course using remote learning platforms, videos, do-it-yourself field trips, and socially distanced field days. The further I get from the elbow-deep, day-to-day operational logistics of this, the more I realize what an accomplishment it was. As a bonus, sitting through all of the lectures reinforced my own learning from the course (back in 2014-2015) and re-sparked my interest in several nature topics.
    • I took an online class in butterfly ID and ecology, and discovered 40+ species of butterfly on my property alone.
    • Most of my birding I did at home, yet I managed to log more checklists on eBird and more species than any previous year. I also had a couple of life birds and a few not-seen-in-a-long-time species, including two great sightings of sandhill cranes (not on my property), and I worked on my birding-while-kayaking skills. One of my big plans for 2021 is to get a lot better at birding.
    • All the kayaking reinvigorated my long-held but recently dormant interest in dragonflies, and I reacquainted myself with some of my favorite species and learned several new ones. I look forward to pursuing this more in 2021.

    Not too shabby for an otherwise hellish year. Another goal for 2021 is to not try to wish time away--even pandemic time, even work time--but to appreciate each moment as it comes. I'll let you know how it goes in next year's I Did It! post.

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    Tuesday, December 31, 2019

    I Did It! 2019 and Decade-In-Review Edition

    For the past six years, I've tracked my annual accomplishments via an annual I Did It! list, originally inspired by writer Lisa Romeo. Previous posts can be found here: 2018, 2017, 2016, 2015, 2014, 2013. It's very easy to get to the end of the year and see all the goals you did not achieve, so this is an opportunity to celebrate the ones you did … and some other non-goals that you hit as well. First I'll give you my 2019 list, then we'll talk about the 2010s as a whole.

    This is me, wondering why it's so hard to climb to the top of this writing business.
    Writing I Did Its!
    This year I felt pretty stuck in quicksand, writing-wise. I had a lot of big goals, but not a lot of forward momentum. Let's see how that shook out, by the numbers:
    • Submissions: 8
    • Acceptances: 1
    • Short Lists: 1
    • Rejections: 12
    • Publications: 3, as follows:
    "Persistence Is the Thing with Fins" A Dangerous New World: Maine Voices on the Climate Crisis, December 2019"A Conversation with Caitlin Shetterly" Literary Mama, January 2019"Confluence" This Side of the Divide, February 2019
    Okay, well, the numbers confirm that stuck-in-quicksand sensation. Dang. One of those submissions was the proposal for my book, which took all summer to write and therefore took time away from other writing and submitting activitites, so there is that, and I did work an awful lot of overtime between January and June, which didn't leave a lot of time or energy for writing or submitting. Let's see some more positive writing news.
    • I reinvigorated my newsletter, sending out 17 issues since June, when I attempted to relaunch as a weekly missive. I've since scaled back to "twice-monthly-ish."
    • I tried to reinvigorate my blog, and wrote 68 posts (including this one) over the year, which is a pretty low number, but 27 more than last year, and more than half of them I wrote during the last three months, the period of reinvigoration.
    • I did another big revision of my book and wrote a book proposal which I've sent to one publisher.
    • I attended three writerly events: a presentation on novel writing, a poetry festival, and a crime writing conference.
    • I attempted to make contact with other writers, sending emails to two writers whose books, in my genre, I enjoyed, contacting two Maine-based writers and becoming "friends" with them via social media, and making one real-life writing friend.
    Travel and Adventure I Did Its!
    We didn't get out a whole lot this year, but we did manage a week in DC, which was terrific. E and I went to Boston for a day, E, Z and I went on a weekend camping trip with friends, I did some toodling around on local ponds in my new kayaks, and I took sailing lessons. C, Z, E and I also hiked the Precipice Trail up Champlain Mountain in Acadia National Park in October, which felt like a major accomplishment for my elderly body (see photo above). We also did a lot of local touristing and micro-adventures when my parents were visiting in the fall, and C and I went to two super-fun concerts (Howard Jones and Rick Springfield!!!) at a local winery, which I count as adventures.

    Art and Craft I Did Its!
    I'm pretty happy with my knitting results from this year, which I'll share at the end of this week. I also  finish-finished (as in bound off) my jeweled squares quilt, made an infinity scarf, made three fleece skirts and then three more, gave new life to an ugly old table with a coat of purple paint, and made a dozen sparkly little houses. I also did some drawing and watercoloring and taught a nature journaling workshop.

    Household I Did Its! 
    I focused a lot this year on giving our house a little spa treatment. I (with some help) repainted E and Z's room and, some months later, cleaned, repainted, and organized their closet. I also (again with help) patched and repainted the stair walls and (without much help) cleaned and decluttered the whole house above ground level (basement, I'm looking at you in 2020), none of which rated a blog post I guess. I had written that I need less clutter in my life when I was working on last year's goals, and I think I achieved that (above ground level) this year.

    2010s Decade in Review

     Writing I Did Its!
    These numbers are approximate and mostly post-2014.
    • Submissions: ~128
    • Acceptances: ~ 21
    • Rejections: ~93
    • Publications: ~56 (not sure why acceptance and pub numbers are so out of alignment)
    • Blog Posts: ~932
    • Books Written: 1
    I also got my MFA in 2014 and have been volunteering as Literary Reflections editor and senior editor at Literary Mama for about 5 years, and I taught a couple of nature writing workshops locally. And I got to spend a week at an artists' colony, where I worked on the first revision of my book.

    That's all really great, but I started writing in earnest in 2005, started a print zine and took my first writing class in 2006, started this blog in 2007, started grad school in 2012 … and it just feels like I should have made more progress in all that time. Granted, I also gave birth to two babies in 2005, but they're nearly six feet tall now; shouldn't my writing career be a lot bigger too?

    Travel I Did Its!
    One of my greatest joys in life and the thing I always want to do more of is travel. I tend to think that we don't do much of it, but while there might not be a lot of variety in our traveling, we've gone on some pretty cool trips over the last decade.

    Family Trips:
    Just Me Trips
    There was also a lot of local Maine travel, hikes, boat trips, etc. over those years, and I spent some weekends away with friends and went on several bird-watching adventures.

    Art and Craft I Did Its!
    Other Life I Did Its!
    • Trained to become a Maine Master Naturalist and joined the MMNP board of directors.
    • Raised my kids from 8 and 4 years to 18 and 14, saw them graduated from middle school and high school, and sent one off to college.
    This is supposed to be a positive post, but I can't look back on the last decade without pointing out that the 2010s were a complete bust professionally, a total failure, in terms of income, advancement, development, the whole shebang. I started the decade working maybe not my dream job but doing work that was interesting, challenging, and dear to my heart; now I make less money per hour than I did 10 years ago, and I'm basically just biding my time, adding to my retirement, waiting for my summers off, when we go broke but at least I get to hang out with my kids, write, and do some things I enjoy doing. My 30s-40s decade, the one where I *should* have been advancing in a career, was a crater, and, unless I can turn writing into something more than a really time-consuming hobby, it's likely that I'll never have a career or professional fulfillment. 

    But, other than professional failure and painfully slow progress in writing, it's been a pretty great decade. What are you celebrating this New Year's Eve?
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    Tuesday, January 1, 2019

    I Did It! 2018 Edition

    For the past several years, I've paused at the turn of the year and, before listing my goals for the upcoming year (and instead of berating myself for those things left undone from the previous year), I've made a list of accomplishments and goals achieved (originally inspired by this post from blogger and writer Lisa Romeo), both with regard to writing and other things in life.



    Writing I Did Its

    Books written: 1

    My one, overarching goal for 2018 was to finish writing my book, and…I did it! I completed a full draft in June, subjected it to one round of revision, and then sent it off to two writing friends for suggestions and further edits. I subsequently sent off queries to several agents. No bites so far, but I have plans for deeper revision and further querying in the new year.

    The focus on finishing the book, meant that my efforts in other writing areas lagged a bit:

    Submissions: 14
    Rejections: 7
    Acceptances: 2
    Publications: 3 essays:

    "Memento Vivere" Still Point Arts Quarterly
    "The Sparrow's Song" The Sunlight Press
    "The World in their Hands" Nature Writing ​(republished)
     I launched a freelance career and enjoyed its brief glow before I had to go get a real job, producing 5 pieces:
    "Sharing a Love of Wilderness" and "Naturalist's Notebook" Maine Wilderness Guide
    "Jargon: Anatomy of a Mountain" TrailGroove
    "Rachel Carson's Maine" Green and Healthy Maine Summer Guide
    "Becoming a Trail Naturalist" TrailGroove
    "Reduce, Recycle, Retire" Green and Healthy Maine Homes
    I also taught four nature journaling workshops, including two in quite ideal circumsances—one on a sea kayak excursion and another on a weekend in a cabin up north.

    Other writing numbers:

    Writing residencies applied for: 1
    Residencies accepted to: 0
    Grants applied for: 2
    Grants received: 0

    I did earn more than twice what I made the year before from writing and teaching—not enough to live on, but a kind of nice bump in the otherwise nonexistant income. I made an attempt to keep a little toe in the literary world by attending a few writing workshops and presentations/panels, as well as the nearby annual poetry festival.

    Travel I Did Its!
    This was a poor year for travel, being a poor year, literally. All of our trips were fairly local: our usual May camping trip and visit to the in-laws' camp, and another camping trip with friends, plus a trip to Boston in February to visit colleges with M and a family expedition to Vermont this summer for a funeral/family reunion/more college visits, as well as trips to the beach and other day trips.

     Art and Craft I Did Its!
    For the second year, I participated in The 100 Day Project, this time drawing each day. In the end, I think I only accomplished somewhere around 85 days, and they were nowhere near consecutive, but I did improve greatly on my pencil drawing skills.

     I haven't had much of a crafty year. The only knitting I did was preemie hats for the twins' class to donate to the hospital. I also finished up E's quilt, made a fun (but perhaps not that professional) farm quilt for a friend's new baby, and put together the quilt you see at the top of this post, which I'll get back from the quilter any day now, and which I'll tell you all about soon.

     Tell me about your 2018 I Did Its!
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