Another accomplishment this weekend has been that our son had his first ride without his training wheels! It took him over a year to muster the courage and keep plugging at it. After grandma bought him his scooter, he wanted nothing to do with that bike. Just recently, we had a new boy move in a few doors down that has been so kind and helpful while riding his bike next to our son's. And in only 2 weeks time, he has managed to get back out there and ride. So we decided to try taking the training wheels off. And you know, he's quite good! :D Yay! He had the best support from 2 of his friends and us of course! He stops very well so far. Now if we could just get him to start on his own. :) See for yourself here (of course I have to brag! Oh and you can see some of the trash we moved from the garage for garbage!):
And then came a grueling night of kids and parents in Halloween costumes. Last year we had 10 kids come to our door. This year, Oh My! I couldn't even begin to count them! It was great! We definitely have a growing neighborhood.
I also had to provide my mom some computer tech support, which I never really like. But, it was quick and painless this time.
So, yeah! I was oh so very tired. I must be getting old, because I have been falling asleep by 9pm ever since my son has been so mobile. :) But again, something from the depths of my brain woke me up at 2am. It was hiding there, in the fog of sleep. But as I lay there trying to go back to sleep it started to clear and come to the front, nagging at me trying to get me to write it all down. I finally realized that I couldn't let this pass me by. Remembering past experiences with such idea/story writing, I know I would never have remembered this story when I woke in the morning. I had to get up and write it. My brain was just too active for me to sleep. So, I realized, that it was the first day of PiBoIdMo and was happy I wrote this down.
Do any of you suffer from an over active brain at the most inopportune time?
And also, are there any groups out there where I can join to have critiques of my work read by peers?
Happy PiBoIdMo!!
Yes, overactive brain is a problem of mine too. It was really bad the first month or so when I started writing. I had to get pen to paper to get all that stuff out of my head!
ReplyDeleteBoy, your son has that bike riding down! Ride on!
I found a critique group on a discussion board. I'm not sure there is one central place to find one, but just getting word out that you are looking may lead you to one!
On the topic of critique groups for picture books...you may be able to get some advice on this from Rachael Harrie, our illustrious Crusade leader. She was a picture book gal before she started her YA project and may have some tips of where to start looking.
ReplyDeleteAnd yep, I definitely have the whole middle-of-the-night creativity thing happening. Usually I'm too lazy to actually get up, though (unless it's after about 4am and I know there's no chance of sleep). I'll just lie in bed for a while, mapping the idea out in my head, expanding it, and memorising the key points for the morning. All to avoid actually getting vertical. ;-) But I've found ideas aren't really so fragile, and won't actually disappear by morning unless you were half asleep when you thought them up. I also keep a pen and notebook on my bedside table, and have been known to make an illegible scribble in the dark which I had to decipher the next day...