I mentioned two days ago that I have a future goal to someday write children’s books, so I thought it would be the perfect opportunity to reintroduce the first ever blog post where I mentioned this lofty goal of mine.
Indeed, 2020 must be the year to bring out all of my childlike aspirations . . . goals . . . dreams. And, I’m excited to see what this year holds. For now, it appears that new product development is on the rise and it has everything to do with children as the main inspiration.
With that being said, the children’s book will have to make way for my current product-in-progress, but I’m quite confident that a book will surface somewhere in the distant future. And because miracles still take place these days, I won’t put a timetable on this dream of mine. I figure it’ll bud and unfold when it’s meant to.
For now, please enjoy this blog post, which was originally published on September 9, 2019 (a couple of weeks before I published my first book).
I’m not entirely sure that I should be putting the following future endeavor out in the blogosphere so prematurely. But when I have an itch, I have to scratch. Current events in my world have encouraged me to share my ultimate writing goal for the not-so-near future. Guys, I want to eventually write children’s books! I know . . . I know . . . I don’t even have my first book published yet, but that shouldn’t stop a girl from dreaming, should it? (Anyway, September marks that month in which I should finally be able to officially place “Author” as a title behind my name. I’ll have some info for you, regarding book #1, in next week’s posts.) Truth be told, the reason I even started my blog in the first place was due to my initial intention to get writing experience to help with my first children’s book. I’ve always considered myself as a children’s writer (at heart) — one who either writes to children or writes about children. After all, my blog and other platforms are known by the name, Degrees of Maternity. Maternity has everything to do with motherhood and my maternal instincts naturally come out in my writing quite often.
In my active imagination, I can easily foresee a children’s book series, geared toward children my son’s age. Actually, writing for late elementary to early middle school (ages 8-12) would be my ideal placement. I completely enjoy the books and book series I get to read with Little Man. He’s in fourth grade now, perfectly within the age range I’d love to write for. Furthermore, it’s not difficult for me to envision a children’s series of books (by Jana Williams) that some other mother and son or mother and daughter can enjoy together. I’ve accumulated notebook pages of book ideas, titles, themes, and illustrations for my future children’s books. And, I even went so far as to buy Writing Children’s Books for Dummies by Lisa Rojany Buccieri and Peter Economy with every intention of reading this how-to in the first few days of purchasing it. But, months have elapsed and it sits quietly, collecting dust on my bookshelf. Nevertheless, you have to start with a vision, right? And if I was on the fast track to the children’s zone, how in the world did I end up taking a u-turn and heading for adult valley instead?
Well, a strange thing happened. My whole creative process organically switched over to where I was currently residing. It’s that location known as “real life”. My first book came to life by what I was experiencing in real life, and this blog is also filled with first-hand knowledge through the experiences of yours truly. I can’t help but to write about things that are real to me. Hopefully, some of the things I write about resonate and are relevant to you, because they’re life’s lessons and reflections (many unique to myself while others are routinely shared by the masses). And for those relatable take-aways you receive from my written works, I pray that you can glean from them what you need.
Let’s get back to my writing about (or for children), shall we? Even though my first book isn’t going to be a children’s book, it’s going to be a non-fiction, adult educational, personal and professional development book that has a strong child component to it. Go figure! And as I’m examining my outlook on life and how I choose to express that outlook in written words, I’ve noticed that I’ve been highly influenced by my children, others’ children, and children in general. There are so many lessons that adults can learn or be reminded of when observing children being who they genuinely are. I guess what I’m saying is that children, especially my own, have provided the inspirational spark to get my writing motor cranking. Quite honestly, Toodlez, Junior, and Little Man are the real reasons I started this blog.
This goal of writing children’s books is definitely far future-focused. I have several book ideas in the pike that I’d like to see hit the online bookshelves before I can even seriously think about switching gears over to children’s fiction (or non-fiction for that matter). I don’t know when this initial dream of mine will come to fruition, but I believe that it will materialize one day. I’m just going to be openly adaptable to whenever childlike creative inspiration slaps me right in the face. I image that how I respond to such a wake-up call will be the difference between staying in my comfy yet restricted space or venturing out into uncharted territory with unlimited possibilities.
degreesofmaternity.com 