That was April, ‘pufft’ over in a flash, we are now officially a ¼ of the way through 2013- oh my!
This month has been massively productive for me as a writer, training in my craft. As far as making money and submitting my work it has been a month off. The writing schedule was only scantily clad this month, I shouldn’t feel I have missed many/ any opportunities really as there were only 3 major projects I wanted to attempt and all of them were competitions. 
I found with my brain split between 2 National Writing Month (International) projects (what could I possibly be talking about? Hmmmm…) I couldn’t get my head to produce ideas for short stories for competitions and I had very little time as in addition to the commitment of writing this month came a mighty pile of research!
Camp NaNoWriMo, (which I discovered in March), filled me with delight. This Spring I had read lots of posts about the challenge, when I looked into it – I was gutted to think I had to wait for Winter/ November to give it a go.
I started working on a manuscript in January which was sidelined in March (due to writing 2 book proposals and 4 submissions) I know Camp is about creating something new, there is no way I could leave the manuscript in its infancy and work on something new. Plus I was already labelled a camp ‘rebel’ for writing Non-Fiction. I vowed to add 50,000 words to my abandoned manuscript. 
What I have since discovered is the concept of a 100,000 word book may have been a stretch too far. I seem to have covered everything already – it’s just over 60K in its entirety. (Thanks to camp nanowrimo and the extra 54,089)
I am aiming now to spend time most weekends finishing the writing and editing. I need to look into markets that would accept a shorter version and if not I will hold onto a nearly finished manuscript and complete further research.
I had originally planned to write 8000 words or so a month on the manuscript, that was before I started the writing schedules, I had been lucky if I wrote a few 1000. Camp Nano has helped me more than double what I had hoped to produce by now. 
My brain is useless jelly, but I got away without any insect bites or blisters!
NaPoWriMo I discovered on the cusp of April and I am delighted I did. It was an idea conceived by Maureen T to help poets join in with the National Writing Month (Canada/USA) and as I am primarily a poet and find this genre as comfortable as an old pair of slippers I was over the moon to challenge myself to write a poem a day. I am currently working on collections of a 100 and plan to go back to the website and use all the prompts I didn’t use, by the end of the summer I should 60 more poems than I ever would have had by joining in this celebratory month! I emailed my thanks to Maureen and hope the website now stays active for me to complete some more poems by prompt. 
Towards the end of the Month in a fit of peak (realising I was about to have a Nano hole to fill and forgetting the need to obtain freelance work) I enrolled onto an online writing course with a University, it is a 6 week programme on composition and there are about 800 students from around the world involved. I have already submitted my 1st assignment, they started on 22nd and I enrolled on the 27th the Assignment was due 29th!
Lots of video material to watch and a brand new challenge for the next 6 weeks!
As for Awritersfountain, I am delighted with the growth of my blog. I thank you all for following, commenting and liking. It means a lot to me.
We have had 65 new followers 
Received 2 Blog Awards – Leibster and Shine On –
Received over 1000 likes
I hope the blog will continue to fill me with positivity and creativity, thank you all.
And in the real world…
I signed up for Writing Classes – starting mid May a short course to boost my knowledge of a genre I have only had minimal training in and have many ideas for.
At the beginning of April, I signed up for a wonderful Comedy Script Writing Workshop, which became one of my greatest Saturdays this year so far! I have met some great people through participating and was glad to start a network email list.
I looked for other opportunities and found out about some Performance Poetry (I used to be a Performance Poet) events and went along … to watch!
I have also booked myself onto a network meeting happening early in May.
A productive month:
| 54K | manuscript | |
| 30 poems | ||
| 1 workshop | ||
| 1 performance poetry event | ||
| 1 uni course assignment | ||
| booked more opps | ||
| Blog | 162 followers | |
| 2 awards | Leibester | |
| 1000 likes | Shine On | |
And in the galaxy far, far away from the tip tapping of writing keys… this month;
Mr G and I have managed to get our allotment ready with the first vegetables of the season planted and all the strawberry plants are rescued, weeds culled, and new tools used.
We have also MOVED MOUNTAINS with our current life plan/ mission that I have made reference to on this blog but until now not revealed. We are buying a new House, keeping fingers crossed but I do believe we are now near completion! (Now any mention of Workmen makes sense.)
I have experienced a nice couple of weeks off work for Easter, celebrated that weekend with my family and visited a friend who I hadn’t seen for a decade, she lives quite far away. So if you can have a road trip by yourself, that’s exactly what that was. It also deepened the realisation to give into more tech and get a Sat Nav! When you’re already driving half way up the country you needn’t add more than 80 miles in 3 ‘I’m a bit lost’ detours! The problem with motorways is you can’t just turn around.
I have managed to pack a few boxes – but not nearly enough – especially in the light of recent events and I have found time to go to work also!
Thanks for following,
Hope you all had an enjoyable April!
Happy writing x
awritersfountain 