Author: Elizabeth Spann Craig

I’m going to the Malice Domestic conference at the end of this month in Washington, D.C.

This has put me in a tizzy. Conferences and other types of public appearances do that to me. I’m on a panel, too. :)

Now, suddenly, I’m done with various deadlines (until revision deadlines come in) and I’ve got Malice coming up in just a few weeks.

Bookmarks!!!

I needed bookmarks. I’ve had postcards and business cards. But I needed bookmarks.

I’ve needed bookmarks for a while. I’m in a couple of promotional groups that are very good to promote me while they’re promoting their own events. I’ve sent along postcards to these folks, but really…I needed bookmarks.

Iconix is supposed to be one of the best places to order bookmarks online. A ton of authors have told me this. Somehow, something always came up, priority-wise for me, though….and I didn’t call to order them.

And so…I got down to the wire and suddenly Malice was right on top of me and it was too late to order them online and still mail them to Lorraine Bartlett who nicely offered to bring them for me to Malice since I’m flying.

So I decided to make my bookmarks on MS Publisher which is a program already on my computer. After designing them (which took maybe 30 minutes), I emailed the bookmark as an attachment to Office Max. I asked them to print them on card stock, in color, and to print about $50 worth…and gave them my cell phone number if they had any questions.

I’m not even sure exactly how many I got, but it’s definitely several hundred.

If you’re in a similar boat, here’s how to make a bookmark on Publisher: (they can be printed 4 to a 8.5 x 11 page), with space for trimming. This is right from the Microsoft Office website.

1. In the Publication Types list, click Blank Page Sizes.
2. Under Standard, click Create custom page size.
3. In the Custom Page Size dialog box, type 2″ in the Width box, and then type 7.5″ in the Height box.
4. In the Name box, enter a name for the new custom page size.
5. Click OK to close the Custom Page Size dialog box, and then click Create to create the bookmark.

   Customize your bookmark publication by adding any pictures, graphics, or text that you want. You can also customize by selecting color schemes or font schemes. For more information about any these tasks, search Publisher Help.

So I’ve learned two lessons from this experience.

One—You can make your own bookmarks in case of an emergency and get them back that same day. If you have Microsoft Office on your computer, you have MS Publisher. They may not be as nice as the Iconix ones, but they were nice enough for the Office Max worker to ask me if I were “the bookmark lady” when I walked in and then ask me for a bookmark.

Two—Perfectionism takes up time and makes me lose out on opportunities. It’s better, for me anyway, to just go with something that works fine and use it instead of miss out on promotions.

Are you putting anything off until you can do it perfectly?

For the past month, I’ve been dying to spring clean. But my schedule has been so busy that I haven’t had time to do more than just basic maintenance around the house.

The house definitely needs it. But I also try to fit in some writing-specific spring cleaning this time of year, too. It’s not hard to remember to do it—my desk is always crazy in April from having done taxes, and it reminds me to clear some space for my writing!

Are your financial and other documents encroaching on your writing space? I’ve finished my taxes, so I’m packing up 2009’s important receipts and documents in a box. Unimportant docs are being shredded. How long should you keep financial records? This link can help my American readers and my friends from other countries should be able to Google for a similar link.

My work space is usually the sofa in my den. I’m clearing off everything in that area to make it easier for me to think. I may move or give away old knickknacks, put the newspapers and magazines in the recycling bin, and try to look at the space with fresh eyes to make sure it still fits my needs.

As much as I’ve tried to eliminate paper from my creative process, I still have Post-It notes and papers from old WIPs. I’m throwing away papers from WIPs that have been submitted. If there are any for my current WIP, I’m making a new folder for them to keep them in one place until I transcribe them…which should be just a day.

I back up everything.

I clean off my computer desktop for improved organization and computer performance.

I organize my random Word files into folders.

Part of my spring cleaning process for writing is to figure out my direction for the year—what are my writing goals?

Has the spring cleaning bug bitten you yet?

I was at the grocery store (again) yesterday before taking ten kids to my son’s 13th birthday paintball party. I was buying lots of chips and soft drinks.

I saw a woman in the produce section and had one of those “oh no” moments where I desperately tried to come up with her name. And this was someone I was supposed to know. Could I hide? Retreat into the dairy section? Shoot! She saw me…

Then suddenly it came to me. “Peggy!!” I said with delight. “How are you, Peggy? And Peggy….how is your son? Have y’all had a good spring break, Peggy?”

Because, if I’m that proud of myself for remembering a name, I’m by-golly going to overuse it like a maniac. Whereas she, after greeting me with a “Hi, Elizabeth” once, didn’t mention my name again. Clearly, she doesn’t have the same memory problems that I do.

I laughed at myself on the way back home, because overusing names is a dialogue problem I’m prone to. Before emailing my WIP to my editor, I make a pass to make sure the characters aren’t referring to each other by name multiple times in the course of a conversation. It’s a useful device for a writer because it eliminates the need for ‘said Johns’ during the section of dialogue.

But it’s just not natural. Ordinarily.

Do you have particular issues that you have to guard for and edit out? Mistakes you’re prone to make?

It’s been a month since my daughter learned to ride a bike.

We were all really excited—now we could ride bikes as a family! Charlotte, North Carolina, has greenways that go on for miles and are nice and flat and perfect for bike riding. And, right now, with highs into the upper 70s, the weather is perfect.

My husband and son go mountain biking together on a pretty regular basis.

I was the only one who hadn’t ridden in 8 years. And my daughter was bike riding like a little maniac since she’d learned how.

“Do you want to practice a little?” asked my husband, a few weeks ago. “Before we get out to the greenway and everything?”

But I shook my head. “You don’t forget how to ride a bike,” I said. Everybody knows that.

Well, let me tell you. You might not forget how to ride a bike, but you can be really, really rusty.

I couldn’t remember how to work all the gears. Were the smaller numbers for going up a hill and the larger numbers for going down one? Or vice versa? And we started off in a gravelly area before the trail became smooth. So….I steered off the path and fell off the bike.

“Let’s wait on Mama,” my husband called to the kids.

We’ve gone riding twice since then. I rode yesterday for nearly 8 miles. And now I’m much better again, but still not quite as steady as my 8 year old daughter who rides almost every day.

I just handed in the second Memphis Barbeque book last Monday. And I had every intention on taking a short break because—I can use a break.

But while we were in Alabama, ideas started pouring in for Memphis book 3 (due in November). I wrote them all down. And then more ideas came and I thought: “Well, what the heck.” And I started writing the book.

I write every day anyway. But I wasn’t going to work on the next book yet—I thought maybe I’d try some flash fiction for fun or some short poems (I’m not a good poet, but hey—it’s worth a try.) Just to keep my hand in it.

But the momentum is still there from all the work I put in the last couple of months on book 2. I’m still in that world. And—I’m worried that if I take a break from it, I’ll be rusty. And I don’t want to fall off my bike.

So I’ve decided to go ahead and write the next book. But I’m not going to keep up the pace that I have for the last couple of books. I’m going to write a little less each day. I’m going to do plenty of brainstorming. I think I’m going to take a slower approach and keep the ideas flowing, but not get any more burned out.

Have you modified your own schedule either to include more writing practice, or to slow down your pace?

For a few months, I’ve seen tell-tale signs of social media burnout at some of my usual haunts—on different blogs, Twitter, maybe a little on Facebook. Mostly from bloggers.

I think those of us who are big into the blogging world really like it. We’re hooked. We like reading other people’s blogs, commenting on blogs, visiting our friends on Facebook or Twitter, and writing our own blog posts.

And because we enjoy it so much, we keep doing it. Or we find it really hard to cut back when things in our non-virtual life get busy with family commitments, holidays, work, etc.

But our online friends are friends, too. We want to keep up with them, support them, and generally just stay in the loop.

How much time does an active blogging and social media life take? It depends on how wide we’ve thrown our net online.

Those of us who have a lot of online friendships and connections probably spend 30 minutes writing our own posts (times however many days a week we blog), 20 minutes responding to comments on our own blog, maybe 30-45 minutes commenting on others’ blogs (this number can go way higher, though), and maybe 30-45 minutes on Facebook or Twitter, whichever our poison of choice is.

So…maybe 2 hours a day or more for a really dedicated blogger?

Then, though, life gets a little wild for all of us. We just don’t stay suspended in our routines for all that long before something comes along to trip us up.

But we’ve established our routines online. In fact, I could do spin-the-wheel, pick a commenter’s name on this blog, and tell you the time of DAY that they probably commented, without looking at my blog. And most people know that I usually comment at about 5 or 5:30 a.m. EST, unless I’ve got craziness in my house getting the kids to school…then I comment around 8:00. I do a second sweep in the late afternoon. I’m a big routine nut.

I’ve been very erratic the last 4-5 weeks as my deadline approached. And I hate being erratic.

But I want everyone to know (and I think you know) that I love your blogs. And your tweets and your status updates. If for some reason I’m not there some days, believe me, it’s not because I don’t want to be. It’s because I’m juggling more things than I’d like.

And those of you who need to take a blogging break to focus on work or family or for just some rest time or writing time—we’ll all be there when you get back from your break. Don’t worry at all about it—I’m guessing most of us just browse blogs through our Google Reader and when your blog is back up, we’ll be right back to visit you. Because I’ve seen some anxiety from bloggers about what will happen to their blog and readers while they’re gone.

Although…if you could maybe do a short post to tell us that you’re taking a break from blogging for a week to rest up or to devote to writing or whatever? Otherwise, you’ll likely get a “Checking Up On You” email from me (don’t laugh—some of you have gotten one from me before. You know who you are.) :)

And if you can’t run by and comment on my blog some days…believe me, I understand. We’re all doing our very best to juggle so many different things. We’ll still be friends! I’m sure most of us feel that way.

We all do what we can. Sometimes we’ll need to cut back on visiting, or cut back on posting, or even take a blogging vacation.

We’ll all be there when you get back.