I'll be in the garden...

I've learned I seem to be a seasonal writer, with more productive outputs over the longer, darker winter months. Once the sun begins to shine, I'm distracted by the garden. Over the long weekend the weather has been glorious and I've been tempted outside quite a lot. There has been some work done in the garden - by work, I mean gardening  - strimming, weeding, mowing, planning and planting.

But I've also had the luxury of some time to rest and enjoy catching up on reading in the garden accompanied by bees buzzing and boastful birdsong.

Despite receiving a few rejections in recent weeks and some writing related plans not going quite as planned, I've been working on some new projects. Most of them will need strimming, weeding, mowing, planning and planting.

And inspired by gardeners with 'Writing Gardens' (especially Monty Don), I’ve recently introduced some writing inspiration to my garden. While you could fit my garden into Longmeadow several times over, I'm hoping that under the bard's watchful eye writer's block will become a thing of the past and that I'll be inspired to write outdoors more over the summer months.

I don't do football....

Football is not my thing, never has been and never will be, but that didn't stop me enjoying a football themed book launch last night. Along with some writing friends we gathered at the Crescent Arts Centre in Belfast to help Jenny Ireland launch her third YA novel 'Matched Up' out into the world. 

With some of the audience sporting football shirts, football partyware, delicious sweet treats and goodie bags we were spoiled!

It was a lovely relaxed event with the coolest of music and included Jenny reading from her new novel. I was delighted to get my copy of the book signed and touched to see our gang of writing pals included in the acknowledgements. 

Writing can be a slow and solitary process so it's great to build connections and support networks to keep encouraging and motivating each other when things don't go to plan. And it's such a joy to be able to celebrate our writing pals' successes at events like this. 

It was a lovely end to a good writing day, which had started out with squeezing in some time to write out in the garden in the morning.

The beach is calling

It felt like a summer's day down at Coney yesterday, with the sun shining, brilliant blue skies and litter pickers tidying the beach. 

And it reminded me of many happy summer days we've had there. It’s been a while since we've all been together, with a lot happening so we had much to catch up on and talk about. 

With the sun warming our backs we spent a lovely morning talking over coffee and chocolate and banana muffins, shared some of our work and some of our plans, (some of which are very exciting!) and we also did a writing exercise. 

And inspired by the morning, the theme continued in the afternoon back home in the garden when I caught up on some reading.

Plans coming to life

In the last couple of weeks, a couple of projects that have been in the planning phase for a while finally came to life.

Last year I was invited to take part in a project with Mid and East Antrim Council during Democracy Week where local schools vote for 'Top Children's Author'. Democracy week took place a couple of weeks ago, coinciding with World Book Day.

This project was a fun way to teach young people about elections with the children reading our manifesto, voting and then taking part in the counting.

Thanks to everyone who voted for me, on this my first foray into elections and congratulations to the winner, Paddy Donnelly.  I'm pleased to say I didn't lose any deposit in this election.

Yesterday I had a busy day in Belfast in the company of children's illustrators and writers. On the way into town on the train I managed to get a bit of writing done.

In the morning we had a good turn out at our local SCBWI Ireland meet up over coffee. It was good to catch up with other creatives and hear how their projects are progressing. It's always inspiring being in the company of other writers and illustrators.

In the afternoon we held a SCBWI Ireland in-person writing workshop at the Seamus Heaney centre at Queen's University. 

I'd been working with Shirley McMillan, current NI Children's Writing Fellow over recent weeks planning this so I was very excited to see these plans come to fruition.

We had a great afternoon sharing and learning new tips and there was also time for a practical exercise writing a synopsis for a MG or YA novel. It was great fun, productive and a very enjoyable way to spend the afternoon.

I'm still buzzing from the creative sparks ignited at both events yesterday. And it's always a bonus to pick up a free book.

Now to get on with a new project  - yesterday's acquisition may just come in very handy.....

 

Writing Round Up

It's been a busy few days with lots of exciting writing activities taking place. Over the weekend I went along to a couple of events in the Look North festival. The first one was a children's writing workshop with Shirley McMillan. It was good to meet other writers there and during writing exercises develop a nugget that could be revisited.

While I missed the main launch of the Translink and Ulster University's 'Poetry in Motion' anthology a couple of weeks ago, I managed to pick up my copy last week and enjoyed dipping into it on the journey home.

Over the weekend I managed to get along to a poetry reading in York Street station where some of the organisers shared contributors' work. It was a lovely event - drinking coffee while being read poetry.

Last night we held another SCBWI Ireland 'Picture This, Write Now' session. It's good to make some time to write and doing this and chatting with other writers across Ireland provides each other with encouragement.

Over the last few days, between rejections I've also received news of an exciting new project I'm going to be involved in - more about that in due course. 

In the meantime I've been doing some spring cleaning and tidying in preparation for World Book Day later this week.

Have a good one when it arrives! 

Ups and Downs

The last couple of weeks have been strange with a real mix of emotions being experienced at various points - highs and lows.

Nearly a fortnight ago we heard very sad news that one of our very dear friends in our writing group, had passed away suddenly. We're all still reeling from this news. During the last week we gathered at one of his happy places to remember him.

We went along to the Black Box where he had regularly been a Tenx9 contributor and remembered him and also supported one of our group in her first Tenx9 story. A very special night.

I've just returned from a blissful few days at The River Mill writing retreat where I've enjoyed good company, the best of food and had time to write.

https://www.the-river-mill.co.uk/rooms-prices

It has been a sensory indulgence, spoiled by gorgeous food, February sunshine warming the garden between the storms. DJ the cat is the perfect host.

I took advantage of time to read and write and made progress on a new project. While I was there I received good news about a couple of very exciting writing projects, sprinkled with a couple of rejections. 

More news about one of them soon I hope. 😀 While I was here I made new connections and  memories. One of the abiding memories will be sitting at my desk watching for the first time a video made of my poem 'The Journey Home's Soundtrack'. I'd written this as part of Translink and Ulster University's 'Poetry in Motion' campaign. I'd heard earlier in the week that a video had been made with an actor reading my poem and was delighted at how it brought my poem to life. It's perfect. Here's The link to the video 

https://x.com/Translink_NI/status/1892880850791899402?t=aY2knBIyZUyTsBcukeFmqg&s=19

Dragging myself away from the River Mill's delicious food back home was a challenge  - but made all the sweeter when I returned to find my contributer copies of Yarns 4 had arrived. I'm delighted that two of my poems made it into this Ulster Scots anthology along with so much good work.

The heart of stories

February has got off to a busy start for my writing.

In the first week I've met up with my writing group, hosted another Picture This, Write Now creative session with SCBWI Ireland, attended a webinar about Getting Published, had an acceptance, done some writing and been to the theatre. Stories have been at the heart of all of these activities.

Catching up with fellow writers last weekend we shared news and stories we've been working on.

I took the opportunity to do some further work on a story at our SCBWI Ireland creative space on Monday evening. This is a great way to connect with other writers across Ireland and it's good to schedule some time to write. I also enjoyed hearing what the others had been working on.

Duting the week I had a story accepted by Writing.ie for their Mining Memories section. You can read 'Through the Keyhole' here:

https://www.writing.ie/tell-your-own-story/morna-sullivan/

I also took delivery of a hardback copy of 'Sky Surfing' from the Dirigible Balloon  - its even more gorgeous than the paperback edition. 

You can order a copy of this beautiful anthology of poems for children here:

https://dirigibleballoon.org/shop

Last night we went on a long awaited theatre trip to see the National Theatre's production of War Horse in Belfast's Grand Opera House. It was magical, with phenomenal puppetry, effects and superb acting.

But at the heart of it was a really good story  - Michael Morpurgo at his very best.