June Goals Recap

Happy Summer, my friends! This month was a fun change of pace from the relentless toll of schoolwork, and my social calendar filled up fast. Between my busy work schedule, graduation and birthday parties, catch-up lunch dates and a friend’s wedding, I did my best to also catch up on my writing goals, often sneaking words in during road trips. I’ll be going back to campus in the fall, and I don’t want to take in-person learning for-granted after the last year and a half of zoom university. Since I anticipate throwing myself into clubs, research, and studies, I also know I need to make the best of this summer for the sake of my WIPs. “For everything there is a season, and a time for every activity under heaven…” (Ecclesiastes 3). Since this summer will be my season of writing before setting it aside, I made my creative goals fairly ambitious this month, and I’m pleased with how much progress I’ve made, even though there’s always a nagging voice in the back of my head that I could be doing more.

Overall Goals: Won by 1 point – 14/26 goals

Creative goals: Won by 3 points – 8/11 goals

Draw 15 Things – I did 6, and some of them were gifts for my 600 follower giveaway on tumblr! Not a win, but satisfying nonetheless, since I got to draw some new OCs for my friends.

Batch Posts and Start Using a Social Media scheduler – I downloaded an app called Combin and it works pretty well, but only when my computer is on. If I’m at work in the mornings, it can’t connect to Instagram and posts late. But I’ve got one, and I’m working out the bugs to figure out what works for me, so I’m calling this a win.

Catch up on Goodreads Reading Goal – I far surpassed this! My goal for the year is 24 books. As of writing this post, I’ve completed 14 of those, putting me three books ahead of schedule. I’m currently reading four things at once in four different mediums, so I think I’m well on track to winning this yearly goal.

Learn to Play 2 Songs on the Guitar – I learned “Drinking Song” by House Phone after the artist uploaded an instructional video to YouTube. This is one of Weswin’s main playlist songs, so I was thrilled to learn it for myself. I also wrote two songs for him to sing in the story, and while they aren’t very smooth yet, I’m still counting them. If you aren’t familiar with Weswin, he’s a traveling bard with a magical curse who features in The Laoche Chronicles!

Write Through Midpoint Twist in Runaways – plot-wise, yes! My WC is 11,488 which is a little shorter than I would have expected, but I’m an underwriter and the second half should be longer by virtue of the plot, so I’m not too worried! This has been a really fun WIP so far, and I’ve enjoyed sharing excerpts and aesthetics as I write.

Edit 3 Chapters of Storge – About that underwriter thing… In the first draft of the book, the middle is go-go-go nonstop drama, and the pacing is way too fast. The characters don’t have any time to breathe or develop, so the next three chapters of Draft 2 consist of writing whole new scenes. I’ve had a lot of fun with it so far, but since it’s drafting from scratch, I didn’t finish the whole goal. My most recent scene is one of my favorites to-date, though! Luca and Grace get to explore the Avian city for the first time, so I get to show off my cool worldbuilding and their relationship with Acheran.

Write literally anything in LAFA – This poor fanfic has been on hiatus for 9 months and I’d like to finish it so it can stop haunting my waking dreams lol. In the end, fan-work takes second priority to my original work, but I put this goal on my list every month to keep reminding myself anyhow.

Queue blog posts so I don’t miss one on the busy weeks – Haven’t missed one yet, and I had an event every weekend this month. In fact by the time this goes up, July’s scheduling will be done. 😀

Do Website Update – I’m assuming you’ve seen my new homepage and other updates if you’re reading this, but I’m satisfied with how they turned out for being self-made and self-taught. The updates also seem to be helping traffic, so I’m pleased with it. Let me know what you think!

Do Publishing Research on the Current Market (Self and Trad) – Not only did I take 27 pages of notes on the topic, I’ve also compiled it into an easy-to-follow guide that will be posting next week! I shared a google docs link on my tumblr in June, but it contained several redundancies and wasn’t organized well, so hopefully this will be a useful resource for anyone looking to publish in the near future. It’ll contain links to my citations as well, to provide a jumping-off point for more research.

Do Marketing Research, and Write a Short Story for My New Mailing List – Guys, I am SO PROUD of the short story I’ve put together for the mailing list. It’s a 5 page long poem about a side character that cameos in Runaways, and I’ve gone through four edits and three beta reads already trying to make it sound perfect. It’s Younger Sibling Approved, and the whole thing rhymes. If you want to get a free copy at the end of the month, be sure to sign up for the email list! I’ll be mailing out PDFs on the 30th.

That’s all I have for today, but I hope you’re as excited as I am for the stuff I have planned this month! Again, if you want to request a topic for a blog post, feel free to message me or leave a comment. Happy writing!

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