Monday, December 5, 2011

December Madness

Ready, set, go! The holiday season is upon us along with all the ensuing craziness.

Things are particularly hectic at Casa Daniels this year since my parents will coming to stay with us for a week before moving into their snowbird condo a couple days before Christmas. We also have other relatives coming for a week around New Years. Add to that all the Christmas and Hanukkah activities and you have reigning chaos.

But between the shopping trips, cooking marathons and seasonal decorating, I always try to assess the previous year. What did I do right, what did I do wrong?

One thing that I think I did right was to self-publish a few manuscripts I had laying around collecting dust. The proceeds from said dusty books more than paid for all the gifts this year, and then some. I also wrote and sold my first series, Long and Hard. Amazingly, I had fifteen books release in 2011 - my most fruitful year ever, by far.

Some things I'd do differently if I could - I'd devote more time to sitting with my butt in the chair, writing. I'd attend more chapter meetings of my local RWA chapter and I'd read more books. The beautiful thing about every one of these coulda-shoulda-woulda's is that I can change them all in the coming year.

What about you? What habits would you change if you could? Will you?

8 comments:

Michelle Polaris said...

Ditto on the writing more. There's always hope for 2012.

Terry Odell said...

Congrats on all your publications. I've branched out into a "new" genre--mystery, although I always thought I was writing mysteries, even though they're marketed as romantic suspense. I wish I'd done it sooner, but I'm hoping to continue the series.


Terry
Terry's Place
Romance with a Twist--of Mystery

Wynter said...

Thanks, Terry. Good luck with your latest genre. yeah, not really so new to you;-)

Callie Croix said...

15?! 15?!

O_O

I bow to your prolific awesomeness. And good for you for self pubbing those books.

I love that you mentioned you wish you'd done more reading. I still adore curling up with a book (er, Kindle) and have been doing a whole lot more of that lately. This coming year I'm going to bite off little mouthfuls as you suggested to me, and make sure I reward myself for meeting those targets. Baby steps!

Best of luck with all your holiday preparations. It's such a busy time of year!

Jina Bacarr said...

I agree with you re: more reading for the enjoyment of it. I'm always deep in research mode but I enjoy it.

Congrats on a stellar year of publishing! Most admirable.

Wynter said...

Thanks, ladies.

Casey Crow said...

Congrats on all your success, Wynter!

Paige Tyler said...

I have a habit of editing as I write! I keep working on that! LOL!

*hugs*
Paige