I've Got The Fire Back!

Since Nanowrimo, I've been on a little hiatus. I edited all through December, but when January hit, I was in a slump. February didn't see an end to it. But here we are in March, and suddenly I have found my fire again.


Firstly, I have been working hard to maintain my blogs and website. I'm tweeting like a madwoman and writing ficlatte's while looking up writing contests. I have found a few that strike my fancy.


While puttering around on my blogs, I found my niche! That's a good thing because now I can try to market myself. I've been trying hard to do that for a while.



The one glitch in the system is that MailChimp and I have been fighting each other. Apparently, I need to build an email list to work on promotion. MailChimp is free, but not the most user-friendly. I have been trying to give out a free PDF and people aren't biting. I realized that the links are not working and the free stuff does NOT integrate with MailChimp. I even tried avoiding the PDF file altogether and just linking to a view only version on Google Docs and when I clicked on it from my test email, it failed.

Anyway, I'm reading , writing, and pushing forward after a rough start to 2018. I expect more hiccups to come, but for now, I'm enjoying the escalating ride up the hill. I hope it leads to an exhilarating ride.

Wordpress Website Fun

I found out, months later, that I actually paid for two domains when I paid Wordpress for my website.

I spent some time fleshing out those two and creating links and funnels between them. Basically, one is a landing page of sorts, complete with our short stories - hawkandyoung.com -

hawkandyoung.com

hawkandyoung.wordpress.com

 - and the other has our blog.  - hawkandyoung.wordpress.com Both have the same information for Contact and About and What We Do.

The trick was to make the link for 'blog' go to the wordpress.com site as well as link back to the main site when you clicked on 'home' while you were on the blog site.


But this all came about because I found my OLD Wordpress blog Spoonfuls of Sugar and I decided to use what I've learned from website building to make Spoonfuls better.

dailyspoonfulsofsugar.wordpress.com  (old website design)

And I edited the content and started using it to share positive posts. I'm a pretty laid-back and positive person, but I've noticed a growing trend with bouts of loneliness and depression in myself. I think it's something I'm going to keep track of.

Back to the websites...

It took me several hours to figure out what each tabbed part does on the Wordpress dashboard in order to customize my website. Some themes do things differently. I found a new theme I liked and changed Spoonfuls. There are a couple basic things I need to edit, but I like the thumbnail images for people to select the positive message they feel they need right now, or what speaks to them. I know that's how I want to use it.

dailyspoonfulsofsugar.wordpress.com

New website design!

I thought about making a website, and paying for it, for ElshaHawk, but having two sites for HawkandYoung, one for Spoonfuls, as well as two Blogger blogs, two Facebook pages, two Twitter accounts, LinkedIn, YouTube, Instagram, two Amazon author pages, and multiple ebook sites, I'm pretty busy!

I'm getting good at automating these accounts, however. Wordpress is great at sharing across Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, Instagram, and other social media sites. Blogger, not so much. Marketing is getting faster. I only need some sort of money maker and I'm golden!

Fear of Commitment - One Writer's Block

This is the final day of Spring Break and I made a Spring Break writer's goal, so it's time to review.

How'd I do?

Well, for starters.. I DID join Instagram. I shared a little bit of my research and that I was featured for a short while on Ficlatté dot com. elsha.hawk.

I went back to LinkedIN and Ficlatté to make sure they all linked together with this blog and my Twitter and Facebook and my Amazon author page. I just need CONTENT to share with you guys!




My co-author and I wrote about 5 more pages on our manuscript at the beginning of the week. We wrote through 3 scenes from our outline, but this past weekend we both got derailed. It happens. The scene we are working on is a good one. We just both lost the dialogue. What should the character say? How should the others respond? How do we get them out of this scene and on to the next one? When we both have time, we'll get back to work on it.

I also set up a YouTube and a Twitter account for my co-author stuff. I used this cool free logo maker to work on some logos and I picked one for Twitter, but I'm pretty sure it's not final. @hawkandyoung While my co-author doesn't tweet, I do. I can work on that.

What do you think? Some logos I made are more complex. I kinda think simple is best. And this is most likely not the official one. Now I can't even remember which logo maker I used..

While we don't have videos and I hate to be on camera because I sound silly and am anything BUT photogenic, that is no excuse for me not to write a script and put together a slideshow to share on YouTube some day. This is all groundwork for our future.

Then I looked into a website. I stared. The tab is still open on my browser. I sorta freaked.

Pressing the button to sign up and purchase a subscription with a domain and hosting is a commitment. Anything that involves money kinda feels huge and important as a decision. I know it's not a large amount of money, but it is revolving. I have to keep paying it. It means I have to be committed.


You said, it Abe.

If I create a website for us, we're big time. I want to have graphics and links to videos and all our stuff ready to go.

And I don't.

They say not to worry about that, to just have a website and go for it and make changes as you go. You can add stuff later.

Like email list dumps, about pages, more links...

This is me freaking out.

I don't want to go it alone. This is a combined effort of the two of us. We both need to make this leap.

So I stand at the precipice and stare into the abyss. The landing is promised to be soft. The way down is dark. I can't see the bottom.

I need a push.

Go Read and Review my Free Ebook "Alex in Hunterland"

Alex in Hunterland is a parody of Alice in Wonderland, but with a redneck spin. See if you can find all the 'redneck' stereotypes in this work.



Alex, scared of his drunken Step-Father, seeks solace in the gun cabinet. Climbing in, he discovers a world with an elusive snowshoe hare whose pelt would make his Step-Father proud of him and maybe stop hitting him. Chasing the rabbit, he encounters an array of characters and nonsensical outcomes. 

Please also give me some stars and a review! This is a quick read, at just under 2,000 words. 

Under Construction!

This blog is currently under construction as a place to post about my book

What I Learned In Tuvalu


So far, I have a proof copy coming to me from CreateSpace.

The book was written during NaNoWriMo 2008.
Here is my hook:
Left on a remote island in the South Pacific by his own father, Trenton must prove he has what it takes to return home to the family business. But even the best laid plans can go awry..

So what do you think?

I'm hoping that by blogging here I can stay motivated, share my experiences, and get a few readers. I plan on posting excerpts in the future; a little something to look forward to!