I'm either late in visiting my goals for the second quarter or early for visiting them in the third quarter. I'll go with the latter.
Here is the list of goals I set for myself at the end of 2013, along with updates on how I'm doing.
Daily Bible reading between 8 and 8:30 a.m.
This one went well until summer vacation. Then I stopped reading altogether. I'm still putting together lessons for the kids once a week and I compiled the majority of the vacation Bible school program we used this year, but I still want to make time during the last part of 2014 to get back to daily Bible reading--even if it's less than a chapter a day.
Reduce blogging/reviewing duties.
I had a bit of help with this one. The new job that I started in June hasn't allowed me to blog or read as much as I was. I've stayed mostly committed to not taking on new books for review, which has helped too.
Complete the first draft of my middle grade historical Amelia's Mission by February 28th.
Never happened and still not done. I'm not upset about it. The great thing is that I joined a local writers group this year, so I am getting tremendous feedback on this story. If I can back away from other things (not likely right now, but one can hope) I'll be able to pick up writing where I left off--partway through Chapter 13.
Research one new publisher/agent a month. I want to submit more often.
I stuck to this for a while, but haven't performed any research for a few months. I haven't increased my submissions, but I did receive an acceptance for another picture book earlier this year.
Write one short story for submission each quarter.
I've given up on this one. It just needs to sit for a bit while I get acclimated to my new job and finish off the first draft of Amelia's Mission. I'm so stoked about Amelia's story that I don't want to spend time working on anything else.
As you can see, there is some success in this list and some areas where I didn't meet expectations. Overall, I'm still feeling good about my writing year. My hope is that once I get going with the real estate, I'll be able to focus on writing part of the time. I know I'll want to promote Little Shepherd and A Christmas Kindness again this fall, so my mind will be in the right place for it.
