Amazing

Kids are amazing. They can come up with anything simply by using their imagination. When my youngest daughter was sad because she couldn't go inside Minnie Mouse's house in Disneyland, my older daughter built one for her out of a cardboard box. The two of them played for hours in the makeshift house. It was amazing. And my youngest was never again sad about not being able to go inside Minnie Mouse’s house. To her, she had been there, and now she could visit it anytime she wanted in her own room. All it took was a cardboard box and imagination. As a writer, I want to do be just like them. I want to take my piece of paper and imagination, and create something amazing.

Catching Fireflies

Ideas are like fireflies. They fly around in a magical glow, just waiting to be caught. And we, as writers, have the job of searching for and catching these fireflies.

This may seem easy enough, but often times it isn’t. It can be a tricky thing to capture a firefly. Sometimes they fly so close, but we can’t quite reach them. Sometimes they are too quick and fleeting, and we don’t have enough time to grab them. And sometimes we are not paying close enough attention to find them.

That is why there is PiBoIdMo. For the entire month of November, we get the chance to catch 30 fireflies. PiBoIdMo gives us the jar (notebook) and motivation (daily posts) that we need in order to catch our fireflies. PiBoIdMo gets us moving. It gets us thinking. And it gets us searching.

This will be my third year participating in Tara Lazar’s PiBoIdMo, and I am excited. Every year that I have participated, I have come out with more than 30 ideas (or fireflies if you will).

There is something about participating that really puts your mind into firefly-catching mode. From the daily posts, to the Facebook page, PiBoIdMo is the perfect place to seek out and find ideas.

So come join me for this year’s PiBoIdMo, and see how many fireflies you can catch.

Artwork is courtesy of my eight-year-old daughter.

Not Every Idea is a Good Idea—Unfortunately

When it comes to picture books, there are lots of story ideas. But as picture book writers, it is important to learn to discern between a good idea and a not so good idea. But how does one do this? Here are 5 authors and their tips on how to do just that.

1)Kate Messner says to write more. “Write something else. Something new. Write more. Because if you’re anything like me, you may have to skip a lot of stones before you get it just right.” Read more of her blog post here. I highly recommend it.

2)Josh Funk says that some ideas don’t work, and that’s ok. “Just grab your notebook and find another one.” Read his blog post here.

3)Tammi Sauer says to start with the title. “For me, the absolute hardest part about the picture book creating process is coming up with a good idea. A wow idea. An irresistible-to-editors idea. One approach that has worked for me is to brainstorm a list of potential titles before I even know a single word of a manuscript.” Read the entire article here.

4)Kelly DiPucchio says to relax. “One thing I have learned is that you can’t force inspiration. You need to relax, go about life, and trust that new ideas will emerge when the time is right.” Read her entire answer here.

5)Tom Litchenheld uses photographs of kids. “For inspiration, I have a bunch of photos of kids on my wall. Whenever I'm stuck for an idea, I look at one of those photographs and think to myself, ‘What would make THAT kid laugh?’” Read more here.

Looks like there are many different ways to find that good idea.