Monday, October 19, 2009

the projects in my head

I frequently have many project ideas floating around my head. I often scribble them down in my sketchbook, on post-its that find themselves affixed in odd locations, or in my moleskine notebook that continually rides in my purse and on various scraps of paper that may be within reach when an idea begins to surface or flesh itself out. Ideas often come at the most inconvenient times—take a couple weeks ago when I was running to a printer to pick up a project and bam! children's book idea hits me (this is the most frequent kind of idea that floats in my head—I've got 7 or 8 kids' book ideas in the works, mostly in my head). I frantically start pawing around in my purse while keeping my eyes on the road, grab a pen, find some random little envelope with a bit of gum stuck in one corner and then realize there is absolutely no way to write down my idea while driving down Kingston Pike in the middle of lunch hour traffic. So I put the free hand back on the wheel again and whisper the idea over and over again until I reach intended destination and can park. Usually at this point the idea starts to sound less exciting and ceases to excite me, but occasionally they will make it to scrap paper and then never see the light of day again. I have dreams of one day, in my retirement, pulling out a tattered scrapbook containing all my ideas and suddenly working them all out and becoming an amazing children's book writer/illustrator in my late 60's and dedicating each one to my grandchildren and my dear husband who never gave up on encouraging me to do children's books.

Well, lately I've had this type project rolling around in my head—at least for 7 months. And yesterday, during the second service sermon (which I was in because I sang in both services) I imagined another type project idea that would relate well to the first. And this morning, there came a third. So now, I'm going to attempt to embark on a type series project. My brain is still mulling out all the details of said project, but for once I decided to put it in the blogosphere and perhaps this would give me a sort of accountability to follow through and see where it leads. Soon this week I will sit down and put a description of the project and the parameters I'm mentally giving myself on here. I've said I will, so I will. Coming soon…

2 comments:

Dani J. said...

Caryn, I highly encourage you to continue with this project, or any project. I started writing a book a few months ago. I had characters (names, backgrounds, clothes, photos), towns, an outline, and a first chapter. I'm not working on it now since more German things are calling, but I hope that maybe I'll pick it up again a few years down the road. And it was a fun experience to work on something like that. Even if you don't finish, I think you'll find the process enjoyable.

Dani

DL said...

Fun to see you your blog! I can never find people on here, so I'm excited when they find me! Ha.

Hope to see you soon!
Dara Lynn