Friday, September 30, 2011

oh, the early work: a contest/blogfest!

Back in February, I put myself out there and started making blog friends. I wanted to throw a party, but felt kind of dumb doing so.

In April, I had my first blogaversary, or however you spell that made-up word. I didn't say anything, because, well, who would notice? I wasn't very prolific, which embarrassed me. A bunch of blogs I read had garnered huge followings before the end of six months. I kept my mouth shut, when I should have danced in the streets. Go me!

In May, I finished my first draft of my first novel, which I did announce, but never really celebrated here. I wanted to, though! It was the best feeling in the world.

In August, I joined the Campaign, which was a huge step, also deserving of a party that had yet to come {insert obligatory "please vote for my flash fiction piece, if you feel inclined and have not done so already! #141, yeah yeah!"}.

And then, this week, I finally made it to 100 followers, and I realized,

Yep. The time has come.
Time for presents.

source, yo.
The truth is, as I've blabbed about a million times before, this blogging journey has truly blessed me. If you would like to hear me gush further, read this post about skunks and crit partners.

So, hey. Let's not just have presents, let's have a contest!

During Christine Tyler's Sparkfest, an idea struck me. I would be really, intensely interested to hear about the "early work" of my fellow writers, and I'd love to share my own.

I'll just tell you know.
My first story ever was about two sad dinosaurs who fell in love and weren't sad anymore.
hey.
         
aw, and now they're happy! yay!
It was awesome. I was six.

In middle school, I filled up a notebook--in stylish burgundy ink--with a story about a girl whose best friends were the wolves behind her house. Sound familiar? It was TERRIBLE. And terribly amusing. Not surprisingly, I giggled through the whole first half of this book.

you can't fight the wolf shirt.
{but it wouldn't hurt to think twice before wearing it to church.}
Are you as excited as I am to hear what crazy/hilarious/embarrassing/possibly disturbing things your fellow bloggers thought up as children? I should hope so, or no one's going to have fun with this. Ha.

A few requirements, to get us started. Please follow me, if you haven't done so already. I want to make sure you'll see the announcement if you win! Let me know in the comments if you tweet/FB/blog about this contest, and I'll give you an extra entry {for each platform} for the random drawing. I don't have a nifty jpeg for this contest/blogfest, so if you include an image of a wolf or a dinosaur, or both, I'll give you another extra entry.

There will be three winners.

Update: more info on the prizes (a copy of Laini Taylor's Daughter of Smoke and Bone, for example) can be found in this post.

Enter your link on the list below-- after you've written your post {please pretty please}-- between now and October 14th 28th. Winners will be announced the next day! {Or maybe the day after that, depending on the level of sanity around here.} The line at the bottom says to comment after you've left a link, but feel free to do so beforehand. I'm not that picky.

Thanks, everyone! See you in the funny pages.

Oh, P.S, this is open internationally. Postage, schmostage.

{Thanks to everyone who participated!}

23 comments:

  1. What a super fun idea. :) Too bad I really can't enter... or maybe I can... hmmm... I'll have to think on that. (I might just be too embarrassed to share my "early work".)

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  2. All I have of my early days is a few short stories. Would one of those do? (assuming I can get over the embarrassment!)

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  3. Elisabeth: Don't be embarrassed! We're all in it together. :)

    Sarah: That would be great! And, I should have clarified, you don't have to actually share the work. Just talking about it is fine with me.

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  4. And now I don't have to think of something to write for Monday. Thank you for solving my problem! :P

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  5. I am doing this. :D i wrote so much crap as a child. when i do it do i link it back to this comment section below?

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  6. Rhianne: If you mean a blog post advertising this contest for extra entries, linking to it in the comments will be fine. If you mean the contest post itself, I'd go for the linky list above. I hope it works! (btw, your name is gorgeous.)

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  7. Naw, thanks for saying my name is gorgeous and I entered. :)

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  8. My first written story was about a puppy whose mother died. I wrote it in a diary that had a picture of dogs on the front.

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  9. Ohmylands. Buckle up, because I've got a doozy.

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  10. This is, er, a little embarrassing, but because you're in the campaign and because you're willing to put your wolf/dinosaur stuff out there . . . here's my entry.

    I was about six, maybe seven, when I came up with the idea for a play about (OMG I'm actually going put this down in a comment!) vegetables in a refrigerator. Yep. That was the grand plan. And then I cast my friends. Mrs. Tomato, Mr. Cabbage (He was type cast.) and the Queen of Celery. In the play the battle was largely over which one of these veggies were the most nutritious and most likely to please the palate. That was it. We rehearsed. We stuck fliers in our neighbors' mailboxes and coerced my grandfather to let use his garage for the performance. At 10¢ person we raked in an amazing 50 ¢ and splurged on sundaes. Grandpa subsidized the acting troop so we could each have our own.

    Of course, I'll fb, tweet whatever. I don't have any wolfie or dinosaur critters to offer and I'm already a follower. :-)

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  11. Oh, sounds like fun. I'll post the deets about my first (extremely silly) story Oct. 5 and come back to link.

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  12. Those pics are precious!
    you want a button? i'm on it!

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  13. I know exactly what I am putting up. Unfortunately I can't get my hands on it until the 10th, at least.

    But oh, it will be great.

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  14. Fun times! I'm going to think hard about it and hopefully post next week. Btw, your blogging story is very much like mine. Except cooler. Especially now that prizes are involved.

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  15. Oh dang, this post brings back memories. I'll have to write a post about it.

    as soon as i finish my english essay.... :(

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  16. come by tomorrow and pick up an award =)

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  17. Just put in my entry. What a fun contest! I loved it. :)

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  18. Ha I love this idea... since I don't delete anything I have tons of writing I wrote when I was younger saved away! Thanks for doing this.

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  19. Julie, I had so much fun doing this. It was fun to go through all of my early stuff and see what I was thinking back then. Thanks :)

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  20. Thanks so much for extending the deadline - I love this blogfest idea!

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  21. This was a lot of fun. Thanks so much for hosting!

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  22. Awesome idea! I posted today and I'm Tweeting about it :)

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  23. Thanks for giving the chance to dig through all my crazy writing... :)I just posted the awesomeness.

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