Advent Calendar for Writers

Did you ever do an Advent Calendar when you were little?  Every day you got a little morsel of chocolate.  Now that we're adults, we can eat chocolate whenever we want, so I don't see the appeal in the traditional Advent Calendar.  But, in the spirit of improving my writing, I thought I'd put together a fun December schedule of writing activities to put the Christmas spirit to work in my writing.  I am also working on brevity, so my word count may be a bit limiting intentionally.  I will be sharing my responses on this blog, and I encourage any writers out there to use this as they see fit, and share your responses as you wish. 

 

1 - Coming out of the Thanksgiving season, write a blog post about what you're thankful for.  If you've already done that, write a blog about what you're looking forward to (in the next week or in the coming month, keep it short-term).  Word count: 300 - 700.

 

2 - Write a Christmas letter (whether you send it or not is up to you) about what you've been up to this past year.  Word count: 350 - 650.

 

3 - Compose five tweets about your favorite parts of Christmas, with links to a graphic, video or song.  What gets you into the Christmas spirit?  What do you look forward to (eating/drinking/singing/watching/doing)?  Word count limited to 140 characters in each post.  

 

4 - Write a short essay on the best Christmas gift (1) you've received, (2) you've given, and (3) you'd like to give.  Word count: 450 - 1500.

 

5 - Write a short story about the holidays in some fictional world - on Mars, set in the future, or set in your favorite fictional world, etc.  Word count: 500 - 750.

 

6 - Write a parody to a beloved Christmas song or poem.  Word count: varies

 

7 - Write a blog post about what you're looking forward to in the following year.  Word count: 300 - 700.  

 

8 - Create a To Do list of the best Christmas traditions to partake in or to start.  Word count: 150 - 450.  

 

9 - Write a review of a product you've purchased or received in the last year that you absolutely love.  Who else would want one?  What makes it unique and life-changing?  Word count: 300 - 650.  

 

10 - Write a blog post about your favorite quote from a Christmas movie.  Include a clip if you can find one!  Word count: 300 - 700. 

 

11 - Write a short narrative about the worst (and/or most comical) Christmas disaster you've experienced or heard about.  Word count: 300 - 750.  

 

12 - Interview a friend, colleague or distant family member about their Christmas traditions and write a blog post about it.  Word count: 350 - 900.  

 

13 - Write an essay about the true meaning of Christmas.  Word count: 450 - 1500.  

 

14 - Use your stories from #5 or #11 to write a Seussical short rhyming story.  Word count: 75 - 400. 

 

15 - Write a short narrative about your favorite Christmas from your childhood.  What made it feel magical?  Did you believe?  Word count: 500 - 900.  

 

16 - Write a report to Santa that an Elf on the Shelf would write if he was watching you.  Have you been naughty or nice?  Word count: 300 - 650. 

 

17 - Write an essay describing what would be a perfect Christmas holiday for you.  Who would be there?  Where would you celebrate?  What would you do?  Word count: 450 - 1100.

 

18 - Write a blog about Christmas shopping, what you love, what you hate, what you might do differently next year.  Word count: 400 - 700. 

 

19 - Use your response in #15 to write a dystopian version of the story.  Word count: 500 - 1200. 

 

20 - Compose five tweets about the ironies of Christmas.  

                              - OR -  

      Write an essay about the logistics of Santa Claus, how the elves know what to make, how Santa delivers presents to all the kids in just one night, how Rudolph's nose shines bright enough to lead the way through fog without blinding Santa, etc.  

 

21 - Write an original poem about family, winter, holidays, traditions, love or peace.  Word count: varies.  

 

22 - Write a letter to someone who is no longer walking this Earth.  What would you want to tell him/her?  How would Christmas be different if he/she was still here?  Word count: varies. 

 

23 - Write a blog post about your favorite Christmas song or story, and the emotions it makes you feel.  Word count: 450 - 900. 

 

24 - Write a warm holiday greeting for social media, that rhymes to send to your friends and family.  Take a nice picture or choose one from earlier in the year to share with it.  Word count: 25 - 100.  

 

25 - Write a heart-felt thank you for all the memories you've made and gifts you've received. Word count: 35 - 75.  

                                                       - OR - 

      Write a short narrative about the fun you had celebrating Christmas this year, and what made it so special.  Word count: 400 - 750. 

Creating Pin-able Graphics (Hack)

Pinterest is an amazing home of flowing ideas and viral images perpetuated by self-described addicts.  Known for identifying more recipes and crafty ideas than one could ever conceivably actually create in a lifetime, Pinterest is also a great place to share business ideas, especially for entrepreneurs, and lifestyle ideas.  Pretty much anything with a picture can be pinned, and that's what makes Pinterest so powerful - its a way to organize, keep and refer to ideas, places and things we saw in this insanely overwhelming information overload we call the internet.  I have written previously about how to put Pinterest to better use, because I believe that its potentially has been largely untapped for individual users.  Now I'd like to spend some time on how to drive traffic to places outside of Pinterest by creating awesome graphics that show up well on Pinterest.   

Step 1 - Tools

As with many graphic design requirements, I use PowerPoint to collect images and I want to use and manipulate them into a collage of text, shapes and pictures.  You may also want to check out canva, at least for inspiration or to throw something together quickly, but in my opinion it is not ready as a tool for complete creation yet.  My recommendation for Pin-able graphics is to start with a blank presentation and use the Design ribbon to set the Slide Orientation to Portrait (longer vertically).  

Step 2 - Sizing

Limit yourself to about a third of the page.  If you don't have Guides and Gridlines activated, right click on the background to do so.  Set the vertical guideline to 1.25 to the left of its default center position (drag it to he left until it says about 1.25).  This little box is your working area. 

Step 3 - Search

I use Google images search to find the images I need, or at least inspiration.  If you plan to overlap a few simple images, you may want to use the Search Tools

to limit your search by Color to Transparent.  What this does is essentially filter on images that Google thinks has a transparent background - its not always perfect but it will get you better results in general. 

Step 4 - Crop, Remove Background, Rotate, Manipulate

Once I find an image, I copy it and paste it into my PowerPoint slide.  Then I may want to crop the image or I may need to do some processing to remove the background.  If there is a background that you want to remove, the most recent versions of PowerPoint have a powerful Remove background function under the Picture Tools ribbon (note, you must have the image selected for this ribbon to be visible).  Older versions of PowerPoint have a Set Transparency Color function available, in which you just select the background color and it makes it all transparent.  I'm also a fan of rotating graphics slightly to give them a more exciting look.  Sometimes keeping them straight portrays a more sleak, streamlined look, which may also be what you're trying to accomplish, so play around with rotating and decide which will work best for you. 

Step 5 - Keep Building

I repeat this until I have the images I want to work with.  Then I add text to go along with the graphics.  Consider putting the text at a slight angle with the rotation tool, especially if you left your graphics straight.  Or add shadowing or outlines to the text to make it stand out from the graphics.   

To make really long pins in Pinterest, build down that section we created to the end of the slide.  I caution not to make the graphics much longer than this, as really long pins tend to be annoying to users and will graphically be shortened

so you lose part of the graphic if it gets too long.  Keeping it about the length of the slide ensure that most of your graphic will be seen, and it will take up a nice amount of the screen when viewed on a board or on the home screen of Pinterst users.  

Step 6 - Export, Place it and Pin it

When you are happy with how it looks, you Ctrl+A to select all, and copy, and then open Microsoft Paint and paste it in there.  Be sure to adjust and crop as needed, and then save the graphic.  Place the graphic where you want the Pin to direct users to on your webpage, and then Pin it to one of your boards to get the ball rolling.