GROW YOUR WRITING CHALLENGE

I’m happy to welcome Christine Alemshah to the blog to talk about her Grow your Writing Challenge project, a wonderful free resource for writers. We’ll also chat about her upcoming books releasing in 2025, the first 2 of 7 in an amazing book deal!

I’m very excited for Christine to share about this wonderful challenge, which is truly encouraging and the best thing is that you can join in whenever you want. I signed up at the beginning of the year and so far I’ve earned some batches, mostly for writing a new story, revising and listenings to podcasts. I love that there are many ways to participate!

A bit about Grow Your Writing Challenge in Christine’s words:

“The Grow Your Writing Challenge is a low-pressure, self-paced, and FREE challenge to cultivate skills as an #Kidlit author. I hoped to create a resource for writers to choose sustainable personal goals and track their progress. The Grow Your Writing challenge allows writers to be intentional with their choices and grow at their own pace”.

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Now, on to our interview:

M. Christine, I’m so glad to have you here on the blog, can you please share what inspired you to create this challenge?

C. I originally had the idea for the Grow Your Writing Challenge early in my writing career in 2012. It started as a long BRAINSTORM BLITZ. I put up a behind the scenes placeholder on my website with the title and no content except to say that I wanted there to be fun badges to earn and free/low-cost resources for writers. I’ve always loved sunflowers and felt inspired by how they grow and how it paralleled my journey as an author. I would return to it every few years, but the page remained blank until the end of 2022. One day, I began scrolling through my personal notes file and noticed I’d curated quite a list of resources I’d used over the years to grow my own writing skillset. I finally felt ready to sit down and expand upon my vision.

M. Wow 2012! I’m so glad you finally got to make this dream happen! What were the most important considerations you made when starting this challenge?

C. I intentionally created the Grow Your Writing Challenge to be free, low-pressure, and self-paced. I wanted to ensure that it was accessible and budget-friendly so that anyone who wished to participate in the challenge, whether just starting or a seasoned creator, could find ways to partake in it in their own way. As with a garden, no one flower will grow at the same rate, and our writing journeys are the same.

Midway through my journey to publication, I had a newborn at home and struggled with postpartum depression. I wanted to keep up with the fast pace of the kidlit world, but my reality showed me I needed to pull way back for several years to nurture and tend to my soil. My vitamins came from experiencing life with my little ones, reading mentor texts, brainstorming, and taking notes to save for later. I often felt like I wasn’t doing “enough.” Looking back, I now realize what an important role my years of brainstorming and reading mentor texts provided me. It helped me stay connected to the kidlit world and reach a deep, more vulnerable emotional layer in my writing. My aim in creating the Grow Your Writing Challenge was to help participants feel empowered at every step.

Writers early in their careers can use the Grow Your Writing Challenge to help experiment with various paths before settling on what resonates with them. More seasoned creators might find they spend a lot of time in the query trenches, on submission, waiting for responses, etc. The Grow Your Writing Challenge provides opportunities and challenges to grow as creators while they wait!

M. I love what you say about how each writer experiments the challenge in a very unique way. How did you decide which badges to include in the challenge? What’s your favorite?

C. I wanted to include a variety of badges that served different roles in a creator’s journey. Sometimes, you may earn multiple badges per month, whereas other times, you may earn just one. As far as a favorite, that’s tough! I love all of them. I resonate most with the CULTIVATE CONNECTIONS BADGE and WRITING CONTESTS badges. Although, I also love the REVISION RETREAT and MENTOR TEXT READING TIME badges. My idea of a perfect day is discovering a new library and finding a cozy place by the window with a huge stack of picture books to study and enjoy.

M. That’s such a wonderful idea for a perfect day! Can you tell us what was your experience with the 1st year of the challenge? Did you do any modifications for 2024?

C. My only expectation for the first year was to post the challenge and badges on my blog. I’d had the idea for so long that I just wanted to get the page up and running. It wasn’t until mid-2023 that there started being more of a “buzz” about the #growyourwriting hashtag after I had introduced the ‘Grow Your Writing Creator Interview’ Series on X (Twitter.) 

Regarding changes for 2024, I wanted to rebrand the challenge logo and badges and add more badge-specific resources. In addition, I provided a pledge form so that participants could identify fellow creators and help cheer each other on. I also made a YouTube video to help explain the challenge. Those small changes have bumped up the number of participants significantly this year. 

M. I’m so happy that the scope of the challenge is growing, Christine! I’m so glad that I’m a participant this year and hopefully more people will be joining in the coming months. For someone starting their writing careers, which 3 badges do you consider would be the most important to acquire first?

C. How to begin is highly personal to each creator, their circumstances, and goals. However, a great way to start in general would be by exploring the WRITING VIDEOS/WEBINARS and MENTOR TEXT READING TIME badges for inspiration, followed by the BRAINSTORM BLITZ badge to take down ideas.

M. Those are great choices! Christine, what’s been the most rewarding and most challenging aspects of hosting this challenge?

C. It has been most rewarding to connect with other creators in the kidlit community and learn more about their journeys. I’ve had the privilege of interviewing creators getting sneak peeks at their work, and learning from their journeys. In addition, this year, I’ve added a list of participants to the challenge page, so I’ve loved visiting fellow creators’ blogs and websites.

Thus far, my biggest challenge has been balancing my creative writing time, family time, and managing the challenge. I have created a ‘2024 Writing Commitment Calendar’ for myself, where I write down important dates and deadlines, which helps keep me on track. Sometimes, I’ve had to teach myself to say ‘no’ to items I haven’t jotted down on this calendar.

M. I’m glad that you’ve found a way to get some balance. Do you have any future plans for #Growyourwriting? 

C. Yes! I plan to add a Writing Contest component in some point in the future. I’d also like to create a #GrowYourWriting Challenge for Kids page with resources and opportunities for young creators. In addition, I’ve invited two other talented kid lit creators, Alison McGauley and Becky Walker to join me as co-hosts.

M. I didn’t know you have co-hosts now, how nice! Congratulations! What can you share about your #GrowyourWriting Creator Interviews on your blog?

C. The #GrowYourWriting Creator Interview series is open to any kidlit creator pre-published or published. My goal is to share their journey as creators and promote their work while also asking them to provide advice or experiences to #GrowYourWriting Challenge participants that align with one of the participant badges. Creators often include giveaways as part of their interviews. I schedule creators to be featured bi-monthly (with a break during the summer months.)

M. That’s wonderful! I’m going to start following these interviews too! Any new projects you’re currently working on? What comes next for you as an author?

C. Yes!! I am working closely with my editor at Free Spirit Publishing on finalizing the first two picture books in a planned seven book series. The FROM FAYE WITH LOVE series invites children to explore the world with Faye as she cultivates connections with her multicultural family, navigates parental separation, nurtures a sense of belonging, and builds empathy, perseverance, patience, and self-awareness skills. The first two books titles releasing in 2025 are FAYE GOES DUMPSTER DIVING WITH LOLA and FAYE’S BALIKBAYAN BOX OF TREASURES.

In addition to this series, my Agent, Vicky Weber of the Purcell Agency, has several of my picture books out on submission. I’m also continuing to revise, write new picture books, and branch out into the YA space with speculative fiction and romantic fantasy projects.

Congratulations, Christine! 7 book deal! Wow! 🤩

I wish you the best with all your projects and I hope to hear great news soon about your work on submission. Thanks so much for taking the time to do this interview and I hope that more people will join Grow Your Writing Challenge in the coming weeks. Thanks for all you do for the writing community! 🌻

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CHRISTINE’S BIO

Christine Alemshah (she/her) is a bi-racial Filipino American children’s author and classically trained vocalist. Christine writes children’s picture books championing innovation, celebrating multiculturalism, and often having a musical vibe. She hopes readers will see themselves in the stories she writes. Her picture books, FAYE GOES DUMPSTER DIVING WITH LOLA and FAYE’S BALIKBAYAN BOX OF TREASURES, will debut with Free Spirit Publishing in 2025.

Website: https://christinealemshah.com/home/

Twitter: https://twitter.com/C_Alemshah

Insta: https://www.instagram.com/c_alemshah/

And Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/christinealemshah.bsky.social

Thanks for reading!

M

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Cover photo by Susanne Jutzeler.