I have spent most of my life writing. My earliest memory was in 3rd grade–my teacher let me write and re-write all the Winnie-the-Pooh books and change the endings as I saw fit. As the other kids filled out pages and pages of worksheets I wrote my stories. I often sat off by myself and wrote. I’m not sure why I was allowed this luxury but if I had to guess it was because my Dad died when I was in 2nd grade and I didn’t handle it very well . . .
After reworking most of the children’s book I had read I moved onto my own writing. I had pen pals, wrote essays, wrote for the school newspapers, wrote, wrote and wrote. It could have been that we lived out in the middle of nowhere with nothing to do . . .
As an adult I tried to freelance but that is hard to make ends meet, so I kept my day/night jobs and wrote in the off times. I discovered that the only real way to be a writer would be to use my science/medical background and become a medical writer–I did that by boldly telling people that “I’m a medical writer” and they gave me a job. And then another job and then I started to freelance again and before I knew it I was writing for real money.
When I left the work force to stay home and have my kids I kept writing, pregnancy journals, baby books, scrapbooking pages . . . and then I started a blog because a friend said that I should. I followed her advice and began to write–but the words didn’t come like they had in the past. I didn’t know what I should write and who would care? It began as a gratidude blog always ending with “Thank you God for . . . ” Then I noticed that friends kept asking me the same questions over and over . . . then I thought “what if I answer them in a blog”–brilliant. Except that millions of others have blogs too!
How will I move this blog forward? It started out as “in everything give thanks” but then I moved from Blogger to WordPress I thought I would change the name–it needed to be about having joy in how I live–hence the name joyful living. I’m still not sure about it–a work in progress. I am certain that joyfulmombaude.com is the best name for my website! Baby steps. As I learn the ins and outs of blogging I want to keep my family and faith first and the blog somewhere on the long list of things. I want to keep it authentic and in perspective. I want to write as the Spirit moves me.
I want to inspire women
- to look at the world differently
- to promote your own style of creativity–we are ALL creative beings
- be the best they can be where they are
- to help motivate–to just get up in the morning or try something new
- share experiences that will help us lighten our loads
- learn new things
- to support each other in our individual choices.
I blog because I love to write. I will continue to write everything from knitting patterns to inquiry based curriculums for the new 2012 standards. I try to live my life as if God were in the room with me and I write the same way. I think of my blog as a conversation with women–I really believe that we all have something in common–we all have pages out of each others book.
Thank you God, for giving me a little bit of talent and lots of desire to share your loving grace with those who read my words.
Today I’m linking up with 
. I consider this blog a “work in progress.”
I’m also linking to 
because my life is blooming because of Him!
