I can’t believe that June 10 has finally arrived! Maybe you’ve heard that writing a book is a whole lot of sweat and tears (yep – true) and now I can add that marketing a book is not for the faint of heart. Holy cow! I loved writing TinkerLab: A Hands-on Guide for Little Inventors, but it wasn’t without work and sacrifice. My in-laws, who put me and the kids up for five weeks so that I could write while they entertained my children, may attest to that!
Although I wouldn’t go quite this far, perhaps George Orwell says it best (this is George Orwell, after all):
The good news is that this part of the struggle adventure is now behind me (until the next book – wink). Because I think it’s a pretty good story, and maybe you’ve wondered what kind of demon overtakes someone to write a book, I’ll give you a peek into my writing journey…
Before having children I was a director of education at a progressive contemporary art museum. To say that I loved my job is a huge understatement. I lived for that job and had so much love and respect for my co-workers and incredible volunteers.
But unexpectedly, when my daughter was born, I had so much trouble getting myself back to work. I kept putting off my return date because I didn’t want to walk away from either my job or my child. Conundrum! After a few months of my shenanigans, they graciously found a way for me to stay on part time to write curriculum and train docents, and it was the perfect marriage of family and work for me.
When my daughter was almost two, I picked up a copy of The Creative Family by Amanda Blake Soule. This kind of book — a parenting book that talked about how to set up a creative family lifestyle — was new to me, and I loved it!
In an AH-HA! moment I came to the conclusion that I wanted to write a book that would inspire families to nurture creativity in childhood through experiments and open-ended questions. Amanda Blake Soule had a blog, and this seemed like a good place for me to begin.
I had just finished training my last group of docents and it felt like a natural breaking point in my job. I could always come back to the work, I thought, and would test this new blogging thing out. Well, low and behold, that was almost four years ago to the day! The poetry in all of this is that Roost Books, publisher of The Creative Family, is now my publisher too. I get chills every time I think about this. The world works in funny ways.
To celebrate creativity, an experimenting mindset, and goals achieved, I’m co-hosting a fun giveaway today with some of my favorite bloggers…
This is a Facebook giveaway, so you’ll have to pop over there to enter.
Contest Details
Click over to Facebook to enter!
BOOK LAUNCH CELEBRATION. OVER $150 IN PRIZES!
To celebrate the book launch of the Tinkerlab book and the newest book from quirkymomma.com, we’re co-hosting a round robin of wonderful giveaways. 9 Facebook pages have come together to offer books and other goodies to some lucky winners.
TINKERLAB GIVEAWAY: We’re giving away two separate prizes: one copy of TinkerLab: A Hands-on Guide for Little Inventors (http://amzn.to/1kULIMC) and one copy of 101 Kids Activities that are the Bestest, Funnest Ever (http://amzn.to/1kULIMC) *affiliate links
Share your TinkerLab book on Instagram
If you have (or plan to get) a copy of my book, I’d like to invite you to share a photo of the book, your child doing an activity from the book, or something that the book inspired.
Upload your photo to Instagram and tag it with #tinkerlabbook and tag me at @tinkerlab, and I’ll do my best to add your image to this roundup of photos.
Congrats on the book launch! I’m so excited to read it 🙂 I have a copy waiting for me but I have to wait a bit long because it’s at my mum’s house in Scotland and it’s coming all the way to meet me in Bali next week – ahhh!
Wow, Rachel!!! I’m honored (and thrilled) to hear that the book will be making such a long and exciting journey around the world. Are you living in Bali? It’s one of my favorite places in the world.
Yes I’ve been living here about 5 years now 🙂 I’ll be reviewing the book on my blog as soon as I get the chance to have a proper look at it – will drop you a note when I do!
Congratulations again Rachelle on such a wonderful accomplishment! You continue to inspire me through the years, and I am always in awe of your ability to bring art and design to daily life while you simultaneously retain such a kind and supportive demeanor. Looking forward to learning even more! 🙂
Thank you so much, Aleksandra. It takes a great friend to put up with all the hours I poured into this project. And as I hope you know, you inspire me too!
Thank you so much for sharing a little about your writing journey! I ordered a copy of your book and can’t wait to have it in my hands (it will be at least another week before it arrives here in Australia).
Hi Elise,
Thank you so much for ordering a copy of the book! That means so much to me.
Warmly, Rachelle