Tag: monthly meme

January #InkRipples: Traveling the World and Beyond

January 4, 2016 / Katie L. Carroll

You’d probably believe me if I told you that in the last year, I’ve traveled to Waterbury, CT, several towns in upstate New York, New Orleans, and the Biltmore estate in North Carolina. You’d have no reason to doubt me if I said my travels included a small town in middle America full of cornfields or if I mentioned visiting Hawaii.

But what if I said I’ve also been to an empire inspired by Ancient Rome, several planets in distant galaxies, and a kingdom full of dragons that can take human form (twice!)? And that is only a handful of the many, many places I’ve been. Now you might be starting to question my honesty, or possibly my sanity. I can assure you, however, that I have been to all of these places.

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You want to know how? Books! (Just in case all the book covers above didn’t tip you off to what I was talking about.) 😉

With two kids under the age of five, my days of wandering the bookstores of London, swimming with the sharks in Tahitian waters, and running marathons in Alaska (all things I’ve done in the flesh) are currently limited. For now I have to rely on my imagination to take me places.

And you know what? I’m kind of okay with that. I love traveling to new places and old favorites, and I’m sure I’ll get back on an airplane one of these days. For now I’ll content myself with cracking open (or writing) a new story because I can travel anywhere in between the pages of a book!

Interested in seeing what I’ve read this year? Check out My Year in Books on Goodreads. Where did your favorite books take you in 2015?

#InkRipples is a monthly meme created by me, Mary Waibel, and Kai Strand. We pick a topic (January is all about travel), drop a ripple in the inkwell (i.e. write about it on our blogs), and see where the conversation goes. Be sure to check out Kai’s and Mary’s posts this month. We’d love to have you join in the conversation on your own blogs. Full details and each month’s topic can be found on my #InkRipples page.

December #InkRipples Celebration and Gifts

December 14, 2015 / Katie L. Carroll

Before I get to the month’s post, I wanted to share a few things about #InkRipples. Kai Strand, Mary Waibel, and I have decided to continue the meme into 2016, and we’d love for you all to join us (I’ll tell you how below)! You may have noticed we have a new streamlined name of #InkRipples (formerly Ripples in the Inkwell) and brand new images to go along with it.

We also have a new set of monthly topics for discussion in 2016:

January – Travel
#InkRipples February – Chocolate
March – Feminism
April – Poetry
May – Memories
June – Movies
July – Inspiration
August – Guilty Pleasures
September – Banned Books
October – Masks
November – Heritage
December – Cookies

How can you participate? Glad you asked because there are lots of ways. The idea of #InkRipples is to toss a word, idea, image, whatever into the inkwell and see what kind of ripples it makes. We provide the topics and will be blogging about them on the first Monday of the month. You can spread your own ripples by blogging about the topic any day of the month that fits your schedule, just be sure to include links back to the three of us please (Katie – https://katielcarroll.com/blog/, Kai – http://kaistrand.blogspot.com/, and Mary – http://waibelworld.blogspot.com/). Or you can simply share your thoughts on social media using the hashtag (#InkRipples). Or even just comment on one of our posts. Tag us and we’re always happy to share your posts and thoughts to keep those ripples going and intersecting.

There is no wrong way to do #InkRipples (with the exception of following basic human decency!). It’s about having a conversation, sharing ideas, and connecting. So if this sounds at all interesting, please do participate in whatever way you can. And feel free to use any of the meme’s images (created by the wonderful Mary Waibel). I’ll include them all at the end of the post.

Now for the last #InkRipples of 2015: Celebration and Gifts

I’m always a little reluctant to admit that I’m not very religious (I guess because I feel like people will judge me for it). My husband and I both come from Catholic families, but we don’t practice it ourselves any longer. We’ve always celebrated Christmas, but it’s more about spending time with our families than a specific religious tradition.

Now that we have kids, I’m struggling to figure out how to make the holiday about more than giving and receiving presents, and Santa. I suppose we could discuss Jesus and how he was an important man and what he stood for (because we do emphasize Christian philosophies with the boys, even if we don’t tie them to religion per se), and that Christmas is his “birthday” and that’s why we celebrate. I’m not sure how meaningful that will be to them, though.

Thinking about this has made me wonder what Christmas means to me. Family, first and foremost. Most things for me come down to family. But what else? Is there more? Should there be more? A spirit of giving perhaps. Something beyond that. A spirit of generosity and goodwill toward others…which is something that we try to instill in our boys all the time, not just at the holidays. So maybe not that in and of itself.

I think I need to ponder it some more for myself before I can guide the boys in the right direction. How can I help them understand what Christmas is about if I’m not sure? Maybe they’ll come to have their own meaning of Christmas as they grow.

Anyway, this is just me thinking out loud. I guess for now I’ll muddle through it as best I can (which seems to be how it is with most of these big parenting type subjects!). What do the holidays mean to you and your families?

(And here are the #InkRipples images you may use!)

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May Ripples in the Inkwell: Change Is Hard

May 11, 2015 / Katie L. Carroll

It’s the second Monday of the month, so that means it’s time for a new Ripples in the Inkwell (#inkripples) post. Kai Strand’s post can be found here, and Mary Waibel’s can be found here. May brings more flowers, buds turning to leaves on the trees, and warmer weather. The winter jackets are packed away and t-shirts are coming out. May is all about change, and that’s our topic of the month.

The change in weather is welcome, particularly after this very long winter. But change is hard. I see how my 3-1/2 year old son, The Boy, is still having a hard time with all the changes that have gone on in his life in the past year. Even though his younger brother, The Prince, is almost a year old, the adjustment period isn’t over. The resentment lingers, evident when The Boy says, “Mommy, I want you to take care of only me. Daddy can take care of [The Prince].”

The Boy started preschool last November, another big change, especially after being home with me all day for the last two years. He seems so old to me in many ways, but I have to remember how young he really is. It wasn’t too long ago he was still sleeping in the crib. Now he’s in a big boy bed in a new, bigger room. The early years of life bring on so many changes.

But even as an adult, I find change hard, harder still than when I was in my teens and twenties. I like my routine, even if every day the routine isn’t the same. I write best sitting at my laptop, sipping my tea. It’s important for productivity not to be tied to that, though. I can’t always be at my laptop, I don’t always have quiet time to work, I don’t always have time to work period. If I’m ever going to finish my WIP, I need to allow myself the flexibility to squeeze in the work when I can.

Change is also good for the creative soul. It pushes my brain into new realms and I see the world in a new light. I so desperately needed to get away the other weekend for the New England SCBWI writing conference. With little ones, it’s been hard for me to be away from them. My job as mom is 24-7. I needed that change, the time to be a writer and not a mom for a little while. I hated leaving my babies, but it was important for me to do just that.

I guess no matter if we’re 3 or 33 or 133, it will be desirable to avoid change. It’s easier to keep to the routine, maintain the status quo. But lack of change also means lack of growth, so I’m willing to step out of my comfort zone and grow as a person as a result.

Inkwellblueandgreen Want to join in on the conversation on change? Or next month’s theme of summer/vacation? It’s easy to participate in Ripples in the Inkwell.

Ripples in the Inkwell #inkripples is a new monthly meme created by Kai Strand, Mary Waibel, and Katie L. Carroll. We’ll be posting on the second Monday of every month with a new topic. We’re all authors, but you don’t have to be to participate. Simply compose your post using the monthly theme, grab one of the images, and link back to the three of us. Make sure to use #inkripples when you play along and promote your posts. The idea is that we toss a word, idea, or image into the inkwell and each post is a new ripple. There’s no wrong way to do it! Full details can be found on my post “Introducing Ripples in the Inkwell.”