I am excited to announce that Festival for Poetry have featured the poem I submitted to them for consideration.
I am excited to announce that Festival for Poetry have featured the poem I submitted to them for consideration.
You can read the poem here: Rogue Wave by Joanne Van Leerdam
I hope that if you enjoy it, you’ll go to www.jvlpoet.com and look under “new writing” for more.
You can subscribe to my mailing list there, too, so you don’t miss another update!
Remember to check out ‘New Horizons’, too! It’s launching next weekend and I’m keen to see it take off!
October 8th is Indie Author Day.
I’m part of a group of writers who are hosting a 24 hour event on Facebook, where there are discussions, book giveaways, and lots of fun to be had…
October 8th is Indie Author Day.
I’m part of a group of writers who are hosting a 24 hour event on Facebook, where there are discussions, book giveaways, and lots of fun to be had.
It’s been really encouraging to be part of the first six hours of the event. People have been so friendly and positive, and it feels great to know that we are experiencing similar things on our various journeys of writing and authorship.
Things got a little quiet earlier on, so I told my fellow writers about the picture of the centuries-old wine cups and accompanying information board that my friend sent me from a museum in Singapore with the caption, “I await the writing!”
The cups and the information really were lovely, and I found them to be inspirational.
Before the end of the night, I had crafted a poem for my friend that I could be proud of.
Their responses were delightful.
How can I be anything other than encouraged?
Thank you, Vicki, Shelley, and Susan.
I hope my readers and followers will look up your books, too!
‘Leaf’ is my first published collection of poems in which I explore my own humanity, experiences, and observations about life in a way that will challenge the reader to see things from a new perspective.
‘Leaf’ is listed on Goodreads, and available as a paperback or an e-book on Xlibris, Amazon, iBooks and kobo.
Saturday, October 8th is the inaugural Independent Authors Day.
Our Indie Writers’ Cooperative on Facebook is hosting a 24 hour long marathon festival, celebrating writers, sharing ideas and conversations, and giving away free copies of our books!
If you’re in Australia or New Zealand, or anywhere west of there, the event will run from Saturday evening to sometime on Sunday, depending on your time zone.
Feel free to join us at the Indie Authors’ Day Writers’ Festival on Facebook anytime during the event and enjoy the company of some fantastic, and very creative, people.
It’s wonderful to be able to honestly say that the show was spectacular.
Every year, this week is one of the busiest of my teaching year. It’s right up there with report writing in terms of stress, but it’s much more enjoyable.
It’s Production Week.
I’m the director/producer of my school’s musical each year, and this is the week where we hit the stage and everyone is wowed by the students’ performances.
The weeks leading up to the show have been demanding. There has been fear, elation, exhaustion, laryngitis, delight, and excitement in fairly equal proportions. Even so, there has been an overriding confidence – at least, most of the time – that the show would be great.
In every show we do, the kids are always amazing, and I’m always proud.
But during the first performance of ‘Les Miserables – School Edition’ last Friday night, I was so proud that I cried. For someone who doesn’t cry much, that says a lot.
It’s wonderful to be able to honestly say that the show was spectacular.
In saying that, I don’t mean to brag. This has been a group effort by singers, actors, orchestra, sound and lighting crew, set construction teams, backstage crew, parents sewing costumes, hair & makeup teams, vocal coaches, musical director and myself. A show like this doesn’t happen without every part of the machine running.
Most of you reading this won’t get a chance to see the show, so here’s a little article from today’s Warrnambool Standard, complete with a totally-unrehearsed-for video that shows you how talented, and how delightfully funny, my students are.
It’s no wonder I’m proud. They’re fabulous.
Today I received the most beautiful photos…
Today I received the most beautiful photos from a friend whose young niece was reading my book to her.
Adorable – AND smart! She knows good poetry when she sees it!
That’s raising her right. A+ parenting!
One of my students has quoted ‘To Kill A Mockingbird’ and Johnny Cash’s ‘Man In Black’ in a piece of writing exploring how people encounter and respond to conflict.
I think I’ve died and gone to Teacher Heaven.
A+.
So, today I’ve walked into my classroom to be greeted by a student with “Happy B-dizzle!”
“Sorrypardonwhat?” I asked.
“Happy B-dizzle!” She repeated.
“Is that even a thing?” I wondered aloud.
“It is now!” asserted another student.
You know, it’s a very caring student that gives her English teacher a brand-newish word for her birthday.
So… Happy B-dizzle to me, I guess.
I just asked a Year 10 student to turn his music off while he was working on a history presentation that is due tomorrow.
He said, “I bet you don’t even know that song.”
“I might,” I answered. “What song was it?”
“The Battle of New Orleans” by Johnny Horton.
Whoa.
That stopped me. This kid must have digitized his grandfather’s old record collection.
“I do, actually.”
Then he sang, “We fired our guns and the British kept a-comin’…”
And I sang, “There wasn’t nigh as many as there was a while ago!”
He thought that was pretty cool, I guess. Then I asked him how much he wanted me to tell him about the War of 1812.
It’s incredible how suddenly kids can become motivated to work on the assignment that is due tomorrow. I wish I knew how that happened.
This morning my students were laughing as they told me the story about the black eye one young lady among them is sporting, due to accidentally being hit on the bridge of the nose with a spoon by another student.
The wielder of the spoon got to the point where he was laughing uncontrollably.
“It’s because I’m a comic genius, isn’t it?” I asked him.
Still laughing, he looked at me and almost said no, then stopped himself.
“You know, there’s no correct answer to that question!” said the student next to him.
The laughter stopped, and he said, “Yeah, I’m just not going to say anything.”
I win.
Comic genius, it is.
WordyNerdBird 