Slice of Life Story Challenge

Day 2 of the March SOLSC! #SOL15

Stacey Shubitz
Write, Share, Give
Write, Share, Give

I’m delighted you’re back for the second day of the 8th Annual Slice of Life Story Challenge!

A quick reminder for everyone: Be sure to comment on other Slicers’ blog posts by clicking on the link to their blog. Please do not leave comments in response to each other’s writing on Two Writing Teachers.  Thanks!

What’s that you say? Are you new here today?  Anyone who starts the SOLSC today, tomorrow, or on Wednesday, 3/4 will still be eligible for one of the incredible prizes we’re offering.  All you have to do is “write, share, and give” today and every day for the rest of the month.  Click here for help getting started.

If you’re participating in the individual Slice of Life Story Challenge, this is where you share your writing.  If you’re sharing your students’ slice of life stories, then head over to the Classroom Challenge, which Anna is hosting this month.  (Please see the previous post.)

ESSENTIAL INFORMATION

This section is mostly the same as yesterday. If you’re a seasoned Slicer, feel free to scroll down to “Be Inspired.” Otherwise, please read this section carefully.

Username:

Please use the SAME email/username information on all of your March comments.

Commenting:

  • Please include the permalink (aka: unique URL) to your post when you leave a comment. Click here and scroll to the “New to Slicing” section of the blog post. Once you arrive, you’ll find two visuals that illustrate an example and a non-example of a permalink.
    • If you link your slice of life story incorrectly today, you’ll receive a reply to your comment from Julieanne Harmatz, who is helping us with tech support, or from one of the TWT co-authors.
  • The six of us worked together to create some comment guidelines. We may, at any time, remove a comment from our blog if it is inappropriate. Please refer to these guidelines when commenting this month:
    • Self-Promotion: Please don’t use your comment or link to your blog for self-promotion. The links in the comment section of our Slice of Life Story Challenge are meant to lead our readers to stories from people’s lives–not just whatever was on your blog that day.
    • Linking and Running: Please do not just drop off the link to your Slice without commenting on at least three other Slice of Life Stories. Comments are the foundation of this community. If you choose to link early in the morning, please return later that day to leave at least three comments.
    • Spam: It’s not just big advertisers who spam. Spam can include: Copying and pasting a comment from one post to another, or leaving a message such as, “Nice post. Visit my blog at…” This kind of comment is a form of spam.  We reserve the right to delete comments that fall into this category.

Thank you for appreciating and standing by our guidelines.

  • If you’ve never posted a comment on TWT before, or if your comment contains more than one hyperlink, then your comment will be held for moderation. I will monitor blog comments a few times today so I can approve comments that don’t post automatically. Therefore, there is no need to re-post your comment if it doesn’t appear after you click “post comment.”
    • If you use the same username/email to log in when you leave your comment, your comments should appear instantly in the future.
    • Tech-related questions? Contact Julieanne Harmatz at mjharmatz1{at}cox.net.
  • If this is the first time you’re participating in the Slice of Life Story Challenge, please let us know that when you share your link as a comment.
  • If you have a Blogger blog, please make sure you’re using the “No CAPTCHA reCAPTCHA” option or removing the security layers to make it easier for people to leave comments on your blog posts.  Click here for more information about “No CAPTCHA reCAPTCHA.”

Prizes:

Prizes will be given away at the conclusion of the month-long Slice of Life Story Challenge.  You’ll be eligible for a prize if:

1.     You fill out the participant data form, which went live on February 22nd.

2.     You comment ONLY ONCE on the daily call for Slice of Life stories (Today – 3/31/15).

3.     You sign a Slice of Life Story Challenge Participation Pledge on April 1st.  (We’ll post the pledge and will ask you to “sign.” You’ll sign by leaving a comment certifying you wrote and linked daily, as well as commented on at least three other Slicers’ writing daily.)

  • In order to be in the running for a prize at the end of the month, you must leave the link to your slice of life story by 11:59 p.m. EST to be eligible for prizes.
    • Only links left before 11:59 p.m. Eastern Time will count when you’re signing-off on the participation pledge on April 1st.
  • The call for slices goes up at midnight EST. Everyone has the same 24-hour window to post, regardless of the time zone in which they live.
  • Please play fair and leave only one link each day.
Click here to visit our store.
Click here to visit our store.

Slicer Swag:

Need some Slicer Swag? Stop by our Cafepress store to purchase some Slicer swag and do a good deed since all of the profits will go the Pajama Program!

Social Media:

  • We are using #sol15 on tweets about Slice of Life Story Challenge.
    • NOTE: You must leave a link to your slice of life post on the daily calls for slice of life stories here at Two Writing Teachers to be eligible for a prize.

Questions:

  • Should you have questions about getting started with this Challenge, please contact:
    • If your last name begins with the letters A – I, please e-mail questions to Betsy, betsymhubbard{at}gmail.com.
    • If your last name begins with the letters J – R, please e-mail questions to Dana, dmurph08{at}sbcglobal.net.
    • If your last name begins with the letters S – Z, please e-mail questions to Stacey, stacey{at}staceyshubitz.com.

BE INSPIRED

  • BE INSPIRED.Leigh Anne Eck was new to this writing community when she began the Slice of Life Story Challenge last March. Leigh Anne posted “The Slicing Community – A Field of Beans” the day after our February Twitter chat about the challenge.  In that slice of life, which included some of her reflections from the chat, she wrote:

    When I first began slicing it was like this bean field, a field full of slicers.  I was quite intimidated.  There were days when I felt like the corn stalk in the middle of the bean field.  I felt I was in a place where I didn’t belong, way out of my comfort zone.  Could I write stories like the other slicers?  Would anyone find my writing interesting?  Who would read it?It didn’t take long to realize that I was among a group of wonderful people.  People who wanted me to grow right alongside them.  It didn’t matter who was a bean plant or who was a corn stalk.  We were all growing writers, thriving in a field together.  Our harvest is in the month of March where we reap what we have sown all year.  We share stories, we share smiles, and yes, we even share tears…every single day.  But that is the wonderful bounty in it all.  That is this community, and I am so blessed to be a part of it.

    Click here to read the rest of Leigh Anne’s post. It is my hope everyone will feel the same way about being part of this writing community over the course of this harvest month.

  • Click here if you need topic ideas.
  • Finally, here’s a visual definition of a slice of life story:
Are you wondering what a slice of life story is? Click on this image to enlarge & to learn more.
Are you wondering what a slice of life story is? Click on this image to enlarge & to learn more.

QUOTE OF THE DAY

Image retrieved on 2/20/15 from http://bit.ly/1F3p8sc. Click on the image to enlarge.
Image retrieved on 2/20/15 from http://bit.ly/1F3p8sc.

OTHER USEFUL INFORMATION

Published by Stacey Shubitz

I am a literacy consultant who focuses on writing workshop. I've been working with K-6 teachers and students since 2009. Prior to that, I was a fourth and fifth-grade teacher in New York City and Rhode Island. I'm the author of Craft Moves (Stenhouse Publishers, 2016) and the co-author of Jump Into Writing (Zaner-Bloser, 2021), Welcome to Writing Workshop (Stenhouse Publishers, 2019), and Day By Day (Stenhouse, 2010). I live in Central Pennsylvania with my husband and children. In my free time, I enjoy swimming, doing Pilates, cooking, baking, making ice cream, and reading novels.

323 thoughts on “Day 2 of the March SOLSC! #SOL15”

    1. Morgan, great post. I too worry about finding time to blog regularly. I have decided for March to take a notebook to bed and jot some things down. I figure I can type them as the next days blog. I enjoyed reading what you shared.
      Jen

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  84. This morning I awakened from my dream compelled to write a slice of subconscious memories, trying to capture them, but I wasn’t ready to share after drafting. Wasn’t it Bradbury who said of writing that he threw up in the morning and cleaned up in the afternoon? Writing can be like that, but when blogging it’s okay not to clean up too much. Another poem–this one about following:

    Following

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  95. I’m about to be a grandma for the first time. No one is more surprised then me with the emotional roller coaster I have been riding for the last two or three weeks. Ah, yes I was aloof at the start. I was happy about having a baby coming into the family and all it means to most people, but I was not over the top about being a grandmother. I didn’t immediately fall into buying things for the baby many of my friends have done. Nope not me!

    Then something took hold about two weeks ago. It was deep inside me. It was akin to a light switch flipping and the room got brighter. Thank goodness Mother Nature has more sense than I do. She started slow before she hit me over the head with the Grandma for the First Time hammer.

    A baby shower was coming soon and I started looking at the registry for my little granddaughter. This is either Mother Nature or Father Time but one of those two smacked me with the OMG- I don’t even know what all this stuff is about. When I had my first child, I had my sister’s hand me down clothes from her children, a car seat, some sweet blankets, and one Captain America outfit for my son (I am a product of the 60’s-70’s).

    My grandchild’s registry was sensible and all but, it also had items I didn’t even know existed. It appears there are several ways to buy sheets for the crib, the necessary breast-feeding support tools, the necessary must have travel gear, the only acceptable gowns that turn with a snap or two into a romper gave a sense of must have all of these “things.” I found myself feeling very old. I found myself thinking of all the countries in the world that do with far less.

    To be really honest I began to reflect on my two beautiful and wonderful children. The father of the baby started his life with a struggle and then a move to Japan…. he had nothing of his own until the sea shipment arrived months after his birth. We had to stuff him into the “Captain America” outfit to send a picture to our lovely friend. My daughter entered the world on the move back from Japan and into the craziness of moving and settling.

    The up shot of all this blather is this…. Having a baby is all about union and love…it is not things. It is not about what is right or “necessary” because in the end it is about love. It is the deepest thing any of us feel since we took those vows of marriage. So bring on the shea butter, and breast pumps my sisters…. you are about to take on a journey of what life is all about! It will be magical and life sustaining….

    I am one happy happy grandmother to be!

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  189. We’re in the throes of winter here in Michigan. Yesterday, though the temperatures weren’t nearly as cold as they had been, I was frozen all day. Here’s my poem today thinking through that chill and the desire to stay warm…

    http://amandacornwell.edublogs.org/2015/03/02/warm-solsc-231/

    For those interested in swinging by, I’d love to know if this feels dark to you. I didn’t intend it to be, but after rereading it, there is a darkness or sense that the chill is something more than just cold. What do you think? Thanks! 🙂

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    1. Tried to comment on your post but didn’t see that as an option–enjoyed your piece. I laughed (sorry) but sometimes like a lot of things in life we laugh because they are true. Definitely not glamorous but your slice was very real.

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  302. Not sure if my March 1st post worked… Comment hasn’t shown up. (Does the post have to be by 12 am East Coast time?) Reposting here. Tell me if this is wrong! Even if I only post a few times this month, so good to be back. A short one:

    It is morning

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