My February review against plan is as follows:

  • Summary of the month: Overall it’s been quite a tough month and I’ve felt quite tired but the review has reminded me that I’ve achieved quite a lot which has been a good psychological boost.
  • Finish chapter 5 first draft Yes done and my mentor recommended that I wrote six of the twelve chapters before sending to agents so I’m getting close to that milestone.
  • At least 1000 words of new nature writing, over and above my book chapters.  Wrote around 2000 words including a commissioned article and a guest blog.
  • An increase to 6 pitches (or competition entries) with at least two of them to outlets I haven’t been published by previously. Whoops! Pitched 3 article ideas, pitched a festival contribution and was directly commissioned for an article. The responses to the 3 pitches were “sorry, have run something similar”, “yes please” and one with no feedback yet.
  • Publications. Very happy to see my article about pavement weeds published in Resurgence & Ecologist magazine with some lovely print illustrations. Also my first real foray into conservation journalism, an article about rare plant introductions, was published on Mark Avery’s blog.
  • 800 Twitter followers (up from 711) 790 followers
  • 55 followers for this blog (up from 45) 51 followers
  • Botany learning plan to support creative writing: I’ve collected online workshops and learning for habitats which I won’t get to see near London, eg. dunes, mire/bog etc. Spending lots of time with my photo flashcards learning common and Latin names and key identification features.
  • Anything else? I published my February nature-writing newsletter and applied for a small research grant which while directly for writing would provide research material for my book.

My March plan is as follows:

  • Take a week off. Like lots of freelancers I find it difficult to carve out a free week but I am going to do this in March and adjust my targets accordingly.
  • Finish chapter 6 first draft.
  • At least 1000 words of new nature writing, over and above my book chapters.  Include pieces for my Suburban Wild Diary posts and commissioned articles.
  • 3 pitches (including direct commissions or competition entries) 
  • 850 Twitter followers (up from 790)
  • 53 followers for this blog (up from 51)
  • Botany learning plan to support creative writing: This month I’m going to focus on my photo flashcards and identifying which look-a-likes will need a bit of thought in the future..
  • Anything else? Publish my March nature-writing newsletter.