I
really wanted to share the Christmas spirit early this year, especially
with how this year has gone. For a lot of us, it's been a real
struggle. It's been full of changed plans, changed dreams, and changed day-to-day life. It's not going to go away magically with a snap of the finger, but if we
can bring a little Christmas spirit into our lives and remember that
love and kindness can go a long way, maybe we can make a little of our own Christmas Magic.
Ghost and Girl
Webcomic
A ghost becomes frightened when he finds himself haunted by a living girl. Her presence may become permanent if he can’t overcome his own fear and help her through hers to get her back home.
Art by co-creator Luna Grey
Do you like Superheroes? Wizards? Magic? I’m writing a superhero story right now, and the tough part seems to be the powers. I mean there’s so many powers to choose from! How do you choose one? And even more importantly, how do you choose one that hasn’t been done a million times? Here’s one of the ways I do it.
First, make a list of ten different superpowers.
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
And now, just when you’re worn out, list one final idea for a power number 11
__________________________________________
write about this new hero with this amazing power!
Dragons are the most amazing things ever. I love reading about them, writing about them, finding pictures of them, drawing them, naming websites after them…
Okay, so I think it’s pretty clear that Dragons are cool. And this particular writing activity is all about them. You see, since dragons have been around for such a long time, we get these ideas about them from all the stuff we’ve read and seen, and sometimes that can make it hard to write our very own unique character.
For example, we all know that dragons breathe fire.
But what if our dragon could breathe something else? Occasionally we get an ice breathing dragon, or lightening breathing dragons. I have a note down somewhere to write about a dragon that breathes out poofs of dust, which is rather inconvenient since he lives in a very clean, fancy hotel.
How did I go from fire breathing dragons to one that breathes dust bunnies? Well, I made a list. I wrote down all the things that dragons might breathe, fire, ice, flowers. . .Wait what?
The longer you make your list, the more you make yourself really think. You start running out of the every-day options and instead have to get creative and think outside the box.
So, write down 10 things your dragon might breathe, then try to think of just one more and see what you come up with!
You can tell me some of your strangest ideas in the comments if you want.
Good luck!
Super fun, brain-bending writing activity today!
Pretend you have a huge house. In your house, there are 11 rooms. Without repeating any, (you can only have one bedroom) list what each room is for. You might have a kitchen, bathroom. dining room etc.… But what comes after all those normal rooms? What do you have? A bug room where you farm cockroaches? (Please no!) Or a room dedicated to toy trains. Maybe you have a candy making room, a fairy garden room, or like Daniel, in my current project, an evil villain lab full of ridiculous inventions.
This activity is all about being creative. When you force yourself to think a little harder about things, you can come up with ideas you have never thought of before. This is a great writing skill to develop! Because even if you write something set in a ‘normal’ place and time, the special attention and thought you put into little details is what makes your own writing unique from anyone else’s.
So, write about 11 rooms in your huge house. What are they for? What do they look like? What’s in them?
Stories are almost always about some sort of conflict. One character wants one thing, the other doesn’t want them to have it. Or, maybe they both want the same thing but only one can get it. This creates tension and conflict in a story. But conflict doesn’t just come from enemies, there’s plenty of friend groups who experience conflict too. If a group of ragtag thieves have to team up to save the world Guardians of the Galaxy or Last Kids on Earth style, then all sorts of interesting things can happen along the way, which is why I’m excited to announce the next writing activity!
You will either need to write down your own cards, or print out the PDF file for this activity. Either way, each card should have a type of character on it. It might be a pirate, ninja, a 5-year-old-girl… Whatever you want. Your writing challenge today is to draw at least two of these cards at random and form a team out of them. Write a story about these two interacting with each other. What draws them to each other? What irritates them? What special skills does each have? How can they work together?
Each person on a team brings something different to the table. They bring some skills that might be helpful, and they bring some habits that might drive the other characters up a wall. But somehow, things tend to work out. After all, even if they can’t get along, the world still needs saving!
