Four Days. Five Elements. The Alchemy of Magic: The SCBWI 2009 Summer Conference

Blogging the 4-Day conference, as part of SCBWI Team Blog, was exhausting, exhilarating, and one of the best professional experiences ever! Thank you, SCBWI Team Captain Alice Pope, SCBWI Director of Communications and Creative Director Aaron Hartzler, SCBWI Executive Director Lin Oliver, and my fellow Team Bloggers Paula Yoo, Jaime Temairik, Jolie Stekley, and Suzanne Young, for letting me be part of this Magical adventure!

So many moments swirl for me.

The Water: The incredible flow of information I was part of creating, on the official conference blog and on the twitter feeds. I personally posted over 50 blog posts in the four day period, and tweeted over 100 times (quotes, impressions, conference photos) on both the official @scbwi twitter feed and on my own @leewind

The Air: Getting to learn from stratospherically talented writers who are so accomplished in their craft was heady! Linda Sue Park. Holly Black. Kathleen Duey. Ellen Hopkins. Melinda Long. And so. many. more!

The Earth: Getting to listen to and talk with brilliant editors, and agents, and illustrators, and fellow writers - all of whom, like me, are passionate about children's books! That shared foundation of energy was energizing and so much fun! We - the children's book community, and the members of SCBWI, are part of a tribe, and I felt - more than ever before - that I have found MY place. My people. My friends.

The Fire: I feel so inspired! All the advice, and writing tips, and career counsel, and brainstorming, and writing exercises... I want - no, I NEED - to write!

The Fifth, Secret Ingredient: All the KINDNESS that was shown to me, and that I witnessed. So many moments of generosity of time, and spirit, and knowledge, and more...

And in the alchemy of the past four days at the LA SCBWI Summer Conference, all five of these elements came together... and I had a BLAST!

I know that it will take me the better part of the next two weeks to process through all the amazing things I experienced.

For today, here's one photo I truly love. It shows one of my conference Highlights: My Story's Spine getting a Chiropractic Adjustment from Holly Black!

My friend and fabulous writer Rita Crayon Huang (on the left),
the unbelievably smart and generous Holly Black (in the middle),
and Me (on the right!)

#SCBWI09 - The SCBWI Summer Conference - was magical for me. I hope it was transformative for you, too. And if you weren't able to make it, check out all the amazing information here and on the official conference blog for a taste of it.

And hopefully after that taste, you'll be inspired to come to the next one. And you'll get to experience the full BLAST of magic, and of SCBWI, yourself!

Namaste,
Lee