Microsoft Word: Home Sweet Home

Here are two of my top things you can do on Word using the Home tab.  I am writing this for those who already have basic knowledge of Word.

Format Painter

If you’ve never used format painter, you will be so happy to finally know what that big paintbrush icon can do. 

This is useful when you have two different fonts, font sizes, colors, or styles in one document.  Instead of going through and fixing each, you can use Format Painter to copy that style and use it on other text.

1. Highlight the type of text you want to copy. 
2. Click on the Format Painter icon (a paintbrush) on the Home tab.
3. Click the text you want to change.
4. Note: if you have multiple places you want to change, double click on the icon.  Then you can change formats as many times as you like.  When you are done, click the icon once to end the Format Painter session.

 Change Case

Ever so busy typing, you didn’t notice you had the Caps Lock on?  Don’t retype everything!  Instead:

1. Highlight the text. 
2. On the Home tab, find the icon that has a cap and lowercase A.  Click on it and choose from the drop-down menu sentence case (although one of the other choices may be more useful, such as capitalize each word).   [Or can do SHIFT+F3 and it will do the opposite of what the text is in.]
3. This button also works if you now want the whole word in caps.

Beyond Word--Getting the Most Out of Microsoft Word

Back when I was in high school, I was given a position as a computer room aide at a middle school.  I didn’t own a computer nor could be considered a computer geek.  But I learned as I went how to use Claris Works and a basic spreadsheet program.  I was willing to “play around” to figure stuff out—one of the most useful ways to advance your computer skills.

A couple years later, I temped at a large company.  They hired me just to figure out Power Point, which no one in that department had used before.  Again, I was given time to try things out. 

Now I’m an author.  I write using Word.  Whenever I wish there was a way to make things simpler, I do research (now I actually have the option of looking things up on the Internet!) until I find that there is an easier method.

And that is what I want to share with you.  I recently switched from Word 97 to Word 2013 and still miss my dropdown menus, but I’m learning that, too.  Since I need to get more comfortable with Word 2013, that’s what this is written for.  I believe it’s similar to Word within the last ten years though.

So, my latest addition to my blog are fun tips, tricks, and ways to use Word more efficiently.  Enjoy!

Making a Memory into a Picture Book

This is my grandma and my aunt.  As you can see, my aunt has a leg brace from polio.  The question is, how much of her true life story do I use in my polio novel?

One of the main reasons people seem to begin writing a children’s book is that they have a personal story they want to tell.  It’s often a childhood memory.  What can be difficult is separating fact from fiction.  Maybe you have this wonderfully vivid memory from your childhood.  You feel that everyone will enjoy it, too.  There are a couple of problems I have noticed as I've read other people's work.

1—Number of Characters: Many times the real incident had quite a few friends or siblings or cousins or dogs.  Often, the heart of the picture book story doesn’t need so many.  Your seven-year-old reader doesn’t need Uncle Larry and Milky the Cat in your story.  Maybe the character said one funny line you just can't bear to take out.  But was that one line something someone else can say in the story?  Try melting two characters into one.

2—Setting Details: I know I pride myself on having a good memory.  When writing a story based on a real-life experience, you often want to include everything you remember, down to the color of the bathroom shower curtain.  Again, is this detail something crucial to the story?  Often the writer tries to complicate the layout of the house, yard, etc. because they want the story to take place in the house they grew up in.  This can add a lot of superfluous explanation.  Change your setting to make it detailed but simple to picture.

3—Plot: The plot can be the biggest obstacle when using a memory to create a story.  Sometimes your memory is just a moment in time—no real conflict happened.  If you’re really serious about making your book stand out to editors, you need something to happen in your book--a conflict.  This can be hard—you’ve written this sweet story about your real cousin, Melba, and her adorable kitten, Jingles.  You just can’t make something bad happen them.

I challenge you to find a book (in the same genre you’re writing for) where nothing happens.  It’s rare.  There are concept books (books on shapes, words, numbers, etc.) as well as night time books where you could argue that nothing happens.  But, chances are you pictured the book you are working on as a picture book or a novel.  Physically pull from the shelves of your Barnes & Noble, library or kids’ bookshelf books with the look and feel of your potential book.  Dissect those books’ plots.  Does something happen?

4—Character Names: Do you come from a family of all p-names? Peter, Patty, Pamela, Perry, and Patrick.  This might work for some stories, but reading off all these names each time you’re referring to the characters in a book may be distracting to the reader.  Often writers try to avoid names that start with the same letter or sound too similar—it can get confusing to the reader (wait, was Brandon the murderer or was Brendon?).  You may also have to change a character's name to fit the mood of the book.  If it's a serious book, you don't want a somewhat silly-sounding name.  If it's a silly book, make it sillier with a fun name.

What it boils down to is keeping your reader in mind.  Are the details you’re including necessary and interesting?  Are they universal enough that they automatically make sense to the reader?  If not, figure out how to cut or change them.  You want to make your memory as special to the reader as it was to you.