Creativity, cupcakes and civic pride

Last Saturday I attended a women writer's day at the Creative Salon, part of the Cambridge Art Salon, a "public space for nurturing art". Click here for an article in the local press.  Amazingly I recognised two women who were there, Sue from Sookio, whom I briefly spotted at a TedxGranta event in February and local entrepreneur Sue Flay who runs The Secluded Tea Party events. Sue brought some mesmerising chocolate cherry cupcakes and a decadent chocolate cake, which we scoffed at the end of the day after a champagne toast.

Fire and Knives

There was plenty of time of pure writing but what really made my day were the two talks. The writer who was supposed to give us a talk about her new book wasn't well we had two surprise guest speakers, which really engaged our small group of nine women. The first speaker was Shelley Davies, who discussed self-publishing in the virtual age and how it worked miracles for writers who were fobbed off by traditional publishing firms but were subsequently offered book deals when their ebooks proved popular. The second speaker was Tim Hayward, a writer and photographer, and the new owner of Fitzbillies, a renown cafe/patisserie in central Cambridge. Fitzbillies closed down in February but Tim and his partner bought it, restored it and re-opened it in August. Tim also publishes a food quarterly magazine, called Fire & Knives. He gave us a thrilling account on how he became a food writer and how he recently managed to secure a book deal. He mentioned the word luck a few times, but it was obvious that he worked hard for years at building his own career. After the talks we had some quiet time for writing, then we closed with a champagne toast. I cycled back home full of cake, creative ideas and three revised chapters of my alchemical novel. As far as I know one other member blogged about the day (if anybody else wrote about it, I'm happy to display a link) - read poet Shaista's post on the Creative Salon's writing day by clicking here.

On Wednesday it was my birthday and Michela's first day at school. My treat was lunch at Seven Days, an authentic Chinese restaurant in Regent Street that was recommended to me by a Chinese researcher whom I met at the Grad Pad. I had their excellent pork and prawn dumpling, followed by stir-fried duck and jellyfish. I drank prune tea, which came in a pretty bottle. I took a photo of it and might upload it at some point.

On Thursday I went to the Love Cambridge's AGM, where I heard great things about Cambridge's retail scene and overall appeal as tourist destination (here is the civic pride bit). Most members come from the retail, entertainment and hospitality sectors so I was a fish out of water but somehow I was asked to leave a couple of business cards. I spoke to very interesting people, including the Mayoress, a cabinet maker, two women running a marketing company with a cute tree frog logo and various other members. The event was held at the Royal Cambridge Hotel and there was a buffet at the end. I cycled back through an eerily deserted central Cambridge.

The new-recipe Fitzbillies' bun

I conclude with a photo of a Fitzbillies' bun, which was a lovely treat but seemed to have inspired mixed opinions at Agenda magazine. Having read the review and found out that the recipe doesn't include nasty fats, I now wonder if they will ever make those lovely lardy cakes I used to buy before Fitzbillies shut down.

How I became a home worker

When I started maternity leave in January 2007 I planned to take a year off and resume my career as inhouse freelance subeditor. I had been doing it for over a decade, so it seemed like the easy option - I had lots of contacts in the industry and knew there would be work for me provided I could find reliable childcare for my child. Mind you, I envied freelancers who could work from home but knew that in my sector opportunities were rare, plus you needed expensive equipment and software. Despite using MACs at work, I had a modest PC at home and no fancy design software.

I soon realised I was missing work so jumped at the chance of using my skills for the NCT, which is the leading parenting charity in the UK. I had become a member before doing their antenatal classes and heard that they were looking for a volunteer to help the newsletter editor at the East London branch. I ended up coediting various newsletters, churning out articles and designing my half with zero budget (we had only money for printing costs). I was lucky to secure a free copy of QuarkXpress by buying a PC magazine so I could use the professional software I was accustomed to. I did enjoy both the writing and the design side. One year later, I was not ready to go back to work. I was enjoying a busy life as charity volunteer, doing some editing work from home (not much though) and training as a breastfeeding helper with the Breastfeeding Network. I started to volunteer for this second charity by assisting my tutor who ran a breastfeeding drop-in in East London. In summer 2008, just before the credit crunch hit the country, I moved to Rugby, where I became involved with the NCT, became newsletter designer and editor of the local newsletter and got involved with the Rugby Breastfeeding Cafe as a volunteer.

Not being in London meant a longer commute if I wanted to resume my career as subeditor. The recession also meant less freelance work so although I had set up my writing and editing business (and created a website to plug it), I was mostly giving Italian lessons and even taught an evening class at a local institute. Then I heard of a new parenting website that needed product testers and I sent my CV. I started writing product reviews, while running two blogs (this one about parenting and one about eco-friendly thrifting) and volunteering for my charities.

In November 2009 we moved to Cambridge, where I joined the local NCT branch and became involved with the newsletter and started volunteering at breastfeeding drop-ins. Soon after our move I got an email from an advertising agency who wanted me to write breastfeeding and baby care copy. It turned out to be a big project so I left tutoring behind and became a fully-fledged online copywriter, contributing to parenting websites whenever I could. I have recently started indexing academic journals, which is regular work and makes me feel that my degree in Political Sciences is of some use.

So far I have produced several NCT newsletters for various branches and learnt a lot about design, commissioning, advertising and the printing process. As a subeditor for major national magazines I was part of a big team, so I was only involved in editing, rewriting, writing the odd feature, fact-checking and perhaps a bit of design but didn’t have to concern myself with production processes, distribution, overall costs and advertising revenue. I kept in touch with the media industry through moderating a group called subsuk (from 2006 till practically yesterday) but have given this up as I am now a copywriter more than a journalist. I’m not the only one, most people I know from journo forums have moved into PR, advertising, corporate writing and more lucrative fields. Aside writing and indexing I volunteer for my two charities and have started to get involved in my daughter’s preschool activities.

So this is the story so far. The picture at the top is my office, basically an antique kitchen table (there is nice wooden top under the plastic cloth) full of useful junk. Below it’s my filing unit, which is a pine dresser my father made bespoke for the kitchen of my previous house. Inside there are backup DVDs and office supplies, on the shelves you can see my reference library and various odds and ends belonging to my child, including her red book and craft materials. More stationery is parked on top of the blue chest of drawers, one of my ‘revamp junk furniture’ projects.

There is a spare room upstairs which has been kitted out as an office but it’s not practical as I need to keep an eye on my daughter when she is at home. She goes to preschool three hours every afternoon and unless my partner is at home, she is around while I toil away. If I need total silence I work after she has gone to bed or wake up really early in the morning.

Now over to you! If you work from home, feel free to link up relevant blog posts and leave comments. I confess I do miss social interaction but not the commuting to different workplaces every week (unless I got a long-term gig) nor the office politics, from which an inhouse freelancer is not totally immune.