malenkayacherepakha | Entries tagged with snowflake challenge

Challenge #15 - Create your own challenge.

My challenge - which is mostly for myself but if other people wanted to do the same that would be amazing - is to reach out more.

I think a lot of people in fandom (myself included) want to feel like a part of the community and make friends, and sometimes it can feel a bit like shouting into the void - everyone is so busy (with fandom things like writing and reading and commenting, as well as real life) and lots of sites move so quickly that it can be hard to build that connection with people.

So I want to start making an effort to build those relationships. I want to comment more, rec more, chat more. I want to reach out to people whose writing I love or who I've always wanted to chat to, as well as people who are newer to fandom (I've not been here long, I remember vividly what it was like to be new - and still feel like it sometimes too!).

I'm terrible at opening up to people but I want to try. I want to keep building the friendships I've already made since joining fandom, and I want to support people with their writing and more. I want people to feel like they can talk to me and rely on me, for beta help or just a general chat.

Being more active on Dreamwidth has been a great start to this - I've loved all the interaction on here, and I want to carry that forward both here and in other fandom spaces ❤

Challenge #11: Recommend a fannish or creative resource.

Popping in quickly before I return to birthday celebrations to do challenge #11.

I really hate coming up with names for OCs/background characters in fics, and it's always one of the last things I do before publishing or submitting a fic. Right up until that stage my fic will be littered with XXX [auror /professor/character name] because I just cannot come up with names.

Thank god for name generators is all I can say.

My favourites are this Victorian Name Generator and this Harry Potter Name Generator. I don't tend to the use whole name they come up with, instead I click through until I find a first name I like, then repeat until I find a surname that goes with the first name or that conveys a meaning etc.

I know a lot of people struggle with names so I hope these help!

Snowflake Challenge #10 is to talk about a creator/someone who inspired you.

This is hard because so many people inspire me, on a daily basis.

There are people who inspire me with the sheer level of talent they have, others with their dedication to fandom and the characters we love.

Anyone who has ever commented on my fics inspires me more than I can say, and nothing is more inspiring than chatting to alphas and betas and my friends about our fics.

There are people who inspire me because they have such a wonderful relationship with fandom, and who inspire me to be better and kinder and more generous. Who inspire me to read more, comment more, rec more.

If we've interacted here, or if I've ever commented on one of your fics or chatted to you on Tumblr and Discord, then you've inspired me too, and I owe all of you a massive thank you - I wouldn't still be in fandom without that inspiration and this community and all of you wonderful friends ❤

Challenge #8 is to rec at least three fics I didn't write, so in no particular order, here are some fics I've enjoyed recently:

Have You Ever? by DoubleApple. (Harry/Charlie)

Summary: Half a lifetime ago, Harry spent an awful summer in Romania with Charlie Weasley. Now, he's determined to follow up on the seeds that were planted back then.

The Beauty of Thestrals and Other Unseen Things by writcraft. (Harry/Draco)

Summary: Harry has terrific friends, an amazing girlfriend and his job as Head Auror enables him to work on challenging cases and Ministry reform. He just wishes he could work out why he's been so out of sorts.

When Draco Malfoy is arrested for gross indecency, Harry's comfortable life begins to unravel. He's forced to decide if it's worth risking everything for love in a world where following his heart is a criminal offence.

Ils se demandent pourquoi je t'aime by Violetclarity. (James Sirius/Teddy)

Summary: No one -- friends, family, or coworkers -- understands why Teddy and James are together. It doesn't bother Teddy. It does bother James.

Don't Mind if We Do by Musyc. (Draco/Pansy)

Summary: Watching Draco wank, Pansy isn't as tired as she thought.

Come Alive by gracerene. (James Sirius/Teddy)

Summary: Teddy already stands out enough being an orphan, a Metamorphmagus, and the son of a werewolf - nobody needs to know he's also bisexual. He's attracted to women too, so it's not a lie if he ends up married to a witch, has children, and settles down to live a perfectly normal and unremarkable life. But when he's offered the change to experience what its like to have strings-free sex with a man, he's powerless to resist temptation. Even if he knows there's no such thing as sex without strings when it comes to fooling around with one's best mate.

Challenge #9 is to promote a canon I love.

Clearly I love Harry Potter - even though as an adult I notice things that are less than perfect about it, I'll never forget how magical it was to read as a child, and I still get that feeling of coming home every time I reread or watch the films.

The other canon that I'm currently deeply invested in is Red, White and Royal Blue. I've read it multiple times since the summer, and still find myself getting deeply invested in the romance and the plot every time. I've dipped my toe into writing fic for it, but I don't feel the same need to write fic for RWRB as I do for HP - the book has already given me nearly all I need. Saying that, I'm sure I'll end up writing more as I can't seem to move on from it!

Challenge #7: Promote/rec/sing the praises of yourself!

Hah. Well. This is a hard one.

Not that I don't have things I'm proud of, or because I don't have things I like about myself, but because bigging myself up is something I've always struggled with. I'm that person that always credits the team for something that went well at work rather than saying yeah, actually, I did that, and it was good. Maybe it comes with being a woman and British? Who knows. I mentioned on a post a little while ago that I've found the self-promo side of fanfic a bit tricky to navigate but hopefully this post will be a good teeny step to becoming a bit more comfortable with it.

So, things I'm proud of and like about myself:

First of all, I'm proud of myself for all the writing I've done since I joined fandom. I never expected to still be here a year later with over 168k words published on ao3. Leaving aside all questions of quality, I'm proud of creating so much, for such a variety of ships, fests and tropes.

I am also proud of my writing - I still have a lot to learn but I think I'm improving and I really like the majority of the fics I've written this year. Particular favourites are Scar Tissue, Seven Days in Sunny June, and Truth and Tradition.

I'm trying not to focus on stats, but I can't believe I've got a fic with nearly 13k views. It blows my mind that so many people have clicked on something I've written (especially considering it's such a ridiculous fic!)

I think I'm a pretty good beta/cheerleader (I'm a massive grammar and language nerd so love proofreading) and I'm so pleased that I've been able to play even a tiny part in the creation of some really wonderful fics.

And chucking in one from real life to finish, I like that I'm pretty settled in who I am - I feel like I know and accept myself, and actually I do quite like the person I've grown into. 10 year old Rachel would be pretty happy with where I've ended up I think.

Writing this goes against everything I'm used to doing, both online and in real life, but it's a great challenge, and one that is really valuable - sometimes being too self-deprecating isn't a good thing!

Challenge #5 was to speak to someone I haven't spoken to before - thanks to this challenge I've done lots of that so far this month, and have met some lovely people.

Challenge #6 is to list some things I wish existed in fandom or elsewhere, or things I'd like.

This has been quite a tricky one for me - I'm not good at asking for things! I also don't tend to have very many specific things I want - I hate filling out exchange forms because my tastes are so wide and generally speaking I'll read anything. But there are a few things I managed to think of:

Betas/Cheerleaders - I've got a few regular betas but not many, and I'm always conscious of not overloading them or asking them to look at things which contain their squicks etc, so if anyone wanted to trade off on betas (for HP) that would be amazing (I can also offer britpicking if needed).

A writing community - I'm not quite sure how to best explain this one, and it does link a lot with the above comments about betas, but I'd love to have a community/place/group chat where myself and others can chat about writing, discuss ideas and what we're working on, and generally help each other to become better writers and write what we want. I'm not a big fan of unsolicited concrit but in a situation like this one I'd be looking for advice on how to improve etc. I know of various discords where this kind of happens but that still seems a bit too public, so I don't really know exactly how to make this work - maybe it's just building a deeper writing relationship with a few people I trust and interacting through email/dms, who knows.

More interaction on Dreamwidth - this is something I want from myself as much as from others. I've loved all the interaction that I've been having here this month with the Snowflake Challenge going on, and I'd love to see it continue past the challenge. I also want to figure out how to properly use comms so I can interact more on them too.

More recs - this links back to my own goals for the year, and I've seen a bunch of other people talk about this too. I'd love to see a wider range of fics recced too - often I see the same fics recced over and over again (which isn't a bad thing, they deserve the love they're getting!) but that doesn't help when I'm trying to find new things to read. I've got my list of 'things to rec' started, so will start posting them soon. paulamcg talked about some sort of rec community in their wishes post, and that's something I'd love to see too.

I of course also wish for more interaction on my own fics but I'm happy to wait for that to happen organically, I don't like asking people to comment on my stuff (my dislike of self promo and complete inability to do it does not mix well with my constant need for validation!)

The 4th Snowflake Challenge is to talk about my goals for the year - luckily I didn't already make a post on this, as it's something I've been thinking about for a little while now.

If I could sum up all my goals for the year, I think they would all relate back to the idea of <i>balance</i>. The past few years have been a bit of a whirlwind - graduating, moving around, moving between various jobs. Things have settled now though, I don't plan on moving (house or city) for at least a few years, I've now got a permanent job that I'm very excited about, and it feels like I can do more than just constantly move towards the next stage of life or focus on getting one thing sorted out before moving on to the next issue. So this year I want to find a balance between all the things I enjoy doing and have to do; a balance between work, socialising, rest, fandom, etc.

This is all quite vague and I don't quite know what it'll look like in practice but I do have a few more specific goals, both in fandom and real life:

Do fewer fests. I spent almost the whole of last year under a fest deadline, and it wore me out. I hardly wrote anything just for myself, and I'd like to that more this year. I did enjoy pretty much all of my fest experiences, but it's not sustainable to do another year that way.

Find a better level of engagement with fandom. This seems like a weird thing to say in a fandom space, and is no way judging people who can and do give a lot of time to fandom, but I gave too much of my time and mental energy to fandom last year. I started to care too much about petty things and got too competitive with stats and readership, and I just kind of didn't like the way I was interacting with fandom by the end? It got to the point where I thought about just leaving entirely, although I'm glad that I didn't (I just needed a break!). This all comes back to that balance - I want to find a balance where I can enjoy fandom and create things I'm proud of without getting too caught up in tumblr and discord and everything that comes with fandom. I also want to continue developing the friendships I've made, because I've met so many fantastic people.

Socialise more. I've struggled a bit with making proper good friends since I've moved here, and I'd like to start remedying that a bit. I'm not going to go as far as setting a goal of <i>make some friends</i> because I think that'll put too much pressure on everything, but I want to make more of an effort to go out after work and do things that will lead to chatting to people etc.

Move more. Last summer I got strong, and I miss that. The autumn term got so busy that my exercise routine slipped away, and I want to start going back to classes and to the gym, because I loved how it made me feel. This also links into the socialise more goal - going to a gym class totally counts as far as I'm concerned.

Rec more. I've read so many fantastic fics since I joined fandom, and I'd like to share the love a bit more. We all love when someone recs one of our fics, right? I'd love to give other people that feeling. I've already got a list started, so at some point the recs will start appearing on my tumblr and here.

Kick ass at work. I'm so looking forward to properly starting my new job (I've tentatively started it this week but will get properly stuck in next week), and I really want to work hard at it. My past few jobs have had long periods of down time where it was easy to slack off, and that's going to be hard to stop, but now's the perfect time to really focus on my career and give it lots of my energy (although not too much, I'm still very much about that work/life balance!)

Cook one new thing every week. My boyfriend and I have got stuck in a rut of eating the same few meals all the time, and god we're bored of it. I got several new recipe books for Christmas and have already gone through and marked things I want to try, so this one feels pretty achievable! Plus I do enjoy cooking, so it should be fun too.

Who knows if I'll actually complete these goals, but that's kind of not the point. Just having them in the back of my mind will be enough, and I'm excited to try and integrate both these goals and the general idea of a better balance into my life.

Challenge #3 - Pimp your favourite communities, fests, or challenges.

I've been putting this one off because I've found it surprisingly hard! I'm interested to see what other communities people mention for this challenge though.

That being said, I still came up with a solid list of fests etc that have been a great part of my fandom experience so far.

( Read more... )

Challenge #2 - in your own space, talk about your fannish history

I loved Harry Potter from the very first time I read it - I clearly remember buying a copy of Philosopher's Stone at Paddington Station on the way home from staying with my Grandma when I was 7ish and falling in love immediately. A few of the books were already out but after that I waited impatiently for each new one to be released and can still remember how excited I would be each time I'd wake up to find the newest book waiting on the doorstep. My brother and I would play Harry Potter for hours on end too, putting on robes and making potions with shampoo while using chopsticks as wands. I didn't know anything about fanfiction and fandom though. I do have vague memories of searching for Harry Potter stuff on the internet as I tried to get my fix while waiting for a new book to come out, and I think I ended up on fanfiction.net? but I was still young and not used to the internet so I had no idea how to navigate it and quickly gave up before reading anything.

I only properly discovered the Harry Potter fandom in the past 2 years or so, and I've already forgotten how exactly I stumbled across my first fanfic. I do know that I started reading Marauders era fics, at first focusing on Sirius and Marlene, then Wolfstar. After that, I was hooked, and started devouring fics from all the pairings I could find. As a child and teen I loved reading - I always had multiple books on the go, and regularly got in trouble for reading at the dinner table - but when I went to uni I stopped reading apart from books I was studying. Fanfic reminded me how much I loved getting lost in a story, and suddenly I was back to reading constantly.

I spent about a year just reading, and then I decided it was time to try my hand at writing. I've always enjoyed writing - as a child I wrote endless short stories, diary entries, and songs, and when I was at uni I made a tentative start on some original fiction. I also wrote the very beginning of what I now realise was Peaky Blinders fanfiction, which I hope has been lost in various computer changes over the years! My first Harry Potter fic was posted exactly a year ago today (happy anniversary, me) and is an incomplete Harry/Ginny fic which being realistic, I won't ever finish, although it has given me the very basic idea for my next H/G fic. After that I discovered fests, and spent basically the rest of the year with at least one fest deadline hanging over me at all times. I was not good at balance and moderation this year!

When I started writing, I also discovered the fandom community - tumblr, discord, etc. I have mixed feelings about some of these places (I'm very glad I didn't discover fandom and therefore tumblr when I was a teenager as I think that could have been a disaster) but I've met some lovely people and it's been great getting more involved in the community. I'm looking forward to seeing where fandom takes me next, and continuing to improve my skill as a writer.

A day late because I was too busy sleeping and feeling sorry for myself yesterday after NYE, here's my first post for the snowflake challenge!

I'm MalenkayaCherepakha (which means little tortoise in Russian), but you can call me Rachel too. I'm a relatively new member of the Harry Potter fandom - I've been reading fic for around 2 years, and writing for a year. I've written for a variety of ships, but the majority of my published stuff is currently Drarry. All my fics can be found on AO3, and I'm also on Tumblr. I'm planning to make a list on here of everything I wrote this year too so that'll appear at some point.

My main ships are Drarry and Hinny, but I'll read basically anything, and have really enjoyed a bunch of other ships - I particularly love Jeddy, Scorbus, and Wolfstar. I actually first got into fandom via Marauders era fics, and finding Wolfstar was what really got me obsessed with reading fic. The main fic I have planned for this year is Harry x Ginny but I'm sure I'll write for other pairings this year too.

I've only recently got into using Dreamwidth, but this year I'd love to post and comment more on here, as I love the community feel of it. I'm always open to more friends, from any fandom or from none at all, so feel free to subscribe and say hi.

A few potentially vaguely interesting facts about me to finish this off: I'm based in the UK (always happy to britpick), work in Higher Education, can speak French and Russian (so if you have any fic recs in those languages hit me up). I also have a pet gecko and two tortoises (hence the name!).