The Art and Craft of Creative Nonfiction. Discover how to “write what you know” as well as to learn about what you need to know to write sparkling, sizzling prose that informs and entertains. Article and essay writing was never this much fun in high school!

The Art and Craft of Spiritual Memoir. It’s all about telling your life story, something no one knows more about than you. Learn how to journal intentionally, to use scrapbooks, letters, photograph albums and journals to tell your spiritual story.

But How Do I Know I’m an Artist? How do you know whether or not you have a creative calling? Once you’ve answered this question, how do you get started developing your gifts? This interactive and fast-paced session helps you answer that question through a series of activities and exercises. Short segments include getting participants in touch with the following:

1. Remembering creative activities you used to do as a child;
2. Identifying creative activities you still enjoy as an adult, but no longer find time for;
3. Pinpointing when and why you stopped doing these creative and artistic activities;
4. Forgiving the discouragers in your life and identifying the encouragers;
5. Moving on beyond the discouragement and beginning to believe in yourself.

Crafting a Winning Nonfiction Book Proposal.  A fast-paced and participatory session for writers of nonfiction who are ready to pitch their book to publishers. Attendees will leave with handouts on formatting a winning proposal, a list of both print and electronic resources, and samples of successful and unsuccessful proposals.

Making Time: How to Be a Writer and Still Do Real Life. “I just can’t seem to find the time to write!” This is the most common lament from both practicing and would-be writers and other artists. In a participatory, discussion-based workshop, Janice will debunk the myths that keep us from finding and protecting our creative time. Participants will leave the workshop with the artillery they need to fend off attacks on their time by both inside and outside forces. Using activities from Chapter Seven of The Creative Call, participants will complete an inventory to find out where their time goes. Then they’ll learn techniques for carving bits of time out of already busy lives. This is an engaging and interactive session.

Surviving Artistic Drought: Growing Through the Dry Times. After the workshop on making time, this is the second most requested conference topic. We approach this important issue through the following segments: facing the fear, showing up at the studio, breathing in the Holy Spirit as Muse, becoming a servant to the work, and finding or forming an artist support group.

To Self-publish or Wait for that Offer of Acceptance: That is the Question.Janice self-published her first book through a print-on-demand publisher. Hear her real-life story of how The Creative Call evolved from a POD book to being picked up by a well-respected publishing house, Shaw Books, and then chosen as a finalist for the 2002 ECPA Gold Medallion award. Topics addressed in this session include

1. What is a POD publisher and how does it work?
2. How does POD differ from traditional self-publishing? What are the advantages and disadvantages of each?
3. Which publisher is right for you? How to do the research.
4. Getting your book picked up by a traditional publishing house: How make it happen.

Unleashing Your Creativity. This interactive workshop will allow participants to tell their own stories about exercising creativity as an integral part of their lives. Based on ideas and activities from her award-winning book The Creative Call, Janice will lead participants to a new awareness of their creative gifts and a new appreciation for the need to exercise those gifts for the sake of their own well-being.

Writing as Spiritual Practice: Living the Writer’s Life. This interactive session offers attendees an opportunity to explore the connection between artistic talent and spiritual development. Janice will tell the writing and publishing story behind her book. She’ll then take the group through some “artistic awakening” exercises that can jump-start writers and other artists who may need a kick in the pants to get busy with their art. Even full-time artists will profit from investigating the connection between developing their art and growing closer to God. A fast-paced, energizing, and inspiring session.

Working with Your Editor: A Match Made in Heaven? New writers might be intimidated by the author/editor relationship. What can you expect? How does it work? How can Track Changes change your editing life? What if your personalities clash? What if ideas about your book don’t agree with your editor’s? How do you disagree without being disagreeable? All these questions and more will be addressed and discussed in this session designed to take the mystery out of working with an editor.