Happy July!

June has been a busy month; full of birthdays, traveling, meetings, writing, & friend events. A week goes by without me even realizing that it has passed & there I go, not posting again. It did become a slight habit, especially within the last two weeks because the D&D group had to pause on play, it was sad but much needed.

The month of June belongs to all of my Gemini babies & there are a lot of them. In one week I had three birthdays. THREE. To add on to that... there were four June birthday at work as well. I do love celebrating birthdays though, celebrating people & their lives is very special. important even. My family typically celebrates birthday weeks so that's how serious I am about it, hahah.

Traveling was linked to a few birthdays as well as the simple need to just get out & be in the world. I'll make a seperate post about the trips later because I've got some cute pictures! Though, to be honest, the last trip was mainly surrounded but food, food, & food hahah. But I do have lots of scenery pictures to share as well.

My favorite event that took place during June (gemini babies, do not take offence to this) but Carpe Artes is back!

In case you do not know, Carpe Artes is a creative group that I host once every two weeks. The idea behind the group is to get creative people out of their houses & get them connected & socializing with others like them. In the long run I do hope to grow the group & morphe it into a starting place that helps the members obtain connections & commissions.

Around the beginning of the year there was a few issues & I decided to take a break to get my head straight & really think things through. One of those issues is that we hosted a Writing/Art challenge that was, in short, a fail. I took the fail particularly hard because I had put so much into it & Carpe Artes is very important to me. Instead of working through the failure I shut down & distanced myself, I acted incorrectly & I was not the only one affected by this. For that, I am sorry to my group & plan to make it up to them soon.

Moving on, the group met for the first time since February last week. Typically, during our meetings we work on some personal stuff while chatting & having a few drinks here or there, considering we meet at breweries normally. The meeting was amazing! We shared burgers, drinks, & caught up on whatever each other had done since our last meetings.

I could not love a group of people more than I love these dorks. Perhaps later on, when things are a little more ironed out, I'll make a post talking about the lovely creative beans in my group, like a highlight post.

Side Note: Carpe Artes might be in the process of creating stickers!

On a related topic, I became a member of Vocal Creators (@vocal_creators on Instagram). Vocal is a writing organization where you get paid for the amount of views that your written piece pulls in, about $6 per 1,000 views. That may not sound like a lot but as a side gig for a writer just getting started, it's more than anyone else is offering. Vocal is also very cool because they host writing challenges where the topic three places include actual cash prizes, which is another big thing for starting writers. No, this is not sponsored but a girl can wish.

I'm excited to be a member because, personally, I feel as though this will push me out of my comfort zone. I tend to write the same things over & over but to grow I can't do that, I have to do more things outside of my comfort zone. So, here is to that!

On another related topic, I've got a bit of exciting news! The second instalment of Anthropology of Wilmington will be published soon! If you don't know, now you do!

The Anthropology of Wilmington is a comic book that is sponsored & hosted by Memory Lane Comic Shop, started last year. It's a collection of artist & writers who co-create short stories in comic book form & these all are published in one comic book. These comic book is called Anthropology of Wilmington, due to the fact that they all aim to have something to do with WIlmington since that is where Memory Lane is.

My artist happens to be one of my best friends (@afernot on Instagram) & we did a pirate theme... obviously Black Beard. The first instalment that Angie & I did last year is available at the comic book shop &, in a few short months, the second instalment will also be available. So, if you're into Black Beard, magic, a semi-historical semi-fantasy combination, & a strong female protagonist, then I think you'd love what we have created.

&, as a bonus, another member of Carpe Artes also has a short in AoW! (You can find him as @ramza_illustration on Instagram)

I promise to write more & write more things that are interesting but I thought a quick chat & update was needed.

Anyways,

Caio Tesoro