By Julie Lavender @JLavenderWrites

My latest project with the Penguin Random House imprint I’ve worked with previously released in mid-August. My hubby and I are thrilled about this assignment that we worked on together because it was something we’d never done before – a word search puzzle book.

I adored word searches when I was growing up, and I loved creating some of my own as part of a school project or just for fun. I can even remember a date-night when David and I were in the throes of parenting and had several littles at home. We didn’t hire a babysitter often, but we’d have “date nights” after the kids went to bed, and I tried to make it something unique – not just watching a movie on television, though we loved dong that often too.

Anywho … I created a fun puzzle and the words I included were dating memories – words that he and I would recognize as something from our dating days.

So, funny thing about our work-for-hire, word search puzzle book. Our editors met with us via Zoom to talk about the project. They of course have a rough estimate of our ages because of grandchildren and what-not. The editors spoke of the book with “large font” for a senior audience who enjoy being entertained with puzzles and challenging their brains at the same time.

Well, by the time we first saw the cover, the name had been changed to Jumbo Bible Word Search. We couldn’t help but giggle because we weren’t sure if our young, precious editors just didn’t want to offend us old authors. Jokes on them, because with these contacts of mine and the recent birthday I celebrated, I actually love these large letters so I can search easily. (And a good friend told me her kindergarten granddaughter can find the words easily with the large font!)

[tweet_box design=”default” float=”none” inject=”#Writing #Writinglife @BRMCWC”]Puzzling Predicaments Along the Writing Path by @JLavenderWrites on @BRMCWC[/tweet_box]

Interestingly, this book that seemed so simple in concept as far as the guidelines from our publisher was by far the book that had the most edits and rewrites comparatively speaking when taking into consideration the word count of the book.

Turns out, even though our guidelines said we could use up to four-word phrases for the book, after the got ready to send the book to print, I guess they realized that many letters wouldn’t fit in the puzzle. We had so many revisions that we joked the book was going to come back with a 4 X 4 puzzle – four letters across and four letters down in order to accommodate the JUMBO status!

In the end, it was a delight to complete the project. We had such fun diving into God’s Word to pick the entries for each puzzle, and we were really entertained and challenged in the work.

Isn’t that so like our writing journey sometimes? The projects we think might be the simplest or least time-consuming turn out to be the ones that take twice as long and require much more effort than we realized initially.

I personally think that’s what makes this writing life fun – the surprises, challenges, and the unexpected happenings along the way. It’s never a dull moment for the writer!

What about you? Did you have a project or idea that you thought would be simple to write but you found out differently as you got started? Share your experience with us. We’ll have jumbo-fun hearing your stories.

Julie Lavender worked on the computer for many nights until the wee hours of the morning to complete her newest book, Raising Good Sons: Christian Parenting Principles for Nurturing Boys of Faith and Character that releases the second week of April. Julie co-authored the book, published by Penguin Random House, with her hubby, David. It’s their first faith-based collaborative effort, though they’ve also recently written twenty-two books for the children’s educational market. Julie is also the author of A Gingerbread House, published by End Game Press.