Calls for Submissions – July Theme: WORK

Submissions Deadline: Monday, July 9

This month is all about work. We are holistically exploring how the work of our hands and our hearts are inextricably connected through our inner-work, work lives, work-arounds and workouts.

Topics to Consider:

Tell us how you’ve worked to love the skin you’re in or how you’ve truly and genuinely owned the body you have.
Share your work ethic ethos and how you live that out with your littles.
My work outside of the home has made me a better mom.
Staying at home is the hardest work I’ve ever done.
Share your spiritual focus on how your physical human holds your spiritual being – the human to your being.
Send us a picture along with a short story caption or show us your favorite workout via video (30 seconds or less). No need to polish – we love to see real moms taking care of themselves any way possible.
Share your work-arounds in life: pants that fit just a bit too tight (unbuttoned underneath a long shirt), hiding that extra baby weight (A-line cuts), swimsuit tricks (ruching); Kid workaround like what to do when you forget the wipes, substituting something new in place of an old favorite, last-minute play date cancellation, etc.
Getting your hands dirty makes you feel like you’ve accomplished something. Share what makes your hands dirty while putting a smile on your face.
Work can be a playground. Share how you make work fun for your kids, family or even yourself (eg. laundry, dirty dishes).
Road trip stories, photos or videos (less than 30 seconds). Send your best traveling tips with kids, your worst or best road trip moments, or you and your family in front of a cool/famous landmark.
Creative play can sound intimidating to a non-creative. Break down creative play in 3 – 5 easy ways to get your kids (and even you) exploring.
Staying vigilant in the summer is real work keeping our babies safe around water, campfires, fireworks, etc. Tell us 3-5 ways you accomplish this.
Tell us about the type of work you have to do over the summer? Homeschool moms/teachers planning curriculum, coaching, additional child care?
Tell us that one something that made all of your hard work worth it.

Remember we accept the following submissions: written (word count 600-900, Word doc), video (less than 30 seconds), artwork.

Tips for sharing video:

Portrait Mode – Keep your phones vertical (the way you would normally use them).
Audio – if you want us to hear you, don’t film outdoors or within big crowds
Shake free – try to prop your phone on the counter or use something to hold it up
Cautious of windows – Windows are great for lighting your face, but try not to have many in your background as they will blow out and just be a bright white square on your video.
Headspace – When you are positioning yourself in the video, make sure your head is above the middle of your phone. We don’t want the entire top half of your screen to be of the wall or ceiling.

How to Submit:

Send us your submission at content@mops.org.

Submission Information

For more information about the tone of our materials and our submission process read our writer’s guidelines (Insider hint: We take these very seriously, so it’s important you take a peek before submitting.)

Submission Process

Just so you know, all submissions are received on speculation. Regretfully, we are unable to respond to submissions when they are received. However, if your submission is selected for publishing, we will email you in advance with the date we will be publishing for your records.

And Since You Always Ask

The MOPS Blog does post previously published or posted material. Just make sure it meets our editorial needs first. Because, again, we take those pretty seriously.

What About General Content

Yes, we certainly accept MOPS stories, general articles, videos, artwork about parenting, mothering and woman-related issues. In fact, we’re always up for a good tear-jerker or one of those stories that gets us laughing. We welcome those submissions through the same submissions process, but we should tell you up front that since we’re a theme-based blog, we only publish a few.