Alannah Hill Challenge: Update #5

The Alannah Hill Challenge aims to motivate me to build an enviable magazine writing portfolio by dangling a designer clothing carrot -- a girly Alannah Hill cardie. How's my quest going lately?

It's been a lean couple of months. Yes, I've been given writing assignments by some pretty juicy publications. No, (sadly) I don't mean I've shed any kilos. Yes, I'm eating my fair quota of Easter eggs. What I mean is cold, hard, sweet, sweet cash -- it's been eluding me.

You see, as a freelance writer you pen your article, send it to your editor along with your invoice and wait for the cash to roll in. If you're lucky, you're paid once the article is accepted. The other option is you're paid sometime after the piece is published, which could be months down the track.

So I was overjoyed to be paid this week. Hooray! I also finished an assignment that saw me take on an assistant editor position for a new magazine about social media. This was pretty exciting, but I learnt editing other people's writing can be time-consuming and frustrating. It was a great resume-booster getting that gig though.

So now I'm back on to pitching article ideas to magazines and (hopefully) my book proposal I haven't even glanced at since time immemorial. In a couple of weeks my article for Women's Health and Fitness should be out as well. I can't wait to see it in print. : )

In the interests of curing my bank account's anorexia, I've also developed a game plan of which magazines I'll pitch article ideas to next.

Here's my new list of magazines to tackle (view the old one here):

• Madison
• Frankie
• Peppermint
• WellBeing
• Women's Health
• Cleo
• Cosmopolitan
• Jetstar
• Virgin Blue Voyeur
• Shop Til You Drop

Fingers crossed I'll get a mountain of work and be able to afford a little Hill soon.