Um ... Yeah ...

The April Challenge was a total disaster for me this year. I certainly wasn't expecting my mom to have a mini stroke on the first Saturday of the month or that I'd have to get creative with figuring out when to be at her house and when I could leave a kid to sit with her, etc. And then we packed up her whole house so she could move in with my sister. I'm glad she's doing well and that she's settling in all right at my sister's, but from a writing goals perspective, this month wasn't successful.

And then ... we all got the flu. My entire family. That's how we spent the last week of April.

So you know, I'm thinking I sort of need a do-over.  :)

I'm excited to hear how well the rest of you did, and we'll plan to make the July Challenge the best one ever!

April Challenge: Day 17

Well, writing has fallen apart for me this month, but I'm making good progress in packing up my mom's house so she can move in with my sister. I'm considering that a good challenge, and so while this month isn't going quite how I'd envisioned, stuff's getting done.  :)

I hope you're all moving forward with your goals as well - share with us how you're doing!

April Challenge - Day Eleven

This is a day eleven update being posted on the twelfth day. Sorry if that's a little confusing.  :) I just wanted to let you know that I managed to eke out 1,499 words last night on "Taking the Floor," bringing my total for this challenge on this project to 10,436. Hooray for me!!  :)

Yesterday I also got a good head start on my mom's house. We're sorting through her things and getting her packed up. It's going to be quite the process because she has a lot of stuff and she's not allowed to do any of the work herself, so she's basically telling us what to do with each thing. I'd say we got in about two good hours yesterday.

And that's what I'm up to!! How are you?

April Challenge: Day Eleven

April is turning out to be challenging after all - my mom had a downturn in her health and we've decided that we should move her in with my sister for the time being. (I'd take her but I don't have the room.) So I'm not sure how I'm going to do with the rest of the challenge - I am going to be spending the rest of the month packing up my mom's stuff and cleaning her apartment. However, I shall do the best I can, and I'm here to cheer the rest of you on. Go! Go! Go!

April Challenge: Day Eight

It's raining, it's pouring, and Tristi wants to be snoring ...

Yeah, pretty wiped out today. But the universe is spinning good things in my direction, so I'm not complaining at all!

Saturday night, I churned out 4,257 words of Punctuation Principles, the third goal on my to-do list for this challenge. I had originally anticipated that it would come in around 10,000 words, but now I'm thinking it might be closer to 8k. We'll see how much I have to say about commas - probably a lot, but I don't know if there will be almost 4k worth.  :) But once I finish the comma section - oh, and hyphens - that book is done.

I'm not going to have time to do personal writing today - I have client work to do and some other important errands - but I will crank out some serious words tomorrow, and we'll chat then! Hope you all had a great weekend.

April Challenge - Day Five

I totally spaced posting for day four - sorry about that. I thought about it as I was drifting off to sleep last night. Just means I have two days' worth to report tonight.  :)

Yesterday I added 1,491 to Taking the Floor, and today I added 2,139. This brings my five-day total to 8,937. What I'm doing is just hammering out one chapter a day, and it's working for me. In fact, I can see myself doing this regularly, not just in a challenge month. I typically go for a few days without writing for myself and then try to put in a few hours, but doing it this way, one chapter per day, makes it more manageable and I can see how it would be more productive.

Okay - how are you all doing? It's fun to see your progress reports start to come in via the comment trail - makes me excited to think about all the little book babies being hatched right now. The world is a better place because of books!

April Challenge: Day Three

Hey, folks! How's it going? Today felt very productive. Okay, my kitchen is full of dirty dishes and my laundry room is full of dirty laundry, but I got a lot of other great stuff done. I wrote 1,454 words in "Taking the Floor," bringing my three-day total to 5,307. The dead body has just been discovered, so we're off to a good start. :) In addition, I spent some serious time today finishing up the ghostwrite - it didn't take twelve hours, like I thought. More like six. So that's crossed off and I'm feeling awesome about that. I hope your first week of April is going well, and I'm excited to see what we accomplish tomorrow!