I haven’t updated my graphic yet—it’s on my other computer, so maybe I’ll remember tomorrow—but it’s December 1 so I have to comment on the experience. Don’t worry, I’ll be brief. :)
I was aiming to finish the book, but got derailed by my solo trip to Massachusetts. Kind of impossible to write when you’re driving in hurricane-spawned rain. Or even when you’re driving under clear skies, actually. So I revised back to the 50,000 of the official NaNoWriMo goal. Four years of participation, four wins, though they keep getting smaller and smaller. The first two years were 89k months! Can’t seem to get even close to that anymore.
My kids both did NaNo, too. All three of us finished, validated, and won on Sunday, a day early. Number One did 35,000 words on a very ambitious thriller she’s writing for an independent project at school. I’m glad she has the project to keep her going, because she’s only added 10,000 words to last year’s NaNo book since then. :) Number Two has decided she doesn’t really care for writing so much, but still had to do NaNo. She met her goal of 10,000 words with a real-life-inspired journal format, and when she fell behind, she wrote play-by-play of the football games. Shh. Don’t tell anyone I told you that. :)
For us, NaNo isn’t only about the writing. I’m thrilled to share the experience (though less thrilled to share my Alphasmart Neo) with both kids—the agony of writer’s block, the energy of brainstorming, the joy of creation. But even more, I love how they’re learning stuff without realizing it. Stuff about setting and meeting goals. Breaking important projects up into small bites. Working with other people, even on something solitary. Relatively few people will have this experience with their kids.
And I think that’s very cool.
4 comments:
I think that is so cool that the three of you do it! Wow, to have had that kind of encouragement when I was growing up would have been awesome. (My mom's great but she didn't get it. Still doesn't ;) ) Congratulations to all of you!
I was really lucky, too, because my mom was a writer. Not that I liked to write as a kid, I hated it until after college. :)
My husband worries about Number One's determination to be a writer, because he doesn't want her to go through what I have, but she's a better writer than I am, and also knows the score, so she has a good backup plan. :)
Very nice! Congrats, guys!
M3
That's fantastic! I love that you all did NaNo!
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