So as I said in a couple posts down, I did NaNoWriMo for the first time in 2012. I somehow, miraculously, through no power of my own, won. This kind of boosted my confidence a bit and I found myself super excited for the following year. Then last year rolled around and my stupid ego got even bigger. I actually had a plan. I was going to write a freaking awesome spin-off novel (nudge nudge *points to the post below this one*) and because I had an idea this year, I was going to succeed with flying colors. I was already planning a little win celebration (and when I say celebration, I mostly mean a five second dance party with myself and cuddles with my puppy dog)

It didn't even matter that my husband (aka my wonderful wonderful) and I were going to be moving that month. I figured I'd have the book done early anyway. I was doing great at first as you can see below:


As you can also see, that momentum didn't last. Let's just say I ate a nice slice of humble pie last year for Thanksgiving. But hey, come on, we were in the middle of moving two and a half hours away from my family and friends and the city I had grown up in. I feel like that's a good enough excuse to lose, right?
While that was a good excuse, it didn't feel very good so I decided I was really going to try hard this year. If you can call figuring out a basic plot line and hoping it's enough, planning, then this year was frikin' ridiculous. I spent Camp NaNoWriMo (a mini version of NaNoWriMo done in April and July with a goal of 25K in the month) constructing an extremely in-depth outline for this year's NaNoWriMo. I basically wrote my novel in summary form. Not only did I do that but, since it takes place in a summer camp, I also drew a map of the camp (not terrible if I do say so myself), wrote out cabin assignments and basically planned out every little thing including the sports and games they played. I was ready. This was going to be freaking awesome! And I was absolutely paranoid that this would be a repeat of last year.
So paranoid, in fact, that I wrote 10K in just the first couple of days. It was already going really well. I actually felt like maybe I could do it this year. Maybe I could actually make it to 50K and make up for my crashing and burning last year. I used my paranoia to fuel my determination and ended up cranking out 50K in the first two weeks of the month! Yes, the halfway point was in fact five days ago and I'm STILL riding my winner's high :)
This was also the first year I attended NaNoWriMo's annual Night of Writing Dangerously. It's this event they put on every year in San Fransisco at this really swank, upscale venue. Basically NaNoers from all over the US (actually all over the world) get all dressed up, come together and spend the evening hanging out and writing. Here's me and Mike classin' it up San Fran style :)

It was pretty awesome and I met a couple apparently very well-known booktubers! In fact, one of them was the first one of the night to hit 50K and ring the winner's bell! That just fueled my determination even more and since I was less than 5K away from winning, I needed to ring that bell!!!
And I did :)
I also got a pretty, sparkly crown, see?

Honestly, I'm just glad it's over and I can take the rest of the month off. I have like a love/hate relationship with NaNoWriMo. I don't know why I put myself through this torture. But I have to say, looking at this...

really makes it worth while :)
<3Shay