Camp NaNoWriMo Winner! (don’t be jealous, my goal was really small)

Back in March, I mentioned that I was going to use the April Camp NaNoWriMo as a replacement for Script Frenzy. This was a slightly insane plan as I was having enough trouble getting through my day job and, say, putting on pants while being at the beck and call of the little one. As usually happens when I’m busy, any writing I am not contracted or otherwise being paid to do falls by the wayside which is sad but a necessity of survival.

But I miss writing for me and I like to stay in the habit or I get rusty so I knew I needed something to make myself fit a few words in. When I signed up for Camp NaNoWriMo, I was a little behind on my writing goals for the year so I decided to set a goal that would, at least, leave me caught up by the end of the April. Since they gave us a new feature for NaNo this year, the ability to set our own word count goals, I decided to aim for a meager 10,000 words.

I was behind for much of the month (and sick but that’s a story for another time) so I was afraid that I wouldn’t hit my goal, small as it was. But I rallied, made some sacrifices, and just under the wire I crossed the 10k mark. (I was actually 92 words short of my goal for two days before I got a chance to bang them out, if you want an example of how insane my life has become. Insane in a good way, naturally.)

“Sit back, relax, and enjoy the sunset. You’ve earned it!”  says the Camp NaNoWriMo Winner page. I was hoping to show you my camp winner’s badge but apparently they aren’t ready yet which makes me a little bit sad. So you’ll just have to pretend that a snazzy winner’s badge is posted below.

What does my barely squeaking by on the last day with a 10,000 word goal mean for the 50,000 word challenge of November? I’m not really sure. But it is somewhat comforting to know that I can still meet a goal of any kind.

As for my writing goals for the year, I am pleased to say that I am on pace and a little bit ahead. I still feel silly celebrating being on pace with such a small goal but, considering how insane life is right now, it still feels like a triumph. I should at least be at 32,877 words today if I were exactly on pace and I’m at…

35,665 words! Only 10% of that has been editing so I’d ideally like to get that closer to 50/50 in the near future but I’m finding that it’s much easier to throw down a few new words in the little breaks I get here and there than to do the slower and more careful editing. There’s also been very little work on existing projects which is OK for now, but I need to get some older stuff finished this year so I need to make myself get focused on that. But, for now, I revel in the fact that I’m at least still writing something and that’s certainly better than nothing.

How did your Camp NaNoWriMo experience go this year?

Edited to add:

Winner Badges!