Breaking Down April

No, I’m not breaking down.

This post is to evaluate the goals I set for April.

Before I do this I’d like to underline that these goals were just there to give some direction and also to make me put in words what I wanted to work on in April.

As a reminder this was April’s Project:

1 – Make Plot Outline (for Editing Purposes)

2 – Edit First Draft (Obvious)

3 – Create Synopsis (Kind of dreading this one)

4 – Write a couple of blog posts (Because it is fun)

5 – Start short story/ new story (To distract from point 2)

And

Make a blog post about my writing challenge to see how many hours I spent writing/ how many words/ how many chapters edited.

I finished or started the things in green, but didn’t do the things in red because I wasn’t as quick in revising/editing as I thought I would be.. After one week of campnano I changed my goal to hours instead of words.

Let me break my April writing down for you in days:

Date	Hours	What/why?
April 1	0	Because of hangover after birthday party. (I turned 34 on 31st of March)
April 2	2	Cut things. Also keep shifting things around in chapter 1 and 2.
April 3	2	Day job. Added some but also cut things. Moved things around.
April 4	2	Finally started editing for real. Chapter one mostly
April 5	2	Chapter one revised/edited
April 6	2	Chapter two revised/edited
April 7	2	One tiny blogpost. Chapter 3: delete/ repeat. Added some.
April 8	Weekend (0)	House painting /chores ☹
April 9	Weekend (0)	House painting/chores ☹
April 10	3	Tinkered again with chapter 1 & 2, and send it to someone to read.
April 11	4,5	Returned to chapter 3, added/cut/rewrite
April 12	1,5	Chapter 4
April 13	1	Looked things up/ get in touch with writerly feeling
April 14	1	Wrote Blogpost
April 15	1,5	Chapter 4 done, needs more revising in next draft but okay for now. Need forward momentum so on to chapter 5.
April 16	2,5	Chapter 5 started also some reading on WordPress reader to look for interesting blogs to follow (also known as procrastinating)
April 17	Minutes	Easter things
April 18	Minutes	Work and birthday party prep
April 19	Minutes	Kid birthday party/ housecleaning/grocery/ watching Luther, because: Idris Elba and Ruth Wilson😊
April 20	Minutes	Work and stuff
April 21	3	WordPress and a bit of editing.
April 22	3	Chapter 5 !
April 23	0	Work and stuff
April 24	4	Chapter 6
April 25	0	Kids vacation, went to a zoo
April 26	1	Kids vacation, zero concentration
April 27	4	Chapter 5 & 6 Done
April 28	4	Started chapter 7
April 29	2	Chapter 7/ WordPress
April 30	2	Chapter 7 done

What have I learned about my process this month? Well I’m a slow starter for sure. It took me FOUR days to realize that if I wanted to improve this draft I actually had to sit down and well, DO SOMETHING. And with that I mean, FOCUS and put words on paper. And even worse: delete everything that doesn’t work. (Which also took time, because I only really cut things when I send my work to someone else).

So by the time it was April 4^th I had that realization and in the days that followed work was done. But then the weekend came around… In which I promised to help to paint and didn’t get around to write much. This is also true for work days and days when the kids are free.  It was a very busy month with loads of obligations but I still managed 50 hours.

Of course I could have done more, but I don’t mind. I like being hooked on watching Luther, going to the gym, meet friends, have dayjob (not liking that one), having 4 kids to entertain on occasion, having a relationship, read books.

And I’ve found some writerly friends! Some say Campnano is very different from the Big November Thing, and that’s true, but I really liked my cabin.

I would have worked on my story anyway but I’m glad I’d a group of people doing the same thing, dreaming the same dreams, fighting the same insecurities.

For May I’ve decided to just keep on keeping on. I learned that if I’ve longer stretches of time I get more work done, so I’m trying to get those this month.

May Goals:

• Continue Edit on The Draft That Must Not be Named 😊
• Make a Polaroid branch and blog about that project!
• Blogpost about editing process part two
• I’m going to Copenhagen this month, so expect a travel post by the end of the month (probably just pictures, because well Copenhagen!)

Ciao!