How I Survived Nanowrimo: With a Full-time Job and An 18 Month Old

It was the night of November 30th and not only was I in a stubborn frenzy, that the next day was the first of December, but it was the last day to score a win for the National Novel Writing Month challenge and I still had a few hundred words to write.

So I did what any desperate mother will do in search for a time of peace, bribe my 18 month old with NickJr., markers, crayons, and an oversized picture of HoHo to color. Scout sat on the floor with her setup and I sat next to her, laptop powered on and ready to go. This actually lasted longer than I had expected, about a full 30 minutes, however one of her favorite shows was on so that probably had a lot to do with it.

It was finally night-night time for the rugrat who, of all nights, raised hell. Now, my kid is a sleeper. After we brought her home from the hospital, I only had bags under my eyes for the first three weeks and that wasn’t from her lack of sleeping, it was from my fear of why she was being so quiet all night. What can I say, she spoils me.

I finally wrestled her to sleep around 10pm and I was still about 500 words in the hole. The hubs came home around 10:45 from his card tournament and began to tell me about how his decks didn’t do so well against the other players. To where I replied, “Hush it. I only have an hour left and I have to pull 300 words out of my butt.”

Silence ensued and the next thing I knew it was 11:48 and I had a total of 50,131 words according to Microsoft Word. I held my breath as I validated the word count at Nanowrimo.com and when the congratulations page came up, I thrust my hands into the air, like you do with any victory, then preceded to stare at the screen in awe for about 15 minutes.

Naturally, I then texted everyone and their mother, shouted out on Facebook and Twitter and even boasted to my cat that I had won. I had dominated the 50,000 word goal in only 30 days. Not only is that the most that I have ever written in a single story, it’s the first time I’ve plugged out more than 10,000 words in a single month.

It’s been a day and a half since I’ve claimed my victory over the beast that is Nanowrimo …and I am still shocked that I managed it.

For most of yesterday I was convinced that I had accidently double pasted a chapter in Scrivener, the program I use, and went quickly over all my documents in the binder, but all was in order. Today on my weekly hike around the neighborhood Costco, I tried to think of all the things I did over the 30 day time frame to help with my word count. These are a few things I came up with:

1) I packed a lunch every day for the day job, so I could stay at my desk and write for my full lunch hour. (With an exception of that one day, when I had to go to the post office.)

2) I think a majority of my word count came from the fact that my kid is a sleeper. Like I said, she spoils me. Bedtime on a normal day is between 8:30 and 9 with no fits or fuss. Naptime is rarely ever shorter than an hour and can lasts for up to 3. Which brings me to my next strategy.

3) I refused (and still do) to clean or do any house work while my daughter is napping. Nap time is quiet time which is primal writing time. How do you think I wrote this blog post?

4) Much like my daughter I like my sleep, but I powered through and stayed up to ungodly hours for the last two weeks of November. I told myself that I couldn’t go to sleep until I managed at least 1,000 words starting from the time Scout was out. This lead to bedtimes of about 2am most nights, and I am far from a morning person but no pain, no gain.

5) When I got home from work I spent as much time playing and doing this with Scout so that after dinner when she is usually the most occupied with toys and such, I wouldn’t feel guilty with my face buried in my laptop. Not much writing was done when she was awake though; she’s a momma’s girl and gets jealous if anything is on my lap that isn’t her.

6) Lastly, in pursuing the writing challenge I have learned that the best seat in the house for ample word outage isn’t in fact on the living room couch. There’s too many distractions and awkward laptop placement there. I began sitting at my dining room table to write for the last two weeks and my word count soared to higher than it has ever been. Being away from the distractions and having the keyboard at a level that makes writing comfortable has done wonders. I am definitely going to be on the lookout for a proper writing desk in the coming months.

With the high of Nanowrimo wearing off and the realization setting in that I still have about another 30,000 words to write until my novel is completed, it’s time to get back to the grind. Then I get to tackle editing for the first time.

Until then, stay writing and stay golden.