Preparing for my NaNo Mini Vacation

This will be my 11th NaNo year.  I have won every year, and done multiple full novels all but the first year.  I love it.  I love the chance to fly.  However. . . .

A couple weeks ago, about the time I realized I could not get the outline for Water/Stone/Light done before November 1st, I began considering not doing NaNo this year. I started feeling as though there was just too much stuff piling up and I couldn't get enough done in time.  I started listing out all the stuff, and by the time I had eight things on the list I had already noticed something rather odd.

Everything except the newsletter turned out to be something I did for other people and without pay.

Hmmm.

So I rethought everything again.  I pushed forward on getting some things done, told a few people they would have to wait, and went to work on the Bunny Hopper outline, which I actually got done and early.  Then I threw myself into the rewrite of Devlin 1 as well, just because I'd been letting my own stuff go a bit.  I always finish my projects by January 1 and I realized I was running out of time with too many projects sitting there in my folder.

And I decided that I can take a few days just to leap in and do something fun.

I'm a happier person now.  I will be writing like mad for the first few days of NaNo.  I'll have a newsletter to do during that time, but I'm hoping it won't be too difficult.  I plan to have everything else that has to be done cleared away by then.  

The first week of NaNo really is my little vacation.  I love to write, but like everyone else in the world, real life and obligations take precedence over what I want to do too often.  Truthfully, I could not write all the time like I do at NaNo.  I wouldn't want to.  But I can take a few days to really live in the heart of a story and enjoy the magic that comes from it.

I have two of my three outlines printed off.  I'll do the last one today.   The first is Beware the Wrath of Bunny Hopper, a fun little urban fantasy. The other two are books 5 and 6 from my Devlin science fiction series.  I already had the outlines done last year, and I'm glad I hadn't written them yet.  They are perfect for a year when I don't have as much time to prepare as I would like.  I have a fourth outline I might use if I need it.  Or, if I still have time after these three, I might go for something without an outline at all.  Those have been fun for NaNo in the past.

Can you tell I'm getting fired up about it again?

I don't know how well I'll do this year.  There is stuff going on that may stop me entirely.  It would, of course, be easier to just say 'oh, things don't look good, I won't do it' and bow out.  What fun would that be?  No, I'm leaping in and enjoying myself.

Year 11, here I come!