I didn't do any writing over the weekend. My family came down Saturday and then yesterday I thought about my novel, but I just couldn't bring myself to get on the computer and write. Maybe I needed to give myself a couple of days of down time after my puny word count Friday(380).

Hopefully today will be more productive than the weekend past.

Well, now I can't say that...it was a productive weekend. My husband and my dad got the side door of our house changed out. We had a very drafty old door there, but we've now got a very nice steel door with windows and NO draft. My dad also cut a board to keep my hubby from falling in the hole in the couch and my daughter had a blast getting to see her grandparents and aunt. It was a nice day.

One thing I thought was cool was that my dad and husband couldn't figure out how to get this Qwikset deadbolt off the new door so they could put a new matching deadbolt and knob on the new door. They took out the screws,but it wouldn't come off the door. I knew my husband was struggling with it for a while because he couldn't figure it out. Just out of curiosity, I went to look at it. I broke the cover off the edge of the door, which didn't make a bit of difference really, but then I got to messing with the deadbolt facings and the cap fell off that goes around the keyhole on the inside.

Wah-La! behind the cap was two OTHER inset screws that the exterior screws had been screwed into. I pointed it out to my dad and my husband and asked, "Could this be something?"

My dad was like "Yep, another set of screws hidden."

Once I removed it I got the deadbolt off with NO problem. My husband said something about how he couldn't believe I figured that out, I smiled at him, then my dad and said, "Well, hey,  I'm the daughter of a carpenter. I should be able to figure this stuff out." LOL Or something to that affect.

So anyway- I best post this booger and get my butt in gear and start writing!

37,885K/50,000K

Again, I didn't write as much yesterday as I planned to- I got my total up to 37,505 yesterday, writing just over 4K instead of surpassing my goal for the day. I was just too tired to wrap my mind around it until yesterday evening.

I only have about 12-13K left to go before I hit 50K. I feel like I'm floundering a bit, faltering and a little weary that the story will end before I hit 50K. I suppose if that happens, I can go back and add more detail and description to the story in places I might've overlooked it before during my crazed writing woman typing.

But then last night, I started crying after a significantly poignant scene that ended one of the chapters. I started bawling when I realized what had happened. I had only "sort of" seen it coming and after it happened all I could think was "How could I do it?!?!?!"

I got my MC shot- as it turns out, only a flesh wound, but dang...I scared myself and gave rise to fear and sadness in my own heart once I was finished with that scene. It felt vivid enough to me that I could see it in my mind's eye.

I almost think my novel has turned somewhat into more than just a romance...it was romantic suspense there for a bit, while this last part played out. In some ways I feel like this should be almost over, but at the same time, I'm still waiting- There has to be more to the story. Besides the fact that after I got through what I DID have loosely plotted, I ended up giving my characters the reins and they took it in a very different direction than I had thought it would go. I have a scene that was part of my plotting process, though it was going to come later in the story. Now it appears that it probably won't happen. I'm actually surprised at that revelation. It's no longer pertinent to the story, nor would it be that I can see. Maybe I can work it in, in a round about way, but it would only be the remnants of that idea rather than the one I had originally thought of.

I'm also unsure of how things will pan out in the end, but that's ok. Sometimes it's better to let my characters lead the way, to let them tell me their story.
37,505K/50,000K

I hit 15,002 last night before heading off to bed but NaNo's site was down so I had to wait till this morning to put in my new word count total. But all in all I feel good about where I am. Plus, I'm starting to get more into the story better.

Since I started writing on the 1st, I had felt set apart from my characters, until Wes fell over the tree stump last night and hit his head on the porch steps in the dark at Melody's grandmother's. LOL Yes, I hate to admit it, but I enjoyed his spill and the gash on his head and him getting knocked unconscious. Yes, I enjoyed it because it was unexpected. I was flying by the seat of my pants on that one. I have a plot, but not all my scenes figured out, so I just went with it last night to see where it would go. It was the perfect opportunity for Melody to HAVE to interact with Wes- especially since she's been running from him for years, avoiding him. Then she had to care for him.

It was a perfect surprise to me, that's for sure. And since having written 3 other novels, I've come to expect that after a certain point, my characters will take the lead, show me what they want to happen, what should happen and lead me toward the end we "all" know will come. I love when they come to "life" for me, point me in the right direction, surprise me with good twists and turns in the story.

Last year my main character Royce did that  and often. There were several turns in the story that came out that I never planned, never intended, but once it was written I realized just what a difference it made to feel as though he was standing over my shoulder, telling me his story, whispering in my ear...In some ways it's reminiscent of The Ghost and Mrs. Muir. 

I love that movie- The ghost of a sea captain, telling this woman his story she she can write it and have it published. It's wonderfully fanciful. In the process, she falls in love with him and eventually he leaves her and she lives the rest of her life believing he'd only been a dream, until the final scene where she dies...and the captain comes back to get her.

In some ways it quite the same when I'm writing, though my characters are the ones telling me their story and yes, I do fall in love with them, though for me, they are like my children, growing and living through me onto the written page.

Well, that would be it for me for today. I need to pull that file up and get my booty in gear for another day of NaNo'ing. Have a great Sunday and WRITE ON! 

15,002K/50,000K

I'm up early on a Saturday. My word count for yesterday was 3,296, giving me a new total of 9,024. I didn't write nearly as much as the day before, but still feel good about it.

My mind just isn't in the story yet really. It's not that I don't want to get into it.

I do.

But it seems the past two or three days have been uber hectic. I have too much going on around me, laundry and dishes needing to be done, too many needy voices calling out my name. My almost 5 year old insisted last night that she couldn't put her PJs on herself. 

She had to have MY help. Suddenly she is helpless. I told her this is pretty good for a kid who would change her clothes all the time without my knowledge when she was 2 years old, but at almost 5 she just CAN'T dress herself! LOL

Truth is, she was at me all day yesterday for something. It seemed just when I would be getting back into the story, she'd ask for this or that or start hollering for my help from somewhere off in the other part of the house. I told her I thought she was purposely being needy. She disaggreed.

But then there were times throughout the past day or so, she'd ask me, "Are you getting a lot of writing done Mommy?" "How many words have you writed?"

She's my little sweetie. Of course when I tell her a number I get the "WHOA! That's a LOT! You're doing good Mommy!"

I don't know what it is really. I have this "energy" for lack of better wording that seems to be racing through me. I can't seem to keep my head in the game for a long period of time. I find myself not writing and wondering if there's something I should be up doing. Maybe it's guilt tearing me away from my writing. But guilt isn't really eating at me- I've been good keeping the dishes washed up and the laundry too. So guilt doesn't feel like the logical choice.

This is more like a planetary change, a movement tingling and pulsing through me. An "anticipation" of something about to happen that has nothing to do with my writing. Though I can't pinpoint what it is, I just feel a change coming. Gut instinct. I just hope it's not something bad.

So anyway...I'm going to check in on my blogs and then start working on my novel some more this morning. Maybe I'll get some writing done while hubby and daughter are still asleep. My stepson is gone on a Cub Scout camping trip with his mom this weekend.

Happy NaNo'ing Everyone!

 I'm exhausted but it's more from running all over last night taking the kids trick or treating. We live in the country, so we have to drive to all the houses we know, rather than hitting a neighborhood. By the time we got home, I was wore out. We watched Kid Nation and put the kids to bed and then watched the first 3 hours of Ghost Hunters Live! filmed here in Kentucky at Waverly Hills Sanitorium last night.

We went to bed at 11PM, but I was up at 5am to get my stepson off to school. Checked in on email and my favorite blogs and then started on my adventure into my 2nd NaNoWriMo. I have somewhere around 4,900 words already. I don't think I'm done though for today. I'm going to work on it some more until 7. After that I'll be watching Ugly Betty, Supernatural and the last three hours of Ghost Hunters that I recorded last night.

Feeling pretty good right now about NaNo. I've proven to myself I can write a novel in a month twice before- Last NaNo and back in mid-July/beginning of August of this year I did my own personal NaNo and wrote the other. I'm confident I can do this, so right now there's no stress. I'm just waiting for my characters to throw something crazy at me. LOL

Ok, so as of right now, here's how I'm standing-

4,936K/50,000K