ROW80 Check-In 10/9/11

It’s been a rip-roaring start to Round 4 of ROW80, huh?

Scads of Team ROW80 members flooded Twitter on Wednesday to play in the ROW80 hashtag. I don’t know about you, but I’m just now recovering. Click here for a quick party recap. For those of you who are new to the team:

Row80 – The Writing Challenge That Knows You Have a Life.

In Tiffany A. White’s words:
Goals and Accountability are two of the most crucial elements for any author when writing a manuscript. Row80 will challenge me to set attainable goals, and signing in twice a week to update my fellow Row80ers on my status will hold me accountable. No one will be fired or kicked out if we don’t meet our goals – we technically don’t have to write a thing.

But we will write AND meet our goals! Why?

• Because it’s fun.
• Because we’re being held accountable.
• Because we now get to rock a whole new hashtag on Twitter (#ROW80)
• Because all our pals are pulling for us.

Speaking of ROW80 pals…today at the ROW80 blog, you can check in and give an update on your progress. PLUS, Kait has given you a Linky Tool to find a ROWBro or ROWSista. Click here for all the deets!

A ROW80 Flashback:

My Round 3 ROW80 Goal – Write 2,500 words on my WIP each week and post 4 blogs/week. If I can meet this goal, which I think is attainable, I’ll have another 28,550 words done on my high-risk pregnancy memoir and the first draft should be finished.

I learned soooo many things. The biggest for me is that I get more done with time goals, rather than word goals.

Keeping my Round 3 lessons in mind, here are my Round 4 goals:

• At least 3 blogs per week + ROW80 check-in posts
• At least two hours of timed sprints per week, four hours/week during NaNoWriMo
• I’d like to get past my current NaNoWriMo max of 27K words
• Encourage 2 new ROW80 peeps each check-in
• Exercise for 3 hours each week

Dang, I’m gonna be busy! Remember, I’m still working on all my Life List Goals!

On the up side, I attended a plotting session over the weekend where we fixed the entire plot for my latest fiction WIP. WOOT!

On the down side, I set my fiction aside to finish my non-fiction memoir on high-risk pregnancy. Can I tinker with that book while finishing my memoir? We’ll see!

To join ROW80 or encourage your teammates, click here.

Update on ROW80 Party

My lovely co-host, Nicole Basaraba and I are haggling over the top pics from the party. The problem is we had most of the same favorites! I promise to post our faves here on More Cowbell before the week is out so you can vote. 🙂

We’ve also just about got our list of links decided for the ROCK THE ROW Mash-up, which will be featured on the official ROW80 blog. Stay tuned…

FINALLY…the Life List Club Milestone Winners!

The party planning and execution wiped my fantastic Life List Club winners out of my mind at the beginning of October. I gave away two prizes – one to a lucky commenter on the Milestone post (9/23) and one to a new subscriber for that last week of September.

The prize for each winner is a choice between:

• A guest post by me at the winner’s blog.
• An interview of the winner and promotion of their cause/site here at More Cowbell

Lucky commenter: Stacy Green
Lucky subscriber: Ellie Ann Soderstrom

 Thanks so much to all of my friends here at More Cowbell! You make every week fun.

What helps you meet your goals each week? Are you part of ROW80? Will you be participating in NaNoWriMo? If these are not your goal-achieving helpers, what does push you onward when you get discouraged? Enquiring minds always want to know here at More Cowbell!

Jenny