It’s been a crazy fall, so I’ll be reblog­ging some of my favorite NaNoW­riMo posts from the past few years over the course of the month.  Please feel free to join in the fun and leave your own tips and tricks in the com­ments! And don’t for­get to find me and add me as a NaNo buddy here!

And most of all, HAPPY WRITING ALL YOU CRAZY KIDS!

NaNoW­riMo Tip #1: Get Your &%$# Together

Last mod­i­fied on 2012-11-01 13:23:23 GMT. 4 com­ments. Top.

NaNoW­riMo is just around the cor­ner! And that means, you need to get orga­nized if you’re going to par­tic­i­pate. Even pantsers can’t wing every­thing. If you sit down to write 1,667 words per day with­out a clue what you’re going to write about, things will get ugly–fast.

Here’s a check­list of MUST HAVES:

1. An idea. Seri­ously. This is a def­i­nite must.
2. A (work­ing) com­puter. If you really want to write your mas­ter­piece by hand, I salute you…but you’ll have a hell of a hard time salut­ing back from all the hand-cramps.
3. Tell your friends! Your Fam­ily! Your Sig­nif­i­cant Other! This way, they know to leave you alone for the month. And you don’t want any inter­rup­tions, now do you?
4. A Folder/File/Program to help you orga­nize. I don’t care if you keep your notes on nap­kins from the local cof­fee shop kept in order by color-coded cof­fee stains, you need some­thing to keep your head and plot straight. Your brain will be filled with ALL THE WORDS so there’s no room for any­thing else.  I rec­om­mend Scrivener and Free­Mind.
5. Time. Novem­ber is not the month to go on vaca­tion.  Unless you can vaca­tion alone in your writ­ing cave.  And maybe this would be a good year to have Thanks­giv­ing at Grandma’s?
6. A word count tracker. There’s a bunch of these float­ing around on the inter­net (this and this are good. Oh, fine have a whole list.). They’ll help you keep track of your progress. And you want to know if you win, right?

So, how do YOU keep on top of your plot dur­ing NaNoW­riMo? Leave your ideas in the comments!