Hey team, we're trying something new (and hopefully fun?): I'm going to make up the first sentence of a story and then tag someone. That person will then come up with the next sentence and post it in a comment, along with tagging someone for the next line. We'll keep this first story going until 8 p.m. MDT next Monday, 9/16. After that, the last person tagged will come up with a title for the story. Get those creative juices flowing! Be crazy, creative, and kind! Who knows, you may get your next idea here . . . Okay, here's the first line: On her 85th birthday, Gladys woke up speaking Italian. @Kai Alger, take it away!

Hoping to successfully complete a 30k in 30 days challenge this time. Life was hectic this last two tries and writing got away from me. Life is still hectic but I have a plan and set time aside everyday to write. I'll keep you updated.

Ummmmmm maybe I should have waited to update Week 3 because I FINISHED! My first draft is currently capped at 70,148 words. I wrote a little less than 30k during these few weeks I have been doing this challenge, but my goal was to take this challenge and finish my book and I did it!! 🎉🎉🎉 I'm going to follow Erin Stewart's advice and give myself a week to catch up on a few other things that I've been putting aside while I've focused on this. Especially since I have 25 days until I move to the other side of the planet! Then I'm going to do a spelling/grammar revision before I send this off to my alpha readers (Because I also followed Ayana Gray's advice from the video and just got it out--regardless of how good or bad it was). I would love some beta readers in a little bit to help. If this story sounds like something you would be interested in reading and workshopping with me, please let me know! So here's my pitch for my YA Coming-of-Age Romance, LOST AND FOUND: Kate is about to begin a pre-college tour of Mexico and Belize, but she's not here for the opportunities to get to know her future classmates or professors. She's found the journal of her late mother containing clues that lead to the father she's never met. There's only one problem: the journal is written entirely in Spanish. Desperate for help, Kate looks to the charming Sebastien to translate the entries. Together they go on a scavenger hunt through unfamiliar cities and ancient ruins searching for the only family she has left. But the closer she gets to her father, the more difficult it becomes to ignore what she's been finding with Sebastien along the way.

I had a very busy week with many different things going on and unfortunately did not write as much as I would have liked. Today is my 30 day mark and my final word count is 16,608. Honestly, I’m still happy with the progress! I really like what @Angela Griffin said about posting when she hits 30k, so I’ll do that too! A big win I just experienced this week was: since I had finally pushed through the writer’s block I had, I have now written perhaps one of my favorite scenes I’ve ever written! It felt so cathartic to write it out, especially after all the toiling. It made me excited to keep going!

I've been putting off my week 3 update, hoping that if I waited a few more days I would have more words to show for myself—but alas 😂 Today is technically my day 29, so I really should be doing my week 4 update tomorrow, but my current wordcount is 11,596. Funny enough, I'm not disappointed in that number; as @Brindizi Hamblin so wisely said on my last update, that's 11,596 words that I didn't have before! In fact, until this challenge, I hadn't really written anything in months. I'm just finding that I can either be stressed about reaching 30k in thirty days or I can embrace the creativity when and how it strikes. For example, this last week in the spare time I had to write, I found I wanted to paint instead. While there's certainly something to be said for writing and just getting the words down even when you don't want to, I decided that rather than forcing myself to write, I'd let my brain be creative in the way it felt inspired to. On the bright side, I've only actually written 12 days this month, so 11,596 words total averages out to almost 1k a day. So I feel like 30k in thirty days is certainly realistic, just maybe not thirty CONSECUTIVE days 🙃 (for me at least right now . . . props to all of you who are in it!) I'm going to keep writing, but I won't post my week 4 update until I've reached 30k and can reflect on the whole experience. Good luck to you all!