What happened in April?

The blog was a little quiet last month. I'm kind of sorry, and kind of not. Life wasn't extra crazy and we weren't sick, but I put my focus towards something else for April. My writing. April is one of the Camp NaNoWriMo months. Writers can pick what they want to write and their word goal. You can write scripts, non-fiction, poetry. Or you can do what I did, which was edit. I gave myself the goal of editing and moving 60,000 words from a first draft into a second. I ended up having to rewrite several chapters so I probably ended up writing 30,000 words and editing 30,000. 

Yep, I did it. Finished just before 10 last night. I spent most of the weekend at my computer as I was about 11,000 words shy of my goal on Friday. A lot of new chapters, for the new ending, were written on Saturday and Sunday, and a lot of it wasn't very good. But now that the words are written down, I can edit them and make them better. In February, I started editing the first draft and I'd send a couple chapters a week to my sister-in-law to read. By the end of March I only had 11 of 30+ chapters done. It was taking too long and I'd lose momentum if I didn't edit everyday. So I signed up for Camp NaNoWriMo, hoping I'd finish and I did. And I'm pretty thrilled about finishing. Winning for editing feels a lot better than winning for writing 50,000 words in November. I'll be rereading the whole thing starting Wednesday and then I'll be sending it out to some Beta-readers next week. Kind of scary but necessary. May's focus? Catching up on all the knitting and quilting that was ignored in April and researching agents and publishers to send my manuscript too (that's super scary). First up - this blog post and then mending my husband's shorts that have been sitting beside my sewing machine for two weeks.

I finished crocheting this afghan in April. (Ignore my face, I was probably yelling at the 3 year old who was outside with us and getting into trouble.) I used all 9 skeins of yarn I had and then did 3 rounds in blue for a border. Yarn was some acrylic stuff from Michael's that is perfect for afghans. It should hold up really well. And after washing became surprisingly soft.

Feels great wrapped around shoulders.

Got to love how colorful it is.

Back inside the 3 year old and I made sure it was good for snuggling under. It passed. The afghan will be a Christmas gift this year.

Other things that happened in April? My daughter and I marched for Science.

I crocheted a ton of button flowers. There are 72 in this picture if you're looking for an exact number. Only have 12 left to make!

And I have been slowly knitting my Duvessa cowlette. The KAL for this ends on Thursday so I have some knitting to do.

I'm halfway done chart A. Still need to knit charts B and C. So I will be doing that today and tomorrow.

I have several pictures waiting to get posted that I hope to do this week and next. It would be nice to feel caught up (does that ever really happen though?).What have you been up to?