April challenges bring May confidences

Only a few days left of March, not that it looks like spring outside with winter trying to make a comeback. But I'm working on clearing out the mental cobwebs and preparing my mind for a blossoming of words. I plan to do not one but two challenges in April. First is getting back into regular participation of A Round of Words in 80 Days. Round 2 of 2013 begins April 1. (Hopefully, that day's work won't be a joke.) And secondly is a new one for me: the A-to-Z Challenge.

For those of you unfamiliar with either of these, ROW80 is a challenge to help us with our writing goals, whether it's new draft, revising, or editing. Some people even throw in an exercise goal to go with it. The important thing is to make the goals measurable and achievable and then to share both the goals and the progress (or lack thereof) on them. This is to show ourselves we can succeed, and by being part of a group, we can encourage each other despite the differences in our goals. I haven't decided on mine yet, except that one will be to keep up with the A-to-Z.

The A-to-Z Challenge is a blogfest. Your topics can be random, or you can choose a theme. Mine will be book reviews. The idea is that each day in April, except Sundays, will be a post on a different letter of the alphabet going from, you guessed it, A to Z. I've got some of the letters figured out already and plan to get some of them written ahead of time. A few letters have 2-3 books on my to-read/to-review list. I haven't decided if I will make it a combo day, or pick one for the challenge and do the others in May. Considering how much reading I'm in for, probably the latter. I plan to do as many new-to-me books as I can, though H will be The Hobbit, since it's both classic and current, thanks to the movie.

If you might be interested in either or both of those, check out the links. Even if you don't want to join the challenges, I hope you'll visit each day to root me on.