It’s #Preptober, and National Novel Writing Month—NaNoWriMo—is almost upon us.
This year, for the first time, I’m going to be a NaNoWriMo rebel. Instead of working towards one project of 50,000 words, I’m going to write three outlined projects: one that will be 5,000 words each, and two that will be 15,000 words each. That adds up to 35,000 words. The last 15,000 words to get me to the finish line will be dedicated to outlining new projects!
I’m super excited about each of these projects, and predict that beginning November with three Draft Zeroes will lead to my first-ever NaNoWriMo win!
I was so jazzed and ready to announce my novelettes to the world on the shiny new NaNoWriMo website, but alas! The site won’t let me add more than one official project for this November.
But no biggie, right? I can just pretend it’s one project on the website and update the combined word count of all three projects every day.
Honestly, that sounded like a drag to me. Also, it sounded like math. No, thank you.
So what’s a tech-savvy writer to do? Whip up a tool for herself, of course!
I call it the multi-project word count tracker. It’s pretty nifty, if I do say so myself. All I have to do is update each project’s word count, and the spreadsheet will calculate how many words
- Are left to reach my goal for each project,
- I’ve written altogether, and
- Are left until I’ve hit my goal of a combined 50,000 words.
Using this tracker, I’ll always know exactly how many words I’ve written in total. See Row 11? That is the figure I’ll use to update the NaNoWriMo website every day in November.
I used my own author brand’s colors and fonts to make the tracker my own, but I understand if my colors are not your colors. That’s why the version available for you to download for free is in black and white—clean, neutral, elegant, and ripe for customization!
Download a copy of your multi-project word count tracker here!
But maybe you’re also a do-it-yourselfer, and you’d rather build your own multi-project word tracker from the ground up. Or maybe you’re a spreadsheet novice and just want to see how the whole thing came together—how I used formulas to do math for me, how I got rid of the gridlines, or how I made the tables and border.
Whatever your reason for wanting to dive deeper, we’ve got you covered! I recorded myself creating this downloadable version of the multi-project word tracker, so you can watch me at work and learn how to do it yourself.
If you enjoy our free videos and blog posts on writing, please consider supporting Writer’s Atelier on Patreon! Membership starts at $1 per month! We also provide extended versions of some of our videos for Writer’s Atelier Patrons and other awesome benefits!
You can also check out our FREE Facebook group, The Writer’s Atelier Online Community!
We’d love to have you involved in our writing community! Thanks for everything!
