Where it all began...

[Siana Blackwood]

We all have that little secret moment tucked away in our memories. The first time you opened a writing page and saw someone mention 'my NaNo' or 'I did NaNo' or any one of countless variations. That casual comment from a friend or acquaintance that they were going to 'do NaNo'...

For me, it was a random comment on a page about creating sci-fi characters. That was in August of 2010. I followed a link, saw the phrase 'NaNoWriMo' and entered it into a search engine. From that moment on, I was lost. By the 22nd of August I had a notebook to record all my ideas (including some lovely cover art of black and white candles), a box full of of delicious writer treats and all kilds of other goodies.

November the first, I remember thinking, will be the day everything changes.

It was, too. It worked. It felt good. I got through it and I was hooked. I haven't stopped since. First there was NaNoFiMo. Then There was WriYe and my quest to become the author of a million unpublished words. It's still working and it still feels good. I'll admit that so far FebNo and MayNo haven't given me quite the same feeling as the other variants, but that only increases the hunger to come back and try it again.

Now it's your turn. Which variant did you try first? How good was it? How many others have you tried since then?

[marielaurent2223]

The first one i tried was SeptNoWriMo and it was a good one and i really liked it, with the challenges and progress threads with word count goals and everything everyone is friendly on the wrimo site and has good advice for beginning writers.

Then the others after that was Gothno, ScifiWriMo, Nanowrimo, NaNoFiMo, WriYe, and now Crazy Club for this year, still WriYe, JanNoWriMo, FebNo, MarNo, MayNoWriMo somewhat, WriDaNoju, then JulNo which is great for this year, besides this wrimo called Arrow of Eloquence!

[butterflywings]

JulNo! I had been scribbling in bed- late at night - forever before even thinking about typing anything.... My laptop changed everything. I found out about NaNo on accident, googling something about grammar, and thought November was too far away. Searched a little more and found July. I was so nervous!

I didn't know if I could do 50k in a month. It seemed impossible! So impossible that I panicked and spent a few days writing crazily. I had 2 14k days before the second week. Besides the panic, the ideas were flying!

Ahh. It was wonderful. So free. Now I worry too much about the grammar and tone and other annoying things while I am writing. Really hampers WC. I kinda wish I could shut that off!

[Rabbit]

I'm glad to see this forum's still alive. I can't thank you all enough.

I'd been writing for years before I really got hooked. I jumped in when I was 18. Three months later, I was doing Word Wars.

I started with NaNoEdMo - I know, weak, but I wanted something lighter as an introduction. I didn't feel much different until about the third week. I realised I was a little behind. Suddenly I didn't want to lose and I jumped in. Sometimes I still can't believe I won.

The very second it was over, though I started to look for the others. I just wanted that panic-induced creativity again but with something I could scribble down in a fit of inspiration. I jumped in with Script Frenzy and April Fools right out of the gate and haven't stopped since. Every time I hit the last day, it's just such a rush knowing it's done - that I won. I don't think I could quit now, even if I wanted to.

And to any new kids: It's always a little nerve-wracking at first. Stepping onto the forums, especially. It's all new. You're nervous and you don't know what you're doing. You'll hit your stride pretty quick though. Pretty soon you can do word wars like it's nothing.

[janefendy]

Umm... My first wrimo was JulNo 2009, when my friend told me that her sister, who loved writing as well, was doing it and suggested me to do it too. So yessss, I did it and fell in love with WriMo despite the disastrous story I wrote. I still remember I wrote my first WriMo in my first language and the story was all crappy, then I began writing in English since NaNo 2010 *I guess*

So yepp, I'm maybe not as crazy about WriMo as I was. When I was so into it, I did almost every month of WriMo. JulNo, AugNo, SeptNo, GothNo, NaNo, WriYe, Screnzy, MayNo XD I might sound fanatic but they all did get me to write something trashy, but it was better than not at all

[nanogeekette]

My first " WriMo " was April 2012. I found out about the offical NaNoWriMo in February, and eventually I got to www.aprilfoolschallenge.com. I set a lllloowww word count goal of 25K, and ended up getting a few hundred over 50K. I was so proud of myself. Eventually I got to NaMayWriMo...then WriYe....ah the world is wonderful.

[Agent Double Oh Zero]

My first Nano was in 2010. I had actually heard of it a few years before that, when I was in high school. I used to go on fanfiction.net and fictionpress.net all the time back then, and I saw people mentioning that they were writing those stories for their nano. At the time, I thought that Nano was a stupid idea. However, I then tried to write a novel and failed. A few years later, I came across nanowrimo.com again, and decided to try. And that November was wonderful! After that, I was hooked!

Now I pretty much want to do every single writing challenge I can find! :-)

Milwordy, JanNoWriMo, FebNoWriMo, MarNoWrimo, April Fools, NaMayWriMo, June Camp, JulNoWriMo, August Camp, SeptNoWriMo, SciFiWriMo, NaNoWriMo, NaNoFiMo..,

[nanogeekette]

I've been searching like crazy for writing challenges too! LOL I've joined some of them, but so far July and September will be for editing the novel I wrote in April and fixing a WIP.

[Agent Double Oh Zero]

There is JulNoWriMo in July, and SeptNoWriMo in September too! XD

[Siana Blackwood]

There's a fairly up-to-date list here on this site: One Year of WriMos....

[wingch]

I've been Nanoing since... 2009 - due to some overcaffinated minutes spent with Google.
This is my first year doing writing challenges outside of November - I've failed at the rest of them occasionally, but aside from that... 2012!
And marie - didn't I see you on 6 Months, 6 Novels almost two years ago?

[RJA]

I learned about NaNoWriMo in 2009, guess it was about September or early October and it was in a thread on a big Dutch Equestrian forum.
I had been writing since I got to old to play my stories with dolls, but always missed a drive to keep going. So I decided to sign up.

Though I totally forgot about it untill I got an e-mail when November was about to start. So I needed to wing it that month. And I failed terribly ^_^ The idea I had totally seemed to suck that month and I wrote near to nothing, untill the last weekend of November arrived and I woke up with this totally new idea.
In the last five days of November I made till 10 or 15k... November had gone by and I failed. So I found NaNoFiMo (Finishing Month). The goal was to write another 30k in December and I did. Not sure about the exact amount, but over the two months I had reached my first 50k after all!
Then I landed on the JanNoWriMo boards, but after my first WriMo's my inspiration was running low.

I went back to my slower pace of writing and in July I came up with this great idea for a trilogy and I wrote quite a bit that summer. By the time November came again I was ready to start on the second book with my second attempt on NaNoWriMo. 2010.
I became more active, went to some local write-ins -which I found very inspiring!- and easily won the second time. Reached 50k in 17 days and ended November with 70k.

After that I did FiMo again and went on to JanNoWriMo, FebNoWriMo and then I found the WriYe boards. Since I already did 4 WriMo's in a row succesfully I decided to join!
My 2011 aim was to write 50k for at least 10 months -> 500k in a year. And I easilly reached my goal again.

So 2012 I decided to do another WriYe! And here I am! Still going strong, so I haven't really won all WriMo's yet, but it's still June. Lots of time to catch up!

At the moment I'm doing CampNaNoWriMo, though I'm mostly on Twitter. Started a 'special' writing acount - bigggest difference; I tweet in English in that one for all my international writing friends - and I post a lot about my writing and word counts on there.
So if anyone has twitter: @rjaaka

That's my WriMo history. In a nutshell. Sort of ^_~