Friday, January 6, 2012

A-to-Z Challenge Official Announcement!

I'm delighted to have the honor of being a member of the 2012 A-to-Z Challenge team, and to be announcing that sign-ups for this year's Challenge will be opening up on the 30th of this month.


For those who aren't familiar with the A-to-Z Challenge, it is a challenge wherein you post every day except Sunday, and you do so with an alphabetical theme, in order. So, for instance, on the 1st of April you would post something that had to do with the letter "A." You can do it any which way you want, in any theme, or lack thereof, as long as you post all but Sunday, and you do so in alphabetical order. For more information on what this means and how it began, click HERE, where you can hear it from the creator, himself, Arlee.

I will be joining this esteemed team:

Arlee Bird Tossing It Out
Damyanti Biswas Amlokiblogs
Alex J. Cavanaugh Alex J. Cavanaugh
Tina Downey Life is Good
DL Hammons Cruising Altitude 2.0
Jeremy Hawkins Retro-Zombie
Matthew MacNish The QQQE
Elizabeth Mueller Author Elizabeth Mueller
Jenny Pearson Pearson Report
Konstanz Silverbow No Thought 2 Small
Stephen Tremp Breakthrough Blogs

Please take a moment to visit their blogs and show them some love. You won't regret it!

As a member of this team, I will make occasional announcements concerning the A-to-Z Challenge. For the best and most up-to-date information, though, please go to the official A-to-Z Blogging Challenge site and be sure to follow so you get the updates. The number of followers on that blog will help us determine some tentative numbers for the upcoming challenge, and help us in our preparations.

While you're there, check out some of the reflections posts from last year's A-to-Z Blogging Challenge, as well new posts on the upcoming challenge. I hope to see you there!

Have you participated in the A-to-Z before? Do you plan on participating this year?

May you find your Muse.

33 comments:

Pearson Report said...

Hi Shannon!

I participated last April - my first time! I had only found out about it on March 30th, so it was really "on the seat of my pants" that I got through.

But...I loved it, and can hardly wait for this one to start!

I'm also very excited to be co-hosting with you and the team - what fun!

Cheers, Jenny @ PEARSON REPORT

Laura Josephsen said...

Ahh! It's already almost time for this again! I participated last year and it was a lot of fun. I met so many awesome people.

Arlee Bird said...

You certainly made that clear. Nice kick-off post! I look forward to being on the A to Z Team with you.

Now I'm wondering if you are still going to undertake another Post-Challenge Challenge. That was quite an undertaking last year!


Lee
Tossing It Out

Timothy S. Brannan said...

I was just talking about this.

I am not sure yet if I am going to participate again or not. I had a great time doing it in 2011, but I want to come up with something really interesting this year.

Leaning towards yes.

Susan Flett Swiderski said...

Sounds like fun, and I hope to participate this year. If nothing else, I'm starting out by following all you brave organizers. Gotta start somewhere, right?

Christine Rains said...

I'm new this year and I can't wait to get started! I've heard fantastic things, and I follow all the team members. You guys are great! :)

Beverly Diehl said...

Like Jenny Pearson, I found out about it not at the last moment, but ON April 1. Joined in anyway, and had a great time, but this time, plan to at least sketch out some posts ahead of time, so I have more time to VISIT all the other cool blogs participating. (Make that MORE of the other blogs participating. If it's over a thousand, again, I know I won't get to everybody.)

Unknown said...

Whoo Hoo!! This is going to be a terrific year once more with you and the erst of these fantastic hosts. I participated last year and had tons of fun. I met so many wonderful people and I can't wait to again.

Andrew Leon said...

I'm still ambivalent about the whole thing, but I'll let you know.

Chuck said...

Oh yes...I will be participating again this year! Last time was such a blast I wouldn't miss it. After all I met YOU there!!

jan said...

I can't wait!!

Janet Johnson said...

I was gone most of last April, but I'm still debating this year. Can't believe how big the thing was last year though! Amazing. :)

Jemi Fraser said...

Lee has created an incredible community with this challenge! :)

Tina said...

Nice to be working with you again! I had no idea that what you and I started would get so much attention! Personally, I'm totally psyched to get invited to host. I can't wait to see how many we have joining this year! Glad to have The Warrior woman herself in my corner.
Tina @ Life is Good

Shannon Lawrence said...

Jenny, I also found out last minute and sort of went through it hanging on by my nails. I'm delighted to be in such great company!

Laura, I hope you'll do it again this year!

Lee, I most likely will! I suspect it will be easier the second year, as many of the same blogs will have signed up, so it will be less about discovery of new blogs.

Timothy, oh I hope you do! I'll have to come by and read what you were saying.

Susan, sounds like a good start to me, of course. ;-p

Christine, awesome! Can't wait to see what you come up with!

Beverly, I also intend to plan at least some in advance. If I could have them all pre-written, that would leave so much more time for visiting blogs.

Melissa, fabulous! I'm glad to see you so excited! I am, too. I definitely feel the same about meeting so many great people.

Andrew, I can understand that. I hope you do, though!

Chuck, fantastic! And darn right; the same is true on my end.

Jan, yay!

Janet, I hope you can make it this year! I'm betting it will be even bigger this year.

Jemi, he truly has, hasn't he? I'm very grateful to him for creating it in the first place, and for being so kind to me.

Tina, I can't describe how excited I am to get to work with you again, this time as co-hosts!

LAH said...

I've only just learned about the A-Z challenge and while it totally freaked me out at first, I am getting excited! Most of all I am looking forward to building community with other writers... I spend enough time alone writing as it is, it's nice to have some sort of lifeline with like minded people!

Unknown said...

Hey Shannon...lovely to be co-hosting with you! This is going to be fun and exciting :)

A Beer for the Shower said...

Cheers and good luck. Sounds like an incredibly busy month of posting!

Stacy S. Jensen said...

I think you mentioned the challenge last year at the PPW. Recently, a blogger friend planted the seed again. I'm looking forward to April.

MISH said...

What a great A-Z team! looking forward to April.

L. Diane Wolfe said...

I participated last year. I didn't get to visit as many blogs as I wanted to because it became a bit overwhelming. That said, when it was over, I already knew what I'd blog about this year.

BragonDorn said...

Very cool :)

Li said...

Last year was my first and it kickstarted my blog :-) Count me in this year, see you there!

Konstanz Silverbow said...

This will be my first year participating and I look forward to it. I also look forward to co-hosting with you!

Jessica Bell said...

Good luck being a co-host! I'm sure it will be an experience you'll never forget :o) Yep, I participated both times before. Wow. It was exhausting and I wasn't going to do it this year, but the co-host line-up is so cool it's going to be hard NOT to ... look what you're all doing to me!!! lolol

Shannon Lawrence said...

Lauren, I definitely agree with that. It's great to have that supportive community.

Damyanti, I'm looking forward to it!

A Beer for the Shower, I'm hoping to mitigate that by having at least some pre-written. Thanks!

Stacy, I hope you'll be joining us for sure! Hopefully I will see you at the conference, as well.

MISH, thank you, me, too!

L. Diane, I bet it is nice to have an actual plan!

BragonDorn, thanks!

Li, wonderful! I look forward to your posts!

Konstanz, me, too! I hope you have a great time with it.

Jessica, hahaha, you know you want to!!!

Anonymous said...

This will be my first year... excited and nervous;)

E. M. Prokop said...

Hey Shannon, so nice to meet you! I did the challenge last April and I'm looking forward to doing it again this year...I have so much respect for you and everyone else who've written and published books! That's fantastic!

LAH said...

This will be my first year, and I'm kind of daunted by the idea of keeping it to a "theme" ... Can the theme just be "whatever pops into my head when I think of this letter?!" I don't think I can commit to any single theme for a month... I can hardly commit to one theme for a blog post, and often veer off in unintelligible directions.

Shannon Lawrence said...

Tania, oh, you'll do wonderfully!

Eve, wonderful to meet you! I'm glad you're back again.

Lauren, you in no way have to follow a theme if you don't want to, other than going in alphabetical order. I didn't follow a theme last year other than trying to make everything have to do with writing. If you want to scope out what it looks like, you can go through the archives of the judges who participated last year and look at last April. I enjoyed blogs without themes just as much as those with. Good luck to you!

Jeremy [Retro] said...

i cannot believe the year is upon us again and i am part of the team. this is going to rock the blogger world. great we have a strong team.

Jeremy [Retro-Zombie]
Visit The Madness:
IZOMBIE

Elizabeth Mueller said...

Hi! So excited to host this alongside you! It was so much fun last year. It will be better this year! :D

♥.•*¨Elizabeth¨*•.♥

Shannon Lawrence said...

Jeremy, it will be a fabulous April!

Elizabeth, I'm looking forward to it!