Well, I posted the update on the forums first,
inside a post created by XwordslingerX, so some of these pictures will be familiar if you've looked at that one, but some will not. (I also believe that, eventually, some of the posts on the forums will be archived, so it may not be viewable at that point, but, for now, it is, and it's also able to accept any additions from writers who attended, if they care to share them.) The picture above is of the NaNoWriMo shield shrink tags I made that were labeled and dated for our 2019 Pie Day as a fun little reminder of the event. Each person who attended received one (although someone dropped theirs, so if you were there and find you are missing your tag, please reach out and I'll find a way to get it to you) and now I find myself thinking about what I might come up with for future Pie Days. We'll see.
Polly Esther and Pierson greeted writers as they arrived. They were also next to the cards we had on hand for people to sign in order to help our region thank the Come Write In locations who had signed up with NaNoWriMo and offered us writing spaces this year.
People were able to drop off their wrapped mugs near the entrance. This is what the grouping looked like (I think not all of the mugs were present at this point, but this is most of them) prior to the actual exchange. All of the fun wrapping paper and bags made it really tough to choose for many participants! We did the exchange sort of White Elephant style. Everyone was given a ticket, which was pulled randomly from the ticket can, in order to determine turns. They then were allowed to choose if they wanted to pick from the pile or steal someone else's mug. If a mug was taken twice, it was then "stuck" with the third person to have chosen it - which did happen with the Elephant mug. The first person to be picked had a choice at the end if they wanted to steal or stay with what they received in the beginning, since they didn't have that option to start with, but they decided not to steal from anyone.
This year, we needed two tables for food, instead of just one! There were so many delicious things to choose from and everyone enjoyed grazing throughout the duration of the write in. Thank you to everyone who brought an item or two to share!
Here are some picture of our room full of writers, busily working away. Congratulations to @Pranbran, who reached 50K during the write in! We all took a moment to cheer for her and then continued writing. Everyone was able to get at least 1000 words (or more) written during the write in, even with all of that food and the mug exchange as distractions. It was really fun seeing some familiar faces as well as meeting some new writers, whether this was the first time I met them this NaNo or I had met them at a previous write-in this year. This seems like it will be a fun halfway through NaNoWriMo tradition to continue - and many seemed to agree that they'd enjoy it if that happened.
For fun, we posed all of the mugs on the table they first sat on when they arrived. Many also placed their mini Sockmonkey buddies inside of their mugs for the photo op, which was fun! Below are a few close up pictures of sections of the mugs:
As a final update to this, I posted the picture on our social media, but I thought it would wrap things up to post a picture of Polly Esther and Pierson with the mug I ended up with, since our as-yet-unnamed Sockmonkey mascot posed with my mug from last year and it seems like a fitting continuation of tradition:
Thank you again to everyone who attended! You all made this a really enjoyable event. I hope your writing continues to flow as we near the end of November and that your mug and shrink tag are reminders of your visit with us.
Did you attend Pie Day? Did you enjoy it? Any suggestions for future events like this? Please, let us know in the comments!
