Yesterday I finished my book.

I know what you are thinking: the book was absolutely perfect. It had the magical word count of 70,000 words, and there wasn’t a single typo in sight. All the characters were perfectly developed, and the narrative was tight and moving.

Don’t make me laugh. (Seriously, you don’t want to hear it. I sound like a donkey.)

Do you want to know how many words the book had? 35,000. I literally had sections that had things like “insert pop culture joke here” or “insert fight scene here” (those things are the hardest thing in the world to write…props to all my fantasy authors). There were some scenes that I am sure my dog would love because they are cheesier than Velveeta (okay, Velveeta isn’t technically cheese, but you get the idea).

I have never created a manuscript where I was more acutely aware that I needed to change and add so much to it. I have been telling all my friends that it is like a dinosaur in the Museum of Natural History: it has the bones but none of the feathers. (Just to blow your mind: a t-rex used to look like a chicken. Okay, this up for some scientific debate, but I want it to have feathers, so I declare that it did. #endofstory)

Did I feel bad about this as I sent it to my editor to review? (Yes, even editors need editors.) Heck no! I celebrated. I ate stuffed crust pizza and watched terrible Bravo reality shows with my best friend. Because every writing milestone deserves a victory.

How do you celebrate your writing milestones? How do you plan to celebrate your next one? Let me know in the comments.