What's Your Revising Process?

I think I'm a bit of an anomaly, in that I love revising. First drafts are painful to slog through, but, the minute I finish my first draft, my heart gets all bouncy and I get annoyingly excited, because I know this is the good part. This is when I'll really get to know my characters, when small things will get shuffled around until they make sense, themes will emerge, and all the little subtleties will start to come through. It's just so... addictive and rewarding! Sure, by the time I've done my 4th revision, I'm not as excited about it, but, for now, it's yaysville.

Here's my process:

1. Buy a binder
2. Print out my draft
3. Buy a hole punch (because I accidentally left mine behind when we moved).
4. Punch holes in the papers
5. Put the papers in the binder
6. Create a reference sheet for every aspect of the story. Each character gets a sheet, where I list their qualities and quirks. I have a sheet for dialect. A sheet mapping out each location. Etc.
7. I skim through my work and write a sheet of general notes that I need to address (Inconsistencies, stuff that needs to be more present throughout the story, etc.)
8. I start revising, one page at a time. When stuff needs to be rewritten, I insert hand-written revisions into the binder. (There are a ton of them for my current project). Something about handwriting them forces me to really pay attention to what I'm writing and connect with it on a physical level. Every time an issue comes up, I add it to the general notes sheet.
9. I use sticky notes to create reminders for myself within the story. Oh, I love sticky notes. Sticky notes make my life amazing.
10. I end up with a very messy, very wonderful binder and a story with logical transitions and character motivations (in theory). My last step is to type it all up, from scratch, paying special attention to grammar and prose. It's at this point that I'm finally ready to send it out to readers for feedback. Then... more revisions! Yay!

I always end up with more words after revision than before. Rough drafts are like complex outlines to me. Most of the description doesn't happen until revision. Same with character intricacies. I'm not one of those people who has to cut away with every revision. If I did that, there'd barely be any story at all!

What about you? Do later drafts end up longer than earlier ones? Do you like revising, or is the bulk of your enthusiasm for the first draft? Have you developed a complicated process that works for you?

Why You Might Want to Come Up With Your Character Names Right Away. If You Like.

I have a habit of learning things the hard way. Even if someone tells me that something's a bad idea, I still have to try it out for myself. I guess I don't always believe advice applies to me until I fail on my own. So, you can take this advice, or you can, like me, find out for yourself.

Never give your characters placeholder names. I was having a horrible time coming up with names for my characters in Mysterious Other Novel and it was getting in the way of my writing progress, so I finally just gave them silly placeholder names. Now that I'm revising, I have three inappropriately named characters whose whole personalities have been built up around the silly names that they're not allowed to keep. This is giving me many headaches. I know, whatever names I settle on will never feel like their real names. I'll always think of them and see them by their stupid, stupid placeholder names. Darn me.

So, just don't do it. Turns out it's harder to change a character's name down the road than it is to come up with a good one in the first place. Learn from my mistakes. Or don't. If you dare.

Has this ever been a problem for you? How do you know when a character's name is the right one? Are there any you've been especially proud of?