New Year's Resolution

SWG Challenge - Resolution - annual SWG amnesty challenge - 1 January through 15 February 2026

A new year often brings resolutions to achieve big changes. Our Resolutions challenge is much more moderate: reach for a creative achievement, no matter how small. Maybe it is a single drabble, a sketch, or a new chapter—the point is to begin a new year with an act of creativity and imagination!

Our annual amnesty allows you to pick from any of the previous year’s challenges. You do not need to use a new prompt to be eligible for this challenge. Participants can choose to complete any of the previous year's challenges. Did you miss a challenge you wanted to complete? Do it now. Did you start a fanwork for a challenge but never completed it? Here is your chance to finish. If you didn't leave any unrealized or unfinished projects behind you (congratulations!), choose from any of our 2025 challenges and start something new. (For a summary of the 2025 challenges and direct links, see the Challenge Prompts section below!)

You will receive a stamp on your 2025 collection for any challenges that you complete now, as well as a stamp for the New Year's Resolution challenge on your 2026 collection. When you post to the SWG archive, please make sure you select the 2025 challenge you're completing and the New Year's Resolution challenge.

To help the mods correctly process stamps for this challenge, contact us if you complete the following, which receive special stamps:

  • feature a character of color in a Dark Matter fanwork
  • feature a female character in a Musicals fanwork
  • the Difficult-level challenge for Period Drama
  • feature an LGBTQIA+ character in a Gates of Summer fanwork
  • feature a character with a disability in a Swinging 40s fanwork
  • row, column, diagonal, or card blackout for Kids These Days

This month's banner and stamps use images from the 18th-century “Chinese Arabesques” by Jean-Baptiste Pillement and Anne Allen, which plays with the theme of striving to reach the fantastical.

This challenge opened in .

Prompts

Choose your prompt from the collection below.

View Prompts

February | Dark Matter 
Create a fanwork using anti-prompts: prompts that don't appear in your fanwork.

March | Birthday Bash 
Daily word, image, and poetry prompts are loosely structured around events and milestones leading up to our 20th birthday.

April | Musicals 
Craft a fanwork inspired by songs from musicals.

May | Period Drama 
A Matryoshka challenge where prompts are inspired by common tropes found in period dramas and historical fiction.

June | Gates of Summer 
Create a fanwork based on prompts about summer taken from Tolkien's life, canon events, and quotes from his letters and stories.

July | Swinging 40s 
Choose a prompt from a list of music, films, novels, inventions, and more from the 1940s.

August | Kids These Days 
Create a fanwork using a bingo card of prompts based on common gripes about kids and teens.

September | Jumble Sale 
Member-created prompts upcycle old challenges and prompts with additional new twists.

October | The Only Thing to Fear 
Create a fanwork about fear that involves a prompt you select from our list of common fears.

November/December | Great Beleriand Bake-Off 
Ready? Set? Bake! Our two-month daily prompt calendar includes sweet- and savory-themed prompts as well as weekly comment challenges.

Fanworks Tagged with New Year's Resolution

This is a Writing fanwork

Winds of Change by Lferion

Anairë, Nerdanel, and Faniel are visited by Ëonwë's sisters, the Winds of Sunset, Midnight, and Dawn.

Four drabbles.

Fanwork Information and Table of Contents

This is a Writing fanwork

Eärendil on Taniquetil by Lferion

Eärendil, waiting for the answer of the Valar to his plea. A triple drabble.

Fanwork Information and Table of Contents

This is a Writing fanwork

In the Forest: Night by Lferion

Celegorm, Returned, faces a challenge. A double-drabble.

Fanwork Information and Table of Contents

This is a Writing fanwork

Natural History of Middle-earth: A Tour by Himring

Drabbles inspired by natural history prompts, from the Years of the Trees to the Fourth Age, from Valinor to Far Harad.

Featuring Indis and Miriel, Ilmare and Varda, Earendil and his mariners, Aragorn and the past, and Beruthiel and her white cat.

Fanwork Information and Table of Contents

This is a Writing fanwork

Maglor's Dream by Himring

Wandering Maglor dreams of Arda Marred.

 

Fanwork Information and Table of Contents

This is a Writing fanwork

Spring in Doriath by Himring

Doriath welcomes the spring.

Fanwork Information and Table of Contents

This is a Writing fanwork

Aurora: Seeking the Northern Sky by Lferion

Fingon, returned, has more questions than answers, and travels north to find what answers he can for himself.

A drabble sequence

Fanwork Information and Table of Contents

This is a Writing fanwork

Eagle's eye by SkyEventide

Manwe and Mandos watch the Nirnaeth. They break the fourth wall.

Fanwork Information and Table of Contents

This is a Writing fanwork

Tales for the New Year by Kaylee Arafinwiel

In the beginning, the Elves awakened...what else happened at Cuivienen, and where might things go from there?

Fanwork Information and Table of Contents

This is a Writing fanwork

Pages from the Archives of Cîr Imladris by Lferion

Elrond took his library with him to Valinor. In that archive are many things, and the librarians and archivists of Cîr Imladris (New Rivendell) are kept delightfully busy.

Fanwork Information and Table of Contents

This is a Writing fanwork

Triptych by Narya

A trio of drabbles from the point of view of Duilin's wife, Netiliel.

Fanwork Information and Table of Contents

This is a Writing fanwork

Sweeping past the minutes of its face by Himring

A mechanical clock is imported from The Shire to Valinor.

Fanwork Information and Table of Contents

This is a Writing fanwork

Nost-na-Lothion by Grundy

Sometimes little things make a big difference. Flowers, for example.

Fanwork Information and Table of Contents

This is a Writing fanwork

Lord by Lferion

Fingon, Returned, still holds the fealty of many, unlooked-for. He's not sure what to do with it.

Fanwork Information and Table of Contents

This is a Writing fanwork

Liegeman by Lferion

Ilverin Littleheart has a story he does not tell, a fealty he cannot acknowledge.

Fanwork Information and Table of Contents

This is a Writing fanwork

Hewers of wood and drawers of water. by hennethgalad

an unwitting eyewitness struggles with the consequence.

Fanwork Information and Table of Contents

This is a Writing fanwork

Twice Burnt by Lferion

Fingolfin Returned reflects on petitioning for the release of Feanor

Fanwork Information and Table of Contents

This is a Writing fanwork

Day Will Come Again by Narya

Fingon takes a moment to remember his cousin at midwinter.

Fanwork Information and Table of Contents

This is a Writing fanwork

The Small and Secret Things by Lferion

"[Yavanna] is the lover of all things that grow in the earth, and all their countless forms she holds in her mind, from the trees like towers in forests long ago to the moss upon stones or the small and secret things in the mould." ~ Valaquenta

Fanwork Information and Table of Contents

This is a Writing fanwork

Through a Mirror Darkly by HannaGoldworthy

Year 2510 of the Third Age: Celebrian arrives in Valinor during Sovalle, a new (for her) feast of repentance and reconciliation.  And, much to her suprise and discomfort, she's not the only new face hanging around...

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This is a Writing fanwork

Bubble, Bubble, Toil and Trouble by Raiyana

Nargothrond, Midwinter:
Curufin attempts to recreate a warming cordial from Aman with Beleriand ingredients. ->
Celegorm tests it. ->
Shenanigans.

Aka the accidental invention of miruvor

Fanwork Information and Table of Contents

This is a Writing fanwork

... of Passion by Raiyana

Gwindor's captivity in Angband involves the torture he might have expected... until Gorthaur hatches a new plan to fulfil an old desire.

Fanwork Information and Table of Contents

This is a Writing fanwork

Tending the Lady's Garden by Raiyana

After the War of Wrath, Finarfin rules in Tirion and Findis is left adrift, her former occupations no longer filling her days. Instead, she journeys with Indis to her house in the countryside, hoping that she might aid her remaining parent in staying just that - remaining to her.

What she finds there?

Well, not quite what was expected, but perhaps there is hope yet for her; small spots of brightness fighting against the sorrow of her house.

And flowers.

Lots of flowers.

 

Warning for many Findis feels.

Fanwork Information and Table of Contents

This is a Writing fanwork

Liver, Heart, and Soul by Scribe of Mirrormere

Caranthir hears of a Moriquendi tribe with a rather unusual practice. He wishes to seek their demise immediately, but one of his daughters selects a different path.

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This is a Writing fanwork

Steel Rose by HannaGoldworthy

A clan of Easterlings makes their way into Beleriand, where they forge an unlikely friendship with the very people they are supposed to betray.

Fanwork Information and Table of Contents