I love that you are giving a different meaning to the WIP challenge. Your project is quite impressive considering how long you have stopped crocheting. You are doing well so far.

My advice on becoming faster is to keep practicing and use a bigger pin and double the yarn you are using. Since it is hard to find worsted weight local yarn around here. What I do is double the fingering yarn and it feels almost the same as the worsted weight, that way it's easier to work with a bigger hook size. Also, double crochet builds faster than single. I'm sure you'll get the hang of it soon enough.