Time to Write? What's That?

By Kelly Bridgewater

As a mother of three rowdy boys, I am always asked how I find the time to write. I have to take care of the house, make sure three boys get to school on time, pick up the boys from school, supervise homework and chores, and have dinner on the table. My oldest son is in chess club. My middle son is in Boy Scouts. While my youngest son just started chess club. I also attend church on Sundays and Wednesdays and make sure my oldest son attends youth group activities. But that is only one part of who I am.

I am also a avid book reviewer for Booktalk.Fiction411 where I review four plus books a month, so I help my Senior Editor, Amy Drown, as we upload the completed reviews and schedule new reviews when possible. While doing the editorial side of the job takes A LOT of time, I still have to produce reviews of my own. Currently, I try to do four to five DIFFERENT  books a month here. 

Plus, I have my own blog to keep up with, which is where you are reading this. I do Book Review Tuesdays and Writing Advice Fridays. It keeps me busy. All the books to review and upload. I try not to overlap my reviews because I like to do different books in different places. Sometimes I have giveaways and interviews with published authors, so I have to keep track of who has responded and who hasn’t. On the other hand, I blog two other places. The Indiana ACFW chapter, Hoosier Ink, and Sleuths and Suspects.

With all this, I still find time to allow my imagination to roam free and work on my own writing.

How? You might be asking.

Here are some of my tips:

     
      1.) All three of my boys attend school for seven hours a day (Not right now because it is summer break, but they will return in about six weeks.) I wanted to homeschool when the oldest started school, but I’m glad I didn’t. I enjoy my “ME” time. It keeps me sane and produces a lot of writing.

2.) On the weekends, I spent time with my family and write in the evenings after everyone else has gone to bed. It is a sacrifice, but it helps to focus those two days on my family.

3.) I plan ahead. I am pretty good at writing at least three months ahead on all my blogs, so that I can keep that far out scheduled. You never know what might come up. I might have some huge disaster that I have to work on with my family. Except for the book reviews because I have to do them around the time the books come out, I pretty much write all my writing advice so far ahead that I have time to work on my writing.

What do you do to keep writing even though you have a forty hour a week job, plus a family to keep track of? I would like to hear some stories of inspiration.