Creative Writing in Creative Places

Summer is here and I’m back to being a fulltime mommy with fulltime writing demands. As hard as I tried to finish all my writing projects before the start of summer, I wasn’t able to do it. Why you ask…because of new writing contracts. So it’s not a bad thing at all. AND I look forward to the summer with my daughter. We get to do lots of fun things together: hang out with little buddies, visit water parks and recreations centers, see summer shows, and attend “Mom & Me” summer camps.

In the beginning, my only struggle was finding a good balance for writing and toddler time. After interviewing other mothers, I came up with a way to include my creative writing needs with creative places for my daughter to have some fun. For example: The play place at McDonalds has become a popular attraction on hot afternoons and often times feels like my second home. No joke. But understand that I’m very picky about the location and not all of these environments work for me. I want the area to be clean, friendly, and safe. I don’t want to have to worry that my busy toddler could find herself unsupervised and wandering in a dangerous situation. For that reason, I did my own foot work and checked out every location on my own. In doing so, I selected three play areas and parks with a safe indoor recreation area that’s perfect for my toddler to play and for me to write.

I also discovered that lugging around my laptop to all these places wasn’t going to work either. It took up too much time to set up, caused a distraction with my daughter, and was just something else for me to carry around. I’ve since downsized to using my tablet or just a good old fashioned pad and pen. Believe it or not, this has worked wonders for me.

I’ve been lucky on occasions to have finished a full chapter while my toddler played and exhausted herself enough to take a good nap later in the day. Those are bonus times and I capitalize on those by writing even more when I get her home. (So that also means these play areas can’t been far away.)

Now don’t get me wrong. My days are not always picture perfect. I have lots of days where my plans go up in flames. More than I’d like. But I still try to block off “Me Time” in the evenings to hit my daily goals. That’s when having a consistent night time/bed time routine comes into play.

Being creative has become essential to my summer survival both as a mommy and writer. Here’s to hoping that the next six weeks go as smoothly as the first.