Writing Cave

Hi friends,

Always happy to spend this time with you. I hope you had a wonderful holiday weekend. We had family time early on and then I spent the remainder of the three-day weekend writing. Yep. It’s that time again. My eleventh novel, The Crushing Depths, released on June 30th and my deadline for book 3 is in two weeks. This equates to crazy time. Literally. Trying to juggle the two is an art form—one I have yet to master.

So the last two weeks before deadline, I enter my Writing Cave. What’s a Writing Cave you ask? Great question. It means I have all my writing stuff set up the night before so when I get up in the morning (after Bible time), I can dive right into the story. I shut down my email, keep all windows closed—the only exception is Google for when I need to double-check a research fact—and I write until dinner. Then I take a short break to spend time on social media connecting with my phenomenal readers. God has blessed me with the most encouraging, supportive, and prayerful group.

After dinner and my short break, I’m back at it until bed. I do have a special way for my family to reach me anytime even with things off but honestly, they know to steer clear of deadline mom. Yep. I’ve actually been dubbed ‘Deadline Mom’ and I don’t think it’s a compliment.

My younger daughter can tell how deep in the story world I’m in or how panicked I am based on my hair. Not kidding. Here’s a shot of deadline hair probably two weeks before due date so you can only imagine how bad it must really get.

However, my family (while avoiding me like the plague) is super supportive. Kayla brings me Starbucks and surprises me with a nice cup of tea and some Dove dark chocolate. Ty goes for physical items to boost my morale. Like this cup and notepad. And, my husband cheers me on. Again, I’m very blessed.

Question: If you’re a writer how do you handle deadline time? If not a writer, what kinds of hobbies or projects do you work hard to complete?

Blessings,

Dani