Writing Tip Wednesday: How to keep writing through the school holidays.

Today was the last day of school for my children, and kids all across Australia are about to have six weeks off, and as many writer/parents know, it’s harder to fit in time to write when the kids are home on school holidays.
Last school holidays I managed to keep writing, and I am going to share with you a few simple tips I learnt that might help you to keep writing through the school holidays too.

1. Make a plan before you start (and stick to it)
2. Set an achievable goal to work towards. For e.g this six week break you might want to challenge yourself to write 30k.
3. If you have a blog, record your goals on it. Going public with it will help keep you motivated because you are accountable to someone else.
4. Write for one hour a day. Having one hour to yourself in a day is not too much to ask. What works best for me is writing in the morning. I give my kids breakfast, and then put them in front of the TV for an hour. I can then take them out for the rest of the day, or go out in the backyard with them. That way I can focus on them because I’ve already written and not agitated because all I want to be doing is writing. You can write when they are asleep if that works better for you.
5. Don’t be too harsh on yourself if you miss a day. Sometimes life is just too busy and gets in the way. It’s OK, your writing will still be there tomorrow. And if your kids are good at entertaining themselves, you might even be able to make up for the day you missed.

It all comes down to determination. If you are really determined to write, you will write. Kids at home or not.

That’s it from me. I hope these tips help.

I’ll be editing these holidays so I don’t have a word count goal, but I do plan to have this draft of my YA fantasy finished by the end of January.

If you want to set a word count goal for these holidays, feel free to leave the goal in the comments and I’ll check up on you during the holidays to see how you’re going.

Happy writing 🙂