Amanda Lamb: Books and babies

People always ask me how I have time to write books with young children at home. The truth is, I don't. I actually had a lot more time to write when my children were babies and slept a lot. Now I have to carve out small chunks of time whenever I can find them. In the parking lot at school waiting for dismissal, waiting for my children at piano lessons, or at ballet, on a plane, in a car, you name it, the computer is always with me.

They do like book signings, however. My oldest especially likes to sit at the table with me, open the books for me, and chat with the readers. My youngest just likes to stay up late and eat the treats that I sometimes bring to signings.

One day I went into my older daughter's room and she was practicing her signature. I asked her what she was doing and she said, "Practicing to be a writer." I told her I thought she might have skipped a few steps, but nonetheless she now has the bug. She writes all the time and will surely publish a book decades earlier than her mother did.

Combining kids and writing can be a difficult balancing act, but not unlike any other job, mothers somehow figure out how to make it work.