Writer's Fallout Shelter

I'm glad to hear you're writing every night. It doesn't matter if it's on paper or talking into a tape recorder or on a computer. As long as you're writing, that's all that is important. Any practice that helps you develop and move forward and keeps the voices in check is goodness. I still have a milk crate full of things I wrote in my 20's that I need to go through and I'm pretty certain there's a box in the basement that's full of handwritten stuff I wrote when I was younger.

What you're doing when you're writing in your notebooks is developing your skill and talent. You're working on the Craft of writing. In the long run, the practice will serve you well.

As for the time thing, it's not ever going to get any better. I'm sorry. It's not. There's always going to be something pressing and calling for your time and trying to lure you away from writing. You just have to decide how much of a priority writing is going to be for you and budget what time you have accordingly. Right now, it sounds like you're doing just fine.