It’s already winter up here.

The snow came in early November but it feels like we’ve logged a couple months of cold season. Temps have dropped to nearly 30 below with the windchill some days, and there’s snow: lots of it.

We’re wearing our parkas and our winter boots and, at this rate, cabin fever will set in sometime in early January.

When we arrived last year, the conditions were startlingly similar (except it stayed lighter longer and the mercury sat a little bit lower in the thermometer).

Faced with a constancy of white and cold, I decided to paint the room that would become my office a bright and energetic shade of orange. When I blogged about it, I posted a picture of the walls around the window looking out at a world that looks pretty much the same as it does now. White.

The colour was a leap for me as I’m usually pretty conservative when it comes to paint. But with winter’s arrival this year, I’m really glad I did it.

My room, where I’m spending many morning hours these days, focused on the new novel, is a warm and cozy place where shades of red and orange predominate. Our cat, an orange tabby (and a female one, which is rare, we’ve been told), fits right in. The red chair, a birthday gift from my mom, is a nod to Sylvia Plath, my first major poetic influence, who painted each of her writing rooms red.

I love studying the rooms that writers and artists occupy because they speak volumes about the artistic process and thought I’d share my own with you – complete with messy desk, because that’s just how I roll…

If you’re a writer or an artist, what’s your space like?

Griffy refusing to take part in this project… And that gorgeous green tile above the chair was made by my sister-in-law, Amber Mills

Walls seem more peach in this pic than their normal adobe colour…

Where the magic (or, some days, hair-pulling) happens. The collage above my desk was a gift from artist Leonard Brooks