yes, good question, yeeeesss

firstly, i would say 2 years ago now i was having some creative issues with my fics and i realised i kept trying to force myself to write with genres, techniques and pairings i didn't actually enjoy that much. i made a mental list of everything i enjoyed doing with writing and everything i didnt, and then just stopped doing the things i didn't like. creating stories suddenly became A LOT easier when i just focused on nuturing my existing strengths

i'm obsessed with foreshadowing and chekhov's gun in media, i love a tight narrative, i love no wasted details. so i think this will always be the building blocks of my stories, with everything else coming after: genre, tropes, dialogue, prose, etc

// spoilers
for 3rd int, i knew the main story beats before i started writing it: that minho was the catalyst in jeongin being fired, that jeongin would at some point pawn his ring (and minho would buy it back), that everything would culminate with the winter showcase, that the wishbone would be key in revealing the meaning of the story name

then it was working backwards. the winter showcase gets off-handedly mentioned in chapter 1, jeongin notices the wishbones in chapter 1, the first power cut happens in chapter 2, the pawn shop is introduced in chapter 4, minho points out jeongin's ring in chapter 4 (in the same scene he also invites jeongin to the winter showcase), all the while there is this underlying tension between them that the reader doesn't yet know is coming from (minho saying "i want you, even though its wrong of me" in chapter 3, and minho getting suddenly emotional about "that night in paris" in chapter 6)

and as we get closer to where the actual event happens, these details need to be brought up more overtly so it will stick in the front of the reader's brain (an example being jeongin relying more on his ring as a coping mechanism as he approaches selling it, rather than fiddling with it being a little detail). especially when the chapters come out with 3-7 weeks gaps, it's easy for active readers to forget details. i've definitely learned from past experiences where i kept the foreshadowing too subtle and then it didn't have the intended payoff!

honestly, 3rd int is an extremely ambitious story. there are a ton of themes and moving parts happening all at once. really i think it could only be done because i knew very strongly what the spine of the narrative was from the beginning, so even when i strayed or the word count blew way over budget, anything additional i wrote had to serve some sort of purpose to reinforce the major narrative beats and themes. but i think if the story was to be edited again as a whole now that it's finished, there would be some aspects of it that would be cut to tighten other areas.

in terms of tips to keep track of the foreshadowing, i leave a ton of notes in my draft for for myself in the chapters, like "remember to mention the wishbone!" and then i'll just work it into the chapter i'm actively working on that feels right. then if there's a few notes that won't fit into a chapter draft, i move it into the next chapter... and that then happens over and over until you end up with a final chapter that has so many notes it ends up being 35k words 🥴

there were only 3 scenes that ended up getting cut, 2 very very early iterations of the first kiss and a conversation minho and jeongin had about drugs (i really liked the idea for the scene but it just didnt end up matching the tone of the story and it wasn't a major theme, so it was removed)

that was a lot, so hope i answered your question! LOL