a newbie Q: can I use sd card pins for something else between writes?

Do you mean how many things can you connect to the clock, MOSI, and MISO lines at the same time?
That will depend on how far apart they are, what kind of current load they present to the atmega's output driver, etc.,how fast you are trying to communicate (the SPI mode can be varied for different speeds), and how connected (one long daisy chain?).