Blogstacles.

One of the hardest things about working full-time has been my inability to keep up with the blog. I love this thing... not only does it keep me connected with people I don't otherwise see, it is an reminder to me that we really do a lot together as a family.

The fact that I have not posted anything lately is not what bothers me most. What bothers me, is that I feel like we haven't been able to find time to do anything worth posting, either. Our together time seems to consist of laundry, a shopping cart, or singing the "clean up" song trying to pull the house back together.

Jack has finished his last day of Kindergarten and thanks to a storm blowing out the power at the daycare, I was able to take an unexpected day off to enjoy the festivities. I cried when I said "goodbye" to Mrs. Brockman. I cried because I feel so grateful for how amazing she has been. I also cried because I know something Jack doesn't know. She will not be at Scobee next year.... which means he is NOT going to see her after the summer... which means he will NOT likely get to see her big pregnant... and will NOT likely get to meet the baby. It breaks my heart. She just didn't have the heart to tell the kids and I am glad she didn't. Jack talks about Mrs. Brockman every single day and his writing about her (and there is a lot of it) is precious. (And to think I was so worried about getting a new teacher at the beginning of the year...)

Jeff sat down in front of the laptop today at lunch and Davis looked over from his highchair and said, "Mommy's chair! Mommy's Chair!" OUCH. Guess I haven't been staying off the work laptop as much as I thought.

Luckily, things are looking up for us in the "family time" department. Jeff was finally granted Saturdays off. I am so relieved. I feel like I've worked full-time for six days a week for the past five months, and it wears on me. I feel bad because by the time he came home on Saturday nights, I was ready to hand them over and lock myself in the closet for some quiet time. It will be great to have two days home together and will free me up to grocery shop on Saturday mornings while they are all sleeping. (That's the plan anyway... who knows.)

So, it is clear to me that I have two choices. I can moan about working full-time or find a way to make it work and be happy. I am trying to find a balance but am so disappointed that we're five months in and I still feel as harried as I did Week One. I have never worked at ANY job, (even Kinko's when I was 16) where at some point I didn't receive feedback that I have trouble staying focused. Every boss I have ever had has given me this feedback, to which I want to reply, "You don't say!?" So, it was almost comforting when it was the first "area of improvement" on my 90-day appraisal at Methodist. Gwen was so sweet about it. I mean, she's raising two boys too. It's sort of reassuring when she drives me to an important meeting and I have to move a Transformer and a blue swim shoe off her passenger seat before sitting down.

I am still working on a "system" for staying focused and organized. With each new job, I try lists, calendars, flags on my Outlook, etc. until something works, but this job proposes challenges I have never faced. Not only have I never juggled so many things at once, I have never before had to support people who work at different facilities all over town, and haven't had to balance a work cell phone. Now people can send me to-do's via cell phone, e-mail, voicemail, and text and I might be at lunch, at home, or at a remote facility when I receive them. It's multi-tasking to the max and those of you who know me don't need me to explain how hard that is for me. On top of that, Smart Phones are NOT in the budget after all, so we are doing this without remote computer access. (I know...)

But, there are parts of this job that are right up my alley and I love to do. For one, I got the chance to create from scratch the new "JoinMEthodist" recruitment logo and pitch it to marketing for approval. After much deliberation, here is what I came up with:

It will soon be seen on thousands of mugs, bags, shirts, and pens, and that's pretty exciting. I'll also be rolling out the website soon if I can just (you guessed it) stay focused on the minutia required to get it all done.

The boys start tomorrow at the Humble Creek Ranch Youth Enrichment and Sports Academy. Sounds expensive. That's because it is. While Jeff is still reeling a bit with sticker shock, he understands that if I am worried about the kids at daycare all day, I will never be able to (you guessed it again) focus on my work. I think he is also tired of hearing me talk about the things that I don't like about our old place. (If the top three ingredients are Sugar, High Fructose Corn Syrup, and Citric Acid, it's not juice, it's a melted snow cone.) Jack loves the old daycare, but Davis is happy to take his "listening problem" with him to a bigger room with more space and newer toys. So, my fingers are crossed that Monday goes okay.

Better run before Jack, Davis, and Jeff finish their naps. The final blogstacle is that my digital camera is broken. Ugh. Thankfully Husband-o-the-year bought the four-year warranty, so I turned it over to the Geek Squad at Best Buy for the two-week repair.

Wouldn't you know the boys were posing in collared shirts and combed-over hair this morning and Jack said, "Mommy, take our picture!!" Wishing I had a smart phone or something, I remembered the words of my wise big bro Trey "Just because you didn't get a picture of it doesn't mean it didn't happen." So, I soaked in their handsomeness for a few moments and we left for church. I would have loved to post a pic for everyone, but here's one from Easter instead.



Easter Sunday 2010. The day it was officially decided that Jack is too old to match his little brother.