Happy New Year

Happy New Year Everyone! 

Mom's trying to stay more on top of posting recent pictures and keeping everyone up to date this year, so here goes.

 

I was partying it up New Year's Day! And then last weekend we went out to Nana and Pawpaw's house, and I took along my Diego tricycle and  flying turtle scooter, and I even managed to give the family some tennis lessons. :)

 

I hope this year is great for all my family and friends. Check back soon for some videos. Mom's been a real slacker about posting those lately!

Telecommuting Tightrope

It's review time around my office and that always leads to a few worrisome days. Will my boss and co-workers, who rarely see me, have any grasp of how hard I have worked this year? Will they reflect that on a blind review spreadsheet that will be compiled to figure my raise and possible promotion?  A few stress filled days and then I realized that I was stressing for nothing. Those in power at my office (all males) are procrastinators through and through and while I should have had a nice review and discussion of my salary and future potential, it was, as always, held late. Matter of fact, it still hasn't been officially held, but this year's phone call and in person announcement of my salary increase and a verbal pat on the back is far better than last year's 2 line email. Hmmm, maybe by next year I'll actually be surprised, rather than checking my bank account, seeing the new amount and doing a little math to figure out if my "review" went well.

All in all it was a good year, I have little to work on, and am good to go continuing on as I am. This bodes well for my continued life as a telecommuter, which is great since after 2 years working from home I would probably go crazy back in an office environment.

~Telecommuting Tyrant

MMM, Macation!

So it's the holidays and that means "Macation" as my two year old calls it. For the first 3 months of his life I was on uninterrupted maternity leave (good thing since he was a coliky, insommniac baby and I spent most of my day ensuring that my arms never moved so he would be eternally comfortable), and the next two working no more than 4 hours a day. That all changed when we moved to Austin and I came back to work full time as a telecommuter. I tried for about a week to manage an active 5 month old baby and my job. It didn't take a genius to figure out that as soon as the baby started crying the phone would ring! I'm sure looking back an outsider would have viewed my days like an Abbot and Costello film; a true comedy of errors, but within a week I was interviewing nannies.

That was really the best of both worlds for me. I could work hard, get my job done right and still hear his giggles, see his smiles and have plenty of time with him every day. At 18 months though my little social butterfly was asking where his friends were and I knew that it was time to cut the apron strings and enroll him in a more social environment. A is now a happy, adjusted toddler in a nearby church school and never wants to come home. This week, our Holiday Macation week, will be spent bouncing from one activity to another, trying to entertain him. I'm looking forward to the quality time, believe you me, but when your two year old knows that Sunday means he'll see his friends tomorrow, and he's already asking for them, you begin to wonder how the week will go!

Wish us luck, I have a feeling it might be easier to handle deadlines, presentations and colleagues than one little, cute, angelic, crazy kiddo missing his pint size running buddies. Good thing I wouldn't trade our time for the world!

Twinkle, Twinkle

This time of year you see twinkle lights everywhere. As I sit here typing this up I can see my neighbors lights winking through my front window and if I crane my neck I can almost see the gorgeous LED lights across the street. We decorated last weekend, when it was still warm enough to be outside in tee-shirts, and it brought back memories of decorating for my wedding several years ago. I wanted a fairy tale outdoor wedding in April so in preparation we purchased thousands of lights at after Christmas sales. Not only did we get them for a fraction of the cost, but after the wedding we boxed them back up and our first year of marriage we were all set to decorate the whole street in white twinkly lights. Now we wrap the front porch columns, decorate the house roof line and even wrap the trees. I won't even tell you how many strands I have left over! Believe me it will be many years before I ever need to buy lights again.

If you're planning a wedding in 2009, and want to decorate with lights, hit the after Christmas sales next week and stock up! If you're not planning a wedding, grab a few boxes anyways and turn your deck into the outdoor entertaining hotspot among your friends! 

A Nutty Irishman Saves My Sanity

The rush of the holidays. Finishing up deliverables for the year. Two days until vacation.

These are all things that are occuring simulteanously during the last week of work before Christmas vacation! I work hard all year, and I work from home which means I work sick or not, so I am planning a bang up vacation for Christmas. I'll be out the door (theoretically :)) on Friday at noon and I'll be back sometime after the first of the year. So this week is nuts and today finds me at Kenny's Coffee having a Nutty Irishman, my absolute favorite coffee drink for a pick me up, to get the day jumpstarted. I can't tell you how many times I have been so happy to have a great mom and pop coffee shop with free wifi in my neighborhood. Anytime I need more noise than I have at home to get me to focus, they are ready and waiting with caffinne a plenty. Off to the grind now, but I can't complain too much since Pandora. com is rocking on my computer, the Nutty Irishman is soothing my lack of sleep that I can thank my toddler for, and I'm looking forward to a coworker lunch today! All in all the best of the best that telecommuters can look forward to!

Holiday Party For One

This time of year I do miss working in an office where celebrations, lunches, and holiday parties are the norm. Working at home I do get my lovely Christmas decorations to enjoy around the clock, hot chocolate whenever I want to make it and Christmas music without worrying about enjoying a neighbor, but this is a super social time of year and as a born entertainer it feels like time to party!

This is my last week of work before I head off on Christmas vacation, so I am rewarding myself for pushing through my "Holidayitis" with a Holiday Party for One on Friday! :) Christmas carols will play, hot cocoa will be served and I might even through a breakfast buffet together.

Telecommuters Unite and Party together! Maybe next year I'll make the rounds of work at home meet up groups and organize a meet and greet telecommuter party!

Crazy Days

Life as a telecommuter varies for me. Some days, when I don't have a super pressing deadline, I have to force myself to focus and work steadily on tasks that are more monotonous than fun. Fortunately there haven't been too many days like that lately.

What there has been are the typical snafus that accompany working from a home office (or a desk built into the kitchen like I do :)).

Yesterday there was a parade of repair men tromping through my house. The first one showed up right on time around 2, he was the cable guy, and being completely into what I was working on I showed him to my husband's wall mounted new plasma TV and left him to fix the broken input. It wasn't until 10 minutes later when a team of Best Buy repair men showed up that I realized the cable guy was there to fix my phones, not my husband's TV. There was a bit of embarrassment on my end and chuckles from the various testosterone infused experts in the house when I went up to shuffle them around. After all that neither party could fix what they came for and both rescheduled service calls for next week. So the saga continues!

Today I woke up sick as a dog, took the day off work and dosed myself with DayQuil. After sleeping for a few hours I woke up feeling better. Having already taken the day off I decided to get some personal business done and am now feeling quite accomplished for getting my Craigslist listings up, packages mailed, books sent off for www.paperbackswap.com, a few groceries (mostly OJ and Superfood juice by Odwalla) and a tiny bit of housecleaning done.

Realizing what all I accomplished from a day free of general work (sick or not I got a few things done that have been cluttering up my desk for sometime), I am now determined to take 1 day a month off to play "catch-up" for the house!