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Chasing Time

Here I am 28 days into 2019, and back at the work like it ain’t no thing. Except it is a thing. A really, really hard thing. There aren’t enough hours in the day, everyone is demanding, and I often forget or don’t have time to go to the restroom. But I wouldn’t trade being a working mom of these kiddos for anything.. except maybe being really, really ridiculously rich AND happy with the same fulfillment that my career gives me. Here are some tips and tricks I’ve picked up along the way that is helping me find some extra time in the day:

It’s okay to pay a premium for convenience. Instacart is one of my best friends. So far I’ve placed Instacart orders that have saved me upwards of 80 hours ( that’s like two work weeks, two weeks of vacation!) and the grocery fairy delivers to my doorstep. And best of all, I order while pumping so I’m also multi-tasking while order. Win-win.

A cleaning service is a MUST. I don’t need to spend precious family time being angry about the house not being clean or worse yet, actually cleaning. While I still clean some thing like the fridge, countertops, and the floors ( why, oh why are my floors always so dirty) as my mother in law says- “Paying to get your house cleaned is cheaper than therapy.”

House Rules When in town, work dinners are reserved for top tier meetings only. I may show face a bit for a drink, but I always am home to say good night and typically well before that if I adhere to my in-town dinner criteria.

Workout at work We have a small gym at work and free yoga classes are offered every single day. If I can sneak in a workout during the day either during lunch or end of day, even if for only 30 minutes without an additional commute, that’s another win. I still get home at a reasonable hour with slightly more calories burned and endorphins released.

Mobile Meetings My teams knows that the best time to catch me is in the car on either my commute into the office or home. If I can touch base with people in the time that I am driving (about an hour a day), it saves me an hour during “normal hours”. Safely and hands free of course.

One day, I’ll get wake up an hour earlier than everyone else at home to fully exploit the “magic hour”, but while the baby is challenging me in the sleep department currently, we’ll just have to call that one potential upside. What are your tips and tricks to get the most out of your day?

Positive Thought of the Day:  The husband took the girls to gymnastics, leaving me home with a very sleepy baby and I got a minute to catch up on chores and work and actually eat a non-rushed dinner at home. The extra hour was nice  (I really do enjoy cleaning and eating without distraction) and appreciated!  

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Year in Review and Resolutions

Every NYE, I join the masses in reflection on the year and making resolutions that I will strive to keep. As a high achiever, I carefully select my goals for the year so that I can check them off- of course. 2018 goals were simple since I found out I was pregnant: take care of myself and enjoy time with those I love, with a side of continuing to kick ass at work.

I give us a solid “A” performance for the year. We had a healthy and abundant year filled with love and lots of time with family and friends. An epic camping trip with neighbors, our first family spring break trip to Disneyland and Legoland, a HOT family camping trip, the selling of our first home in Philly, the elimination of almost all Ikea from our house (except the girls room), completion of several house projects, the addition of our chubby bundle of joy to the world, stronger relationship with family and friends, creation of this blog, and a maternity leave focused on my intentions for the year. It was also an excellent work year. Whew. Not sure how to top that for next year, but I will try!

2019 Resolutions:

Give myself permission to not uphold myself to impossible standards Self-imposed requirements of perfection only leave me irritable and don’t demonstrate good behaviors and habits for the kids (and they are always watching now). Know when good enough is good enough and when any more only results in diminishing returns and grumpiness.

Find new ways to give to the world. In 2018, I gave up my position on a board and  leadership responsibility for our women’s network at work to focus on pregnancy and baby. Letting go of leadership responsibility is freeing up some time for me to give to another cause or organization TBD.

Continue to focus on family and love My family centers me and grounds me. I work like fiend during the week to have untethered and focused time with them on the weekends whenever possible. It’s a constant for me that I just want to continue to pen, just to remind myself when I forget.

Declutter what doesn’t make me happy I’ve spent a lot of time this year purging boxes, drawers, closets. I’m on my second round of purging in the last four months and it feels GOOD. I’ve just done a purge of sheets, bedding, clothes, pantry. I want to keep this up into next year because clutter also inhibits precious discretionary time that is better used for things that I value. This also goes for toxic people and relationships- my mindshare and well-being is better off without the drama.

Notice that none of these are directly financially or career related. Earlier this year I attended a talk where author Shawn Achor postulated that the key to success is attained by focus on happiness first. Therefore, my goals for this year are centered around personal happiness and we’ll see where that takes us in 2019! Happy New Year to all!

Positive Thought of the Day: My heart is full after reflection on a great year, a wonderful day spend with and old friend, and looking forward to a fun filled NYE party where I only have to walk across the street.

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The End

Day 60:

Here I am posting on Day 60, 10 days later. If you were waiting with baited breath for a reflective and well-written post…. well then, move along.

Like many things in life, I had high of expectations of my third and last leave- but in after re-reading my posts I realized did a lot more than I ever did while on leave with the girls. This last quarter I have birthed a baby and a blog, spent tons of quality time with extended family, read books, watched movies, been pooped and spit up on many times over, went on a work trip, attended a conference for personal development,attended fundraising events for non-profits, hosted Thanksgiving for 50, completed a few house projects, scoped out our next house project, tried to pretend like I enjoyed cooking only to realize I much prefer eating, caught up with old friends and developed stronger friendships with new ones, kept the paper industry in business by receiving Amazon packages on the daily, had our family pictures taken twice, and probably organized every drawer in the house only to have them be messed up just in time for work ( because.. life).

It was exhausting and refreshing, fun and boring,  slow yet quick, hard yet easy… I am not ready to return to work but I am confident that I struck a good balance over the last three months.

So to the future working/ frenetic/ crazy version of me- remember the zen badass that you were on maternity leave and get through it. In times of stress, don’t forget the little beautiful things in life like a babies smell, first smile, or laugh.  And when you are really struggling or feeling unsure or helpless….. just own it like  you did when you were pooped on in public. 

Positive Thought of the Day:First Day of December really kicked off the holiday season and put me in a great mood despite the foreboding return to work.

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The Final Days Continued

Days 57-59

We enjoyed many maternity leave lasts this week. I say lasts, because these types of things will be less frequent once I get back into the work hustle.

  • Lunch with #1 per her request
  • Morning strolls with baby and dog
  • Shelves and bay window treatments hung
  • Started the holiday decorations and completed Hanukkah shopping and gift wrapping. Celebrating Hanukkah in our house has the added win of meaning I’m slightly more prepared for Christmas shopping. Yes, we celebrate both just for added stress and complexity.
  • Cooked dinner 4 out 5 days
  • Another shopping trip to Honey and Hay to get some coworker holiday presents

But mostly… snuggles, lots and lots of snuggles.

Positive Thought of the Day: The girls wanted to make sure that we were thinking about others this holiday season and both pulled names off trees at school to ensure that we pay it forward.

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Soaking in the last week

Day 56:

Today I visited baby J’s infant classroom and it really hit me that I am soon going to have to give up my slower pace and long morning snuggles when I return to the office. I can’t believe I am one short week away from back to back meetings and a more frenetic pace. While I am looking forward to some aspects of returning to work, my mornings conversations with baby will be the hardest to give up. This week I plan to enjoy every single moment with the baby.

Positive Thought of the Day: My office is closed the week of Christmas, so I am a few short weeks away from a week of added quality time with the family.

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Black Friday

Day 55:

For Black Friday we bought- absolutely nothing. I’ve been working towards simplifying life and in the words of Marie Kondo- only having items that spark joy. Over the last few weeks I’ve purged closets (twice now), drawers, boxes, and the pantry. I’ve tried to donate to those in need of items whenever possible and it’s been really satisfying to get things organized and added bonus if we can provide an item for someone . It’s not easy to keep a handle on owning excess “stuff”, especially when your mom is always bringing over things she just picked up like serving platters, skillets, random kitchenware…. But I am working towards being intentional on what gets brought in to our house and not buying things just” because we don’t have one”.

So, this year I am saying no to the air fryer/toaster oven combo, the ninja coffeemaker, the chunky Amazon sweater that keeps popping up my newsfeed, the holiday pillows and decor even though they are calling my name. We’ll see how we keep this up. My Achilles heel are books and fleece sweatshirts and I also have spent a small fortune at Zullily  since discovering the app -because, deals.

Positive Thought of the Day: Golfed with my dad for his birthday, brother, and cousin for the first time on a beautiful Texas fall day.

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East Meets West for Thanksgiving

Day 54:

Growing up, we always celebrated a traditional Thanksgiving complete with turkey, mashed potatoes and gravy, stuffing, and pumpkin pies- only ours also come with sides of Cambodian food.  If you aren’t familiar, Cambodian food is kind of a mix between Chinese, Thai, Vietnamese, with a dash of French colonization. This Thanksgiving we hosted roughly fifty people, granted 12 of them were little people ( who either seem to eat like they aren’t fed daily or conversely not at all making planning annoying) and three don’t yet get to indulge in real food (more for the rest of us).

We went all out this Thanksgiving and our main proteins included an animal smorgasboard of 26 lb turkey, 8 lb smoked turkey, a whole pig, and three roast duck. A great day was spent with family and friends, but the real plus of hosting a Thanksgiving with my family is that there is relatively no clean-up involved because mostly everyone pitches in and also happily takes home a Tupperware or two of food.

Positive Thought of the Day: Thankful for family, friends, and abundance of love and food. Thankful that my hardest decision on Thanksgiving is whether or not I should mix Cambodian and American food on one plate!

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Turkey Day Prep

Day 52 and 53:

Thanksgiving is my favorite holiday since it’s all about food, family, and football- just some of my favorite things. These last few days we were Thanksgiving prep mode. Bounce house rented to wear out the dozen children we were expecting, Costco and grocery store runs. Baby J has been a trooper through sickness and frantic house preparations.

Positive Thought of the Day: Even though my mom was supposed to be a patient this week, she watched little baby J as we finalized Thanksgiving errands.

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Texas Conference For Women

Day 45:

I started attending this event almost ten years ago in Philadelphia at the PA Conference for Women. It’s always a day filled with passion and energy of thousands of women and I always leave the conference ready to try out new strategies at work and ready to change the world. This year we were able to send 23 women from our company and it was fun to be able to share our reflections on the day afterwards.

Following the conference, my amazon account took a hit as I added several books to my already long reading list. While Reese Witherspoon was one of the keynote speakers and was great, Dr. Brene Brown’s urging us to be courageous leaders and to have the hard conversations resonated. She stated that “tapping out when things get tough is the very definition of privilege.” Whoa. I won’t forget that. Managerial courage is one of our leadership competencies at work and one that is an ongoing challenge. I also attended several other talks on killing complexity in the workplace and how happiness is key for success and not the other way around. Sorry team, if you read this, I’ve got several ideas I’ll be implementing in 2019.

Positive Thought of the Day: Thankful to my husband and mom for watching baby J so I could fill my bucket at the conference today. Also for private facilities and fridges at the conference for nursing mothers!

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Third Children

Day 44:

I’ve always been intrigued with birth order and have been thinking a lot about the dynamics and differences in my three kids. I’m pretty much representative of first borns: reliable, conscientious, structured, achiever. #1 is my mini me and I can just say ditto to the above. #2 is fairness obsessed, the peacemaker but with her own rebellious streak. She was a middle child, even before she was a middle child. So far baby has also proven to be the most-easy going- but is it because of his nature or because of my temperament and attitude gained from experience (and also lets be honest here- exhaustion and convenience). Here are some differences between this baby and the girls.

  • Activities: Life doesn’t stop since having a baby. With two older sisters this guy has had to attend his share of birthday parties, work related coffees/lunches, and countless family gatherings. I used to dread going out with baby in tow, but he’s so easy. I just pop him in the carrier and usually don’t have to worry about him at all as long as he’s fed !
  • Eating: Breastfeeding with this guy has been the easiest so far. Which is funny because he is the hungriest and biggest of all ( weighing in at 13.5 lbs at his dr appt today). Although I have been open to supplementing as needed with formula or when I’m not around, he is primary breastfed just like the girls were at this age.
  • Diapers: not sure if this is a gender thing, but both girls hated a dirty diaper. With #3, I don’t even know if he has dirty diaper because it’s typically not a cause for him to cry.
  • Sleep: With the girls, I obsessed with trying to establish a sleep schedule and getting them to sleep through the night. I am pretty sure we didn’t get our first real full night’s rest until #2 was 2.5 YEARS old. That means we pretty much went 4 years without good sleep. Baby has been “sleeping through the night” since 3 weeks ( KNOCK ON WOOD). He is a great sleeper and napper- probably because of all the activity mentioned above.

What I’ve learned from this baby is that you can prepare and overthink it all, but every baby is different. It’s some nature and some nurture, but I believe having an open mind and being adaptable are key in parenting.

Positive Thought of the Day: A healthy and happy baby who sleeps from 9 until 5am almost every night!

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