Homework

Work.

It’s a dirty word in my house.

This last January, I dove back into public accounting after nearly two years’ reprieve. This time though, I’m back with a purpose. I take online classes through Southern New Hampshire University toward a Master’s of Science in Forensic Accounting, and I work in public accounting for practice and pay. I’ll have my required hours to sit for the CPA exam before I finish the education requirement. With a little bit of luck and planning, when I graduate, I’ll have not three but six letters to tack on to the end of my name. At least one of my professors thinks I ought to continue and pursue my PhD as well. Regardless, I’m a freight train heading for a destination known as alphabet soup.

This comes with quite a lot of work.

During tax season, 50 - 60 hour weeks were the norm for me, and that was just the work I was paid to do. Admittedly, it’s a little bit light - many accountants pull 80 hour weeks for three months out of the year. Several in my office pulled this for a few weeks toward the end. They went home, nibbled on a bit of food, and went to sleep to wake up and do it again the next day.

I went home, ate a cold dinner, and did homework before a short sleep to wake up and do it all again the next day.

January through April this year, there was a lot of me doing work of some form or another. My toddler started protesting.

“Mommy has to go to sleep,” my husband would explain to our night-owl of a child,

“Mommy has to get up and go to work tomorrow,” I said, even on Friday and Saturday night.

“NOOOOOOOOOO!” His protest would start with something recognizable as a word, and quickly devolve into screaming, tears, and spits and raspberries of rage.

Work is a dirty word in my house.

Months later, when I’m home by six and don't go to work on the weekends, that word may still elicit a near-epic breakdown. Especially if we suggested there might not be any cartoons if there wasn’t good behavior.

My toddler is smart. He understands what that means. But he’s not quite mature enough to handle it. Tired of the demands for more “Transformers,” and horrible shows meant to edutain that only hurt my and my husband’s brains, and he hid the TV. He unplugged it and put it in the closet.

It was two nights of bliss.

I’ve been able to sit at the kitchen table and knock out homework, and even put a bit of thought, effort, and research into it to turn out something I consider quality.

What’s even better is that my toddler joins me.

I sit on my little Chromebook and type away and calculate taxes for fake people and prepare fake financial statements and journal entries, and he sits at his place and scribbles on paper, making letter and Earths and BumbleBee and Optimus Prime.

What’s even better is that my husband gets a few minutes of peace to focus on his own work while I split my mind between accounting and our toddler.

And “homework,” apparently, doesn’t have the word “work” anywhere in it.

Words

My writer friends will understand what I mean when I say I haven't found any words in far too long. Though most of my writer friends are far more prolific than I am, they too go for a while without finding words. I could go on for hours about reasons why I can't find words. Tax sea. School. A two year old who refuses to sleep normal hours. A husband who needs and deserves a break, but can't get one because of tax season, school, and a two year old who refuses to sleep.

Unfortunately, my reasons for not finding words are not so glamorous as a difficult emotional scene, a need to research, or wrapping up the final book in a series and thus saying goodbye to a long-loved and life-changing story and process. Nor am I experiencing a bit of writer's block. I find myself surrounded by stories to tell; by characters who want to dance and be heard. It's the reasons above that keep me from finding the words to bring those characters to life. The stare at a screen with hands on keyboard and make a bunch of noise while my fingernails clack out a world that may resemble my own, but is not.

Right now though, I have bus time as a good friend once called it. And I am thankful for bus time, and for the ability to look at story in a whole new light while on my phone. It may be tax season, and I may be a full time student and a mom, but I can still put my thumbs to work.

I'm coming words. Don't leave me now. I'm coming.

The Price of a Burger

I got in to the spirit of New Years a bit last night. I got off work, headed home, picked up the husband and two year old, and headed to a burger joint for dinner. We were all hungry, and the husband and myself had been craving a burger for a couple of days. Sprinkle in a bit of a festive spirit, and you have yourself a bit of a recipe for disaster.

That's right, disaster.

No, my disaster didn't have anything to do with alcohol on New Year's Eve. We were all home, safe and sound, by 730pm, in bed by 9, and I think I was asleep by 10. Early to bed makes it easier to get up early in the morning, and, just like much of the world, I greeted 2014 with a big, fat, whopper of a headache.

Except my headache isn't just a headache. It's a full-blown migraine.

The answer is really quite simple: eat whole foods. No, not the grocery story chain (though I love them for banning all things containing MSG) but simple, real, whole foods. Foods that haven't been adulterated by processing in a factory. Foods that come from a farm and straight to my table.

Foods that I like to eat anyway. It's harder, and takes a bit more planning, but, there's little we go without when we actually try. Including Chocolate Hazelnut Spread. This recipe is great (I don't know just how close I followed it as I'm not so great with the measuring things - I eyeball just about everything, even when baking - but it came out great, and turned me on to coconut sugar). I'm really loving it in just about everything, and can't wait to try another batch with cream. No offense to coconut milk lovers out there, but, my food issues do not disallow cream, and I like the taste of it better. So, next time, ganache with cream, not coconut milk, and don't forget the salt and vanilla extract (maybe vanilla beans?) and a lower ratio of coconut sugar.

I digress. Though my head hurts, I'm excited for the food I have planned out for the day (dhal with yoghurt and jalapenos and coffee for early breakfast, oatmeal with that lovely chocolate hazelnut spread for 2nd breakfast (snack for me, breakfast for the boys), humus and cucumber cupcakes for lunch, and I don't know about dinner just yet.

Meanwhile, I'll be directing the husband to make and do all the things today, as movement magnifies my head by about a billion.

Damn that MSG.

Lookout 2014, Here I Come

I hate making changes at the beginning of a year. The changes never seem to stick. The challenge starts at the beginning of the year, but interest is lost when a goal is reached or it takes too long to reach a goal.

2013 is a testament to that. My employer implemented a challenge to get us all up and moving every day. The challenge came with a reward: walk 10,000 steps a day, every day for a month and a half, and earn Black Friday off. We all started out well. We took walking lunches once or twice a week, ate at Sonic less and less, and were more conscious of moving. I saw a huge difference in myself, and started seeing a difference in my pants. 

The challenge lasted for a month and a half. And, I'm quite happy to report, collectively, we did make it. But, as the weather turned, we walked as a group less. Some stopped walking all together. Others who were more motivated walked and moved more, earning 50k and 70k steps or step equivalents.

Me? I pulled through and marched in place with my two year old and got my 10k a day more often than not. Some days more.

The end of the challenge was the same for me as everyone else: we all dropped off the moving bandwagon. We stayed in our seats more. Walking lunches stopped (though, this probably had as much to do with Boise's weather as it did with no longer having that challenge). We all shoved our noses back in to our work and forgot about walking. Myself included.

A challenge is great. It motivates and pushes, but, when the challenge is over, the motivation goes away. And the pants start fitting again.

In the true spirit of pushing and challenging myself, I've already started making good on the things I'd like to change in 2014. My first term in Graduate school yielded amazing results: straight As. And I hope to repeat that feat this next term. I'm pushing myself to grow and to change, and not playing it safe.

Most importantly, I'm not letting fear get in my way anymore.

Fear has ruled my life for as long as I can remember. Growing up horseback riding on the hunter-jumper circuit in Southern California, I was scared to death to jump. I wanted to do dressage. My trainers had other plans for me. They got me jumping. First over tiny little things, then, the jumps got bigger. I still think there's little more exhilarating than riding an extended trot across a diagonal line. The collection through the corner to create the explosive power across the largest portion of the arena to only be collected and bottled back up in the next corner is truly the most freeing experience I've had. But, it's also controlled. It's safe. Horse and rider are communicating the entire time, and the horse is able to leave decisions up to the rider (not that the horse will always follow those decisions).

Jumping is an entirely different experience. For the entire time the horse and rider are in the air, the rider only has control over her own body. Leading up to the jump, the rider has to relinquish a certain amount of control to the horse; yes, the rider may get to choose the spot, lengthen or shorten the horse's stride to help select the best take-off point, but, it's a small level of control. My trainer used to say, "once you round that corner, the line is done. Look through the jumps and to the next corner."

When I could push my fear of the large 4' jumps with spreads just as wide and follow her advice, it was easy. I'd come round the corner, two half-halts inside the turn to collect and stead the horse, see the spot, adjust the stride, and count. Three, two, one, jump one. One, two, three, four, jump two. Land, one stride, half-halt, and regain control. Half-halt in the corner. Inside leg to push the shoulder up into the outside rein. And look to the next jump.

I never let go of my fear. It always rode right along side with me, in my back pocket or under my chin strap. But, sometimes, it didn't drive me but shaped me. It allowed me to calculate all the variables and set myself and the horse up for success for that giant leap into the unknown. And, when the leap was over, I could take control again and guide the horse to the next jump.

I've already started taking the reins and using fear to help guide me, even though it's not 2014. I'll never be able to let go of my fear. But, in 2014, I can keep it from controlling my every move. Here's to pushing forward in 2014, to new adventures, taking advantage of all my talents, and setting myself and my family up for the same successes I experienced in the hunter arena.

Short and Sweet

Small things make the world go round. Make the world a little bit better.

Good music about sheep. Mascara. Re-discovering something old anew.

Productivity

Productivity is harder than one might think, especially for a girl who does too much; has her hand in too many pots. Do I work on this project or that one? What happens when I have a bit of inspiration for the project I'm not working on?

Why do I always have inspiration for the project that isn't due right now; that has no technical due date?

I try to give myself little windows of time. I know that I run in sprints of 20 minutes and two hours. Sometimes, satisfying the thing that isn't necessary right this minute for 20 minutes gives me the ability to focus for those two hours and knock something else out with a more pressing time line.

Sometimes it backfires, and I move on to another 20 minute window of something.

Regardless, it all gets done. Everything gets wrapped up in a neat little bow, and the box is ticked as complete. Eventually. 20 minutes and 2 hours at a time.

Making Things

I'm not what my office would call a "doodler."

I suppose I should qualify. I work for a hybrid advertising firm in Nampa, ID. We do everything in house; creative production, media buys, strategy. If it has to do with marketing, we do it in house, all under one roof. That's quite a bit of work, and someone has to do all the invoicing. That's my job. Okay, it's one of my jobs.

My point still stands. I'm not a "doodler."

I am, however, quite creative. I write. Not as much as I want, and I haven't written anything I actually like in quite sometime, but, I do write.

I also put things together. 3-D things. No, not clay or anything else that would be considered a sculpture. I love running fiber through my hands watching it turn in to something. Personally, spinning is my favorite. There's nothing quite like starting out with a bundle of fluff and coaxing it to a workable size and then watching the spindle on my spinning wheel gobble it up and turn it in to something useful. I like knitting too; sweaters and scarves and the like. And toys. Small little knit toys. Even before I had a kid to give them to.

Sewing is pretty great too. It's kind of like spinning; materials run through a machine to turn into something completely different. I have plans to cut and make a dress, a skirt, pants, a jacket, bags, purses, padfolios, tablet cases and covers, and, yes, toys for the little ones. Though, I really do prefer to knit those.

Lately though, I've been returning to one of my first 3-D loves: beads. As a kid, I made so many things from beads it's a bit sickening. My bead collection was one even for professional beaders to envy. I gave it away to someone at some point along the way. Seed beads were my favorite. Tiny beads and toddlers sound counter-intuitive, but, it oddly works out okay. At least, it does with my toddler. Better than spinning or knitting.

Pics or it didn't happen, right?

Soon as I'm happy with 'em. Till then, patience.