(Maintaining Me) RE-Creating Me

Wow, so much for having more time to write today.  I have a lot of loose ends to tie up in the office, and I won’t be here Monday as I will be traveling to a site to perform an investigation (always something) so my processing time was shortened.

Yesterday was a good day.  I did my turbo jam fat blaster DVD.  I like it because it is much more fast paced than normal TJ (they are okay, but not really sweat fests) and it is a short workout which I can pair with yoga or treadmill.  Anyway, I did that plus repeated two segments to get an extra 10 min in, then treadmill.  Dinner was a smart ones calzone thing because the kids wanted hot dogs.

Today breakfast was lowfat waffles w/ strawberries, coffee … lunch is LC tortilla fish, dinner is taco salad.  Exercise is a Firm DVD with weights, maybe kickboxing one.  Last one, then two days off, woo hoo!

Tomorrow is our American Girl day! :)  Up early, hit Starbucks for breakfast on the train (lol) and lunch is at the cafe.  I booked a birthday party, should be adorable. 

Sunday will be relaxing.  Well not really .. it will be school work.  But it WILL be a stay at home in PJs day.  I think.  Then again, I will have to go food shopping then.  Oh well.

A little anxious about work related things.  Actually, not about the things I have to do themselves, I have no problem with that - it’s regarding dealing with boss about them.  Even though he is the “boss”, some things are confidential and he just can’t handle that.  It puts me in a very awkward position.  Several months ago, I had an extremely sensitive situation with an employee and management and mental health issues and I just couldn’t share some of the information with him, and I swear things with him have been different ever since.  It’s the first time I ever stood up to him and said no, but if I am hired to perform a job, you better damn well bet I am going to do it correctly.  Sigh.

Looking at my calendar for the next two months and it’s like I have something every single weekend. 

Can’t WAIT for spring!

Another busy, busy day.  Yesterday was good, food good, exercise good, etc. etc. 

Today:

• Work
• Finish up psych essay, finish reading mgmt text - try to do early so I can watch Greys!
• Exercise - TurboJam Fat Blaster/Treadmill or Yoga
• Cleaning

2 days until American Girl! 

Not much to report and a lot of work to do, sorry, will post more tomorrow!

Lol … a little backwards - I got sidetracked at work BY work, so I haven’t written yet.  Heh.

Yesterday … yesterday … good day, food good, workout okay (wasn’t impressed with the new DVD I bought, did that and treadmill).  Got a lot of school work done also.  Today is girl scouts and normally an exercise off day, but I still plan on trying to squeeze one in because I have a busy weekend coming up and want both Sat-Sun off.

Breakfast was choc cheerios w/ banana, coffee, lunch is LC, dinner is TBD because kids are having hot dogs.  I may make tuna or something, or end up eating another LC which I know is not healthy … but we will see.  Going to try to fit in Get Chisld DVD.

Work is busy.  Will finish up my mgmt. class reading at the GS meeting tonight.  If I can’t workout before meeting, I will have to workout after.  I hate doing it so late, and like to use that time to unwind with the kids.

Be back later . . .

Day started out with a snow delay, then they ended up cancelling.  I had to go in to office anyway to get some paperwork, but now I am back home.  Just sat down to eat my breakfast, which I guess will be brunch since it is noon, lol.

The day started with a very interesting employee issue - one for the HR book SBFF and I always say we are writing one day, lol.  Too gross to write here … let’s just say, an employee is using paper towels in the women’s bathroom for a reason other than intended (instead of feminine products).  That is going to be a fun conversation to have with her, sigh.

I stopped at the store on the way home and now have all meals planned this week … pot roast tonight, shrimp w/broccoli pasta, taco night, hot dogs.  Will do hot dogs tomorrow because it is easy for Girl Scout night, and I will eat something else anyway because that was a meal the kids requested, lol.  Tacos Thursday and Shrimp Friday.

Got my workout in yesterday, ate weird but well within my calories.  Will do the same today.  Might try a new kickboxing DVD I picked up in Target.  To do:

• Work
• Exercise - Kickboxing DVD
• Call Mom (she wasn’t home yesterday - yes, I actually have to schedule these calls, lmao)
• School Work - at least 1 pysch discussion, aiming for 2

Okay, doing some work and then running to make kids lunch.  BBL to comment.  Hugs!

The b-day party Saturday was a blast!  The kids played in a bouncy house/foam gun barn thing, then lunch and cake, then indoor water park, then snow tubing (mom got in on this action too! FUN!) and finally a horse drawn wagon ride.  It was really a great party, and I don’t know how I will ever top this one for DS7, lol.

Despite the party, I ate well.  The buffet selections were really not appealing to me so I just had a sandwich, half a pc of cake and scoop of ice cream.  Dinner was back home and I resisted candy R bought Saturday night, lol.  Unfortunately - Sunday I found the leftover candy and indulged.  HEAVILY.  Blech.  Yesterday was a totally OFF day.  I skipped breakfast, had pizza for lunch, ate candy in the afternoon which led me to skip dinner, which left me hungry in the evening when I decided to eat brownies.  Well, those were lowfat at least, lol.  Bad, bad day.

Today, back on track.  Off today, so I am going to take the day to get the following done:

• Housecleaning - bathrooms, mop kitchen and dining room, vacuuming, laundry (I feel like I do this DAILY but I am never done!)
• School work - finish Psych reading assignment, start Mgmt reading assignment, phone call with Mgmt instructor @ 6 pm.
• Exercise - Firm DVD, maybe 500 calorie workout
• Planning - Plan some dinners for this week, possibly run to grocery store (though I really wanted to hang in PJs today, we will see) Done Tuesday
• Call mom - Tuesday
• Watch Night at the Museum 2 with kiddos

It is after 11 am and I haven’t accomplished a thing yet.  Still sipping on my first cup of coffee.  Trying to think the best way to get everything done … have to charge my ipod, so I will do that first so I can use it during house cleaning, lol.  Makes everything go by more quickly.

I can’t believe how crappy I feel today.  I really blew it yesterday, and I am really trying not to beat myself up about it, but I am not succeeding.  It was valentine’s day, R had to catch up on work since he is traveling again this week so he left after lunch and I was by myself feeling sorry for myself … I guess that is what it boils down to.  Ugh, pathetic.  Probably true though.

MBFF and I are thinking of planning an overnight visit for the guys as a surprise.  It is her hubby’s bday in March and I am thinking of just surprising R with the trip … considering he has taken me on so many fabulous vacations, and I have never done an overnight thing for him.  Looking into possibly Mohegan Sun for now, but it changes hourly, lol.  A month away - maybe this will give me some added incentive.

Okay, I really need to get my day started.  Love you all, Happy Valentine’s Day - hope you all did better than I did with the chocolate!! 

I managed to do everything I needed to do last night, except the school work I had to get done.  Not because I ran out of time - but because I ran out of patience.  Computer problems, and I couldn’t view the video I needed to see and was so frustrated. Anyway, HS transition night was interesting … HS is more like college now, lol, with all the choices they have.  Which is neat!  I did have a bake sale brownie which put my calories at just over 1300, so not too bad.  I did go home and did my fat blaster DVD (cardio only) with 30 min. on treadmill, go me! 

BOTH DS’s are home sick today!  The big one’s stomach was hurting (more of this, AGAIN) and the little one has been coughing and sniffling so I decided to keep him home for a day of rest because his party is tomorrow, and I don’t want this to get worse.

Food today: breakfast - usual egg beaters, english muffin, coffee.  Lunch is a new lean cuisine I picked up, some honey chicken spa thing.  Will review next post.  And dinner is TBD.  Snacks are fruit.  Exercise is Firm DVD - maybe total body toner, all weights.

Tomorrow is the party, Sunday is V-Day and I’m thinking of taking the kids to the movies.  Going to take both days off of exercise since I just did 5 days in a row.  Will still be running around, though.

Been thinking about vacation a lot lately … I would really love to take the kids on a family cruise this year.  We didn’t do a real vacation last year, just a couple days away.  Of course, fence falling and ferret surgery most likely squashes those plans.

Be back later …

I’m back … had to come back to say I love the new Honey Roasted Chicken!  It is a spa cuisine … “roasted white meat chicken in a sweet honey sauce with snap peas, yellow beans & whole wheat pilaf.”  Definitely sweet, but much better than I thought it would be!  Yum!  Apparently there are several new ones, including an apple cranberry chicken that I’d like to try. 

Okay, off to drink water.

Wish I had to leave at 10 am every day, it’s such a nice relaxing morning! Lol … Of course, then I would be working until 7 or 8 at night, so I guess that wouldn’t work out so well.  Sipping my coffee, eating a muffin …

I was apprehensiive about WI today because although I have had a great week, I had a not-so-great weekend (which was warranted, being away, b-day weekend and all).  But I did it and was happy to see I am down a pound.  I am down 7+ pounds from last month, but 12 pounds away from my usual weight - what the hell did I DO to myself last semester?!?!  Geez!  But I am getting there.  Slowly but surely.  I will be there before summer, at the very least.

The boys shoveled for me yesterday and I went and did a quick shovel around 7 pm, and we still need to go and shovel to get out of here today.  There actually isn’t a ton of snow here but the winds were crazy so whatever we got keeps whipping around and re-piling up.  Annoying.  And it is COLD.  Cannot wait for spring!

CHANGE IN PLANS: Today is work, early dinner, 5:30 leave for HS transition night, home by 8 pm ?, 8:30 - 9pm Fat Blaster DVD, Treadmill during Grey’s, then working on Management Case Study. 

Breakfast was a pumpkin muffin, will need something else small … maybe bring another with me to work.  Lunch is a LC, Dinner is (finally) those damn Boca chicken sandwiches I keep talking about all week and baked fries.  Snacks are apple and/or banana. 

Have to mail out DS7’s little league registration and the chocolate we bought my mom.  And, I think that is it!

I did a lot of thinking last night (which kept me up in bed till midnight, thank goodness for snow delays) about my job and actually shed some tears.  I don’t know why I am so emotional, but I am not happy there anymore.  I used to LOVE it.  And I still do love my JOB, but I guess not so much my employers.  I also feel stagnant, there is no more room to grow.  Too many limitations on what I can do.  And no internal parity.  Too much unfairness.  Hard working people being paid far too little without an increase for years … one site in particular hasn’t seen raises in 4 -5 years, with the longest being 8 years.  They all make $8- $11 hour.  It’s disgusting.  Yet, there are no shortages in upper management.  I suppose it is this way a lot of places, but I don’t like it.  It really, really upsets me.  I really advocate for these people, to get them what they deserve, and it fell through.  Amazing that the funding isn’t there for them, but magically appears when it is for others.  Two of my employees at this particular site are married and just had their first child last week.  (So clearly, they aren’t very well off)  Well, I wanted to get them something useful - a Babies R Us gift card would be fantastic.  Instead, I was given a $25 visa gift card.  Okay, better than nothing, but I almost feel like it is insulting to throw them this.  When I have to overnight my boss his newspapers, the fed ex cost more than that!  So, although things aren’t great for me either, I am going shopping for them myself this weekend and I will ship them something. 

So what is holding me back?  Convenience of course.  Being able to work at home when I need to, and leave the office in the afternoons or when a child is sick.  And the tuition reimbursement.  I am looking, my eyes are open.  But, for now, this seems to be the best fit for my family until everyone is a little older and I have my degree.  Maybe I need to sit my boss down and tell him how I am really feeling and discuss this.  Things have changed with him, and I know I have been treating him differently also because I am a little resentful.  I also used to look up to him like he was such this fantastic manager, and now I am seeing things a little differently.  It’s time to talk, I guess.

Well .. that was pretty heavy and unexpected.  I need to go put ‘my face on’ as my mother used to say when she was putting on makeup.  :-D  Have a fabulous day Chicks!

Well, we got our snow day.  Not sure what we are supposed to get, but not as much as other areas.  I think we are at 2-3 inches now, coming down pretty heavy.  Wonder if this will also affect tomorrow.

Last night, 8 pm, I was sitting at my desk and my boss IMs me asking if I had called him and we start talking, and he brings up the snow.  He writes, “kids will have no school tomorrow.  <separate IM> WORK at home.”

Okay, maybe I am too sensitive, but that PISSED me off.  Yes it was via IM soI have no idea how he meant it, but why on earth did he capitalize WORK?  First of all, I am the only field HR administrator that has an office, all others work from home EVERY day.  I am always working in the evenings, I work some weekends.  I am ALWAYS available.  I never put off anything, he knows I am almost obsessive about my job.  How dare he write it like that, implying I would do anything other?  You know what the problem from working at home is?  Yes, it is convenient.  Yes, I can get up from my computer and throw a load of laundry in (sometimes!).  But my day DOESN’T end.  People - especially said boss - seem to think when I work at home, he can call me at 6 pm to go over something we were supposed to do at 2 but he didn’t have time for, and I should drop everything and do it.  GRRRRRRRRRRRRRR.

Okay, deep breath.  Rant over.

Although it was a snow day, I got up early to make pumpkin muffins (before my WORKING at home day started) and they are yum-my.  I just used a box mix, but instead of oil I used pumpkin puree, and subbed EB for the eggs.  Delish.

I ended up making some weird baked chicken yesterday (some seasoned flour coating I picked up at the market, was pretty lousy) so boca sandwiches might be today.  Breakfast was pumpkin, maybe tuna for lunch.  Today is normally exercise day off, but since there will be no girl scouts or HS orientation tonight, I will work out.  Yesterday I did Jillian Cardio Kickbox, and because that is so short (25 min) I did a half hour of yoga/pilates too.  My abs are sore this morning, lol.

Today is normally WI day, but since I never got dressed (lol) I forgot.  Will WI tomorrow.  Knowing the weekend, it isn’t going to be a positive thing anyway, lol.

TY again for the b-day wishes. 

Ummm 9 am and kids are already at my door with shovels?  We are going to get tons more!  Argh!

Expecting some snow … wonder if it will miss us again.  I could actually use a Wednesday snow day.  It is a good mid-week break. 

Yesterday, yesterday … what was yesterday?  Oh, yes, ortho appt, school, dinner, exercise.  All went well.  DS7 made me feel a little bad.  See, this is the downside to making myself a priority for one hour a day.  He said I have so much work, school work and exercise that I don’t have enough time to play with them.  Sigh.  First, I no longer do school work until they are in bed (except for weekends of course) so I fixed that.  But I can’t skip work … and I only workout 4x per week, sometimes (rarely) 5.  So what do I do?  The fact of the matter is, I only have an hour between 7 and 8 to get my workout in - and that is generally only 3 nights a week anyway.  Work till 5:30, then until 7 is dinner, homework, cleaning up, lunches, all simultaneously.  8 pm is where I get to spend 30 - 45 minutes with the kids before bed, playing a game, reading, tv, whatever we can fit in.  9 pm until bed time is school work.  It sounds like nothing.  I don’t know what else I can do, other than skip working out to fit more time in with them.  (And I cannot get up an hour earlier to exercise, I am up so late doing school work I will REALLY be running myself down)  I can’t neglect myself, but I can’t neglect my children either.  The last thing I want is for them to remember their childhood as with “the mom who never had time to play”, sigh.

There just aren’t enough hours in the day.

Today I am 33.  Woo Hoo.

(that was a sarcastic woo hoo)

Breakfast today was egg beaters on EM, coffee.  Lunch is LC panini.  Dinner is tilapia or Boca chicken sandwiches … probably the boca.  Exercise is a Firm DVD.  Laundry, etc. Business as usual.

Back to work. 

Oh.  My.  I am so so tired.  Like I seriously contemplated locking my office and taking a nap.  And I have only been here less than 30 minutes.

Had a really nice weekend.  B-day dinner at Nobu was fantastic.  We tried many different things, and every single thing was amazing.  Nothing was just ‘okay’.  Sashimi salad was to die for, wagyu beef was delicious, miso cod was oustanding.  And the drinks were delish too.  I just can’t say enough about it.  Of course, the fact that dinner costs way more than my monthly car payment is enough to stop us from going often, lmao, but is it sick that we thought it was worth it? lol!  Oh well.  I did get a beautiful happy birthday bento box for dessert.  Actually, it was cute but dessert was the one thing that was just okay.  The food was phenominal though.

Then Sunday … Lion King was spectacular.  The kids loved it.  Of course, I cried through half of it, lmao.  I always do.  I still cry at the animated movie!  But DD7 held my hand and said, “It will be okay, mommy” … she’s so sweet.  We were home by 7:30 after a quick stop at Target, so we had time to settle back in and get some laundry done.  Then I had to finish up and submit three assignments for school.  In bed by 11, but I still feel like a train ran me over this morning.

Also, I had no real food yesterday and nothing but junk.  I wasn’t hungry most of the day, and by the time I was (train station with 4 minutes left to get on train) I grabbed a cookie, and then when I was back home I just nibbled on crackers and more cookies.  They weren’t even good.  Blech.  I suppose this, and TOM, is adding to my lethargy.  Time to get back on track.

Super busy week (I say this each week, don’t I?) so let’s make a schedule

• Monday: Work, DS13 Ortho, Firm DVD / School - Psych/Mgmt Reading
• Tuesday: Work, Firm DVD /  School - Psych 4.1 - 4.2 Discussions, Start Mgmt. Case Analysis (I turn 33!)
• Wednesday: Work, MS to HS Transition Night CANCELLED, Weights DVD / School - Psych Discussions 4.3, Start Journal; Mgmt. Reflective Journal Thursday: Work, Fat Blaster DVD & Treadmill / School - Management Case Analysis, Edit Psych Paper
• Friday: Work, Firm DVD , Grocery Shopping? School - Management Case Analysis
• Saturday: DS7’s birthday party / School -  Continue from Thursday, finalize Psych Paper, respond to discussions
• Sunday: Recuperate!  Stay HOME, clean, School - Finish Mgmt. Case, submit; Finish Psych paper, submit
• Monday: If everything’s done, movies with kids!

Okay, I think this is a good start.  Makes me feel a little better to see it all down on paper.  Or, screen rather … lol.

Sipping coffee to breathe some life into me and start my day.