I WILL Survive!

Phew, another long work week tucked behind me! I guess you could tell from my conspicuous absence here that I've been a little busy. Yeah, that's an understatement. I worked more in the last two weeks than most people work in a MONTH. Insane.

Don't get me wrong, its good. But tiring. I just focus on the fact that this won't last forever. Ebbs and flows.

I've had so many great thoughts (well, I think they are great) in the past week to share, but haven't had a chance to. But I do want to share this article with you before I leave to embark on my busy weekend (mom, you gave the wrong middle name, it should have been "busy"):

The Test of Time: A busy working mother tries to figure out where all her time is going

I was whining to my dear friend AA about my lack of time yesterday and she sent me this great article. I could definitely relate to the author!! Tempted to start a time journal to see how much leisure time I have :)

How was YOUR week???? Please reply! I sometimes feel like I'm talking to myself here, but I see you reading!

Focus

Its really quite simple. So simple in fact that I feel a bit silly even posting it. But, its something that I needed to hear, so I figured maybe some of you do too?

The number one impediment to my productivity and success is - lack of focus.

Adult-onset ADD? Perhaps. I speculate that its more properly diagnosed as declining self-discipline. And why not? There are zillions of things these days to steal moments of our attention away. We live in a fast-paced world that is over-immersed in information. I have found that this makes it more and more difficult to train my brain to focus at the task at hand. Hello, Ritalin??

But naw, I don't need medication. I need to buckle down, grit my teeth and focus. Set my course and not deviate until I have reached my planned destination.

Who knows...perhaps if I can focus long enough to complete the tasks that need to be completed, it will get done more quickly so that I have more play time left at the end of the day!

So, dear friends. I know its Wednesday, and it feels unnatural to start anything in the middle of the week. But, starting tomorrow morning, join me in this little experiment and really truly focus and concentrate on your tasks and see how much more productive you really are!

Book Club: Brainstorm for October!!

Don't forget that this FRIDAY is our first ever Book Club discussion post for The Lovely Bones! I can't wait!! I've pre-programmed the post to come up at 6:00 a.m. for those who are uber-excited and anxious to share their thoughts!

Being that October is a mere two days away...we need to start brainstorming book ideas for our October selection. EVERYONE - please post some ideas of books that are on your list to read!

WOO HOO!

Also, while you're at it - I recently had a funny discussion with some friends about finding time to read and the funny times and places we read. My friend and I discovered that we both sneak in a page or two during the two minutes it takes to brush our teeth (on the morning Bennett isn't hanging off me...)!!

What are the "interesting" ways you squeeze in a little page turning???

Buying Time

The only thing all human beings are given in equal measure is time.
- Anthony Robbins

We all have the same 24 hours in the day. What matters is what you do with it. It doesn't matter if you are rich, poor, smart, or not, you can't get anymore than 24 hours. (Man, we could make it big if we could figure out how to!).

It doesn't matter whether you work out of the home, in the home, or stay at home with your kids. Life is BUSY. We find ways to fill every free second. There never seems to be enough time to get it all done. As a working mom, I think the challenge is even greater, as we have to account to someone else for at least 1/3 of our day. Work and life can consume you to the point where you cannot seem to find time for anything else.

I don't know about you - but that just isn't "enough" for me. I love practicing law, but its only a part of my life. So, I try desperately to find ways to squeeze in time for other things I enjoy (and need!). For example, I get up at 5:30 a.m. to work out. I listen to books on cd in the car while I commute, and make my personal phone calls (and sometimes professional calls too) while commuting. Most nights, I have to work for several hours after my boys are in bed for the night (the evil of billable hours). So, even though I rarely hit the sheets prior to 11 p.m., I always make some time to read for pleasure, even if it is only 10 minutes (a necessity to clear my mind, or I dream about work and wake up panicked!). When you work 10-12 hours a day, you have to get creative!! Especially with two precious boys, who I refuse to sacrifice a single minute with unecessarily!

The weekends aren't too much better either, since I often have "catch up" to do for work, housework, laundry, and errands. Of course, we try to do lots of fun things with our boys and our friends and families too.

So long as I can manage to keep the routines in place, we seem to manage pretty well. Of course, sometimes more focus has to be on work and at other times, more attention on home/fun. But I try my hardest to keep homeostasis, so to speak. Its a constant work in progress, and to be honest, its exhausting. But that is the price you pay for living an otherwise "fulfilling" life, huh?

What are your tips for squeezing extra time out of the day????

A day in the life of Elle...

Tonight I suffer from "I've sat on my butt and can't get up" syndrome. I need to get up and do about a gazillion things, but my energy and motivation are both sapped. Perhaps this is due to the fact that Carter was up 2/3 of the night last night puking. So, I only really slept from 3 a.m. to 5:30 a.m. when Bennett woke up to eat. Or perhaps I've just become lazy. Maybe both.

One thing is for sure, momma needs to make some changes around here and get her act together. I've been blaming my messy house and neglected piles of work on the fact that I'm adjusting to the new challenge of working full time with TWO children, instead of the one I had mastered previously. But, um....Bennett is 11 months old now. Its time I dug my heels in the ground and whipped my life into shape, don't ya think??? The problem is that now I have twice as much that needs to be done in half the time. So, I need to learn how to be more efficient (just when I thought that wasn't possible)!

This is a sampling of a day in the life of Elle:

5:30 a.m. - I wake up to feed Bennett. If I'm not being a TOTAL lazy bum (which I am about 9 times out of 10), I will trudge down to the basement and crawl onto to treadmill in a pathetic effort to shed these last 10 (or 15....0r 20....you take your pick) pounds of baby weight. If I AM being a lazy bum, I will crawl back in bed until I start getting that panicky feeling in my stomach that if I don't get up soon, the whole morning will crash down around me (i.e. the children will wake up). So then I shower and get dressed.

7:30 a.m. - The monsters...er...children...begin waking for the day. Most mornings I have to toss Bennett on top of Carter to slobber on him and pull his hair in order to compel his butt into action. Then Bennett and Carter "race" to see who can get dressed the fastest, with Carter whining and screeching "no mom...don't let Bennett win!!!" the whole while. Once that monumentous task is accomplished, I drag them downstairs for breakfast. Carter spends 30 minutes trying to decide what to eat for breakfast. I throw some Cheerios on Bennett's tray while I set about making my and Carter's lunches for the day. I yell at Carter to EAT and then I pack my pump bag and my work bag and then Carter's school bag. Then, if I have a minute or two left, I yell at Carter again that he's going to starve unless he inhales his food in the next two minutes, and then I inhale my food (oatmeal with peanut butter and berries every.single.morning - its supposed to be good for breastfeeding). Then I yell at Carter to PLEASE brush his teeth now and find his shoes. Then I yell at Ace to PLEASE get Bennett's bottle ready, he's starting to melt down.

8:15, or 8:30, or 8:45, and sometimes on a really bad day, 9:15 - Carter and I leave the house. I drop Carter off at preschool, 9 times out of 10 exasperatedly apologizing to his teacher for him being late once AGAIN and coming up with some lame excuse as to why. Then I battle my fellow commuters all the way down I-95 and try to sneak into my office without any of the partners noticing how late it is....

Somewhere between 9 and 10 a.m. - I plant myself behind my computer and start to work. Or... check emails, check blogs, check message boards, update my Facebook status... Then I freak out that thirty minutes (or an hour) has passed and I haven't billed a single minute yet. So, then I fervently work for a few hours until I get distracted by the internet once again. Then I waste more time playing around, then panic because "omg, I have to leave in two hours and I still haven't finished drafting this stupid motion or called back opposing counsel or researched that issue..." You'd think I would LEARN my lesson, huh? But I've already explained to you all that I am insane.

5:00 - Ace begins to send me panicky emails, text messages or IMs inquiring as to when I will be home. By 5:30 I usually give in and log off and crawl back onto I-95 for the northward commute home. I usually hit a decent amount of traffic at this time, so I take advantage of the downtime to harass my mom with yet another phone call, or my best friend if she has a minute free from her newborn son to listen to my nonsense. If I've phone stalked everyone on my Contacts list enough in recent history, I resort to listening to books on tape. I know, I sound like my dad now...

6:00 - It hardly matters what time I leave the office, I always seem to get home at 6. I greet the children who attach themselves to me like barnacle and try to use any free appendages I may have to cook dinner. Ace greets me with a hello if I'm lucky, but usually with the same old "I'm crazy busy today" and heads back up to his office. He reappears for 30 minutes after dinner is ready to eat with us (how nice of him) and then disappears again, usually for the remainder of the night.

7:00 - I bathe Bennett. Carter either "helps" me or plays on the computer or causes some brand of mischief around the house. Then I nurse Bennett and put him to bed.

7:30 - I fight with Carter for 30 minutes about whether or not its a bath night and whether he can go to the basement to play for "just a little bit." I usually cave under the pleading of his big brown eyes, and we spend some quality time together. Then I get him his "bednight" snack and read him his "bednight story(ies)" and say goodnight. That usually happens around 9 p.m. His bedtime is supposed to be 8:30, but since Bennett emerged on the scene, it just isn't possible.

So, at this point, as you can clearly see, I'm exhausted. So, I find myself sitting here tonight staring at the mounds of dishes to be done, a kitchen to clean up, a basket full of laundry to fold, Cheerios to pick up off the floor, several HOURS of work to make up for since I was a lazy bum at the office today, and the clock advancing all too quickly.

I know what I need to do, I just can't bring myself to do it because, well...my butt hit the chair. Now I can't peel myself off. And therein lies my problem. I need to get rid of all my chairs.

So, tell me please - how can I get my mojo back? Or where can I buy a new one???