These precious things....

My family is the most precious thing in the world to me. Maybe I'm becoming prematurely cantankerous but I find myself less and less willing to sacrifice the things that are important to me for certain things, even if it means taking a financial hit. I have recently found that if I am just careful about how I manage the day there is plenty of time for me to get all my work done, do school stuff with the kids, and not have to give up nights and weekends. I do not need to be constantly on the phone talking business at 10pm, I do not need to spend my weekends talking a client down, I am perfectly capable of getting it all done during reasonable hours during the week. I used to be very diligent about keeping office hours and over time I've let that slip considerably, and with that slip my misery has increased more and more every year. I am returning to keeping regular office hours other than pre planned special events or legitimate business emergencies. And emergencies do not include bad hair days, whining, or random pep talks. My family needs me, and I need myself before I become lost in the shuffle, I've been living like a machine for too long.

And what brought all this on? The other day I was frantically trying to work while the baby napped, the girl was with daddy at work, my older boy was doing puzzles.....then the power went out. Ok, no big deal, it will come back on any minute, like it always does...right...right? No. Hours went by, we confirmed with the power company that there was an outage in the area. It was miserable and hot, we don't have air conditioning and with no power I didn't have the fan blowing on me, I didn't want to open the freezer and risk defrosting my frozen breast milk so it was horrible. Then the battery in my laptop died, then my cellphone battery died. So no computer, no cellphone, no possible way to work..believe me, I tried. And when I started to get panicked over not being able to work I realized that I am working way too much. I should be able to embrace and welcome a break like that, just quiet peaceful time where work can't reach me. So I did. I opened the front door and back door to get a cross breeze going through our place, and the sun coming in, it was just beautiful and I felt a huge weight lifted. I did some scrapbooking I've been meaning to get to, wrote some thank you cards for the baby, did puzzles with my son, nursed the baby, and just had a nice time. I've decided that I can't mentally do without moments like these so office hours are in folks.

My in laws have a nice outside area they can enjoy like that all the time, when we're ready to buy a house I definitely need a nice peaceful outside place. I'll be spending more time reading outside, enjoying the breeze, enjoying my kids and my husband, and I am not going to feel at all guilty for taking the time that I am my family deserve. It's a beautiful thing, we all need to take the time to slow down and realize what really matters. It feels good.