The BIG Experiment!! Day Three by Diane

4:38 am  Wonderful Hubby wakes me up with his snoring.  This is a recurring theme in our household.  Move to spare bedroom.  Spend half hour worrying about interview.  Fall back to sleep.

6:25 am  Woken by small dog who wants food.  Wonderful Hubby comes to wake me up as well, since my alarm has gone off, and then goes to wake the kids.  I am grateful for having prepared the coffee to start automatically.

6:30-7:30 Take out recycling, drip stale beer down my shoulder.  Not going to ruin my mood, however. Got the kids out the door on time and with most of their morning chores completed!  Even stopped the car before pushing them out at school!

7:30-8:45 Have a walk with Kim.  Good discussions of why our hubbies are helping out MORE than usual this week.  BOTH husbands have pointed out that they'd do whatever around the house, we only had to ask.  Strangely enough, we haven't had to ask them to do anything so far this week, they've just seen something needing to be done and done it.  Think the blog is great in more ways than one!  Got a bit lost and had to use the iPhone to find our way back to our cars.

8:45-9:30 Yikes!  Gotta hustle to shower and prepare for interview.  Try on aforementioned out of date suit.  Marvel that it still fits (see that scheduled exercise really pays off!) and looks okay.  It is a bit uncomfortable because it has a waistline that goes over the navel, and I have been wearing low-rise pants for the last 5 years, but, with the jacket on, no one will know but me!

10:00-11:00 Meet with a wonderful friend who has a need for some part-time contract work.  (It really is all about who you know!)  Work out a win/win for both of us.  If CFO agrees, I start next week!  Really great company with bright engaging professionals.  Got to use big words!  Head home, starting to really HATE suit and want to pull an Al Bundy.

11:00-1:15  Voicemail from teacher who says son might have pink eye.  Ignore it.  They'll call again if they need to send him home.  Panic about what happens now that Wonderful Hubby is traveling.  Emails from volunteers in a panic.  Get home, want a stiff drink, settle for what's left of the coffee, RIP off evil suit and throw it into a pile - climb into comfy jeans and slouchy sweater.  Sit down to work.

1:45-3:00  Realize that I forgot that I'd help out at kids' school and hustle out the door so that they don't wind up riding the bus home to find that I'm not.  Have kids do homework while volunteering.

3:30-5:00  Take kids to Toys R Us.  Need birthday gifts, and kids are dying to spend gift cards.  Curse gift cards given by well-meaning family members.  Tell kids only 1/2 an hour.  1 and 1/2 hours later, leave store.

5:30-7:00 Yay! Awesome brother comes to rescue and grabs kids for dinner.  Work on volunteer projects in peace.  Have glass of wine!  Forget to make to-do list for tomorrow.  Remark that I need to 1. take dog to the vet, 2. take car in for repair, 3. am almost out of milk.  Wonder when the heck I'm going to do that!?

7:00-9:00 Friend time!  Enjoy get-together at friend's.  Feel connected with other women/mommies.

9:00-10:00 pick up sleeping kids from Awesome Brother's and try to sneak them into bed before they wake up too much.  Have LONG conversation with emotional (and tired)7 year old. Realize I have only had string cheese, coffee, and wine to eat today.  Have another glass of wine, eat frozen dinner and a bunch of potato chips while catching up on DVR TV(so much for that workout).  Feel guilty, throw away bag of chips.

For the most part, this was a good fulfilling day.  Didn't spend enough time with children, which seems to show.  Plan on making up for that tomorrow!

The BIG Experiment!! Day 1 by Kim

6:30-7:30 Hit snooze until 6:40 but fortunately Shorty is a better morning person than her mom - so smooth sailing for a Monday morning.

7:30-7:45 Slowed down and she remembered to tuck and roll!

7:45-9:00 Didn't make the workout as I was obsessing about the huge amount of crap that I had to do. Hubby gets all chatty while I'm typing but after a few grunted responses asks if I want to be left alone.

9:00-9:45 Still wearing the pj, yoga pant, hoodie combo that I pulled on when I got out of bed. Soooo pretty. But have whittled down my to-do list enough that I'm able to see the rest of my week being ok which feels like a decent trade off.

9:45-11:30 Have gotten SO much done! Only played words with friends twice and danced with the cat once...not too shabby!

11:30 Made some lunch and walked past all the dishes still in the sink where they were left by unnamed family members. Maybe they will put themselves into the dishwasher...

11:35 Chuckle at Diane's husbands' quest for $10 socks and marvel at her restraint. Thank Hubby for picking up prescription and feel slightly bad that I didn't wait to have lunch with him.

11:45 Back to work. Edited seminar materials, posted the resume blog entry, paid bills, and did some more research.

1:15 Decide that today I'm going to "volunteer" to shower and the "passion" that I'm going to focus on is making myself generally presentable. Feeling like a scrub, albeit an extremely productive scrub.

So my following of the schedule this morning wasn't too great, seeing as I didn't get the workout or the shower in - but tomorrow is another day! And I'm feeling pretty optimistic about this afternoon...

2:20 Got Shorty picked up and ran to Walgreens. Now she's putting her clothes away while I peck away on this and then it'll be time for homework. Fractions today - it's a little disconcerting when you're apprehensive about 2nd grade homework but she still believes I know everything. Do you remember fractions...I don't!

2:30 - 4:30 Shorty does homework and I putter around in the house, nothing especially constructive. Hubby loads the dishwasher and starts it. :)

5:30 Realize that I bought flounder instead of ANY other type of fish plus it's been a couple of days so it's a bit sketchy. Hubby cooks flounder and squash while I make a chimichurri sauce to disguise flounder. Comes out of oven - blech, not eating it!

6:30 Make spaghetti. Laugh about disgusting flounder as a family.

8:00 Shorty to bed and Hubby and I watch House.

9:30 BED!!!

10:30 To sleep.

The thing that made the most impact on me today is that if I block out the time to work and have the discipline to stick to that schedule, I get so much more accomplished and feel better about myself (and things in general) at the end of the day. I was disappointed that I didn't get a work out in but have to really work at making that a non-negotiable priority, hence I'm walking with a friend at 6:30AM tomorrow. I also will remember that I don't like sketchy flounder.

THE INTERVIEW or....

How I decided that self-employment seemed like a pretty good idea. By Kim

Last April I was dying to go back into the Manufacturing Operations industry – I was eagerly looking forward to the challenges and being able to interact with peers, I just wanted to get through the summer. In May, I was eagerly searching, figuring it would take the summer months to find something and get the ball rolling but that I would be able to enjoy the time with my family. In June, I was less actively searching but still jonesing to get back into my profession after school started in the Fall. In July, eh….but a couple of prospects had come along and so I thought that I might as well go interview.

Now I’m not going to say that THE INTERVIEW(s), and everything that went along with them, completely made me want to explore the possibilities of self-employment, but….

Suits and pointy-toed heels:

After my time in Thailand, where I had to wear everything to death due to the lack of shopping for “Western-sized women” (“we don’t have extra extra-large size for you, Madame”), I came back to the US with one suit and one pair of shoes. No worries, as you only need one to interview. I found them, pulled them out and started getting dressed. Maybe you’ve heard the expression “two possums wrestling in a gunny sack”, well apparently some badgers had eaten the possums and were PISSED to be stuck in this particular gunny sack – not pretty, not pretty at all. OK, no big deal, I would just have to go shopping, I thought, that’s fine I like shopping and at least I have the shoes.

The shoes….after 20+ years of wearing heels of every type, you would think that a person’s feet would be immune to just about anything and there was a time that I could’ve jogged the NYC marathon in stilettos without even wincing. Unfortunately, after a year+ of sandals, flip flops, tennis shoes and ballet flats, sliding back into those fabulous heels was a bit like sliding into medieval torture devices. I was undaunted though, my feet just aren’t used to heels anymore, I’d wear them around the house for a while and get readjusted in no time flat. Twenty minutes later, I was pretty certain that my effing feet had also gotten fatter, and as I crawled up the stairs to my room, I cheerily repeated to myself – shoe shopping too, I love shoe shopping!

Shopping day…trying on suits. I was feeling pretty good because I haven’t actually gone up a size, it’s more like bits of me have shifted around (read: down) a little and that’s ok, it’s normal in fact, gravity and all that (full turn in the mirror)…..what the hell is that on my ass….is that….cellulite??!!!

Spanx.

The best thing that I can say about that particular shopping excursion is that I did find the penultimate pointy-toed heel – Cole Haan makes all of their shoes with the Nike Air technology in them and the Miranda Pump is without a doubt the best multipurpose “work” shoe I’ve ever worn. Don’t misunderstand, it’s still a pointy-toed heel but your “back-to-work” feet will thank you!

I know that I haven’t even gotten to THE INTERVIEW yet, but I’m going to have to regroup and have a glass of wine before I can recount the rest of my humiliating tale.

If you’re wondering why I’m (over)sharing this with you, it’s partly to illustrate one of the 3 major obstacles that Diane and I see in getting back into the workplace, which is:

"If it’s been so long, and so much about me has changed, that my work wardrobe is obsolete, I can’t begin to imagine what has changed in my industry. I know that there are new business philosophies, technology, and buzz-words, and that business practices have shifted along with the economy. But I’m not entirely sure what has changed AND if I have this much trouble getting my wardrobe together, how am I possibly going to catch up on my industry in time to sound articulate and relevant (and not like I’ve been talking “mom-speak” for the past 5 years) in time for THE INTERVIEW, much less in the actual workplace? Being humiliated in the dressing room is one thing, being humiliated in front of my peers is another!"

So one of our goals is to provide that industry knowledge so that there’s one less thing to worry about.

…..and you’ll find the Spanx link in the LifeSavers section of this blog! ;-)