A Look Back... What has Mommy been up to these last three months???

As many already know, I've been in professional limbo since early March when I left my job.  That first weekend (sick with what turned out to be strep throat) I was in Napa with some of my closest Junior League friends to celebrate our friend Lisa's 40th birthday.  What a trooper Adam was taking on the boys for me to do a long-weekend getaway!!!

We also planned a relaxing vacation away to Mexico in late March.  Boy did we need that time away from the responsibilities of the life and kids!  All in all, a pretty good month!

I had only planned on taking off one month before launching my consulting practice, but things have progressed more slowly than I had anticipated, and I had no trouble filling the days.  I've been in discussions with a really large client (whose workload would take up 75% of my time) since late last year, but delays on their end postponed an April 1st start date (contract terms still pending).  I had one obscure client project in mid-March, which thankfully funded most of my start up expenses, but otherwise March-May were largely quiet on the work-front.  In the meantime, I spent time doing fun outings with the kids and tackled some nagging projects around the house. 

We came back from Mexico having made the big decision that we weren't ready to move to the suburbs!!! My family in Jersey was pretty bummed by the news, but took it in stride. This kicked off a flurry of activity, including purging, getting our house prepped for sale, and house hunting.  We actually put an offer in on a house, and it fell through at the very end.  I was extremely bummed.  The silver lining was that we were motivated to tackle some lingering projects, including getting the raised flowerbeds filled!  It looks so nice out back now!

The biggest project was re-organzing and purging our back storage room, which had started to look like something out of an episode of Hoarders.  I also tackled my master closet, which was a whole lot of fun, since I was getting rid of all my fat clothes!

You are probably wondering where all that stuff went!  Well, I hauled a whole carload to Jersey (thank goodness for the jewelry store basement) and donated a mountain of clothes to the Junior League Thrift shop!

I  have also been very busy with the Junior League, both finishing off my position as Chair of the Farm Explorer Committee and my side-project, creating another brand new commitee (you know, in my spare time!).  I initially took on the Farm Explorer Chair position, because I was feeling like I needed something else in my life outside of my job, which I was bored of, and the kids, who my life seemed to solely revolve around -- I would have never imagined I would be this involved!  I love the Junior League of Philadelphia's (JLP) "healthy eating" initiative and really enjoy the women I have met through the organization.  

Here's a photo of me prepping the "blender bike" at one of our events -- the bike has a Vitamix attached to it, and kids ride the bike to work the blender and make the green smoothies and other healthy drinks that we give out.  

At the end of the year banquet a few weeks ago, I was honored to be awarded "Volunteer of the Year" --- I'm still feeling pretty proud to have my efforts recognized!

I think my love of consignment sales is already well documented.  I was at two this Spring, including the Just Between Friends sale in Oaks, PA -- check out what it looked like!  And this was on Day #2, so plenty had already been cleared out!

For $220 I got a second bike for Oliver (one for bungalow, one for city), a potty for when we potty-train the lil' ones this summer, a brand new slip & slide, a bag of dinosaur toys, a box of transformers ("that actually transform" - as Oliver says), puzzles and other toys to work on Lukas' fine motor skills, dress up toys for daycare, and a fresh batch of trucks and cars, and outdoor toys for the boys to destroy over the summer.  

That night, Oliver happily played in the tub with his new transformers, while wearing his new Lightening McQueen water shoes.  Those transformers ended up being a big mistake.  Oliver can turn them into a person, but needs me to turn them back into a vehicle -- I have converted that yellow one about 50 times already!!!  And a few of them, we adults (including preschool teachers!) haven't been able to figure out - in particular, one that is supposed to be some sort of bulldozer.



I have also been spending quite a bit of time with Lukas (more on this topic soon), as I shuffle him to the feeding clinic and various doctor appointments -- it is on those days especially, that I feel confident I made the right decision leaving my job.  It's tough working a 9-5 job (or even more hours!), when you have 1-2 mornings a week some weeks when you are sitting in doctor offices.

In recent weeks, I've gotten two new clients -- when it rains it pours -- so I'm suddenly juggling a lot more than expected. One project is all on my own and the second one is a project with my former boss/mentor, which had a very tight turnaround timeline.

Never a dull moment around here!