Why Snowdays Are Not As Productive As You Hope

We have been snowbound for 6 days. And not, oh school is closed so we’re just going to go to the mall, snowbound. But our street was just plowed at midnight of Day 5 kind of snowbound. And we can’t even go out for a walk because there’s 2’ of snow outside kind of snowbound. So you would think that all to-do lists would be cleared by the time the snow melts. You’d think. Unless you are snowbound with your hubby and four children and a dog.

When the snow falls and its pretty clear everything is cancelled, the initial response is “ahh, no running around from here to there, imagine all the things I can get done in the house.”  You revisit the list – reading the library book that’s already overdue, staining that Pinterest-inspired cute table you found at a yard sale, finally clearing the 483 emails in your in-box, cleaning out your closets and putting away the summer clothes, starting (or finishing) the next great American novel… the list goes on. And by day 6 you would think – that list is cleared. You had 144 hours of not going nowhere.

But alas. As the snow melts, you are only on page 10 of reading the overdue book, on page 2 of writing the great novel, increased your inbox by 25 emails and pinned 72 more ideas to your Pinterest boards. How did this happen? I’ll tell you.

• You let the kids sleep in – great decision. But you so enjoyed the quiet, you actually sat down, looked at the snow and finished your coffee while it was hot. – 1 hour
• Since you usually give the kids a pop-tart and juicebox for breakfast, you decided to make french toast, sausage, potatoes, and eggs with all this un-rushed time. And eat it with them. – 2 hours
• While the kids went out in the snow, you got a few things done, but when they came back, you mopped the floor of melting snow, dried off the dog, and triaged hanging up wet coats, gloves, scarves, pants, and socks all over the house. – 1 hour
• The kids were hungry and cold when they came in so you cooked home-made chicken soup and hot chocolate. Again the mom guilt of actually fixing them hot food instead of a peanut butter and jelly sandwich. – 1 hour
• With all this found time, surely, there’s time to catch up on How to Get Away with Murder. – 8 hours
• And you missed The Martian in the theatres. - 2.5 hours
• Hmmm… was Gone Girls the movie as good as the book? – 2.5 hours
• If you were lucky enough that your kids still like you enough (or need a big person to pull the sled) to ask you to come sledding with them, you went. – 3 hours
• Sledding is a lot more effort than your Zuumba class, so it warranted a nap. – 2 hours
• Folks who are home eat A LOT!  You are doing dishes 3 or 4 times a day. – 2 hours
• If your kids still want to hang out with you, you got wrangled into a game of charades or Monopoly or Scrabble or JustDance! – 2 hours
• You had to check on Facebook and Twitter and Instagram to see how everyone else was doing in the snow. And post your own pictures of your snow covered street, the pretty snow on the branches, and all the cookies you were baking. – 3 hours
• You were baking cookies. – 1 hour

Now add that all up. In most cases, multiply by 6. Add to it the loads of wet, cold laundry you have. And the re-inventorying grocery shopping you now have to do. And refinishing your floors. And rescheduling the doctor’s appointment, teacher conference, basketball game, and PTA meeting that you missed.  Renew your library book, continue to carry notes for your great novel (really do try to write at least 30 minutes a day), commit an hour to that closet, and keep the satin handy. You’ll eventually get those to-do items checked off. Just now during the snowstorm.

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Tips to Have Fun on Your Next Business Trip

I’ve just come back from a business meeting at a beautiful resort in Florida. Whenever we think of conferences at great resorts, we often think “boondoggle.” I even tease my husband when he’s headed out of town for business meetings with this term. But the reality is – there’s often little time to enjoy the property, no matter how beautiful and what great amenities, other than walking from one meeting space to another. Unless you are intentional and plan ahead.

As a mom who rarely gets the kid-free trip away from home, I definitely try to squeeze in a little bit of me-time, around my conference agendas. Conferences aren’t cheap to attend (for the attendees or the host organization), so it doesn’t make good financial sense to pay the fees and not go to the prescribed business sessions. Instead, make the most of the time outside of the agenda.

Grab a few of these tips for the next time you find yourself heading out for a conference away from home.

Arrive early, stay late. When attending conferences, I always plan to arrive before the conference starts, even a day before, if possible, and take the last flight/train home after the conference ends to build in a little free time to enjoy the host city. When I went to my sorority conference in Chicago, this plan gave me lots of hours to bike and wanderthrough the city.

Wake up early. As tempting as it is to sleep in, or as much as possible, instead, wake up early and go out for a run or walk before your business agenda starts.  We had breakfast, followed by a full day of meetings on my recent conference agenda, so I got up early and went for a run around the hotel property. This was my time to myself and the opportunity to get in some exercise to counterbalance the sitting in meetings all day.

Make the most of “lunch on your own.”  Just because the agenda allows a 2-hour lunch break doesn’t mean you have to sit in the hotel and eat for the entire time. Wander outside, grab lunch at a food truck, and explore the city.  Or find that much-raved about restaurant in the city and get over there. Or skip lunch all together (you know you ate a big breakfast) and do something relaxing instead.

Be ready for spontaneous moments.  I know, sounds like an oxymoron, right? But there’s always that session that ends early, an unexpected break for a technical glitch. Keep a book in your bag or loaded on your e-reader and find a corner to catch up on your reading, wander outside for a breath of fresh air, keep cash in your pocket for a scoop from the ice cream shop.

And lastly -

Always pack a swimsuit.  I don’t know of a hotel worth its stars that doesn’t have a swimming pool.  Find the time for a refreshing dip in the pool or even a few laps – wake up early, jump in during a lunch break, or slide in after the day is done.

With a little bit of planning ahead, you can actually enjoy your next business trip. Have fun!

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Getting The Perfect 1st Day of School Picture

If you’ve got kids, you’ve got to post the perfect first day of school picture on Facebook / Twitter/ Instagram/ Periscope.  You’re little sweety waving & smiling as they board the bus. Or blowing you a kiss thru the car window. Hanging up their backpack in the perfectly neat row of cubbies in their new classroom. And then a mom and kid pic – you smiling with your trying to look like you woke up like that make-up on, hair combed and a clean blouse and cute still-summer shorts.

As if the first day of school isn’t stressful enough!

Because this is probably the first day in almost two months that you’ve had to wake up your whole family before 8 am.  And if you are lucky enough to have high schoolers, you’ve had to get up at the break of dawn. Then you had to pack lunches, and realized that since you went to the grocery store last week, the kids ate all the snack bags of chips over the weekend and handed out the juice boxes to their friends at the pool.  And where are all those dang forms, especially the one that proves your kid got his measles shot this summer so they will let him in the school door?

You spent a mortgage payment on back-to-school clothes, but the little one refuses to wear the new outfit you picked out – the identical pink dress or red and blue striped shirt that they wear every year so that it looks so cute in the scrapbook on the “how they are growing” page. Instead, they want to wear their favorite summer movie t-shirts, so your daughter is wearing a Minion t-shirt and overalls with fake black glasses and your son is wearing a Straight Outta Compton t-shirt and jeans and won’t smile.

And they changed what time everyone goes to school this year, pushing it back 15 minutes – just enough to screw up your schedule, but not really enough time to get any sleep that makes a difference – and changed the bus routes, so you actually have to check the bus route schedule this year for the bus your kids have been riding for 6 years to figure out what time its coming.  But what mom worth her coffee puts her kids on the bus on the first day of school, so you’ve got to drive them to the door to prove to everyone that you aren't one of those free-range willy-nilly parents.

But before you load up the kids in the car, you’ve got to fix your hair and swipe on some lipstick and put on a real clothes. You cannot do the in-pajamas drop-off today because you know that other mom in your kid’s class is going to be there in an outfit that matches her kid’s, with a full face of make-up, unchipped manicure and hair fresh from the salon.  She’ll be there with that cute-sy sign she made stealing an idea from Pinterest, a chalkboard with cute-sy lettering announcing the first day of school and the new grade. (She also wrote a funny haiku for her kid’s lunchbox, you’ll hear about that from your little on after school.)

There's just enough time to pour coffee in your car mug, search for the top, get the kids to stand on the front steps and not poke each other.  Try to get a couple good shots of them smiling without making those goofy faces they usually do when you pull out a camera, but they never do when they are taking selfies.  Hurry to school and try to get towards the front of that nightmare of a drop-off circle. And before the teacher on drop-off duty blows her whistle at you, you snap a couple more pictures of the kids in front of the school before they see their friends and you get one last picture of the back of their heads as they run into the school.  Waving from the curb is the PTA President and if you make eye contact for too long, she’s going to ask you to chair the fall festival bake sale or to join the healthy food committee, so you wave, jump back in the car, and knock over your coffee onto your nice clean outfit.

Now to get home, flip through the morning pics, and find that one good picture of your lovely darlings and try to think of something new and catchy to say, but its been too hectic a morning for all that so you’ll just go with “first day of school – when did they get so big – tears” like everyone else.

Whew. Relax. Finish your coffee and clean up breakfast. In six hours, it’ll be time for the “home from the first day of school” picture.

Happy Back-to-School Day!

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Currently...Getting Ready to Go out of Town

I’m going to my sorority conference this week, which means Dad’s in charge at home.  Unfortunately (for him), that means he has all mom-chaffeur duties. Unfortunately (for him), the kids have about fifty-eleven activities this week. And these are the ones I really wanted to attend, the culmination of all the previous mom-miles and waiting hours I’ve put in to practices. Cue: violins and mom-guilt.

Mom-trips are different than dad trips, though, aren’t they? My husband travels a lot for work and when he does he packs his bags, says “bye,” and leaves. That’s it. Pretty easy. With me leaving, my last day home is pretty busy.

Checking the grocery list. Making sure the fridge is stocked with the makings for sandwiches, milk, fresh fruit, easy to cook dinner options, snacks for all the activities. Of course, when I get back, with the exception of the snacks, all this will still be sitting here, fruit getting soft, and to-go containers will be stacked in the trash.

Doing hair. At least the two oldest girls can do their own hair. And the youngest would be fine except that she swims e.v.e.r.y. day and unfortunately she doesn’t have that braid and swim and keep moving hair. The best I can do is put her hair in a couple braids, leave a big bottle of conditioner and cross my fingers.

Downloading my brain onto paper.  I’ve got my routine and who-to-call-in-an-emergency in my head and on my phone. For Dad and kids, I’m printing out the family schedule, with notes on directions, other folks we know who will be there, and packing lists for each event. With full knowledge that I will still get several texts per day about where someone is supposed to be, or I’ll find out when I return that they just skipped some activity.

Packing a book and crochet. Okay, that’s anytime I leave the house, but this takes special thought because whatever I take, I’m stuck with until I get back. Unless I go to a bookstore or find a yarn shop while I’m gone.

Getting in my last hugs. Every time I leave my kids, and it’s not even that often since there’s not too many full-time mom reasons to leave the kids (not legal ones anyway), I start missing them before I even leave. I get this weight of sadness of all the things that I will miss while I’m gone.  I kinda hope that all my whinings reminders of “put your plates in the sink,” “hang up your towels,” “get your summer work done” will kick in while I’m gone, my voice ringing in their heads.  At best, this new-found responsibility will continue when I return.  Or worse, what if they realize how much they can get along without me, that I’m easily replaceable by Uber, Chinese take-out, and a housecleaning service? Leaving can be a bit risky.

Here I go. Packing my bags, hoping my family will be intact and take me back on my return.

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