Eleven Days

Hellooooooooo and welcome to 2008! Boy I can't believe it is here and I'm so glad that it is! 2008 is gonna be great! That is my mantra for this year. Good things are going to happen for us all. Just put on a happy face!

I've never been one to make New Year's Resolutions. Instead, I always make goals. Resolutions get broken, goals get obtained. Just a personal opinion. Anyway, my new "blog" goal is that I will now post every Monday night. Sunday nights got to be too complicated especially if I was traveling or doing one of my many hundred tasks. So, since I'm home practically every Monday night, and since I really hate Monday's. I thought it would be best to devote two "crappy" tasks, Laundry and Bills with one fun task, my blog. Therefore, those of you who have asked me where the update is, you now know to look for it on Monday evening or Tuesday a.m. when you get up and have nothing better to do with your life than to listen to me ramble on. Hee hee hee. But truthfully, I appreciate your interest and I'm glad to have you with me.

That being said. Let's get on with it. My title of this post is "Eleven Days." Eleven days represents the time I had off over the holidays. I had off from Saturday, December 22 until Wednesday, January 2. To me this was a phenomenal, monumental, amount of time. You see, it's been almost five (count'em 5!) years since I have had an ENTIRE STRAIGHT WEEK off from work!!! When you work for a company that has three people, it is very, very different than working for a company with tweleve to one hundred people. No one else does my job and frankly, when your in charge of money, accounting, scheduling, phone calls, emails, supplies, ordering, homeowners, changes, subcontractors, complaints, etc. etc. etc. the company doesn't run when your gone for too long. Not to mention, working two jobs on top of that!

The scary thing is that the housing market has become so bad, that Gilbert decided to close the office for the entire week and for the first time we actually could. What's more scary and even kinda incredible, is what that did for my mind. It took me several days (five to be exact) to unwind. During this time I got all my personal paperwork for my home, my Silpada business and my Raspberry Rabbit business in order. I cleaned, straightened and organized. All of this is liberating and refreshing for me. I like order and cleanliness. Yes, it's a control thing. But honestly, I work better and feel so much better when things are in order.

While doing all this "mundane" work, my mind was free to wander and wander it did. For eleven days I spent many hours in my studio with the bunnies. My mind was free of people's house problems, subcontractor problems, money problems, material problems, and well... problems. As my mind relaxed, my creativity came back. I suddenly had all these wonderful ideas for my artwork. For eleven days I was able to spend time with friends without being in a massive rush. I went to a movie! I read my beloved magazines cover to cover. I drank tea in the afternoon. I ate dinner without worrying about deadlines. I actually got to eat lunch for 20 minutes in peace instead of my normal 12 minutes ( 6 mins to nuke it, 6 mins to eat it) while answering the phone and cell phone. I actually tasted my food! For eleven days I actually remembered what it was like to be myself again. For eleven days, I actually had time to find myself again and I liked what I found.

So, with all of that said, my "Goals" for 2008 are actually pretty simple. While I love my job and frankly I'm damn good at it, and while I truly love my homeowners, (most of which are now friends) in reality, it's only a means to make a LIVING and pay the bills. My LIFE is created when I make and sell art, get invited to be published in magazines (more to come on that) spend time with David, the bunnies, my friends and family. My greatest happiness is being home here at Rosewood Cottage in my studio. 2008 is going to be a year of creating more art, spending more time with those I love and spending way less money on things to try and make me happy for working so hard. TIME truly is the greatest gift and this year it is a gift I am giving myself. To think, it all started with eleven days....

Hugs to all and Happy New Year! May all your dreams come true!

Shell