I Am Not Superman

Or Superwoman.  What have you.

I don't know if you have noticed, I took the entire month of January off from blogging. I know there was no advanced warning or anything, sorry about that. I felt I needed a short break because I am becoming more and more aware that I am unable to do everything.

Working is proving to be harder and harder, especially as N grows bigger and is more aware of me. She's doing so well, and getting huge - 15 pounds at her last appointment two weeks ago. I am also increasingly aware that I cannot manage a household, cook dinner, spend enough quality time with family and friends, and maintain work.  I hate it, and I love it.  It's a strange dichotomy.  I love being busy, I hate being rushed or to feel like I am slacking off in any department. We have a new hire at work, and I am struggling to keep up with my own workload, as well as train a new employee. I feel like I am in the spotlight here at my office, so I don't want to let anyone down.  Same for everything else, I guess.

I was reading my usual blogs a couple of weeks ago (don't even ask when, my unread items in Google Reader is getting up past 600+...ugh), and something struck me as profound: Working mothers don't really have a balance - balance implies that there is one precise point where everything is coming up roses and works out perfectly, and this is rarely, if ever, the case. Rather than balance, I should strive for a harmony - with its ebbs and flows, where one day, work will take precedence, and the next, I can host a dinner party (haha, as if).  I guess what I mean is that I need to stop holding myself to ridiculous standards and stop trying to keep all the plates spinning.  Who am I impressing?  NO ONE.  I just want to be able to manage my life and make the Hubs and N happy with me :) 

SO.  In light of my ridiculous standards, I am going to try a little 28-day experiment.  I am going to try to post something every day in February.  You might be asking, well, KP, doesn't this seem like another pain-in-the-ass thing you have to balance on top of everything else?  Yes.  Of course it is.  But I want to do this.  So stuff it :) 

I will warn you now that everything might not be fabulous or interesting - I am going to write regularly to try to bring a little normalcy and order to my chaos filled life.  Right now I am working 12 or 14 hour days, and the work kind of beats you down after a while.  I want to do this for fun. 

I hope everyone is doing well, and had a wonderful holiday.  Obviously, during my hiatus, I neglected to share all my holiday fun.  We had an amazing first Christmas with N, who was spoiled rotten, even in her young age.  The In-Laws came down from Crazytown for another typical visit.  This time I received a blue velvet dressing gown with quilting.  It's hot, let me tell you.  I also was gifted a fabulous Kindle from the Hubs, and it has been my favorite new toy (you wouldn't beleive the number of books you can read while pumping at work!)  N and I left the Hubs at home and took off for Sunny Texas (which was actually not sunny at all) to visit with some of MyMom's family.  N was a hit, and my Auntie gifted her all kinds of posh clothes.  Upon our return, N, the Hubs and I all joined the gang at a cabin in the mountains for a New Years weekend of fun (and OMG, the food...YUM!).  Since then, I've been plugging away at work, training our new hire, and this past weekend was a wedding for Dr. T.  She was of course a beautiful bride, and the weekend went all too quickly.  There's my month in a nutshell. 

February should have lots to talk about - of course work will be my number one time suck as usual, but this upcoming weekend the gang is getting together for JK's bachelorette limosuine wine tour (yessssss!) and bridal shower, and ending the month out with her wedding. 

I hope everyone is doing well, and I plan to get back into the game real soon!  It might take me a while to catch up on reading old posts and such, bear with me!