Things that make you go zzzzzzzzzz

It should be easy to write about my recent trip to New York City. So many things were seen, toured and experienced while there. As with every time I go there, I had the time of my life.

So, why this heavy case of writers block - or rather, writers block when it comes to conference blogging (as you can see by my words, not everything I want to put down in writing is blocked)?

I could blame it on being tired. I'm worn out. I want to talk about the things I learned and the shows I saw but my brain is beyond exhausted when it comes to talking about work. Actually, I will blame it on that.

I've been meeting myself coming for the past 4 weeks... more so than usual. Sure, we all take work home at night (or do you, I do hope I'm not fooling myself) if we're not already hunkered down in the office until the wee hours of the morning. Sure we all work through lunch only to find your half eaten PB&J stuck in a file folder weeks later (don't deny that you smelled it to make sure it was beyond it's prime). Sure we've all been there, but I've been living what seems like 40 hour days since mid-January.

Now wait, don't get on to me for complaining, that is the last thing I'm doing. I have adored my time over the past few weeks. I've volunteered at the Super Bowl which the thought of still blows my mind. I've been planning a major fundraiser that went off without so much as a hiccup this past weekend and raised quite a bit of money in the process. I've also attended a conference smack dab in the middle of the city that never sleeps. All of which have made my awesome list.

They also have made my 3 ways to leave Erin wanting a nap by 11AM list. I'm tired. I can't talk about work because I'm tired. I can't make dinner that doesn't come from a box because I'm tired. I also can't seem to stay away through an episode of Chopped because I'm tired.

Maybe I'll catch up on rest this weekend... but then again, I've not graced the local thrift stores with my presence in a while and the flea market booth doesn't restock itself (and I can't just let my awesome sister sustain it all of the time, I need to put in my work too).

There is always next weekend... after all.

No time to blog, only time to explore

I'm sorry if I've disappointed anyone. I fully intended on blogging each day while at the conference in NYC, but it seems I've been busy.

NYC is truly one of the most inspiring places. There is so much to see... do... and experience, finding time to download the information while here seems like a waste of precious time in the city. I promise a big, huge, fat post upon my return to Arkansas (and after a few days back in the office).

Until then, enjoy one of my favorite late night stops so far...

It Never Sleeps

Once again I find myself in NYC at the beginning of a conference. As I blogged about recently, it was in NYC a little over a year ago when I had a defining "ah ha" moment. So much has happened since that conference... so many personal changes... so much growth... I can only imagine what this week will bring. I look forward to finding the time each night to download my thoughts and do a bit of blogging (which we all know I'm not very good at when at home - I can't be trusted with continuous blogging).

I can't say that today has provided much more than airport time, plane rides and the most amazing corned beef sandwich in the world (thank you Carnegie Deli, I love you so). It also provided a solid 2 hours of awkward laughs. A colleague and I scored a couple of tickets to Book of Mormon and I'll just say that my seeing it will result in spooky Mormon hell dreams tonight. If I was Catholic I'm sure I'd find myself in church tomorrow morning ready to confess my sin...

my sin was that I laughed, hard, at that musical...

hopefully worse things have happened...

like war... and murder... and clubbing sweet baby seals...

yes, all of those are worse than laughing at the topics that were sung to lively tunes tonight. If you're reading this and thinking that surely it wasn't that bad and perhaps I'm just a prude... go do a search for the song Hasa Diga Eabowai and then come join me in church tomorrow.

One last thought before I sign off for the evening. Champagne glass hot tubs are so 1989. Apparently they are a big thing in NY. I've seen 3 commercials for resorts with those gawdy things in the rooms in the past 20 minutes. Oh NY, I'm embarrassed for you... jealous of your corned beef sandwiches but still embarrassed for you. I'm sure I'll turn a blind eye to your champagne glass hot tubs by the end of the week because you'll blow my mind with awesome, but for now... for now this can't be ignored.

To Remember

Taken at my 18th birthday party - this post goes out to the awesome guy to my right, Tyson.

This has been quite the week. Sometimes I hope for a momentous week and sometimes I prefer the weeks stay unremarkable... this week falls within the latter.

On Thursday morning I spent a couple of hours in our bi-weekly Sr. Team meeting at work. It was fairly tame considering the amount of work we've all be doing lately, but a lot of work issues were on my mind. I sped back to my office after the meeting to quickly get started on another project while I had a few minutes at my desk only to see that I had a handful of texts from a couple of friends down in Texas. The last time this happened was in 2002 and it was a handful of messages on my answering machine to announce the death of a close friend (things have changed in the past 10 years). These texts were very similar - Tyson, a close friend of mine from my Jr. High/High School days, passed away the day before.

Whatever work project that I was about to start was quickly forgotten. My heart instantly turned inside out. This isn't news you expect... ever... let alone when you and your friends are barely into their 30s. I had not seen Tyson for quite some time and only kept up with him on Facebook. I mean, at least we posted on each other's walls for birthdays and marraige congrats and when he announced his twins made it safely into the world. I am afraid, as wonderful as Facebook is, that it has lead to a complacent upkeep of old friends.

Tyson had been a close friend. What started out as the most redonk crush ever (like, could not stop thinking about him and wrote his name on every notebook I had) early in Jr. High, turned into a great friendship before 9th grade was over. He came to my birthday parties, my regular parties (parties were popular back in the 90s), he did a mock strip tease at one of the parties when we were 15 on a dare and then brought it back as the main attraction for my 16th birthday complete with costume (don't worry, we were young, my mom, the party supervisor, was modest, she never let it get further than it needed to). We competed together in lip sync competitions in 9th grade and he, along with his best friend, made my biology class both highly entertaining and extremely stressful (just ask me how i feel about having my tennis shoes tied to my desk over and over again and having to look at rubber bands from braces wrapped around your desk neighbor's tongue while they taunt you when you should be learning about frog dissection... okay, I'll tell you, I hated it although my mom said it was flirting... I didn't buy it).

However, when college came, we went our seperate ways. He attended Texas A&M and I went down to UT.

And that was that.

And now he's gone. My heart hurts for his close friends, for his wife, for their tiny new babies. My heart cries for his family, his mom and his brother.

My heart knows how to react, buy my brain isn't sure how to process this. He's the 3rd guy who I was close to in one way or another that I've lost since graduation. First was Chris, then Ben, now Tyson. Does this happen to everyone? Do we all lose good friends this quickly? It seriously has me considering what it would take to pack up and move south to find a house right next to my best friend. Life is so precious. I know this. Sometimes I forget it but I hate how I'm reminded of it.

In conclusion, I didn't decide to post this to make people sad. I did it as a reminder that one moment can change a life.

Please live yours beautifully.

Who do you work like?

I recently saw a status update on Facebook that went something like this:

Act like a lady, think like a man, work like your boss.

While acting like a lady is something I am constantly trying to do (just ask anyone about my high level of modesty and if you aren't my significant other, sibling or close friend, you won't hear off color comments coming out of my mouth). I think you could go as far as to just act appropriately. Chew your food with your mouth closed, put the smart phone down in meetings, and other similar things that keep those around y0u from wishing you had called in sick that day.

Thinking like a man probably won't get me anywhere. I think like me. Thinking like I do has propelled me pretty far down a path I rather like, so there is no way I'm even going to consider changing the way I think. How does a man think anyway? Who wrote that? It's silly.

Now, working like your boss, that's the golden ticket. It's a pretty fair assumption that your boss likes the way they work. They like their output, they like their style of work and they like what they accomplish. While they don't expect everyone to be like they are (at least, we hope they acknowledge that fact that everyone works differently from one another), they might wish that those around them at least kept up with their speed.

I've used my bosses as models, if you will, of how I need to work. My job might be similar to theirs or vastly different depending on the day of the week, but I want the quality of my work to at least be something they don't have to dwell on. If they aren't dwelling on me at the end of the day, then I'm doing something right. If I work for someone who is the most detailed oriented person I know, then I need to be one step ahead of them and have every single thing figured out before they ever have to involve themselves. If they are the best editor/proof reader in the company, I guarantee you that I'll have 4 people check over my work before I ever submit it to them. If they are one to follow up with me on a project a day after it's assigned, I promise you that I'll have my details and plan laid out the night before.

It's how I work and it works very well for me. It isn't the degree pictured above that has me sitting where I am looking down the path I gaze at every day, it's how I work. I also look beyond my boss for examples to model my work style after. Who have I met within the industry that impress me? What can I take away from each of those encounters? What attributes make up the perfect employee? While I'll never be perfect, I will try my hardest to get there.

I think many times people fall back on their bosses as someone up on a pedestal. These bosses work long hours because they are paid more (ask me about how many LONG hours I worked before I was ever a boss). They have been around longer so they are there to check/correct what you do. It shouldn't be that way. Shouldn't you want your boss to see you as capable of doing it on your own or with your peers? Will you be given more assignments and ladder climbing projects if it means they are going to have to spend more time on your other projects?

Probably not.

So, ladies and gentlemen, I challenge all of you to work more like your boss. My goal this week will be pinpointing new ways to challenge myself to be 2 steps ahead of mine. What is your goal? If you're your own boss, who do you look to for work style inspiration?

Now for my disclaimer. As a boss and as someone who has a great boss, I know that that dynamic makes an excellent team. It isn't a hands off relationship. However, the relationship should be about moving forward and creating some amazing projects, not trying to figure out what went wrong.

Of a crafty nature

All throughout my college years, if I needed something for my apartment, I would run to Target and purchase it. Before you give me a stern, disapproving look, I will say that every piece of furniture/decor item purchased there is still holding up nicely. My tall, cheap, book shelves that I purchased at $33 a piece, still standing (maybe a bit lopsided but still standing). The mission style desk and hutch I used for ages was sold for a nice price at last year's garage sale. The TV cart was used not only for a TV, but also a printer, and later a craft room storage area, and eventually a plant stand also sold for a fair price at last year's garage sale. The candle sticks, the boxes, the baskets, the crap - all still good and most still in use.

However, as I've grown into my adult years and adult style, my eye has grown tired of what fills the shelves of Target (the only thing I still buy there is House and Dexter when new seasons come out on DVD as their new release season prices always beat Walmart and Best Buy). I've found myself wanting to find new uses for old things. There are flea markets, junk shops, barn sales and dumpsters just FULL of useful objects - why on earth are we letting these items go to waste in landfills and back rooms? Let's all breathe new life into these old treasures.

A year ago I found an old farm/utility/wooden basket thingy at a local junk shop. It caught my eye not for the structure so much but rather what was in it. It was full of old, wooden produce baskets that were perfect for displaying my handspun yarn at the local farmers market. $15 later, the small baskets and large wooden one were mine. I happened to stumble across another one out at the family farm as my sister and I were getting ready to put it on the market (that's another story all together). I rescued that one from going back to the land and brought it home with me.Now I had two of these wooden utility basket thingies (anyone know what they are actually called?). I never ended up using the small produce baskets and everything sat in my living room, looking sad and unused. I eventually sold the produce baskets at the Junque Rethunque flea market booth and priced the 2 wooden utility basket thingies to sell as well.

And then they haunted me. For 3 weeks I thought about using those baskets in a creative way to solve 2 problems. 1 - a lack of shelf and display space in my condo and 2 - a lack of pretty things in my bedroom. When the thought of those wooden utility basket thingies selling to someone else was too much to bare, I went up to the booth, rescued them and brought them home with me.

Then they sat in my living room, once again, sad and unloved for almost 2 months (I'm great with coming up with uses for things, but not great on actually putting things to use).

One day during the Christmas break, I decided enough was enough. My bedroom was ugly and I needed something to anchor all of the lovely, vintage touches I had throughout (and old wire book stand, a cute Samsonite train case to old bulky jewelry in, a small wooden stool my grandpa made, a small wire vanity seat, a large Samsonite suitcase that adds the perfect height to our clothes hamper, an antique dresser... you get the idea, I love old). All of my vintage touches sat strewn about with no real purpose. Those wooden utility basket thingies were going to be the anchor.

2 hours, lots of drilling and rearranging, and a bit of sweat later, I had finished the project. 2 wooden utility basket thingies, 4 shelf supports from Hobby Lobby (get them when they are on sale, I think I paid $30 for all four and they make the project) and viola! A lovely new room.

On a side note, I made this necklace hanger before I even moved into this condo but of course, it was never hung until I moved (the story of my life). I found an akwardly wide and short antique frame at the family farm painted silver. A few coats of cream spray paint, some quilt batting and a fat quarter of fabric produced the perfect necklace hanger. My sister gave me some old t-pins and I was set. It looked weird hanging alone, so I painted some other interesting frames the same color and showcased a few, small prints also saved from the family farm. It's a nice collection and doesn't look out of place now that my room makes more sense.

A Sunday

Today has been a rather quiet Sunday. The sun hasn't shown it's bright face for even a moment and the light coming in my windows has been soft and full of secrets. It wasn't a day for running errands, or organizing a closet, or even dusting the shelves.

It was a Sunday for many a moment exploring You Tube for music I've missed out on.

It was a Sunday for a bit of baking.

It was a Sunday for reading magazines and snoozing with the Schmoo Cat at the foot of the bed.

Today has been a rather quiet Sunday. Sometimes you need those quiet days. Plans go out the window and you find yourself doing nothing of note. It is those days that leave me the most relaxed when they are over. It is those days that are far more valuable than a day full of productive adventures.