Millennium Mom

Tuesday, June 22, 2010

Children and chores

We have started to introduce chores to our kids. We started very "formal" with a chore list that they could check off what they did each day. If they did their chores they got paid. It lasted about a month. Some things they loved doing and we didn't even have to ask (like feeding the cats) and other things never really took off (like making their beds).

They stopped almost all chores and missed the money after about 3-4 months. They started asking when they would get paid again, and I said when they do their chores. Lately they have taken a much greater interest again. The girls actually love to clean - Swiffer in particular. Ben still likes to feed the cats and help with the garbage.

Tonight the girls decided to clean their playhouse and playset. The asked for a bucket of water and cleaned for over an hour. They actually did a really nice job overall. I haven't been giving them money each week because it still isn't consistent, but instead give some money when I feel they earned it. The problem with this is sometimes I forget. Ben said to me this morning "when will I get paid again?" It was kind of cute. For that he got his $3.

I guess the lesson I learned is to just "ease" them into it and let them do things they like that help you out. Don't "assign" things but talk about it with them. Any little help I get from them makes my life a little easier and I will take that.

For those in Cincy watch Fox 19 tomorrow at 8:25...I will be on talking about helpful web sites for family vacation.

Friday, June 18, 2010

Back in O-H-I-O

Wow does it feel good to be home. Even though I am EXHAUSTED and bobbing my head trying to stay awake in this conference call. I have been up since 3:30 am Denver time...ughhh, no wonder I feel like my day is over. I have been debating back and forth if I should just hang up and go take a nap. Ben has a baseball game tonight and I am not sure I am going to make it without a nap.

My trip to Denver was great. If you have not been, GO. It is such a great city. Arnie and I have Colorado on our list of potential retirement spots and now I remember why. The city of Denver is so unique in that you have a pretty large downtown that immediately runs into neighborhoods....no highways to cross, bad areas before nice areas, etc. It is just so cool and hip. I ate at two great restaurants (Zengo and Cuba Cuba in case you head out there), could have walked everywhere if needed and the weather was 80 degrees, no humidity and blue skies. What is not to love.

The only down side was once again being away from Arnie and the kids. I knew June was going to be a brutal month for travel, but when you are in the midst of it it always seems worse. As I was driving home I remembered Ben was at his academic camp this week at NKU (Northern Kentucky Univ). I had to drive right past the exit so I decided to pick him up (even though I had an hour to kill). I called Amber and gave her a heads up, took a call from the parking lot, cleared email and got to see the pure joy and excitement on his face that I surprised him and picked him up (made better by the fact that he hadn't seen me in 3 days). It was delightful.

So now I am back home, finishing some calls before heading to the Dermatologist. My primary caregiver wants them to look at all the moles I am blessed with from my Italian heritage. I guess as you get old (yes, cross 40) these things needs to be checked every now and then. Maybe I will get a nap before or after it, I hope so.

For the soccer fans out there, great comeback today, too bad the ref killed us, I guess like they sort of did with the Celtics last night. I really didn't care who won, but boy did I think it was an ugly game not helped by the refs.

Wednesday, June 9, 2010

Oh the joys of traveling

Hello from India everyone. This week I traveled to Indore, India. For those not familiar with the country, it is pretty central, East/NE of Mumbai, South of Delhi. We have some research going on for a new product I am developing, so doing in-home visits. Traveling is always an eye-opening experience and India is definitely one of them. The country is one of polarities - very educated people, and very poor people. Beautiful new corporate parks on roads that you can't go more than 15 MPH on. Gorgeous hotels, with slums next to them. Even in the SEC A ++ (which in non-marketing research term means the wealthy) the beds are plywood with thin blankets on them. Boy do we have it good. I have taken some videos with my flip cam so hope to figure out how to upload those to share.

My trip over wasn't as smooth as I would have liked. First, I had to fly Atlanta, to Amsterdam to Mumbai. Anytime you break up a long trip it makes it tough. I didn't realize this until at the airport. So all of my mental planning went by the wayside. With the direct flight you can sleep a good 9 hours and arrive in the morning/afternoon. Going through Europe you only get to sleep a few hours on each flight and you arrive at 11pm. Well that is without monsoon season in Mumbai, which had us circling for almost an hour.

I ended up checking into my hotel at 12:30 am only to be woken up at 4:15am for a 6am flight (but of course I was nervous the alarm or wake-up call wouldn't come so I got up at 3:30 and showered). Needless to say I had a rough day, trying to stay awake. I think I made it until 8pm and then went to bed, thankfully I slept until 5am. This is not like me, I don't really get jet-lagged, but the strange flight pattern killed me. I am fine now, only took my getting sleep that night. I have two more days here. Tomorrow I fly to Mumbai at 8:45 pm, then to Paris at 2:25 am (yes all flight West out of India leave between midnight and 3am, crazy how busy the airport is at that hour, we are 9.5 hours ahead here). I arrive at Paris in the morning and then Cincy Saturday afternoon, one less flight on the way home...yippie.

I think I have my plan worked out where I shouldn't be too jet-lagged, wish my luck with that and getting these videos uploaded.

Wednesday, June 2, 2010

6/2 Blog: In a bad mood

I have been in a bad mood all day, I guess you can say I woke up on the wrong side of the bed. Actually it was the "right" side, literally (yes, I lost my favorite side in marriage) and figuratively. So I guess that isn't my excuse. I did wake up tired, so maybe that is it...I blame it on the Cake Boss, I had to stay up and watch him last night.

Or maybe it is stress. I feel like I have been running for two straight days. After a wonderful long weekend, I started my week with a full-day offsite. That made for the fifth work day in a row that I wasn't at my desk. Let's see...full day training last Tuesday, team building offsite Wed, Innovation Review downtown Thurs and Friday, project offsite yesterday. That means I am stressed because; 1) I can't print documents easily. I very much prefer to print and read things so I can digest them, file if needed, mark them up and return to person and so forth, when I am out I have to "flag" them to print and it causes me stress; 2) I feel like a bag lady. I have to take key docs with me in case I need them and planning for a week out means a lot in the briefcase (did I say my bad hurts too); 3) out of office means out of sync, email piling up, to do list not getting checked off, those both cause me stress.

That likely means I can blame my bad mood on stress. After my team offsite yesterday we had a nice picnic planned at a local park with families too. I was looking forward to it. I had Amber bringing the kids to me. Then I got a call from Arnie at 9am reminding me Sarah had her dress rehearsal for her recital at 7pm. The whole start the work week on a Tuesday got me, I was thinking it was Monday. So we ran to the picnic at 5:30 hoping to meet other people's families, eat, play a little and leave by 6:15. Of course the caterer went to the wrong area in the park, so instead we started to get food at 6:15 and were in the car at 6:30.

I literally drove way fast and had Ben help Sarah get dressed in the car. Total bad mother moment. We arrived on time, and I totally could have dressed her there (but they have to go straight into auditorium and she would have been embarrassed so it all worked out). We got home at 9pm and I was spent, but somehow stayed up late watching Cake Boss.

Today was much of the same. I had to rush home, grab the kids (and try to grab Arnie some dinner), pick up the Bonne boys and get to the baseball field. We were there by 6:15 a bit late but before the start time at 6:30. The game got called early due to lightning which was a blessing. That gave me 45 minutes back to be able to blog and clear some emails.

So now I am trying to kick my bad mood laying in bed. Maybe some Suduko will clear my head. I don't like being in a bad mood, I am mean to people for no reason. Today I was not myself in meetings, probably was short with people and certainly bit my kids heads off a few times tonight. It just isn't me. So I am being quiet while I do this and going to go to bed to hope it all goes away tomorrow.