the girl who has an assistant

I am pretty darn lucky.

"Take Your Child to Work Day" is every Friday for me.


You see, I didn't really take a maternity leave. I gave birth on a Wednesday and was back to work the following Monday. And--as my GM loves to point out to people who have attendance issues--I managed to call in 2 hours in advance from the ambulance as they were loading me in.

clearly I haven't lost all my baby weight yet

Why so dedicated? Do I love my job that much?


Well, the truth of the matter is that I am in charge of payroll, and Monday was the day to run payroll. Since Eli came so early, my replacement wasn't trained and if I wanted to get paid, well, I had to do it myself. After that, well, Eli was in the NICU and being able to go to work for a few hours when I felt like it was good for me. It kept me from worrying so much and actually gave me a chance to rest more than I would have at home. I was given the best terms ever. I got to come and go as I pleased for the first three months after the birth, as long as I got payroll done and took care of the "essential" parts of my job.

Completely Awesome!

It gets better.

Once Eli got out of the NICU, I took some time off (about a week and a half) to bond and visit with my parents who drove from Texas. When I went back, it was with Eli in tow. I worked the hours I wanted and was able to take time for the doctor's appointments and such. Heck, I even took time because I just felt like sleeping in! The important parts of my job got done, but I wasn't trapped in the house.

I set up a little cradle in the corner of my office, got myself a baby sling to tote him around in, brought in a little changing station and we were good to go. When he was hungry, I'd just close the door and nurse while one-handed typing. Bliss. Plus he became everyone's favorite little guy. He even has his own nametag. It says "Eli Eleven, Human Resources Assistant."

When I came back "officially" to full time, I started leaving him with the sitter's. That didn't even last a week. Every day it was, "Where's my Baby!" "Where's Eli?" People would tip toe into my office just in case he was in the cradle sleeping. Anyone who walked past my door would always peek to see if they could spy him in his cradle.

And I missed him too.

So that first Friday of full-time, I brought him back in. I needed my Assistant after all! So Fridays are Eli days. I still get asked about him during the week and I just say, "Friday, he'll be in on Friday." Now that he is getting more active and is awake and alert more, he gets fussier, so it really can't last much longer. But I'll enjoy it while I can.

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In other news:

This is how I stand in the two scrappy contests I've been participating in.

For the Effer's Last Scrapper Standing, I have officially progressed to Round Three! Yaaay! This was my entry for that:

Pretty Darn personal. The challenge was to scrap 7 random things. Since I scar so easily, it grew into this. It evolved from a previous idea I had where I wanted to do seven totally unrelated random things, but work my journaling into the picture. After failing to find a revolving door in a decent driving distance, (it was relevant, trust me) I decided to just scrap random things about my body and write directly on myself. One of the random things I had thought about is the fact that my second toe is longer than my big toe. However, when looking at my feet, didn't want to take a picture because of the scars I have everywhere. Little nicks and dings, not really aesthetically pleasing. So I decided to just scrap my scars. I really have always wanted porcelain, Nicole Kidman, luminous skin. But I've learned to accept I never will. Its just me.

And now, onto Round Three! I can't wait to see what the challenge is, they've already narrowed the ranks from 250-something to 42, so just getting to Round 3 is a feat I can be proud of.

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And in the Bad Girls contest....this was week 5, using the design element of unity. I chose shape and color as elements to create unity. Lots of round and circles here and lots of orange to contrast the blue in Ian's outfit. I love this pic, even though you can't really see Ian's eyes.

I am happy, pleased and otherwise estatic to announce that I made it to the finals! Yes, it's down to just ten ultra talented ladies and I am in that number! I got a personal call from Wendy Rago--the owner of Bad Girls Kits--and she is just such a cool girl to talk to. If the boys hadn't started killing each other in the next room, I'd still be on the phone with her!

The neat thing about the Bad Girl's challenge is that it has been structured like a class. Each round of competition has been a class in design. It's been pretty awesome. I was always the kid at school who did really well with parameters. I have plenty of creativity on my own, but give me a set of rules to follow and some guidelines and I'm off! I've been loving this! I will be so sorry to see it end and can't wait to see who gets chosen as Top Designer.

And, btw, I think I have a new kit obsession. I'm definitely jumping on the waiting list for this club!

Final entries are supposed to be up by eight pm (EST) on Thursday. I'm actually done. I had an idea, I ran with it, and Aramis even allowed me to get some adult time in this weekend by going to a crop. (A definite mood lightener since I've been feeling a little trapped lately. He doesn't have his weekends off anymore and we have no time together as a family. Which means my weekends are filled with all of the kids home with me when I just want to relax and unwind sometimes. I have no time during the week to run errands which means I have to take all four kiddos with me when I go to the grocery store, get an oil change, get a haircut, etc, etc, etc. I've been stressed out by it all) So my page is done, but I don't want to post it yet. I wwant to wait until the due date. I guess its the competitive side of me not wanting the other contestants to see it just in case they haven't completed their own. But I can't resist sharing a little sneaky peek since I love this layout so much. Who cares about the contest when you get inspired to create this kind of art?

Here it is! Shhhhh!

Well, I'm off to get some sleep and dream of scrappy goodness.