work life balance Archives - Sunshine and Holly

10 Simple Tips to Survive Solo Parenting When Your Spouse is Traveling

By sunshineandholly on November 20, 2017

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Solo parenting isn’t for the weak. Single parents, military parents – they’re my heroes. I have no idea how they do it. They really are super moms and super dads!

When you’re solo parenting, everything falls on you. There’s no one there to help with the chores, help with the kids, or even keep you company at night. The days I’m solo parenting are long, stressful, exhausting, anxiety-filled, lonely days. And the nights? They’re pretty miserable. Luckily, my husband doesn’t travel too much. Usually just 2-3 days every other week. I can’t imagine what it would be like if he was gone months at a time.

Since he’s started traveling, I’ve figured out a few tricks and tips that have helped me while he’s gone. So if your husband or wife is about to head out on a business trip, check out these 10 simple tips to survive solo parenting when your spouse is traveling.

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family | friends | fun | Uncategorized | work life balance

Weekend pics and an update

By sunshineandholly on June 2, 2011

Weekend pics!

Chocolate Bar!

Laser Show!

Headed to the Braves game!

Lacey and Jack are Braves fans too!

Sorry my blog has been mostly pics lately. Apparently, I only have a lot to write about when my job’s not going well. 🙂 But honestly, work’s actually been pretty good. I’ve been super busy (which makes the days go by super fast!) and I just spent the last few weeks on-boarding a new employee in our department (which means I get to use some of my Human Resources skills that are going to waste!). So I’ve actually been happy with my work-life.

As for my personal life, things couldn’t be better! We’ve been doing tons of fun stuff (as you can tell by all the weekend pics) and we’ve almost finished the kitchen renovation. I’d say we’re about 99.5% done! 🙂

On a completely separate subject, I need to renew my teaching certificate. Yes, I’d rather die than teach, but I don’t want to let it expire – it’s a good back up career. But MAN – the Georgia Professional Standards Commission website is SO confusing! Hopefully I’ll figure out what the heck I’m supposed to do before the end of the month!

New Years Resolution

By sunshineandholly on January 3, 2011

Usually I don’t take New Years resolutions very seriously. I mean, I’m ALWAYS dieting and trying to loose weight – so I don’t join the billion other people out there who make a New Years resolution to “get healthy” or “loose some poundage.” But this year, I really have something that I need to work on.

Today is my last vacation day. Yep – I have had an 11 day break from my job. And it was AWESOME! I didn’t miss work one bit. Today I felt a little guilty not going in since I think everyone else went back today. (Sucks for them! 🙂 They should have saved their vacation days!)

But as for missing work? NOPE! Not at all. Not. At. All!

In fact, I’ve been dreading this day. I knew the vacation would have to end. And I knew I was going to be upset. I actually started getting really upset yesterday about going back to work. Josh could tell I was in a funk and made me get out of bed and go for a walk. We talked about work and my attitude…my bad attitude.

I hate that I complain about work so much. My job isn’t what I thought I’d be doing at this point in my life, but it’s a good job. I’m lucky to have a job. And I need to remember that.

Soooooo….my new years resolution is to be more positive about my job. Here’s a few things I’m going to try:

*Multiple Personalities – During my week off, I really felt like I became a different person – the person I used to be before I started getting bitter about life (because of work). The biggest example is New Years – I drank, laughed, danced, acted crazy – and didn’t worry a bit about acting too immature, feeling too old to do certain things…basically I didn’t feel shame for doing stuff people my age do. I don’t want to be the uptight person I have to be at work all the time. So I’m going to try to have “multiple personalities.” I’ll be one person at work (boring, calm, obedient, smiling Holly) and another person when I’m not working (fun, happy, carefree, energetic, somewhat-party-girl Holly). Now, that doesn’t mean that I’m going to go out every night and get drunk and dance. But that does mean that I can’t be a loser and NOT go out if something cool’s going on because “I’m too tired from work” or because “I have to get up early and go to work tomorrow.” Lame-O. I need to remember that even though most everyone I work with is older ~~and cares way more about their job than I ever will~~ that doesn’t mean I can’t act like a young, carefree adult. Just like Carrie says, “While we’re young and beautiful, we’ll party down on main street!” That’ll be my theme song. 🙂

*Leaving work at work – I’m such a worry wart. And I really started worrying about work WAY to much last year. My week off reminded me that life’s not all about this darn job. And it’s just not worth it to worry so much. So once I leave the building, my brain is done with work. And on my drive home, every time my thoughts stray to work related issues, I’ll give myself a mental SLAP! “No! Don’t think about work!” And when I’m home watching Glee and a commercial comes on and I start thinking about work…SLAP! “No! Don’t do it!” And when I’m laying in bed trying to sleep, and I start worrying about the stuff I have to deal with tomorrow….SLAP! “Nope! Think of something else – anything else but work!”

*Be positive – there are some times when I NEED to complain about work. Maybe I need to get something off my chest or get reassurance that I was right, etc. But most of the time, I only complain about work because that’s what I’m thinking about at the moment. And not only is it mean of me to whine and complain to others all the time, it’s detrimental to my attitude about work. I need to stay positive – and that means when I do talk about work to other people, I need to not complain and only speak about happy positive things.

And lastly…

*Lay off the caffeine – I really think drinking too much caffeine makes me even more worrisome and anxious that I already am. 1 cup of coffee a day – that’s it – no more.

I’m really going to try – try hard – to follow this plan. And hopefully, I’ll keep this New Years resolution!

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