LLama lips

Traci has been in Texas since Wednesday. The kids have been awesome, only having minimal meltdowns. My work has been completely amazing as well, allowing me to work half days Thursday and Friday. All in all, we have been having fun like crazy. Wednesday we went to a park, Thursday we went to the aquarium, Friday we played 36-40 rounds of mini golf, and today we went to feed some llamas and will go disc golfing and make sugar cookies later. In your face! We will be excited to get mom back, but we are trying to leave her alone and let her enjoy her time off!
This picture was taken by Max!

I got a promotion at work a few weeks ago. My boss took another position in my department, and they asked me to take over as inventory manager. So far, it has been a really good experience. The most difficult thing about it is the workload--three weeks ago we were a team of 5 people and now we are only three, but with the same workload. I am now, essentially, doing the work that was being done by three a few weeks ago. We have hired a new inventory specialist, but they won't start until mid-late June. The strongest lessons learned are these:

1. When you start earning salary, the company owns you. I have been working really long days, often not taking any breaks, just to make sure the daily tasks are completed. No one asks me to work these long hours, but I know that it's the only way to get the job done. Mo money mo problems?

2. Being salary and working long hours means having to know when to stop working. It has been hard to be home with work and school pulling me every which way, but I am realizing the importance that I need to place on cutting off from everything and being with my family. I think I have a solution, but, mostly, things will probably have to remain a little over-booked until after the first block ends in a few weeks. I will then only have one class instead of three, and our new inventory specialist should be on board as well.

This week I was musing about how awesome it would be if JCP were to start me this fall, all on my own, instead of waiting till the next regular training session in January 2012. Oddly enough, I got a call from my recruiter yesterday suggesting just that. We will see if it's even an option, but if it works out, we will be done with classes mid-August, pack up, and move to Buena Park, CA to start September 1!