Ramblings

I have a big fan of my blog my friend Anastasia a creative genius in so many ways. Her talents are astounding as an author, artist, musician, salad maker, craftswoman. One of those people that can do anything well.

She is always telling me you should write about this or that. So many things to write about I don’t know where to begin. I don’t want to bore the pants off people with what I had for breakfast and what my kids did funny but talking real truth about daily life is kind of interesting. It helps us connect with other people.

I guess if you come to a blog you want to feel like you are sitting at the kitchen table with the person discussing life.
So this post will be some of this and that and ramblings along those lines so pull up a kitchen chair and let’s chit chat.

The biggest challenge for me as a mom /freelance working mom is to balance it all. I mean work, home, kids, dogs, husband, shopping. Enough to make my head spin. Well I admit I am a bit fascinated by those women who seem so put together and life seems calm for them.  I am NOT one of these woman. I heard Suze Orman speaking the other day, I love her by the way, she has a great philosophy about life, finances whatever. She says “know your truth.” Wow that one is IT in a nutshell. She was referring to spending primarily but it relates to all aspects of life.

Know what your good at, your strengths and weaknesses, and spend time doing it. The stuff you suck at forget about it. Or if you really want to punish yourself keep trying until you get better at it.

Now my husband has often thought I have ADD. Well I don’t think that is the case more like I am not 30 anymore and I stayed at home raising the kids and now they are older and I am on a mission from GOD!
To quote Elwood Blues.

Seriously I have things to do and learn. I love it that my husband was on board with me staying home to raise the kids. To me it was important and something I waited my whole life to do. Yes I was one of those girls. I had no post partum anything just pure bliss with baby/toddlerdom. Pre-teen/teen years not as blissful!! LOL

Now that the kids are teen and pre-teen they don’t need or want me as much and with college looming in the forecast I better get making some dough. Plus getting out of the house and being with adults is a good thing. For me and the kids.

My career has suffered or lets just say I could have been further along if I had not stayed home with the kiddies. It was hard entering the workforce after 10 years and expecting people to hire me again.

The people who were assistant food stylists were now lead stylists and I could not exactly say hey here I am I know you have all been waiting for me to return. Really, the fact is there were plenty of others to take my position. And chomping at the bit to do so. So starting all over again has been hard. That is why the blogging has been so good for me. I can be creative in my home studio/kitchen and use my talents as a food stylist and also perfect my photographic skills.

Anyway back to my ADD. So my friend Anastasia came over last night to deliver a red velvet cake she got from one of her students after having her emergency appendectomy. I had worked out of the house food styling so everything felt chaotic. That is when she said you should blog about this. Oh you mean my crazy life?

I have been freelancing all my career so that is all I know. Here is how it goes. So I get the call to work a job for the next day. Ok it’s a book. So I proceed to put all the ducks in a row like hiring Lynn the dog walker, figuring out who will take Michael to football practice, making sure everyone has food, feeding dogs, cooking and cleaning house, doing laundry, packing lunches, signing school papers and so on.

When I work I come home and literally leave one kitchen and step into another. Yesterday I left the photo studio and walked in the house and went right to our sink to tackle the days dishes as well as a few from the evening.

As in most households the kitchen is the hub. Well mine is no different. Everyone is hungry all the time.

I actually have a big smile on my face as I’m writing this because it is so comical when I am in the kitchen. I have three dogs yes I am crazy and yes it was a mistake but would not give them up for the world. So every time I am in the kitchen I have at least one if not all three waiting for any crumb to drop. I have a black lab that is obsessed with produce and when I even so much as open the fruit or vege drawer she is running from wherever she was prior to sit for a piece of fruit or vegetable. Or sometimes half a cantalope if I turn my back and she gets on the counter.

My son has been begging me for cake. My daughter wants muffins. My husband wants meat of any kind that pulls away from the bone and is fork tender.

So my house is set up like a restaurant kitchen because that is what it feels like to me. I have all my white restaurant dishes on a shelf above the stove. Ready to grab. Frig behind me for easy reach.

A small breakfast bar to the left of the stove where people like to hang while I cook. Above the breakfast bar is an industrial strength pot rack put in by Bob my handman extraordinaire.

So my life is a bit crazy as a freelancer the stopping and starting the wearing of this hat or that but I would not change it for the world. I could never go to a cube all day I am not cut out for it. I need the constant change and stimulation of new things. Even though I do get a bit stressed it all works out and when I am working on new things and get that fix of creativity from my styling it makes it all worth it.