Hubby and I arrived last Wednesday evening and we are leaving tomorrow morning. He’s here for some training for his job. He was able to have lunch with me each day (except for Sunday) during a break and dinner each night.

Here’s a list of things that we’ve lived through, seen, bought, visited, places we’ve eaten and other random things. Let me know in the comments if you want any links or names of any of the places or things that are mentioned.

I’m not a city mouse, I’m a country mouse. Visiting a city here and there for a few days or a week doesn’t bother me, but, I know that I’m happy out in the boonies. So, please keep that in mind as you read all of this entry!

Wednesday – We arrived in the airport. I had reserved a shuttle to take us to the hotel. No one rents a car in the area, at least not anyone we know. The shuttle was great, we had a very talkative driver that’s always lived in the area. He gave us a great mini-tour as we drove the 12 or so miles to our hotel on Canal Street which is in the French Quarter. We now have seen the rebuilding after Katrina in person. We’ve seen the City of the Dead through the windows. We know where the Superdome is, Tulane and Loyola. We tipped him $5 for our bags, most people just gave him a buck. It was worth it though, he was really nice as well.

After checking in we went out to explore a little bit and found House of Blues just down Decatur street. Our server, Josh, was totally a blast and very helpful for things we were asking about. I really enjoyed the food there and so did hubby. It’s an awesome place and I hope to get some photos of the inside before we leave.

Thursday – The next day I set off to explore the area. I had a few hours before meeting hubby for lunch. I took my camera and started off towards the Mississippi River. I found a few things that I was looking for, the streetcar station, Riverwalk, a steamboat and a ferry and the Aquarium. I walked into Riverwalk for a while…it’s an indoor mall. I did buy a few things, but, it’s very repetitive here with the same hats/t-shirts/masks/beads. I found a great silver shop (Silver Salon and they give military discounts!) and I bought a pretty bracelet, some Fleur de Lis earrings and later when I went back the other day a ring and a necklace charm.  The prices are extremely reasonable…I was a little shocked at how low they were. I found some really cute Voodoo Watchover dolls at Destination New Orleans. They also have salt water taffy in a box with a postcard attached. The food court is on the top level, near the end of the mall. It’s not set up like a traditional mall in that sense. The only thing I can figure out is because the riverboat cruises embark/disembark right there as well as the convention center. There’s also the food and drink museum, that charges a lot of money and a very expensive gift shop. It’s a nice long walk from the food court back to the hotel, especially when hubby was waiting for lunch! That afternoon I gambled a little at Harrah’s. We ate dinner at Popeye’s! It’s the first time that I have eaten there in a long, long time. The first Popeye’s is in the area, but it wasn’t this one. It was really good! It’s located on Canal Street between Chartres and Royal.

Friday – We ate lunch at Subway and it was a good meal. It’s on Royal St. within the first block off of Canal. We saw two people almost get hit by a streetcar! Seriously I knew that he wouldn’t hit them, but, they weren’t paying attention and just were walking without looking. He rang the bell a few times to move them off of the tracks. I’m sure it’s not the first time he’s done that. I walked around down Decatur and went to the French Market. I took photos at Jackson Square of everything including Joan of Arc! I also went to the Canal Street Shops. I went to Starbucks and bought an iced tea, visited JT Kids, which is really overpriced, looked and found one thing at Ann Taylor (not Loft, that’s in Riverwalk). I also saw a few places that were way out of my price range, Saks Fifth Avenue for one. Even on sale I cannot afford a dress n there. Friday night we walked down Bourbon Street. Wow, that’s something to see! I saw a lot of strip clubs, fake cops called “Party Patrol” that should be stopped, I also saw a lot of drunks and street people. We ate at Crescent City Brewhouse. It was okay. It’s a micro brewery, so hubby wanted to try it out and see how the beer was. It was okay. The food was okay. I’ve had much better and much worse. I ordered a steak, it was a little chewy and the green beans and Au gratin potatoes were undercooked. There’s a lot of different places to try, so, unless you are set on this place, skip it. Read more

I cannot believe all the snow that we’re still getting! We measured and in some places it’s over 40″! We do have a nice huge pile in our cul-de-sac that has grown from the plows and the drifts. It was snowing pretty heavily on Tuesday night. Good thing I went to the grocery store on Monday and then Target on Tuesday. Hubby’s been off of work all week. We are betting tomorrow as well.

I’ve been keeping as busy as possible. I reworked my business site. I love it! It’s more or less still bloggy looking, but, I added and removed some things. I’m going to see if I can get a Flickr Feed on the site splash page. I’ve also been doing some things behind the scenes. Right now I have a potential client meeting tomorrow evening and then on Saturday two potential client meetings. I hope they will all be clients. The one tomorrow night is a gal that will be graduating this year and wants to get her photos done. One of the girls that I photographed already, gave her my card. The two on Saturday are both Juniors! I photograph Juniors differently. I usually do a Spring session, then a Fall and Spring when they are Seniors. Kids change so much over the summer. Besides, they can hand out their referral cards in the Spring and Summer.

On Monday we hunted at the local furniture warehouse and found a couch! It’s a sectional. It was supposed to have been delivered tomorrow, but, the snow made it impossible. Hopefully it will be here on Wednesday. I’m so tired of things being pushed back with this furniture! We decided to wait to get tables, we want to see how everything fits into the room. We’re moving the piano to the other wall and then a bookcase will go between the windows.

I’m going to try to get some work done, then, heading out with hubby later on for some groceries and maybe some dinner as well. I have to make him a Valentine’s Day card also. Have a great weekend with your honey!

Yup, it’s out there, tons and tons of snow. Hubby shoveled for almost three hours this morning to get a path from the driveway to the garage. The plows have been through our neighborhood, a backhoe as well. Just when we get it all handled, we’ll have more snow. They are predicting more on Tuesday night. Goodie.

It’s pushed back a lot of things, not having access to the store, clients, school, work. I think that he has to try to get to work tomorrow, good thing he’s got a big vehicle. I had to push my clients back to next Saturday, so I have one on Friday night and two on Saturday. Let’s just hope that all the snow will be over and gone soon. Bring on Spring!!

We painted the living room last month and ordered furniture. So excited!! Then. Then the call came that the couch wouldn’t be available until March 1st. What? I don’t think so. We got a refund for all of it. So, now, we’re at square one again. I’m hopefully shopping at a few places this week locally. I found some stuff online that we like, maybe in the area I can actually try them out. I don’t want some stiff furniture in our living room. We plan on being in there daily.

Hubby and I both started our Roth IRA’s this month! This is very cool to us as we’ve never had the income to have extra. Ever. Now we can build for the future and not have to worry.

I cannot believe that Christmas is only a few days away! I have everything wrapped, for the most part. I just need to get one little thing wrapped and make cards for my hubby and kiddos.

The grand-daughter is getting a kitchen for Christmas! This is destined to be a hit as she loves helping in the kitchen. I still remember when we gave her mom her first kitchen, oh wow, I’m so old! Anyhow, that’s her big gift this year, I’m sure there will be photos after Christmas of her using it and making some great food!

I’m so looking forward to the New Year, 2010. Wow, that sounds so cool! There’s a bunch of things on my goal list for next year, both personally and professionally. So, we’ll see what happens. Hopefully I will be sitting here next year typing out the things that I’ve accomplished and the next year’s list.

Personal List

1. Lose that last 15 pounds. This is something that I’ve slacked off on big time. Now that I will have more time for ME I hope to accomplish this before the Spring.
2. Start a Roth IRA. Hubby and I just visited with our financial planner last month. We have enough left over to start our IRA’s in 2010 and keep them going for years. He did an analysis of our finances and we’re not exactly on target, but we’re pretty close. Even though we’re getting a late start, we’re still going to be okay.
3. I want to get some sort of furniture in our living room. Right now everything to be hung on the wall is leaning against the walls and we have a piano in there. That’s it. It will be two years since we moved in next month and while we have the room painted, I want it darker. We had it painted in August and it’s a very pale green. Over the past few months I’ve decided that I want forest green or at least something darker than baby green in there. So, we’re either going to repaint it ourselves or hire a company to do it. I hesitate at re-hiring the company that did it in the first place. The guy is a great person, but he’s very conservative with color and we really aren’t. It’s not a good match. He did a pale blue for our dining room as an estimate and we really want something bright, like orange. I guess we’ll do it ourselves.

Professional list

1. Gain 3 new clients. This hopefully will happen through the Chamber, word-of-mouth and advertising next year.
2. Have all my current clients repeat sessions with me.
3. Order a couple of really nice logo shirts for me to wear. Sometimes I’m in an environment with other professionals and they are wearing their logo shirts and I have nothing but a name tag. A silly goal, but something I want to change.
4. Create and order a 16 x 20 collage to show clients at print delivery. I have everything, just need to make it and print it! I hope to do this soon, in 2009 I have one or two more print orders I can tag this onto.

Have a great Christmas and Happy New Year!

Jennifer wrote about The Working Mom vs. the Stay at Home Mom. Which reminded me that I too have been on both sides of this.

I never needed benefits because the military insurance covered everything, so, looking for jobs was pretty easy actually. People liked that I didn’t need insurance so, they offered me part time jobs.

I’ve had a full time job with part time pay or a part time job for most of our marriage. I sold Tupperware and Avon in the 80′s. I also worked part time at Lerner’s. (New York and Company now.)

The oldest was about 3 when I was hired at a bank in upstate NY. I was VERY excited to have a job, a career maybe. Being military you need to have skills that you can take with you when you move every 3-4 years. Banking, nursing, teaching are really popular with military families. Then, I found out I finally was pregnant with our youngest. We had been trying for years. Hm. This was a hard thing to do. I continued working and then when I had her, we used a sitter to fill in the times that hubby wasn’t able to watch her. On shift work it’s pretty set in stone, so there were days that he would watch both of the girls, which was great. I hated dropping them both off at the sitters. She was a friend of a guy that he worked with at the time and we liked her a lot. I always felt that because she was there and older, she would watch out for the youngest, and she did. Once we found out we were moving, I stopped working there and took a small cashier job for a few weeks to make some extra cash. That was in 1991.

I didn’t work outside the home again until 1995 when we moved to Georgia. I again found a job at a financial place. A credit union this time. It was a little easier this time as the girls were older. It was very part time, 3-4 days a week. Nice pay though as they didn’t have to give me any benefits! The youngest was in kindergarten and the oldest was entering 5th grade. If one of them got sick, I was able to leave to pick them up, or  he was. We were really lucky that he had a good job at the base down there. I was learning other aspects of the industry, loans, balancing the ATM, doing things that challenged me to learn. I stopped working there in early 1998 after being a victim of a bank robbery. I then decided that I wouldn’t work in banks or any place that would be a target for a robbery.

In 1999 I landed a job as an office manager at a truck garage. It was great part time hours, 9-1 every day. I really liked the job, it was challenging. I thought I was up for a promotion 18 months later, but, I was fired. They hired someone to replace me when I was at home helping my husband recover from his hernia surgery. It was at that moment in time that I made a promise to myself and to everyone that was in my family: I would never work for anyone but myself again.

In 2001 I started a hosting company with my hubby. We folded it in 2003 after many triumphs and some really bad times. We never did get the money back from our merchant company, it’s gone forever I’m sure. I learned a lot of things about blogs, MySQL, cpanel, everything.

We moved to Northern Virginia in 2004. I was still taking photos and I was asked to take photos for a neighbor’s wedding. He and his wife had about 12 people total including hubby and I and the youngest. That was in 2005. It was okay, I really did not like how the photos turned out. I had a Nikon CoolPix 950 at the time. A digital camera, but a HUGE digital camera.

In 2006, after our cross-country trip, I wanted to try to work again. I had taken some really nice photos on our 3 week journey, it was with our little Sony Cybershot, not even a good DSLR. The youngest was in high school, the oldest was on her own in Richmond. It was time. I applied for a job at a local, private nursery school. Three year old’s aren’t for me. After three weeks I was done. Plus we found out that she was pregnant with the little girlie, so I couldn’t work at all. She didn’t have the means to get around, doc appts. school, etc.

The little girlie arrived in the Spring of 2007. I took a lot of photos during the 2006-2007 time frame. I went to DC and took photos of everything. Most of them are still in my portfolio.

I bought my first real DSLR in June 2007. It was time for that! I loved it and still use that camera to this day. I took a million photos of everything. Of course of  the baby girlie, but other things as well. I worked for a sports photography business for a season in 2007.  It was so helpful in what I was doing, I still remember things that I learned there in that short time.

I’ve always taken photos. Ask anyone in  my family or any of my friends. I started really young with a camera in my hand, I remember being 6 or 7 and my grandpa helping me figure it out. He took wonderful photos. People, places, things. You name it, he shot it. He was a hobbyist though. I always thought that if he had lived in a different era, he would have changed careers. I like to think that he not only started me off, that he’s watching me now from up above.

We moved to Southern Maryland in January 2008 and I’ve been snapping photos ever since. I had just a few clients last year, this year more though. I’m getting repeat clients and new ones. Hopefully in 10 years I can look back at this entry and say that I have grown with clients consistently since 2008.

I totally agree with Jennifer when she states this:

I read on someone’s blog about how the blogger was a working mom and absolutely hated it. If you’re in that boat, then you need to step back and evaluate what can you do to make changes to live a life that you can tolerate. It won’t ever be perfect – but if you absolutely hate it, then this does not sound like a decision that is “right for you and your family”. You may not have the option of being a stay at home mom, or it may require changes in your life that you’re not willing to make. But that’s the trade off I guess.

Life is full of compromises and there are things you aren’t going to like doing. I’m 44, I like what I’m doing, right now. Hopefully in 10 years or even 5 years I can say that I liked this time period in my life. LIFE IS TOO SHORT. Seriously. Look at what you want to do, what you want to be, and do it. Life passes by in an instant and if you aren’t happy with where you are right now, change it. Have the guts, the nerve, to change it.