Is there anything worse on vacation than opening the Friday on a pill case? I can’t think of one!
Our last day at Lake Winnipesauke was spent on the boat with my sister and her husband who drove over from their home in Maine. We tried to dock in Wolfesboro for lunch again but everyone had the same idea so we headed over to Weirs Beach instead. We’ve been there many times by motorcycle for Laconia Bike Week in June so this was a whole different view! We saw buildings usually blocked by big white vendor tents and the arcades were in full swing. We had lunch at Dox and headed back out to drift on the lake.
It was a great week of boating, hiking, and shopping! The early part of the week was sunny but by Wednesday the smoke from the Canadian fires made its way to us and it was hazy sun. We knew rain was coming on Thursday so we headed to Conway for shopping – but we didn’t think to bring our umbrellas so ended up buying new ones!
Packing up on Saturday and saying goodbye to our little home was sad as I was finally sleeping past 6am but it was time to go. I’m hoping to rent for 10 days next year at the same location.
Our one bedroom cottage among 4 rentals on the property
Today it’s rainy in Connecticut which is perfect weather to get laundry done, open the mail, and get ready for our family’s Fantasy Football draft tonight!
I’m on vacation this week which I’ve told you about in previous posts.
So why not share a picture from today!
Early evening on the water
We had our friends over for a day on the boat and lunch in Wolfeboro. It was still very warm after they left so we went back out to anchor somewhere and spend some time reading.
The smoke from the Canadian fires made the skies very hazy and strange!
It’s beautiful here on Lake Winnipesaukee and we are loving every minute. Isn’t that what vacation is all about?
Looking out from our property on Alton Bay
We spent some time on our boat Sunday anchored up and Monday we boated down to the town dock to go to breakfast 🤗. We also boated up to Wolfeboro and docked to do some shopping. My husband gets nervous docking if it’s a right spot but he did great! I took the pressure off by dropping the push off/hook on pole in the water! 🤣 Luckily it floated towards the boat launch area and some nice young people got their hook and dragged it in.
Yesterday we drove up to Lincoln to go hiking with one of our employees and his wife. We held our own but omg I could barely walk by the time we were done. I have a couple of toes that give me trouble when they’re in shoes for too long (one connected with our rowing machine when I kicked back doing yoga 😫).
We hiked in Franconia Notch, first to the top of Mt Pemigewasset, 3.3 mile round trip.
Came back down, ate our packed lunch, and then heading to the Flume Gorge which is a 2.2 round trip. You need tickets to see it and it was worth every single penny. We had no idea that existed!
Mt Pemigewasset ele. 2,557 Flume Gorge in all its “gorge”ousness
We had dinner at the Woodstock Inn and brewery then headed back to our little cottage.
Today it’s more boating with our hiking friends who are heading back home.
I’m so grateful to be able to take this time and relax!
For the past 25 years, it has been a tightrope walk between work and home because my husband and I run a business together. Some of that balancing act involved the two of us but a lot of it, was my balancing.
Our remodeling company started in our basement, an unfinished, low ceiling space with a concrete floor and painted stone foundation walls. I faced crumbling painted walls at the bottom of the stairs and when my husband came home at 4 p.m. to start his estimates, he faced the oil tank.
Having a fledging business at home made both the work and home balance tough. Being home, I would realize there was laundry to do, or something needed cleaning, so I’d get immersed in that. On the weekends, I’d go to the basement to do/finish the laundry and remember a proposal to type or phone call to make and get caught up in that!
After the basement we moved the office to space above our newly built garage and then almost 20 years in, we purchased office space about 10 minutes away. Each step away, made the physical work/life balance easier. However, I found myself determined to put in as many hours a day as possible because once I left for the day, that was it. My husband put in his 7:30 to 4 and I would try to get in at 8 a.m. every day and usually stayed until 5 our shortly past. Now, mentally it was very taxing knowing there were things I was leaving behind but definitely couldn’t sneak into the office to take care of. I found myself bringing files home but letting them sit there and never touching them all weekend!
As far as my husband and I balancing business and home life together, we made a decision early on that work stayed at work. It hasn’t always been easy but if I was mad at “my boss”, I didn’t want to bring it home to my husband and vice versa! It was sort of weird and definitely an act of compartmentalizing but it has worked for us. After a few years, we also decided that our company wouldn’t physically work on the weekends or go to any estimating appointments. People found that strange but we told them, “everyone needs their weekend”.
My husband has now retired, but is still available when my son, who took his place, needs him. I am still working, but now that we have a very capable Client Manager and I have been able to pass all client work on to her, I am able to come in later, leave earlier and take some time off and I finally feel like there is a good and healthy balance for me both physically and mentally.
In January, I wrote about completing my first puzzle. I “got it for Christmas” in 2022 but it and the roll up pad sat for a year before our Aunt Mindy’s dedication to hers inspired me to start on mine!
After I took that puzzle apart, I looked for another by the same maker, Eeboo, but quickly realized my coffee table was not large enough! Evidently the “A Day In Paris” was the only one and that one just squeaked in.
We went to Amatos Toy and Hobby in Middletown to find a new puzzle (I was armed with the table measurement!), and I bought one by White Mountain called New York New York and is made up of New York State landmarks. There’s a bit of a theme there – puzzles based on places I’ve been. Anyway, the puzzle was a few inches too big but my husband told me he’d get a piece of plywood to cover for the few extra inches needed. Didn’t happen! 😂 I started looking for a coffee table that was wider. Can’t decide on one! 😂
I ended up perusing the puzzle aisle of Walmart with my measurements and found this Buffalo Games and Puzzles Charles Wysocki puzzle called “Sunday Morning Stroll”.
I’ve been at it for about a month now and boy, it’s a tough one! Usually I finish the perimeter first but for this one, I removed and switched pieces constantly because pieces that didn’t go together, seemed to fit! The pieces are smaller than the last and there are so many similar colors!
Colors for the leftColors for the right
Every night as we watch our scheduled show, I listen more than watch it as I pick away at the trees and sky.
I had to think about what emotion I feel the most these days and it would have to be contentment. I usually relate everything to our business and my work there and this is no exception! For many years our remodeling business has been consuming because I oversee the operation of it. Clients, financials, and social media – three jobs that can be full time on their own.
Our office assistant of the last 1-1/2 years has taken over all of our customer service from the start of the project pricing phase, right on through to completion and that has given me the chance to BREATHE and really do what I want to do which is social media. Of course, I still have to do the financials and I can’t say I’m 100% gone from the customer aspect but 95% of it. I can now focus on setting up the path for success for our son as he takes over.
That has also given me the opportunity to leave the office before 5, go in after 8:30, take an afternoon off for some spa time and boy, when you can start thinking about yourself – what a world of difference it makes.
A conversation with a taxi driver in Lake George NY has prompted me to sit down at my piano and start playing again. Sounds strange right? Here’s how it happened….
We needed a ride from Bolton Landing back to our resort cabin on Friday after we dropped our truck and trailer at the marina. We would spend the day on the lake and then take the boat out of the water to head home on Saturday. We were going to wait for the trolley but given the “well, yeah the schedule says 9am, but you never know”, we got from the gatekeeper at the Sagamore Hotel, we decided to pay the $45 one way. Not the end of the world. It is about a 20 mile ride after all. Next time we’ll definitely find a place to stay that either has a launch or is very close to a marina!
So anyway, we got into the cab, me in the front because my husband wouldn’t be able to hear him anyway (left ear has less hearing than the right!). We started talking, “where you from, trolleys, subways, NYC, travel, California, East Bay and finally, Tower of Power! Evidently he lived in California and saw then in their heyday as did my husband.
We started talking music and instruments and he is a guitar player. He and his friend enjoy playing along to music and recording themselves. He asked if we played any instruments and I said I played the piano but after 5 years of lessons I stopped and I haven’t really found myself playing very much.
He talked about how much he enjoyed playing and how the time went by when he did and how relaxing it was. I realized he was absolutely right! When I sat at the piano, working out a song, or even a section, everything else fell away. I didn’t think of anything going on around me.
When we reached our resort, I thanked him for the conversation and told him he inspired me to start playing the piano again. When I took it up in 2017, it was never to become perfect at it, but to enjoy learning and hearing what I could accomplish. I needed to be reminded and I have a Lake George cab driver to thank for that.
I finally got around to reading one of my Real Simple magazines that have been piling up. It was the September 2022 issue. I got halfway through and then it ended up under my instructions for a scarf I’m knitting. I decided to finish it because nothing gets thrown out until I’ve at least glanced through it. And that’s when I found this article…. How to Be Less Busy by Catherine Hong stopped me dead in my tracks.
She started out talking about The Phantom Tollbooth’s Terrible Trivium, who was a “demon of petty tasks and worthless jobs, ogre of wasted effort, and monster of habit”. “if you only do the easy and useless jobs, you’ll never have to worry about the important ones which are so difficult”.
Wow, that is me! When I’m at the office, I always gravitate to the routine, the easy, the things I can do with my eyes closed. “Must get these done FIRST before I can move on to what I REALLY want to do”, I say to myself. “All of this is much more important than those out-of-the-ordinary projects on my list!”
When I’m at home, I’m always tidying up, always organizing (not cleaning!). On weekends I think I have to get everything done before I relax but when I do relax I pop up like a jack in the box because it feels wrong to sit and relax.
Well, what’s the answer? She has eight suggestions. The first is: “examine the root of your devotion to productivity”.
From the article: “Was your relationship with your parents transactional with their love, attention, or rewards doled out based on your performance rather than your inherent worth? Deep down do you think breaks are for wimps and whiners who aren’t as tough as you? Do you think you haven’t earned the right to take a break? Life experience, culture, and families can instill the desire to overachieve. If we understand where the “toxic productivity” comes from, and create a new story for ourselves where we deserve love and rest, it can help us carve out time for ourselves, unapologetically.”
That is A LOT to unpack! I feel some truth to the transactional relationship, not because they were cold or unfeeling parents, but because I was one of three girls all aged within 18 months of each other. There was the older sister, middle sister, and younger sister. Perhaps our best performances did receive the rewards. I was told by my mother when she came through in a medium reading that “You were always like that”. “That” would be my need to keep everyone and everything under control.
The second suggestion is: “Accept that your to-do list will never be done”. THIS IS ME! My to-do list comes and goes but that In Box? I will get a burst of energy at 4:15pm on Friday afternoon and I am just absolutely determined to clear my inbox before I can walk out that door! I get this ridiculous pit in my stomach while I’m trying to get the work done and out. Block out some time for to-dos and some time for leisure. For my office problem, I think it would be to block out time for to-dos and time for those “special projects” I want to get to but am “too busy” to do!
I’m going to work on those two suggestions but will come back and share some of the remaining suggestions.
Thoughts From The Passenger Seat 