Progress

Well, I've actually not been as accountable as I'd hoped these past couple of weeks, but I have, in fact, made much progress...believe it or not! I will say, however, that all the brilliant and important things I planned to do which didn't happen are simply postponed...and that should absolve my guilt a little, right?

First, we've started paying back a student loan of my darling husband's. This is quite an achievement because it is actually a consequence of our new-found accountability, which can only be surmised as adulthood; the same milestone of maturity, mind you, which I have evaded all my life up to this point, and for good reason: paying bills is so unrewarding!

The positive side is that we're conserving and not consuming as much. Even though we have to drive our recycling 10 minutes away, we're actually accumulating twice as much recycling than regular garbage, and that seems pretty significant. We're also reconsidering multiple trips in order to conserve gas, which means less eating out or impulsive shopping trips to places we have no business going...like Target.

Furthermore, staying home has made working on FireWireGems all the more convenient. Last week, in fact, my jewelry had their own proper photo shoot, thanks to the creative collaboration of Olga and her German house guests, Nick and Lina. I now have awesome pictures of my merchandise which are better than I could have hoped for.

I have posted the new photos onto my *new shop* at FireWireGems.Etsy.com, and I am working hard each day to upload them, and new content, onto my website, FireWireGems.com. Please remember: any and all feedback is so much appreciated! I'm pretty anal about the aesthetics and grammar, so it's easy to overlook something on the larger scale, like navigation, or something.

Milla is potty training first thing tomorrow, Lorenzo is doing really well for a tortured pre-teen, and our troublesome Loki is enjoying the lovely weather in the back garden/ fenced-in concrete slab lately.

Finally, my darling husband has made the miracle-of-miracles decision to go back to school! This has been a long time coming, and while I can't take the credit for planting the idea (although I have gently suggested it from time to time, dammit!), I am so happy for him to finally find what he wants in this life, or more importantly, how to achieve it. Maturity strikes again! And more gratitude to Charles for all of his encouraging support, of course!

Perhaps that's what all of this capricious change has been about: growing up. It is my perspective that we are each where we're supposed to be at the exact time in our lives when we're supposed to go through it. Good or bad, up or down. I just want to let other "adulthood-adverse" people know that it might not be so bad, once they find the need to grow up, too.

No one really told me that, and apparently their examples weren't too tempting. Not only that, but I probably would have been a bit better off if I'd not fought it for so long. Who knows? I sure did have fun while it lasted, though. Now if only I can still keep the party going while balancing a checkbook...

Thanks, everyone, for reading, and for your feedback on the website(s)!


The key to growth is the introduction of higher dimensions of consciousness into our awareness.
~ Lao Tsu, Taoist Philosopher