This is my tenth year-in-review post. My first came in 2012, which was certainly a good year to start: it was the year we were married, the official beginning of the life of our family. Each year together since has held its share of joys and pleasures, sadness and disappointments. Looking back in intentional ways – marking the time with reflections like these – has helped me to take what I can from each year, to appreciate what it had to offer, to learn what it had to give, to acknowledge the hard and appreciate the good.
I read recently that our lives are what we give our attention to. These posts are my way of giving a little attention to the year of my life I just lived. Thank you, as always, for indulging me!
We kicked off the year by celebrating our best six year old with a day trip to the beach – it’s not often we get to celebrate a January birthday with 70-degree weather! Annie tried solid food for the first time, we got enough snow to go sledding, and we persevered through ridiculously-low temps for an outside Articles Club in the midst of another COVID wave. On the blog, I shared my 2022 goals and reading list as well as our top ten meals of 2021, thanks to my record-keeping neuroses.
In February, the COVID wave crested in our house when our littlest brought it home from daycare and we all fell one by one. Thankfully, our cases were mild, but we suffered through the awful cascade all working parents know well, of sick kids and sick parents, and days missed from school and work. We did manage to make some cute valentines in the midst of it, though :)
March saw our triumphant return to Duke Gardens after COVID restrictions were lifted, and that visit was emblematic of spring springing as a whole: my camera roll shows lots of time outside this month! March was also the month I surprised John with tickets to see Nate Bargatze, a date night that tickled me to no end. On the blog, I shared about our first weekend away as a family of five (to Black Mountain!) and the other names we considered for our children (I think this post might win for most comments of the year!).
April was a delight, and many of its pleasures were captured in our first filming of Annie in April: strawberry picking, a return to Jekyll Island for spring break, seeing our beloved babysitter in her senior year musical, a spring flower party, celebrating Easter with our church. John also buzzed his hair for the first time and Cultivate’s acquisition talks began, both momentous in their own way.
In May we finally made good on two Christmas gifts: an overnight girls’ trip to the American Girl store in Charlotte, and a train trip to Durham! Annie was dedicated at our church, Shep had his first playdate ever with his very best friend, and – in less exciting news – the drive belt on our Telluride failed, kicking off a six-week period without our family car. On the blog, I shared six favorite parts of my evening routine.
Off to the mountains! We celebrated ten years of camping with the Rays in glamping style, a highlight of the year. I got to volunteer at June’s field day before wrapping up her first year (and beginning her first summer) of elementary school. Kristin and I assisted Lisa for the day at her big Maylis shoot and I spoke about “everyday magic” to a hundred local moms. We celebrated Juneteenth with a visit to Hammocks Beach State Park, a local treasure that had been on our NC bucket list since we moved here. And on the last day of the month, Cultivate officially changed hands.
July was bookended with trips: first to Michigan, with 33 Thomas family members and Annie’s first birthday, and then to Maine, with a Sunday service led by me. Both were as golden as always (it was nearly impossible to narrow down these photos). In between, we tucked in birthday peach cobbler for John, a camping-themed birthday party for Shep, and Cultivate’s biggest photo shoot of the year. Unsurprisingly with all that action, I eked out just two blog posts in addition to my monthly goals, including my mid-year goals review.
With the tail end of our trip to Maine and a week in Connecticut, my camera roll was almost entirely blue and green in August. Looking back on the photos, I can’t believe I didn’t name the week in Maine one of my favorite trips of the year – it was packed with such sweet memories. And Connecticut, with a visit to my family’s farm and a particularly memorable date night in Mystic, wasn’t far behind. We also bought paddle boards and took them for their inaugural spin before we celebrated the first day of school. In the midst of it all, this was by far my most challenging month at work as we weathered some of the rockiest aftermath of the acquisition. (I also transitioned to part-time, which was unrelated.)
On the blog, I shared my first year baby gear picks after three kids (I promise part two is coming in 2023!).
September! Work finally kicked off on our kitchen refresh (in the works since January!); the first phase happened while John and I were in Mexico (notBermuda). Our tenth-anniversary trip was a forever memory we are so grateful for. Around the edges, we moved things in and out of our kitchen cabinets and enjoyed a really awesome soccer season for the older kids. On the blog, I wrote about family movie night and how we handled summer as two working parents.
Sickness struck again in October, as June, I, and John fell in succession to the flu. Absolutely brutal. Thankfully, the two littles, who had already gotten their flu shots because of when their well-checks fell, stayed strong! (Let this be a lesson to us all to get our flu shots early and often ;)) On a positive note, our kitchen refresh crossed the finish line (praise!) and our mountain trip to Highlands was a delight. On the blog, I shared everything we read in Articles Club this year as well as part one of my working part-time series.
We celebrated a (chilly!) major milestone for our church in November; this felt like the sweetest cap to our first year in the community. We headed to Virginia for Thanksgiving with the whole Thomas crew for a turkey trot, lots of card games, and cousin time, then snagged our tree on the way home. A few days later, Annie and I spent much of the Duke Chorale Christmas concert outside, since she could not hang in an echo-y chapel :)
I ramped things up on the blog towards the end of the year, sharing parts two and three of my work series (part four was in December) and what to include in a college care package.
December, like much of this year, was full. Honestly, when I detailed month after month for this post, the pace felt somewhat relentless – I had several moments where I had to double-check dates to make sure all that I was describing actually happened in the same month. The most beautiful thing, though? The pace of our life almost never felt relentless in the moment. Usually, it felt rather slow, ordinary, and yes, full. For that, among so many other things, I am grateful.
Friends, I know I’ve said it before, but I am SO excited for what we’ll discuss here in 2023. Thank you for being here, and for sharing so generously with me! It’s one of the delights of my life. Wishing you a healthy, happy, and abundant new year. My 2023 goals are just about ready to share, so I’ll see you soon! :)
I hope you’ve all had wonderful holidays, friends! We are laying low after a stretch of extended family visits, and it has been sweet. I’m down to the wire to squeeze in the two final blog posts of 2022 – this one and tomorrow’s year-in-review – but I wouldn’t miss them. They help me count the fruit from another precious year, and that’s an opportunity I’ll fight for even in the midst of these full, chaotic, slow post-holiday days. I hope they can serve as an opportunity for a little reflection on your own 2022, if you haven’t had a chance for it yet! In the comments, please share a few of your best memories, finds, and favorites from 2022, if you’d like. As always, I can’t wait to hear!
Best adventure, travel, or trip: Our tenth-anniversary trip Mayakoba in Mexico is an obvious frontrunner here, but our Fourth of July week in Michigan was near perfect. We were so happy to be back after a five-year hiatus and to be with so much dear family. Just looking at the photos makes me grin. We also took an unexpected day trip to the North Carolina coast for June’s January birthday since it happened to be 70 degrees, and I feel like it’s a memory we’ll be talking about for years.
Best book: I read 21 books in 2022, a bit lower than my usual, and that included a higher percentage that I was ambivalent about and one I didn’t finish (rare for me!). Still, there were gems: Hunt, Gather, Parent and The Common Rule for nonfiction, and The Evening and the Morning for fiction (with an honorable mention for my favorite read-aloud with June, The Penderwicks!).
Best TV show: The second season of OMITB was as good as the first. (Steve Martin, I will never quit you.) We also thoroughly enjoyed The Mole, a delightful, clever reboot of the early-2000s cult classic. Severanceand Reacher get honorable mentions.
Best movie: After a movie-theater drought, John and I saw Top Gun: Maverick on opening night and it did not disappoint.
Best album, song, or artist: “King of Kings” and “All Glory Be to Christ” struck a chord with me this year in the way the best worship songs do. The Arcade Fire is inextricably twined into the narrative of John’s and my relationship (Funeral was the exclusive soundtrack of our first months of dating); their newest album We was on repeat after its May debut. And “Dance With Me Tonight” is just a fun bop that was my pick-me-up song this year.
Best new podcast listen, newsletter subscribe, or blog follow: I subscribed to Laura Wifler’s newsletter earlier this year, and it’s been a once-a-month delight ever since. Laura is the co-host of the Risen Motherhood podcast, and her newsletter is meaty and packed with things she’s learning about life and faith, book recommendations, and parenting insights. I also rediscovered Erin Loechner’s blog, Design for Mankind, and though she only posts a few times a year, it is worth it to me to subscribe to make sure they land in my inbox. Her writing is elegant, poignant, searing. I love it.
Best kiddo milestone: Annie walking and “talking” has been a delight. She loves to move purposefully around the house, her hands clasped behind her back, making earnest burbles and gestures to each of us, and it does not fail to crack me up.
Best faith grower: This one is probably obvious, but joining our church. It has stretched and grown and deepened our faith even as it has renewed our faith in the local institution of the church.
Best beauty purchase: I mix one drop of these tanning drops into my moisturizer every other night and love how they even out my skin (which can sometimes run a tad too rosy) without makeup.
Best friend memory: I’ll always remember our backyard “spring party” as a sweet turning point in our friendship with two dear preschool-friend families. There’s just something about inviting people into your space that deepens relationship.
Best new tradition: This is a nascent tradition, but I can already tell it has legs: Saturday board game nights. Now that family movie night is well established on Friday nights, we thought it might be time to introduce a second themed family evening. And you know I’ve been waiting for this one! Ocean BINGO has been our most successful game so far when we include our non-reader – the illustrations are beautiful, and it really is fun for everyone to play.
Best habit you created: This isn’t necessarily a new habit, but perhaps a renewed one. I had fallen out of the habit of biking with June to school, but with the start of her first-grade year, we picked it back up and it has been the sweetest bookend to our days. We biked well into November, and look forward to getting back at it once the temps rise a bit!
Favorite blog post written: This post with tips for the fourth trimester is dear to me, because it contains hard-earned wisdom I’ve been grateful to pass on to many friends offline, and am now glad to have it recorded here, too – and while it was fresh. Any time I’m able to capture my love and gratitude for John is a privilege. And this four-part series on working part-time as a mom helped me process a big transition in my life. I’m sure it’s a series I’ll be returning to for years to come.
Best life or mom hack: For years, I’ve used the monthly calendar in my PowerSheets as my sole planner. Our family’s life together is pretty simple, and, combined with my trusty Word to-do list, it got the job done. This fall, however, I’ve started to transfer the contents of each week to CWM’s weekly notepad on Sunday, and it has been so helpful to have more space to see each day’s happenings at a glance and to jot reminders and to dos in one central place as they pop up. I just wish the notepad included full columns for Saturday and Sunday but (spoiler alert!) the next version we print should include them!
Best mama moment: There were so many favorite moments, remarkable in their ordinariness and preciousness, but our girls’ trip to Charlotte and the American Girl store is a very sweet memory. I love spending time with our kids, and love seeing who they are becoming.
Best home improvement: Another obvious winner here: our kitchen refresh, which was a decade in the making and has transformed our entire downstairs. I am beyond grateful and still somewhat in shock that it’s complete. But if I could pick one small detail that has sparked a surprising amount of joy, it would be the wall clock we added in the midst of the renovation. I can see it from anywhere in the main room, and it has smoothed out a pain point I almost didn’t notice: having to reach for my phone whenever I wanted to check the time. Adding the clock has made it so that I can go phone-free more often, which I love.
Best little luxury you’ve enjoyed:Fairlife chocolate milk. John turned us onto it after reading that Katie Ledecky drinks chocolate milk in the cool-down pool after swimming a race, and so naturally we’ve adopted it as our post-Peloton reward of choice. Yes, I’m saying we’re basically the same as Katie Ledecky.
As always, I’m ending the year so grateful for the delights, big and small, that filled our year. I’ll be sharing more in my year-in-review post coming tomorrow, but in the meantime, please do share: what are some of your “bests” from 2022? Can’t wait to hear!
This is the fourth and final post in my working part-time as a mom series! If you need to catch up, start here:
Part One: Background on my work history and some reasons (or not) for shortening my work week Part Two: Why we chose me over my husband, why we chose going part-time over other solutions, and the financial impact Part Three: My role, negotiation, and how I structure my time at work
In the first post, I shared a bit about my intentions for how I would spend my extra time outside of work. I wrote that I did not want to add more tasks to my plate, but that this change was largely about shifting the timing of tasks (from evenings/weekends to the workweek) versus adding new tasks or responsibilities. I also planned to prioritize digital tasks, because they are the most opaque and thus least likely to teach my children something, and tasks that are complicated with the ages of our children.
Almost five months in, I would say I’ve hewed pretty well to these hopes. In looking back over what I’ve accomplished in this season of Fridays (which is easy, because you know I love me some good record keeping), a few things have surprised me:
— I knew that grocery shopping would be a constant every week, but I thought cleaning out my email inbox would be, too. (Not getting to email zero, but just responding to anything that came in in the last few days that needed a response.) That has flat-out not happened at all. I also have yet to work on a blog post on a Friday (!), something I definitely thought would happen.
— I have gone to Trader Joe’s WAY more than I expected, ha. Though I love TJ’s, it’s just far-enough out of the way as to be inconvenient. I would go 2-3 times a year, usually when another errand took me past its cheerful doors. My Friday flexibility, however, combined with John’s discovery of this Instagram account, has me going there far more often. This has been fun on the food front but likely not as fun for our budget or my use of time.
— The category that seems to have expanded the most is social connection – the time I’ve spent with and for friends has exceeded my expectations, even though I planned for it to increase. This has been a joy, but has also required me to adjust my expectations for how my time will be spent and what else I’ll be able to get done.
— I’ve also generally had to adjust my expectations for how much I can get done in six hours. I know – I knew – that six hours is not that long, but I am constantly overestimating my capacity for a given Friday. It feels like I get a lot less done than I do on a six-hour workday, and I think that’s because my work days are extremely efficient – I’m basically just sitting in one place and pounding things out (and I’m also very good after all these years at planning my time blocks and estimating what I’ll be able to accomplish). On Fridays, I’m gathering supplies, driving places, moving around our house. That in-between time adds up!
Shall we take a look at a few representative Fridays? Let’s do it.
An August Friday — An hour of physical therapy — Grocery shopped + unloaded groceries — Stopped by school to drop meds and forms — Visited the Ferguson showroom to look at kitchen lighting — Updated our kitchen plan doc and sent it to Callie — Emailed a copy of my Sunday service to an Islander who had asked for it — Finally purchased the Atlantic subscription I promised my Dad’s for his Father’s Day gift (in my defense, this took longer because I had to call customer service – but a great example of a simple task that I just never seemed to get around to!) — Registered for mother-daughter camp weekend
A September Friday — Played tennis with John (this was a treat!) — Dropped a package at UPS — Unloaded and loaded dishwasher — Met with our cabinet painter to finalize details and sent a follow-up email to our other kitchen contractor — Grocery shopped and unloaded groceries — Changed the sheets on our bed and the kids’ beds — Scheduled various appointments — Picked kids up from an early release day and went to the pool with friends
Another September Friday — Picked up meals at Donovan’s Dish — Delivered a meal to friends with a new baby — Delivered a meal to friends who had just moved into a new house — Eye appointment — Picked up supplies from a coworker — Picked up clothing at the tailors — Dropped a package at UPS — Picked up specialty cat food — Dropped our expired car seat in the Target collection bin — Messaged our community group to plan the food for our next dinner
An October Friday — Went to the book fair at June’s school — Doctor appointment — Brunch with Lisa and Kristin — Picked up a necklace repair — Picked up diapers and a prescription at Target — Grocery shopped and unloaded groceries — Paid credit cards — Photographed and offered several things for sale on our Buy Nothing group — Packed up coats for a coat drive
A November Friday — Dropped car for inspection — Took Annie to a play place with a friend then brought her to school — Trader Joe’s — Made a donation drop off — Grocery shopped and unloaded groceries — Called to ask a question about our dental insurance — Updated my Christmas gift spreadsheet and made some more decisions — Texted our babysitter about upcoming dates — Found a new date for a rescheduled phone call with a friend — Attended Shep’s parent-teacher conference — Met up with a friend from church to walk and chat about an upcoming program
A December Friday — Walked with a neighborhood friend who asked to pick my brain about starting a blog — Caught up on text messages — Met with a friend who’s asked me to edit her new product — Wrote a thank you note — Dropped packages at UPS and USPS — Returned books to the library and picked up holds — Picked up an item from a friend’s house — Trader Joe’s — Grocery shopped and unloaded groceries — Made our end-of-year celebration dinner reservation — Posted my monthly Instagram Stories update — Ordered Yoto cards
Whether you look at these lists and think, I wish my Fridays looked more like that, or you look at them and think, heck no, I’ll keep earning money, thank you, I hope what you take away is a little more appreciation for all that you do to live a thoughtful life and care for others. I have no doubt your own list would be long, too, and that at least some of it is squeezed into less-than-ideal pockets of time.
Friends, thank you for being thoughtful and caring here in this series, and generous and interested, too. It means so much to me. Whatever stage of your career you find yourself in, and whatever plans you have for the future, I hope you took something away from this conversation! Grateful for you. xo
When I started writing this series, I was mainly focused on my reasons for transitioning to part-time work, which were personal, not professional. I was surprised, then (but delighted!), by your many wonderful questions about the work side of this transition, and so it was an easy decision to dive into this angle with an extra post. (We’ll look at how I’m spending my Fridays in the fourth and final post.) Let’s take your questions…
Part One: Background on my work history and some reasons (or not) for shortening my work week Part Two: Why we chose me over my husband to make this change, why we chose going part-time over other solutions, and the financial impact Part Four: What my days off have actually looked like (so far)
Annie’s first visit to the Cultivate office earlier this year
Was your decision influenced by Cultivate’s acquisition?
Those of you who have followed closely may be aware that Cultivate was acquired in June of this year. My decision to go part-time was not in response to the acquisition, but it did put a point on the process. After I went back to work following my maternity leave in late fall 2021, the squeeze at home became more and more apparent. By the spring, I knew going part-time was the right decision, and I was eager to confirm my new schedule before the acquisition closed, knowing that negotiating with a brand-new boss could be far more challenging. The new owners agreed to my hours as part of my signing on to their company despite not having many part-time employees, for which I am grateful.
How did you negotiate this arrangement with your boss?
I remember so clearly the first time I broached the idea of reducing my hours – I was standing in my boss’s kitchen, heating up my lunch :) This was in 2016, when I was pregnant with June, and she had mentioned several times that we should talk about what my maternity leave was going to look like. I was nervous to have the conversation, because I worked for a small company with no clear blueprint for leave – I wasn’t sure where we’d land, and it felt like there was a lot riding on the outcome. I also knew I wanted to ask for a shortened schedule (9-4 versus 9-5) at the same time, and I had NO idea what the response to that request would be.
My boss met my requests so graciously, which should not be a surprise to anyone who knows her. With that first change of hours, my promise was basically that I would continue to produce the same amount of work with five fewer hours by trimming “fat” anywhere I could throughout my days – and that’s pretty much what I did.
When it was time to arrange this most recent transition of my schedule, the situation was very different. I did not feel nervous about approaching my boss – we were both in new places in our lives and in our relationship with each other, and I knew she would immediately support this change, which she did. I also knew that if for some reason my request was turned down, I could walk away and our family would be fine – it wouldn’t be what I wanted, but we were in a very different place financially and in our lives than we were in 2016, and so the outcome did not feel as pressure-filled. What did make me nervous, however, was breaking the news later to the rest of the CWM team, as I worried they might feel I was abandoning them in the midst of the upheaval of the acquisition (they, too, were very gracious).
I recognize that my situation is unique: I’m a key (though not indispensable!) cog with a very niche role in a small business. I had major longevity at the company and had demonstrated long-term loyalty. I work for a business whose purpose is to help customers live out what matters most, and wants that for their employees, too. And most importantly, I had a boss who cared deeply about me as a person and is a woman of great compassion, integrity, and love for God. (I know you’re reading, Lara – what a gift you are to me!)
Is anyone watching the fifth season of The Crown? Towards the end of the first episode, the Queen requests funds for refurbishment of the royal yacht from the Prime Minister. He initially balks at the expense, which prompts a forceful response from Her Majesty: “I hope we can agree that as sovereign, I have made very few requests, let alone demands, in return for the service I have given this country. Perhaps the reason I have held back is in the hope that when I actually do, people don’t just take it seriously, they do as I ask without question.” Wowza.
I’ve talked about this before, but staying at Southern Weddings and Cultivate for as long as I have is not an accident – among other reasons, I hoped my tenure would allow for exactly the flexibility, trust, and latitude it has when I needed it most. Though I would never have spoken with such imperiousness (yipes!), I did recognize a bit of my situation in the Queen :)
What had to change in my role, or what has changed, for this to be possible?
This is an astute question. It’s not possible to go part-time in every role, and even if it is, many roles (and individuals, and company cultures!) are just not suited to it. Though I have worked for the same company my entire life, my role has changed several times over the last decade, and when I look back, I can see the ways I consciously and subconsciously nudged it toward a shape that is suited to part-time hours. Here are a few of those ways:
I am an individual contributor with long-term projects. My main responsibility is devising and writing the content for our printed products (PowerSheets, conversation cards, Reading Journal, etc. – almost everything!). I interface with designers, editors, and occasionally higher-ups, but it’s largely just me at my computer, writing and thinking. I have very few daily deliverables, as most of my projects take several days or weeks to complete. Since the projects are more long-term, I have more choice over how I structure my time each day.
My role is not driven by immediate metrics and generally does not require immediate responses. This is very different than, say, a job in marketing, which has daily data points that might require pivots, changes in strategy, or new initiatives. I also receive almost no email. (Seriously – probably fewer than five emails a month that require responses. I do have Slack to keep up with and chatter in our project management system.) In my Southern Weddings role, by comparison, email was a HUGE part of my job and I responded to (and sent!) hundreds of emails a month.
I have bowed out of managerial responsibilities. Over the years, by choice (and sometimes not by choice!), I have shed my more unpredictable responsibilities – namely leadership and HR roles. This has given me more autonomy and control over my time at work, since I am less buffeted by the needs and whims of other people. It also means I have very few meetings.
And here are a few things I have had to accept to make this work on my end:
I have to look WAY far ahead in our project management system to see what’s coming down the pike for me. I work on big, long-term projects that can’t just be dashed off in a few hours if I didn’t see them coming. With fewer days and hours, I don’t have as much room for error in planning my time.
I live and die by time blocking. At the end of every week, I look ahead at my calendar and in our project management system and block my time in half-hour increments. This is the only way I can be realistic about what I can and cannot accomplish in a week. As I adjust due dates in the project management system, it helps others with expectations, especially since I’m not always available to answer questions. Time blocking also helps me stay on task and avoid distractions during the day, which is always important, but even more so with shorter hours.
I have had to release control. As my hours have shortened, I have had to give up projects to other people. I can’t weigh in on as many decisions. I just don’t have time to have my fingers in all that I’d want to, which can be hard. (But it has been good at the same time!)
I turn off notifications and don’t check Slack (or anything else) outside of my hours. This is counter-cultural in our world and in many workplaces, but it’s a key to actually enjoying the time away from work I have carved out for myself.
I have sacrificed being a star. Though I play a key role and am respected, I am outside the power structure. I’m not a manager, I’m not on the leadership team, my employers know I am not interested in “moving up the ranks,” I have limited hours, I’m not the first one tapped for new opportunities. I don’t think I will ever be the most beloved employee. All of this can be hard, but it’s a trade-off I’m making with open eyes.
How do you structure your six hours on days you work?
I generally block off the first and last half hour as “check in” and “wrap up,” respectively. Because I work shorter hours, there’s usually chatter that I need to catch up on (in Slack, email, and our project management system) that happened while I was out. If a small, last-minute ask comes up, I’ll usually tackle it in those windows, too.
I currently have a one-hour meeting on Mondays, and will occasionally schedule one-off meetings as needed – but other than that, it’s largely up to me how I schedule my time. Depending on deadlines and what I’m working on, I like to have a 2-3 hour block of deeper work – writing a chunk of a longer product or writing curriculum for a class – in the morning, then a break for lunch and a 10-minute walk around the neighborhood with John. In the afternoon, I schedule shorter blocks for blog posts, teaching emails, product descriptions, scripts, and similar tasks. I might use my final wrap-up half hour to finish a task I need a little extra time on, respond to messages, or take care of admin tasks.
I hope this sheds a little light on the other half of this transition! I’d love to hear how our work days are similar or different – it’s always interesting to learn about different experiences than your own!
Part One: Background on my work history and some reasons (or not) for shortening my work week Part Two: Why we chose me over my husband, why we chose going part-time over other solutions, and the financial impact Part Four: What my days off have actually looked like (so far)
