Today’s Holy Hustle Review
Work Hard
BJD Photography
I am so very close to having all of the images edited from the newborn session! Just a handful left! Today was a productive day on that front. I’m not the fastest image editor, perhaps because I’m actually learning a lot about editing still, but I am getting better with each shoot!
I also got my October newsletter created and scheduled to go out tomorrow. It takes longer than one might think to pull together a newsletter…or, at least, it takes me longer…but, I’m convinced that as I do these kinds of tasks more and more, I’ll find ways of getting them completed quicker without loss in quality.
Just Your Average Jo
This blog post is all it looks like I’ll be able to do for the blog today. Ugh. It’s frustrating that, with so much more time available to me (i.e. eight hours in the day that used to be obligated to my job), I still find that I don’t have enough time to do all that I want (or even need) to do! But…that’s part of this 31-day challenge to focus on discovering my holy hustle balance, right? Here’s to tomorrow!
Social Club Sponsor
I am a sponsor for one of the women’s social clubs (think sorority) at the university that used to employ me. It also happens to be the university I graduated from and I was a member of this particular social club while a student. So, I love being able to serve the club as an alum by being a sponsor. As a sponsor, I commit to being present at activities, events and weekly meetings, as needed, as well as mentor the women and help guide the club from behind the scenes.
Last year, my husband and I organized and led a team of women from the club on a mission trip! We went to Honduras to work with a children’s home, kindergarten and after-school program. It was the first year for our club to do a mission trip and the first official mission trip for any of the social clubs on campus to do! We want to do another one this year so this morning, I met with a department on campus that helps with planning mission trips for students, department or organizations on campus.
Later tonight, I will spend a couple of hours at an activity for the club. It’s pledging season!
Budget Manager
My husband and I live on a budget.
Each month, Scott and talk about the upcoming month, before the month begins (usually), and create a budget using YNAB that we will then use to drive our spending habits. As the month progresses, we track all of our spending through YNAB and periodically (i.e. once a week at a minimum) reconcile YNAB with our bank accounts and then come together to touch base on how the budget is looking.
But, I am the financial nerd between the two of us so we agreed that I would be the “budget manager” of the household. This doesn’t mean that I make all of the financial decisions and Scott must obey them. It also doesn’t mean that I make all of the financial decisions and, therefore, Scott has no responsibility (and I’m always the “bad guy” that says “No, it’s not in the budget.”). Rather, it means that I help us stay on top of tracking the spending, sticking to our budget categories and keeping an eye on the day-to-day movement of the budget as much as I can.
Because September kind of got away from us, October snuck up on us and we haven’t actually done the budget for this month yet. Tonight, that changes. After Scott gets home and we eat supper, we’ll take some time to reconcile everything, tie up September’s budget and then plan October’s budget.
Rest Well
Connecting with Others
After my meeting on campus this morning about the upcoming mission trip, I spent my lunch hour (well, two hours…) with the friend whose newborn images I’m in the middle of editing right now. It was great to catch up with her and spend some time admiring the Little Miss.
Holy Hustle?
I think today may be a little heavy on the “work hard” side of things, but that’s ok. Yesterday was probably a little heavy on the rest side. And I don’t expect every day to be balanced…so long as the weeks, months and years are.