Back to Life, Back to Reality

Image Credit: FreeImages.co.uk

For the past five years, I've often felt like I'm the printer from "Office Space" - all jammed up and occasionally beat on in an open field. I let life overwhelm me. Pure and simple. Five years is too long to feel that way.

I was sad and bitter to go through pregnancy loss...and the loss of my father. I was gravely disappointed over the results of the 2008 Presidential election. I was beyond angry at the ordeal my husband went through with his former agency. I was beaten down after going through health issue after health issue. I was discouraged over feeling like my freelancing was constantly taking three steps forward and two steps back and not achieving the numbers I wanted. And I was damned exhausted balancing a full-time job, freelancing, starting up a media/publishing company, supporting my husband's wacky schedule, trying to be the best mom possible and trying to get healthier in the meantime.

And so, I shut down for awhile. I stopped blogging. Dribs and drabs for a year or so and then nothing. I posted to friends on FB and Twitter, but nothing longer. I avoided things I didn't want to deal with at all costs. I lost my nerve for taking risks and became afraid of simple things, such as getting on an airplane or even going down a bounce-house slide. I was *not* a great wife or mom.

Earlier this year, I started turning that around. First things first, I quit my job. If a decade of building wasn't enough to make my freelance career sustain, nothing would be. At that point, I got to enjoy more work/life balance. I've been vigorously tackling health issues; by the start of next month, I'll have had 5 surgeries in 21 months...plus, I've been dealing with squaring away a few other health issues. I'm working damn hard to be a better wife and mom. I'm busting my butt getting the media/publishing company into the zone of recurring monthly profits with my business partner. I finished my first novel and am going through edits I got back, polishing it up, before it gets published. I'm freelancing whenever I can and my health allows.

And now, I'm getting back to blogging. I've missed it. Terribly. I own several blogs that are all mine and contribute to several others. Slowly but surely, I'm working on getting back up to speed on all of them.

So...what will I focus on here at Breakfast at Tiffany's? Well, I'm going to drop writing about NASCAR. I'm not a sportscaster, and although I've enjoyed several opportunities to write on the sport for other sites and may do so again in the future, I'm retiring that topic here. I'm going to work on my "Tiffany Takes On" column, tackling stupidity in the news, one story at a time. I'm going to gently sneak back into political blogging - thoughts, not rants. I'll have personal posts now and again. I'll share what I'm up to with writing - freelancing, non-fiction and fiction. And I might even tiptoe into a podcast or two.

It's going to be a process, not a one day victory. I might have fits and starts for awhile. But I hope you come with me! My stats tell me that quite a few people still follow this blog by feed and others through Google and I hope you'll stick with me. I've missed you!

I'm Baaaa-aaack!

Have you missed me, dear readers?

I have missed you! And boy, what a long 5 months it has been since we last conversed!

The highlights:
~Went on maternity leave early because of preterm labor
~Had a baby - Jeffrey Brent, 7/19/10, 7 lbs 8 oz
~Incorporated nephew and niece into household - nephew for a few months, niece for the summer
~Cate went to day camp 1/2 days, 2 days a week
~Cate started preschool (today) full days, 2 days a week
~Husband got a new job

And I'm sure there is more that I'm missing! But I'm back to blogging now (you'll remember that I took a similar hiatus both last summer and following Cate's birth) and hope to reconnect with many of my Blogging Buddies!

A taste of what's coming soon...

Breakfast at Tiffany's:
~Elections are coming, and I have opinions on races for local offices, state-level positions, and candidates for the US Congress. Stay tuned!
~A return to Tuesday Travels...I have many more tales to tell!

Zero to Mom:
~Terrible Two's (which actually start on the day after first birthdays)
~Sibling Interactions (Cate thinks Bubby's a doll she should be allowed to tote around all by her not-so-big girl self)
~Parenting other people's kids (short niece-and-nephew visits are fun; longer stays can be tricky to navigate)

How to Have a Baby:
~Differences between pregnancies
~HTHAB with 5 doctors or more (when it rains, it pours...)
~Jeffrey's birth story

...And more! So happy Tuesday to all, and I'll be back soon to restart my blogging adventures!

(Simul-posted to B@T, ZTM and HTHAB)

New Year, New Plans!

Howdy!

Welcome to 2010 - and I'll bet I'm not alone in saying "Thank GOD" it's a new year!

For a variety of reasons (maternity leave early in the year, family/employment drama later in the year), I was an inconsistent blogger here and at my other sites in 2009.  I hate that!  I love blogging, because I love writing AND I love the social aspect of connecting with my readers and with other bloggers.

So I'm excited for this year and for new goals and objectives and a new chance to get back to blogging regularly.

 Because I thrive on structure, I'm going to be focusing on a few main points for posts this year.

1. Travel - I love sharing these stories, quips and tips with you, and have a list of a TON more to work on - these kick back off tomorrow.
2. Writing - this is going to be a fairly unbounded area.  It will include talking about my goals as a writer, talking about the mechanics of being a writer, and occasionally sharing some of my writing.
3. Current Events - this is what I've traditionally called "Tiffany Takes On."  I'm not going to bore you with my thoughts on everything going on in the world, but when something fires me up - and so often, it does - I'll be here to share it!

I've discovered and am LOVING "Blogger in Draft" so you might also see a few design things here that are different.  If I use a "Blogger in Draft" tool that is not yet available in "Blogger Beta," I'll try to highlight it.

Happy 2010, and looking forward to reconnecting with ya'll in the blogosphere!

Back from Hiatus

Hi, folks!

Well, things are still crazy. But...I guess they always will be. So rather than wallowing in that, time to refocus on the good parts of life! I will probably not be posting a ton over the next couple months, but the goal is to get ramped back up to more regular posting by the holidays.

Thanks for your patience and for continuing to visit me here at Breakfast at Tiffany's!

On Hiatus

Hi, folks!

Life is a bit crazy right now. I know, I know, that's always been my complaint. But right now, it's just...well...in overdrive. If you live in the DFW area, you've probably already heard some of the hoopla around the Rainbow Lounge. Well, that nonsense has overtaken my life. To read a GREAT account that fires back at the hysteria, check out Restoring Reason.

I'm going to take a bit of a break from blogging for the next month or two, until life in general calms down. I may put up a post here or there, but otherwise, see you back here at Breakfast at Tiffany's early this fall!

Love,

Tiffany

New Design

Voila!

My new design is implemented! After almost a year of the old design, I was thoroughly tired of it. I was actually looking for a new design for my How to Have a Baby blog when I stumbled over this theme...and I just love it, love it, love it!

I've tweaked the crap out of it, but now I think it's where I want it to be. What do ya'll think?

And...any RSS experts out there? I need your help! I want to somehow stream the most recent headlines from some of my other blogs in my sidebar...but I don't want to list out in separate widgets per blog like I did before. And I hate the Feedburner widgets. Any suggestions? I've played with this for like 2 hours tonight and I'm throwing in the towel for now. Leave me a comment if you can help!

Have You Missed Me?

Howdy, dear readers!

I've missed you all terribly, but once I decided that my work maternity leave needed to extend to my blogs, I was determined to stick it through.

So why did I go cold turkey on blogging for 3.5 months? That's easy. Because I needed and wanted to spend as much attention on baby girl as I could, both while I was still away from my full-time job on maternity leave, and also during the first few weeks that I learned to balance my new schedule once I returned to work.

And let me tell ya...it's been tough! The kiddo definitely keeps me on my toes. That...and she doesn't sleep. Seriously. Her limit is 3 hours. She slept for 5 hours once, about a month ago, and I actually woke her up because I was frightened that something was wrong...since she'd never slept so long before! She's doing absolutely wonderfully well. Growing like a weed! And, of course, is the most beautiful/smart/sweet/lovable child ever born.

Balancing work and baby is definitely a challenge. I am going to start referring to myself as a semi-single parent. The great news about my husband and I working opposite shifts is that the baby doesn't have to go to daycare. The bad news about my husband and I working opposite shifts is that when we're home with the baby, we're almost always home alone with the baby...as in, no back up if I'm trying to work on writing and the kiddo starts fussing...and keeps fussing for the rest of the night. And then during the one day a week that we're actually home together, I feel guilty wanting to work on writing...since it's our only day when the 3 of us have significant time together. So I'm still learning to balance. More on that later, over at 0 to Mom.

I read a ton of books while on maternity leave - about the only thing I could really accomplish during the kiddo's 10 minute naps. (No, I'm not kidding. During the day, her naps typically only last 10-20 minutes.) The book blog, unfortunately, is behind by 30 books right now. ACK! So, until I get up-to-date, mosey on over to Read and Release and check out my old reviews (there's a ton of them!) and I'll let you know when the new ones are up.

We've been asked about a million times so far when we'll be having more kids...and although the answer to that is "not yet," I will be continuing to writing about the TTC journey over at How to Have a Baby. Even after 3 months on hiatus, that blog has enormous search engine popularity for phrasing related to family planning and so I will be continuing to post both on my own experience as well as general factoid-ish articles. And speaking of family planning, please tell me that while I've been on hiatus, some stupid unemployed and unmarried woman didn't actually have in vitro and add 8 babies to her family that already had 6 kids. I guess I'll save that rant for another post.

On the "keeping my sanity" front, I have finally begun the process of truly dealing with my father's death. I simply couldn't begin dealing with it in the last 8 weeks of my pregnancy. And then once the baby was here and wasn't well...and when I got sick (learn all about my mastitis in a post later this week at HTHAB)...and then when my in-laws were here for 3 weeks...and then when I was down after having all 4 wisdom teeth out...and then when more family was here throughout Christmas...and then when I first went back to work...

Basically, I completely comparmentalized my life for about 6 months just to keep my head glued on. On an interesting note, one of the ways that I've chosen to deal with Dad's death is to make him the focus of the speech I've recently used to win club and area level competitions in Toastmasters. It's not a sob-story speech - don't worry, I don't do that. But it deals with the topic of sharing memories - learning more about your friends and family through their special memories, and sharing your own remembrances with others. I only briefly mention his Alzheimer's-related memory loss, but instead choose to honor him by sharing one of my favorite memories in the speech. I've submitted a volunteer profile to get more involved in the local chapter of the Alzheimer's Association this year, as a part of their speaker's bureau as well as in helping to plan the DFW area's 6 memory walks later in 2009. I also successfully nominated the Alzheimer's Association to be the recipient of donations during one of 12 monthly dress-down days at my company. Miss you, Daddy.

And...that's the update in a nutshell from my world! I look forward to catching back up with all of you, my dear readers, over the next few weeks as I ramp back up on blogging both at Breakfast at Tiffany's as well as my other blogs! In addition...I'll be announcing two new blogs where you can check me out shortly! One is a cookbook blog that I'm working on with my husband and his aunt, and another is the long-awaited Obama blog! Stay tuned!

Tiffany

(simultaneously posted to 0toMom, Breakfast at Tiffany's and How to Have a Baby.)

Back to Blogging!

Well, not really! Just wanted to let you know to visit How to Have a Baby and 0 to Mom to get the latest on our new addition!

I'll be back here to post my 2nd Presidential Debate Wrap Up as well as over at Read and Release to post three new book reviews (one of those books read entirely while in the hospital!) very soon!!

She's Got the Look

So, uh, I'm working on another redesign here. And at How to Have a Baby.

Yeah, I know, I just did that in May.

But it's not going to be major - I promise. I'd originally chosen this new template because I wanted to attempt to increase my ad space and see if I could tweak my blog to make a few more pennies than I already had been. Well...those cute little ads on the side just aren't getting many hits. My adsense modules have actually started getting a lot more attention - my revenue there has picked up considerably at both this blog and HTHAB, according to my channels on Google. But anything non-Google just doesn't seem to have a draw. That's ok. I get it. I ignore ads unless they really grab me, too. So those little 125 x 125 blocks are going bye bye. Why bother annoying you with them when they're not doing any of us a lick of good?

I may play with ad schemes here and at HTHAB in the future, but for now, Google it is - with a bit of Amazon thrown in occasionally, and especially over at the book blog. For now, I'm simply pleased that my traffic here has picked up significantly - some before I joined EntreCard, and a whole lot in the week since.

As far as monetization, I'll stick with being more agressive on the sites I'm about to launch that are not personal in nature. Those are the kind of sites where I've made decent money in the past, so if it ain't broke...

Thanks for indulging my sidebars while it lasted. In the future, you'll instead see widgets like "Recent Comments" and "Recent EntreCard Droppers" and such. Should make for much faster page load time as well.

Any suggestions/feedback/thoughts?

Tiffany

New Weekly Feature!

Howdy, folks!

After much brainstorming and planning...and a few frustrating experiences that spurred the idea, I'd like to announce a new weekly feature coming to Breakfast at Tiffany's, beginning next Tuesday and running indefinitely into the future.

Called "Tuesday Travel Tips", it will feature my advice (born largely of my frustration) to those less bright individuals around us who get on planes, stay at hotels and rent cars. I'm going for a humorous tone, here, but am hoping that the little snippets I publish every week may help just one person, who can then stop screwing up and pissing me off! :-)

Hubby helped with the brainstorming and I believe we've got 30 topics so far, so this should continue for quite some time into the future. I'm going to "cheat" and pre-write many of the posts and just future date them, so you can reliably count on seeing these weekly posts at the same time each Tuesday.

And if ya'll have any funny travel observations to share - or questions to ask on protocol - just pop 'em over to me in the comments section of any related blog post, and I'll work them in!

Here's a preview of some items to be discussed:

-Water is a liquid, too
-Overhead bins are not expandable
-Flight Attendants: not your personal servant

Ok, so those are all related to flying, but I promise that there are some hotel and rental car ones thrown in, too. I just happen to know flying best!

Hope you all come back weekly to read Tuesday Travel Tips!

BIG ANNOUNCEMENT

Good Monday Afternoon, everyone!

As looooooooooooong promised, Breakfast at Tiffany's has a BIG ANNOUNCEMENT!

I think I've been hinting around at this BIG ANNOUNCEMENT for over a month now.

I've known about it for far longer than that.

So if I haven't totally driven you crazy yet...HERE GOES:

My husband, Chris, and I are very pleased to announce that we are expecting an addition to our family!

A little girl, to be named Catherine Elizabeth, is due on or around October 25th, 2008.

Our first child, we're crazy-mad in love with her already! She is, of course, the best little baby ever conceived and we can't wait until she gets here this fall.

For the past year, I have maintained another blog dedicated to the not-always-easy journey of having a baby. Called, simply, How to Have a Baby, it chronicles our two-plus year journey from when we got married until today. Because of the sensitive nature of the blog's topic, I have maintained it semi-anonymously, referring to myself only as "Future Mommy". I finally told the (mostly-female) readers of that blog my first name only a couple months ago.

If you are interested, please go visit. Be warned, however, that there is very frank language used there - there is also a disclaimer on that page. More recent posts - those from mid-February to-date - are not quite as sensitive and focus more on the baby that is to be. If you dig in the archives, be warned that I've lost all semblance of shame - so if you don't want to know personal details, simply don't read!

I've added a feed to the right side of this blog and you'll be able to see (and visit, if you so wish) the latest postings as they come out.

Yay for Baby!

I fixed the fix...

So I implemented a "fix" on my blog over a week ago so the sidebars would display correctly...

Totally didn't notice that my fix only made it worse!

The fix is fixed.

Phew!

(If you have Firefox, you likely never saw the problem...IE people probably hate me.)

Getting There...

The new code is primarily installed...and the new system of how I'm displaying ads (even writers with full-time jobs could sure use some extra gas money!) is pretty well settled into place.

There is one big old problem, though, and it's that my dang blog roll was eaten during the conversion.

Now, luckily, I have EVERYONE from that blog roll listed under my Google reader.

Unluckily, it's 2:13 AM and I've been playing with this now for like 4 hours and I need sleep!

So...still to come...

1. The NEW AND IMPROVED blog roll
2. The game plan for my new feature, The Breakfast Nook
3. This major announcement I've been hinting around at for weeks now.

Stay tuned!

Pardon the dust....

I'm gonna do it! I swear, I'm gonna do it!

Ok, relax, folks. Just wanted to post a little warning that I'm actually going to be loading the code for my new blog design this evening, so if things get a little wonky around here for awhile, you'll know why!

Come back soon!

Blog Revamp - PART 1

I've successfully finished part one of my BIG BLOG REVAMP!

All posts from Tiffany Takes On... have been successfully transferred over to this blog, as well as related comments. YAHOO!

If you haven't kept up on my rantings, read them here!

Next step - upload new template.

I gave my chosen new template a try-out tonight on a test blog, and it works beautifully - I think you're going to love it! I'll have it uploaded over the weekend and ready to roll...yahoo!

Stay tuned...much more to come.

And as for Linkies...

Yes, the linkies are coming back!

I'm realizing that it's much harder to return visits when I simply have people comment instead of leaving a Linkie AND commenting.

WHY is it so much harder, you ask? Well, quite simply, a lot of people have more than one blog - as do I - and so figuring out which one to go to can be time consuming, and then halfway along the way, I usually find that I love one of their other blogs as well, and so I read through that for half an hour, and then finally make my way back to where I was headed in the first place...or I'll get distracted and follow another link and just never get there and...

Are ya getting the point? Not that I don't want to visit each and every blog maintained by each and every kind person who comes to visit me here, but ye Gods - it can get to be a full time job!!

Starting Thursday, the Linkies will return and I'll consider my non-Linkie experiment that resulted in laziness from not wanting to go to another web site in lieu of simply posting my MeMe a loss. All hail LINKIES!!

Tiffany

Changes, They Are A-Comin'

To the site, I mean!

I've decided that I'm completely bored with the look of my blog, so over the next few days, I'm going to be working to change that. Want a sneak peek on what may be coming? Here's what I'm contemplating!

• Total Layout Change. It's blah-blah boring right now, isn't it? I need some pizzazz!
• Header/Banner Change. I'm kind of a fraud according to my own banner. Let's face it. This isn't my writing blog. It's a blog where I post random thoughts, occasionally a product or site review that I'm commissioned to work on, lots of MeMes...and oh, yeah, the occasional snippet of my writing. So yeah, while it was meant to be exclusively about my writing, it's gone pretty far beyond. And somehow missed the theme of fiction along the way!
• Fiction. Hey, I knew I started this site for a reason! In the future, I'll be posting more snippets of my writing for you, dear readers, to give me your feedback on. Some short stories and some excerpts from my manuscripts in progress.
• Theme. Yeah, I call this place Breakfast at Tiffany's, as a play on my name and my passion for both the book and movie Breakfast at Tiffany's. But other than splashing a picture of Audrey Hepburn up, I've done zip, nada, nothing with that theme. Shame on me! I'm working on creating a weekly, or potentially bi-weekly feature that's actually a play on the theme. Stay tuned!
• This whole columns thing... I don't like it either. Two just ain't cutting it. So I'm going to three. I'm actively in the hunt for a new template that mimics the layout I've got pictured in my mind. (Did you know that at one time I was a Layout Editor?) So why three? Well, let's face it. I've monetized my blog. I'm trying to make pennies wherever I can. Have you seen the rising costs of gas and food? So even though that's all I'm making right now - pennies - I'm working on improving that. I once ran several moderately successful websites that pulled in around $50 bucks a month each in advertising. Not a lot, but some cash. I gave it up because I just didn't keep up with it and thought that I'd rather focus my efforts on blogging instead of HTML-ing. I now realize the error of my ways - I should have done both. (And in an effort to do so, I've purchased a few new domains and will be making them into monetized sites with specific niches. More on that later.) In any case, going to three columns is a boon to both me, the person hoping to make a bit more money, and you, the reader who may not want to see my ads. I'll be "segregating" all of my ads to one of the columns...so as you're scrolling down, you can quite easily let your eyes ignore a portion of the site, instead of having to scroll through ads to get to other sidebar widgets or information. And hey, if you happen to see an ad you like, go for it! :-)
• Two become one. A few months ago, I created another blog called "Tiffany Takes On." It is basically my rant blog. I see a news article that gets my feathers in a flair and write my reaction to it. Ok, in like 8 months I've written 14 posts. I'm not exactly prolific over there. And my site traffic reflects upon that! So as a part of the redesign of this blog, I'll be incorporating those posts in (dated appropriately and with comments copied and pasted as they won't transfer) with the contents here. And in the future, when I feel like ranting, I'll just do it here!
• Cheaper by the dozen. Ok, not really a dozen. But I'll still have other blogs independent of this one. Namely, the book blog, Read and Release: Tiffany's Tomes, will be staying a standalone blog. A couple others I started as a whim, however, will be going away. Not worth my time/effort. Don't worry - you won't miss anything. I never announced them here or put them under my profile, so the few posts I have done on those topics won't be missed by anyone if gone. I will, however, be introducing one of my other blogs to you all. It was actually the first blog I started, back in July of 2007 - 3 months before this blog here. Since then, I've written it quasi-anonymously (using even a different Google login!) and it's on a fairly personal topic. But the readership, interestingly enough, is about 5 times of this site, with no marketing or advertising on my part. Google loves to index that blog, so it gets lots of hits. Anyhow, I think you'll like it, and so it's COMING SOON as a part of a BIG ANNOUNCEMENT. So, other than the four sites I mentioned buying above which will be run entirely independently, I'll be down to three blogs - and that I can handle!

So there you have it! Now it's your turn, readers! What do you think? Any changes to suggest? I'm open to them all - and to your feedback on everything I've written about up above!