next time...

When talking with the average person, they're always surprised when I tell them that I work from home teaching music lessons in the evenings. Inevitably, this question comes up: "Oh, well do you have a day job?". Ok, I guess I can understand why the average person would ask this. The average person works during the day, 9-5 maybe, gets home, makes dinner, watches TV and goes to bed. I get this probably once a week, even from people who know me very well, but I was asked this just yesterday, and found myself extremely internally frustrated with this person as if they expected that "of course I would have a day job, what else on earth could I possibly be doing during the day", and all I could answer was, "no". She even went as far to say: "This is why you have a husband!" I was so insulted that like an idiot, I giggled and said jokingly, "haha yes". What I should have said was one of two things:

1) Oh, well do you have an evening job? Does your husband have a uni-brow?

2) Well, considering I'm a professional musician and own my own business teaching music lessons in the evening after kids are home from school, and take it very seriously, here's a detailed list of things I could be doing at any given point during each day:

• Practicing

• Marking theory assignments

• Arranging songs and pieces for students and ensembles

• Lesson planning

• Teaching clinics

• Researching new books, teaching methods, and instruments

• Scheduling weekly lessons and make up lessons

• Answering emails, making phone calls

• Writing and designing newsletters, contracts, policies, registration forms, websites

• Accounting and budgeting for my own business

• Building clientele and advertising

So, please ask me again if I have a day job. Listen sister, this is my day job, my evening job, my weekend job. I run my business alone, from top to bottom. I don't have employees with specific titles who can take care of specific individual responsibilities, I do the job 6 people would do, I have to be well rounded, I do it all, I'm it. And while you get to leave your work at work and proceed home in the evening to make dinner with your significant other and wind down in front of the TV, this is what I could be doing:

• Teaching back to back music lessons to wonderful children

• Rehearsals for three separate ensembles

• Concerts for three separate ensembles

• See everything else above

And when you're spending weekends prettying up your garden, drinking cocktails on your deck, catching up on your favourite TV shows and surfing the net, spending time with family and friends, this is what I could be doing:

• Wedding Gigs

• See everything else above

And no, I am not complaining. I love my job, I love being responsible for every working aspect of my home business, I love being in control. Because I work for myself, I do manage to find spare time at my own discretion to do the following things which I could be doing at any given point of the day, evening or weekend, which probably gives the average person the impression that I'm sitting on my ass twiddling my thumbs, but be warned, you are wrong:

• Check my personal emails

• Make personal phone calls

• Blog

• Watch TV

• Make all 3 meals of the day + snacks

• Eat, shower and use the toilet

• Spend time with friends and family

• Hang out with my beloved husband

• I could find the time to exercise if I wanted to...

• Read books, play sudoku and the occasional video game

• Run errands
• Grocery Shopping
• House cleaning
• Laundry
• Traveling

Now, let me address the reason I have a husband. We met, we became best friends, we fell in love, we have common interests and goals, we wanted to spend the rest of our beautiful lives together. I consider myself financially independant, I did not marry to be supported. Teaching music lessons and playing professionally is an extremely lucrative career, I probably get paid more per hour than you do if you must know. But it's true, my hours are limited and dependant on the schedule of other people. And it's also true that I can't afford to live in this house on my own. But neither could he, and neither could you. So take that, witch.

If only I could have thought that fast, it would have felt like a gigantic slap in the face so hard she'd turn red from the mere thought of it. I suppose I'd then have to explain that I'm not necessarily exploding exclusively at her. I've just simply reached the breaking point, I refuse to let other people make me think that I don't work hard, and I refuse to let them believe the same. I already feel sorry for the next person to tread on this sensative subject, but may the truth be known. I work equally as hard if not harder than you.

Power to the self-employed!!!!

here i go again...

Well, I've gone and done it. Decided to change the look of the website for our musical duo (change #3) but at least this time it was well warrented. With the closing of my stationery business, I decided it was time to give us a fresh look. One that was all our own and this time I'm making an effort to keep the content super clear and super easy to access.

BUT! Now that I feel like I've got the design down, I'm having such insane severe writers block that I can't even begin to write. My brain is all tangled up with voices telling me to make sure it sounds professional, but don't change the vibe you've got going on, sound fun and accessable without sounding too cute and unprofessional. Speak volumes about what you do because it is that awesome, but don't sound like your bragging for the fear that you'll turn clients away because you'll sound cocky. Don't write too much because people won't read it, but don't write so little that it feels like point form (I hate, point form). Come up with something catchy and original but don't turn it into a cheesefest because you want this to be modern, because you're not just any other stuffy, traditional, classical duo. You can play anything and make it sound like it was meant to be played that way, but don't say that (see above: cocky).

I have no idea where to start, and I'm not in the mood to copy and paste content from our old website...the whole reason I wanted to start fresh and new. Maybe I'll just leave it for another day... *sigh* blah, blah, blah...

am i there yet?

Well...I could start off this post explaining how busy the past month or two or three have been. How I've just started my laundry tonight after over a month of laundry non-doing, how every spare second I seem to have is spent cleaning the house, or working on our deck. How we've had the cable cut for almost a month and I haven't even noticed, how I thought Friday would be my last hectic day before summer started, which was pushed until Saturday, then Sunday, then Monday, then Tuesday...well Wednesday (today) wasn't so bad...but I won't...well I guess I already have, haven't I?

So, let's see what's changed:

1) I've finished my last big stationery project - some gorgeous wedding invites for a friend, though we're not quite done as she still needs some stationery items for her reception, though the order won't be as big or complicated.

2) I've finished teaching regular private lessons until September, though I'll be keeping a few students on throughout the summer.

3) Our deck is slowly coming along - my mom says it all the time, and she's so right - how on earth did we get this far with the limited amount of time Noel and I have to spend on it?? Anyway, I'm hoping it's done in enough time to enjoy it this summer and still have time to replant the grass and make our back yard look healthy.

4) We've been mostly refunded for our shoddy fence job done last November. SUPER! We'll fix the gate and leave the rest to be dealt with next year I think.

5) We now have 2 leaky toilets instead of 1...oh the perils. Thankfully they leak into the bowl and not onto the floor...still though. Waste of water and money.

6) Altra Volta has finished up for the summer too, our last concert was on Sunday and we rocked!

7) I've almost secured times for all my students in the fall, so my schedule is firming up nicely and I've changed my working hours to be done at 6:30 everyday, rather than working till 8:00 some days. This allows my brain to relax in the evening like normal people, and hopefully Noel and I can have dinner together once in a while, and not just at his parents' house!

8) I've found a new dentist who actually cares about my teeth and their future health, not just their health 'right now'. Her name is Dr. Cedergren. She's fabulous.

9) I decided not to take the position on the board for Alberta Winds, which takes a HUGE load off of this summer and in the future, though I'll still be taking care of small marketing tasks.

10) Sweeney Todd music is in, so I've got to go get that picked up soon!!

Hang on a sec...this is suddenly turning into a to-do list...uh oh. Anyway, there are a tonne of things I want to do this summer. I want to paint pictures for our bedroom, develope wedding photos, throw cute Martha Stewart style parties on our new deck when it's done. I want to move the shed and plant a vegetable garden. I want to have lush green healthy grass. I want to clear out the guest room and basement. I want to re-evaluate the possibility of getting a dog this summer, I want to face-lift our front yard that looks like absolute hell right now (though I love the idea of halting the wide-spread use of herbicides). I want some time with my husband to plan our trip while in NY. I want to paint my toe nails, have breakfasts with my husband again. I just want to LIVE! I believed all of this could happen, but so far my everyday life has been filled with these little tasks that I just can't seem to shake!! I think I'm stuck in a timewarp of stress, and I can't remember how to get out!! Imagining having a dog or even babies in the future makes me really panicky right now - I never thought things could be this busy!

Ok, good news then - we're going camping with close friends next weekend, if that doesn't get me out of this rut I don't know what will! And it'll be good to go on more coffee dates with my girlfriends, and continue to plan our July road trip together, and I should take advantage of having my mom work with us on the deck and have mother-daughter conversations with her too.

I guess I believe life will get back to normal, I just thought it would have happened by now and it's freaking me out a little bit. I can't live like this forever!

Well it was good to get bits and pieces of that out, I can't seem to form sentances well enough to say it all outloud. But this was good enough. I've begun to think that I shouldn't be using two different blogs to discuss basically the same things...initially I thought it would be a good idea to not pollute the family blog with junk like this, but maybe it belongs there? Who knows...maybe it will make more sense when I've got a proper head on my shoulders. This post turned out a little more depressing than I meant it to be! Can't wait to feel good again posting about silly little things that make my world go 'round...

♥

lesson learned

I did something really dumb yesterday...well it's sort of a dumb thing that stretches out over the last 12 days or so. A friend of a friend needed some Baptism invitations done for her baby boy...

When he was first born, I helped my friend create baby announcements and shower invitations for her friend, the mom, and I did it for practically free - all that was paid for was the material. My friend was giving them as a gift for her friend, the mom, and I agreed to design and help put them together for free as a gift to my friend. It was SO fun designing with a good friend at my side, we had a blast and I really enjoyed making things for babies (this was my first baby project). This was not the dumb thing I did, this was really really great.

So then almost two weeks ago, the mom contacted me herself to ask about Baptism Invitations. I was thrilled that she liked her announcement and shower invites, and agreed whole heartedly to create Baptism invitations, and was very excited about it!! So excited in fact, that I didn't think it was necessary to have her sign a contract because she was a friend of a friend and was such a sweet person when we spoke over the phone.

We agreed on a price of $3.00 per invitation over the phone, and so I went and designed a few samples for her to choose from. I've been so busy this past week that I spent my spare time designing for her, rather than hanging out with my husband, practicing for a concert that happened last night, or marking my students' theory homework. I was so proud of the work I'd done and couldn't wait to show my client what we could do for her, I emailed JPEGS of 4 different samples and waited for a reply.

Later last night I got a response, which kindly said "thank you for the wonderful samples, but they are costing a little more than I had wanted and have decided to make them myself". No problem...wait, big problem. I had already done all that design work and sent her my samples which could absolutely be copied, or even printed directly from the JPEG onto photo paper or something of the sort to create a very nice invitation, and yes much cheaper than what I was charging. And I didn't have her sign a contract (which I normally do before any sort of work is done) so there was absolutely no obligation for her to hire me - I just didn't think I needed to have her sign one in this situation. But how could these be costing more than she wanted if I landed the dollar right on her $3.00 mark?? What the hell happened?

Sheepishly I had to email her back and tell her that it was fine, good luck on her project - oh and please don't copy my designs. I felt horrible even mentioning the issue of copyright, but I really felt that I had to. I felt totally screwed over, used. I gave her exactly what she asked for, at the price she was asking for. I just don't see the reason for her to cancel her request - coincidentally immediately after I sent the samples her way.

I should have known, but I guess now I really do. And luckily it wasn't a huge project anyways. Lesson learned then. It's just saddening, this was one of my last projects until/if I decide to continue the stationery business - feels like a tainted way to leave it. *sigh*

dancing bear

Although I'm in an incredibly foul mood, I'm thankful that this bear was having a good time. There were numerous songs that this bear dances to, but I didn't feel like making anyone watch a full minute and a half of the same bear moves over and over, so I thought this short clip of an old favourite would do the trick.

Thanks for making my night, bear.

i can see you

I don't know if I'm being paranoid or what, but I swear that every time I look out of my front window there is someone watching. Especially bylaw officers. One was here yesterday in a truck and parked himself a ways down the cul-de-sac...and today there was another one parked right on the main street with a perfectly clear view of my house and of the neighbors house who filed the complaint. As soon as my sister came to pick up her daughter from my care, the bylaw officer left...what were they doing here?? Am I going to get another letter in the mail saying that I can't babysit my own niece in my own home??? Next thing I know I'll be getting complaints about having my own babies living in my own house. My God.

Perhaps I'm starting to let the world revolve around me a little bit, but I really feel as though everyone is out to get me. I'm not allowed to screw up. There's a shimmery translucent layer of very light snow on our sidewalk, and even though you can see the ground through it, I feel like I should go and shovel before someone says something.

I just feel terrible about this whole situation. Like I've done something very very wrong. Even though I haven't. I feel like there shouldn't be this much back-lash (if you can call this back-lash) just for teaching music lessons out of my own home. Why couldn't my damn neighbor just tell me that they'd appreciate it if I didn't allow my students to idle in their cars around her house? Why am I feeling so guilty about all of this? It's eating away at me really quickly, and I meant to give my application in today, but I ran out of time. So now I have a whole extra night to stew and worry about it. I just don't know what I'm going to do with myself, this is insane.

unbelievable

I got the bomb of my lifetime (thus far) dropped on me this past weekend. A neighbor of mine decided that it would be better to complain to the city about running a business out of my home, rather than take it up with me - sweet little me, am I really that unapproachable??

So here I am, thinking life is finally starting to wind down and get itself organized, and I get this terrible letter in the mail on Saturday regarding the complaint, and the city looked into my business and found that I didn't have a permit or a licence to run music lessons out of my home. AHH! I really didn't even know that I had to have one. I've been teaching for almost 10 years, and hadn't thought about applying seriously even once. I thought it was optional, something you did if you wanted to claim your name to your business, or be 100% official. I was fine being unofficial. I get paid, I do my taxes like everyone else. So what's the problem?

Well, apparently, my neighbor doesn't like it when parents wait in their idling cars on main public roads. I can safely assume exactly which neighbor filed the complaint - a parent of a student told me that while she was idling for not even 2 minutes on the blvd, my grumpy neighbor stuck an "IDLE FREE ZONE" sign on her window inside the house. This was just a week or two ago, so things are lining up nicely here for that ridiculous neighbor. But seriously, we've seen them a million times, and although we don't know each other I thought we were all friendly and looked out for each other. So why not just come and talk to me about it? I have the ability to tell my students where to not park, and in fact I did so immediately after receiving the letter, assuming it had to do with extra traffic that I generated. I had NO IDEA that idling cars would become an issue. Wow.

The next step is to apply for a permit and a licence (that's $450 by the way - without even knowing whether it will be approved or not). I'm pretty sure the city will be fine with it, as there are music teachers that teach out of home everywhere in the city. But ultimately, the public gets to decide whether I can keep my business or not. That is the scariest thing I've ever had to deal with. My mind is constantly focused on that issue, and on finding ways to make myself as invisible as possible so that no one realizes they can actually do anything about it. I think that after I've applied, before the city puts a BIG SIGN on my lawn for people to complain about, I'm going to talk to that wretched neighbor (very politely, of course) without accusing them of anything. I'll say that I'm applying for a permit, and that I've made changes to my parking/idling policies, that I'm sorry I ever offended them in any way, and to come to me next time before they go and screw me over.

Please hope with me that it all works out.

The hardest part is feeling like I'm not free to do as I wish in my own home. The second I leave my door I feel like people are watching my every move. I didn't know that people actually had that much time on their hands, to be so fixated on the comings and goings around my own home. Seriously, really? I feel utterly violated, like I have no privacy. I had to take pictures of my own house to give to the city. And how does one neighbor have so much say in what I do and don't do - how does idling cars justify this kind of up-roar?! I'm so confused, lost, alone - even though Noel is SOOO extra caring and supportive about all of this. It's really hard for me to stay positive, I think mostly because it's completely out of my hands once I hand the permit application in (which has taken 4 days for me to do, when it should have been 10 minutes). I think subconsciously I'm trying to avoid handing the application in so that I can't get negative feedback. Even though I know that after March 20th, running my business is going to become illegal...still it's hard to get it done.

So I'm kind of stuck in limbo. I don't know for sure what's going to happen, although I'm really trying very hard to stay positive so that the power of my positive thinking will put things in the right direction. It has to work out, it must. Therefor it will. Right?

the story about the shoe designer

I'm in a much better mood than I was earlier, so this is going to sound a lot less lethal than I planned, which is probably (definitely) a good thing. I was too hungry to do anything else but eat, and my chicken noodle soup did the trick to calm my head and my nerves.

So I'll start the story with some key points. This is not really a story about me and a shoe designer. But to ensure this person maintains a professional reputation and to hopefully preserve a friendship, I felt the need to become a little bit creative. Understanding is not the point here - in fact, I hope you don't - but I need to relieve myself of this incredible frustration.

Prelude
Years ago, I auditioned to become a shoe model for an up and coming shoe designer. This shoe designer was extremely friendly, and incredibly talented. And like most young and new artists, this shoe designer wasn't financially prepared to pay their models for a photo shoot, which in turn, would produce photos of their products for promotional use. The sinker was that one day, when the time was right, this designer would make each of us a shoe all of our own at no charge, for all of the help we had given. I gladly took this role without payment, and enjoyed every moment. It was super fun, met some great people, especially the shoe designer. We quickly became good friends, and I ended up helping this shoe designer in several shoe shows, accepting pennies as payment. I wasn't doing it for the money, I was helping out a friend.

Development
Well, my time came. I found the most amazing outfit, it fit just right, it complimented all of my flaws, it even meshed well with everything else already in my wardrobe (easy for mixing and matching later on). The shoe designer had a feeling that I would be coming across such an outfit, and wasn't surprised when I asked them to design the perfect pair of shoes to wear with this awe-inspiring outfit. The designer was so happy for me, and for no monetary payment, this designer helped me to create a shoe that fit just right, with all the little details I was looking for -albeit, not without a little stress and anxiety. After all, you can't just wear any old pair of shoes when you have the perfect outfit. So I was finally being repaid for my efforts in the beginning stages of this designers' career.

Climax
I wore my designer shoes with such pride, and even amongst the stress, all I had to say about my shoe designer was glorious. I wanted everyone to know about this heavenly shoe maker. I even had a couple friends who paid the designer for a lovely pair of shoes to wear with me. Unfortunately, we hit a bump. It was the kind of bump everyone knew about - a really, really big bump. And when it came time for my friends to wear their shoes, the shoe did not fit!! It was an emergency, I was already wearing my perfect outfit and equally amazing shoes, and so they, being the friends they are, rushed out to buy another pair of shoes that very day, so that they could wear a pair of shoes with me, while I wear my wonderful designer shoes - even though they already paid the shoe designer for their other shoes (the shoes that did not fit). Well, no one noticed that my friends weren't wearing designer shoes that day - collective sigh of relief.

Finale
So, my friends were told that they would be reimbursed by the shoe designer, as the shoes that they had made did not fit. This put me in an slightly awkward position, as I was close friends with the shoe designer. So instead of letting my friends deal with it, I paid them back myself, knowing that the shoe designer would repay me in turn for her unfortunate, accidental mistake. I even returned the shoes to the designer, but the designer forgot their chequebook that day and could not pay me. I trusted the designer fully, and left the ill-fitted shoes in their possession. Well...suddenly the shoe designer, my friend, would not return my phone calls, my emails, my attempts for contact to get together, have coffee. Catch up. To get my money back.

My friends who are in the market for designer shoes bump into this designer frequently, and now I find out that behind my back, this shoe designer is claiming that I wasn't available to help them at their recent shoe shows - even though there was no contact made between this designer and myself asking for my help. Even though I, myself, have been trying to make contact for nearly a year now. I would have loved to help! I even find out that this designer is in contact with a very good friend, and in fact a meeting has been set in 1 week to discuss a custom shoe order. Why is it that my friend can reach her, with no problem whatsoever, and I cannot?

Had I done something terribly wrong? So wrong that it deserves complete severing of all possible contact? Or could it actually be, that this stupid money has come between our friendship? I could care less about the money now, I stopped caring months and months ago. It's silly really. Putting the friendship aside for a moment, it really just comes down to being a business owner and being professional. You can't let your paying clients walk around with shoes that don't fit, then take them back and not return their money. You especially should not cut contact with no rhyme or reason for it. Now what am I supposed to do? Should I bring it up with the shoe designer? Should I tell them that I don't care about the money? That I just want to salvage the caring and giving friendship that we once had? *sigh*

Ok, I'm done now
I'm so happy I got that out - now I don't have to sleep with it - although I'm still bothered by it. I just don't understand how some people can let money stand in the way of friendship (assuming that's what this is about...I have no reason to think otherwise). I reeeeaaaallly cannot even understand this whole, cutting the ties thing. I haven't even heard one word, not one. Don't I deserve just one, for everything I did for this shoe designer prior to them designing my very own shoes? It just drives me nuts. We were friends. Business buddies. Turns out that all it takes to ruin it all, is a couple hundred dollars. That's sad.