Oh bobbins!

As you can tell, I am having to watch my language these days, as my littlest has this scary habit of tuning into every last word I say and then repeating it back out of the blue a bit later on, generally to an audience! And she’s only just learnt to talk! So that’s why “oh bo***cks” has had to become “oh bobbins”, and even that sounds naughty the way she says it!

Anyway, to cut a long story short, I think I’ve messed up! I asked someone I really respect for business advice … and got it … and now I don’t know what to do with it. I wish I’d spoken to him three months ago, when things could have been changed a lot more easily.  As things stand the design templates are about to wing their way over to the technical developers and a good few people are going to be mightily fed up with me if I start back-tracking now.  And, of course, there’s always the dilemma over who to trust - an expert … or my own gut instinct?! Am I just having a bit of a wobble and really what I need to do is stick to my guns, or is it better to rock the boat with a re-think now rather than being forced to do it later, once the whole thing’s up and running? Oh bobbins, who knows?!

As you can imagine, I didn’t sleep much last night, and ran straight to Starbucks this morning with my trusty notepad, hoping for clarity to come with my coffee! Of course that didn’t happen, but instead I bumped into my favourite Starbucks friend and had a lovely inspirational conversation that set me up for the day. Made me realise that sometimes it’s the simplest things that can make you happy, and when you connect with someone who’s on the same wavelength as you it’s a really good feeling. I need to do it more often. For now, though, it’s back to tearing my hair out!

Enterprising women …

Got invited to a ‘do’ the other night! Not quite sure who invited me, but I thought I might as well go anyway. Where? To the ‘Celebrating Enterprising Women’ event run by Finance South East to celebrate the end of their ‘Funding Enterprising Women’ programme. It started out as one of those fairly horrific scenarios with lots of people milling around the room supposedly ‘networking’, whilst also trying to carry a cup of coffee, a piece of cake, a handbag and a laptop bag! I didn’t know a single soul and didn’t particularly feel like meeting anyone … so spent quite a while studying the various bits of literature on offer! Interestingly enough, I then joined a workshop all about the importance of networking, only to find that most of the other women there felt exactly like me. We all had plenty of ideas as to how networking needs to change in order to become less intimidating and more useful to us, like perhaps, to start with, calling it something different! Maybe we should just have ‘coffee mornings’, rather than networking breakfasts, lunches and dinners? After all, there’s nothing worse than trying to elegantly combine talking and eating! I guess that’s the idea behind Ladies who Latte and the Athena Network’s Cappuccino Connections. Must try them out one of these days, instead of always sloping off to Starbucks by myself!

Having said that, Starbucks is fast becoming my own little sanctuary. Went there with my littlest one yesterday afternoon after a night of no sleep and a day of tantrums, hers and mine. With tear-stained faces we made our way in there, ordered a grande decaf americano for me and a giant chocolate chunk cookie for both of us (or at least, so I thought at the time!) and then collapsed into two big velvet armchairs in a dark and cosy corner. And hallelujah, the day was saved!

I’m out the door …

No, really, I am, in just a couple of minutes! I’m on bathtime bedtime duty tonight, so must be home and switched into “mummy mode” for 6 pm. Which means this is a bit of a rushed one, just to let you know where I’m up to. The truth of the matter is I haven’t got much done today at all. It’s been one of those days when my mind has been jumping from place to place to place, I’ve ignored my ‘To do’ list and spent far too long faffing around trying to order a new mobile phone! Am starting to feel completely out of touch with all this new technology - GPRS, EDGE, 3G, HSDPA … blah blah blah, etc etc. Do I really need it, or am I just a marketeer’s dream?

Perhaps what I should be doing really is practising some of what I’ve preached in my former life as a trainer? Time management - get clear on your priorities, put first things first, don’t procrastinate - JDI! Anyway, tomorrow is another day, so I’m going to start it by doing something pleasant (a coffee in Starbucks) to get myself going and give myself a sense of achievement, and then follow it by doing the task I’m most dreading (finishing off the numbers in my business plan). I’ll let you know how it goes …

Kitchen table dramas!

Well, here I am again, sat at my kitchen table … except it’s not actually mine, it’s a friend’s. She’s been letting me use it so that I can stay out of the way of the nanny and the little ones, for their sake as much as mine. I just kind of knew that work and kids wouldn’t mix, even ‘pretend’ work which is often what this feels like! (And, before you jump in, I do know, from three years’ personal full-time experience of it, that looking after children is harder work than anything else you could ever do … but you know what I mean!) Anyway …

This is it, just me and my laptop, a mobile phone and a fledgling business idea. It’s a lonely old place, really. In fact, the title of this entry is more than a bit tongue in cheek, as I could do with a drama to liven things up. Still, shouldn’t tempt fate and - knowing me - I can always create one if I get too bored! So what am I doing … and how long before I can go to Starbucks (again) for coffee and company?! I’ve been trying to sort out my research questionnaire, which I’m hoping to send out to lots of mums to get some background data to support my plans. I’ll be slightly gutted if people’s replies come back and they don’t tell me what I want to hear, because then all that hard work will just have to go in the bin! I’m offering to donate money to charity for every completed questionnaire I get back, so fingers crossed that’ll motivate everyone to help out. I did sensibly remember to say ’subject to a maximum donation of …’ just in case the whole thing got out of hand and ended up as its own viral marketing campaign. Talking of which … (but I’ll have to come back to that as the coffee urge has just got the better of me!) See you later!