March Is the New January?

Nothing like finally feeling you’re ready to start the new year 68 days after it begins!

Well, I knew when I took my new job that I would be in for a really steep learning curve, and I could see see right away how much time it was taking just to keep relatively on top of all the new things.

What I didn’t really expect was how long things would stay that way:

Only one post in November!

Also only one post in February!

Between keeping my head above water at work and doing what I needed to to keep the Bells afloat, there hasn’t been much time for anything else: professional reading, dreaming up new storytimes, watching my blog feeds, or blogging much at all.

Don’t get me wrong–I’m not beating myself up for not being more active–that’s just how things shook out.

But I’ve missed being here so much!

And while everyone kept telling me, “It’s going to get better! Hang in there!” and I pretty much sort of believed them, as of the end of February I have turned two serious corners and now I really do. Whew.

For one thing, I have wrapped up my active leadership of the Bell Awards and have handed things off to two amazingly smart, thoughtful, energetic new co-chairs, and for the second thing, for the first time since we launched the team I have a full staff AND I made it through my first round of year-end performance reviews!

My daily work is already starting to fit back in that 8-hour-a-day box that it used to, and for the first time in I-actually-don’t-know-how-many-years, I am not in charge of a professional committee.

Thank you, Anna, for my new sticky notes!

I still don’t know what a regular blogging schedule will look like, and I don’t know exactly what I’ll be writing about (some of the same stuff, to be sure! But also new things as a result of my new scope), but I can’t wait to figure it out.

Thanks for sticking around!