“SAVOUR THE SEASON YOU’RE IN”

I’m sitting here trying to wrap my head around how it’s already October?!

September flew by and it was filled with a lot of work and not much down time.  I realized the other day if baby girl decided to make her debut early that means I could go into labour in 3 weeks…gulp! *cue panic* We have quite literally done nothing…but that’s all going to change! I remember feeling this same way with J as soon as I crossed over the 30 week mark the nesting urges had kicked in.

So, instead of getting overwhelmed and spiralling down that not so fun rabbit hole – I sat quietly for a little bit to get a bit of perspective.  My mind started to think of all the things I had on the calendar for October and I started to get anxious wondering how to fit it all in…then the word just came to me loud and clear as if from God himself…Simplify.

I’ve simplified a lot of my life and business of the last year so having this come to me so strongly was a little surprising.  My initial reply –  more? how?! And then I started to see where and how I could.  Baby girl is fast approaching so I’m determined to simplify and streamline life for the time being to enjoy these last few weeks as family of 3 and make room for becoming a family of 4.

OCTOBER’S THEME: SIMPLIFY

Let’s dive into to go over September’s goals and see how I did and then I’ll list out my October plans!

SEPTEMBER RECAP (WORK GOALS)

1. Focus – I actually did this pretty well! Every day I set tasks and did my best to focus on them and my goals.
2. Launch New Print Packs – Everything’s shot and ready to go – launching next week! I did push the product shoot back twice because I didn’t have everything I needed (thanks mom/preggo brain) – I’m proud of myself for laughing it off vs. getting down on myself – this is how things are going to go now juggling work / motherhood – sometimes things get pushed back and thats okay! When we did do the shoot during the last week of September it came together beautifully and I’m so excited to launch these babies next week! Oh and since I know you guys love it when I keep it real…totally lost my camera charger and on the day of the shoot it was a race…me vs. my camera battery…I won!
3. Get at least 6 new blog posts up – I did it! Lots of great feedback from you guys too on the ones we got live and glad it’s helping some of you get inspired!

SEPTEMBER RECAP (PERSONAL)

1. Nesting Month – clearly from the intro this didn’t happen to to full degree of what I’d hoped BUT we did make major progress in the studio, the upstairs and family.  It’s already cleared of half the clutter and things are getting back in their place!
2. Night-Time Routine – Didn’t get to the bath but I did make sure to not skip my skincare which helped me feel more awake in the morning and less like a dried lizard in the dessert.
3. Long Walks – The weather hasn’t been the best so we didn’t get to go on as many as I liked but I did walk J to pre-school whenever the weather co-operated and we had lots of fun unplugged family nights playing
4. J’s Baby Book – uhhh moving this one to this month lol

I also wanted to be more consistent – I guess that was the theme of September.  Happy to say I think I did a pretty good job keeping this promise to myself. Feeling back on track in many areas.

Okay now onto my October Goals…

GOALS FOR OCTOBER

WORK

In keeping with the theme of simplifying this month, I sat for a while the other day and thought about where and what I could simplify even more in my business to allow me to be more present during the season of welcoming our daughter into this world.  I learned the hardware with J and I tried to take on too much and got burnt out fast. I don’t want to make that same mistake again.

1. Get my team ready for my Maternity Leave-ish – As I realized how quickly my due date was approaching I also realized I needed to get some things in place so I set up my team for success while I’m being mom.  We’re going to put in place some new systems and make sure everyone knows what they need to be doing.  That way I can check in once a week and see progress without having to do the “planning”…one example is our annual black Friday sale is happening RIGHT when my due date is.  All this content needs to be planned out and schedule this month because I will most likely be in labour when this is happening.  I no longer do fulfillment so that is covered and my assistant Denitta will be able to oversee all the newsletter campaigns and manage my shops’ social while our Graphic Designer preps all the goodies.
2. Actual Launch of The Print Packs – We’re all set and ready to go, my team is working on their part and I’m prepping what I can on my end. So excited to see this go live!
3. Simplify – Looking at all the creative content I wanted to produce this month one thing was really clear – it just wasn’t going to happen and something had to give – so I made the decision to take something off my plate…my monthly creativity challenges.  You guys, this pains me to do but I know it’s best!  They won’t be gone forever just taking a little pause from them until the baby arrives and I can be on track with starting a new one at the beginning of every month not mid-month.  Even though I’m bummed to do this as soon as I admitted it had to be put on pause I felt a sigh of relief.  This is why it’s SO important to pay attention to what’s pulling your focus and causing some anxious feelings – usually they aren’t worth it and have to be put aside temporarily.  I caught myself saying “I have to get this up” and then I remembered ‘sister, you created this idea, you can pause it too‘.  Seems simple but it takes a while to get to this conclusion sometimes – those of you who have been there will know what I mean.
4. Capture Fall – This one isn’t directly “work” it’s more my creative pursuit.  Thought I’m pausing the challenges it does not mean I plan to stop being creative and pushing myself to try new techniques…there is one in particular I watched a youtube tutorial on last week and I’m really excited to try! Stay tuned.

FAMILY + PERSONAL

Fall is my favourite season, thought we’ve all been sick these past two weeks my hope is we can venture out this weekend to enjoy some fall activities.  J is SO excited about his new pumpkins I cannot wait to carve them out this year!  I love that there is still so many firsts with him every year as he changes and grows and understands things more…don’t even get my STARTED with how excited I am for Christmas this year…

The one and only big personal goal I have is to finish nesting, I know the entire house won’t be done and decorated but I want everything organized, rooms tidy and put away and the nursery almost done.  I have before photos so I’ll share my after photos with you guys in November for progress.

For Family, I’m excited…these are the plans:

1. Pumpkin Patch
2. Apple Orchard
3. Dress up for Halloween
4. Bake Apple Pie or Crumble
5. Corn Maze + Tractor Ride
6. & yes..getting a kick start on J’s baby book (round 2)

Thanks for reading loves! I’ve always loved reading peoples monthly goals I don’t know what took me so long to do it here but I’m excited for this month of simplifying and looking forward to paying attention to where else I can simply our lives.

Your turn, tell me ONE thing you can do to simply your life this month?