Christmas, One Month Later

I was reminded by a photographer friend today that it is January 25, or one month after Christmas.  So I thought I would take a little time to write out my Christmas memories for 2009.  This was MB's second Christmas, and the first one where she was aware of what was taking place.

She enjoyed opening presents, but I really think she got more of a thrill out of the paper than the gift it hid.

MB had a great time and got plenty of kisses from the "Sugie Monster" (aka Uncle Dave).

Christmas morning, she was excited and ready to see what Santa had brought for her.  Seriously, how can you not smile when she's looking at you like this?

She pulled everything out of her stocking and then she was ready to move on to the big stuff.  When she saw the slide Santa had left for her, it was all over.  That was it; she didn't care about anything else.  All she wanted to do was slide.

MB had a great time on Christmas, which means that her mother and I had a wonderful time as well.  I always heard my parents and grandparents say that the best part of Christmas wasn't the presents, but that it was the time everyone spent together.  Now that I'm an adult, I realize just how true that is.  Every chance we get to spend with the ones we love should be treasured.  Christmas isn't about giving or receiving gifts; it's about love.

Reading for Improvement

One of the things that working on my MBA has forced me to do is to begin reading again.  After I finished college, I jumped into work with a job that was similar to my computer science degree, but it really had nothing to do with any of the classes I had taken.  So I had to read to figure out what I was to do.  For about four weeks straight, I did very little at work other than read.  I think that experience overwhelmed me to the point that I became burned out on reading.  It was shortly after this that my fiancee (now wife) and I got married, and all of the changes associated with being married pushed reading way down on my list of things to do.  Fast forward a few years and not much had changed.  I had read a few books here and there, but nothing of any significance.  In the back of my mind, I knew it would take some event to make me start reading again.

Four months after our child was born, I started working toward my MBA.  My thought process was that if I didn't start it soon it would take me much longer to finish.  I witnessed it with my former boss who put his pursuit of a Master's degree on hiatus while his children grew up, and I didn't want the same thing to happen to me.  I enrolled in the online MBA program at Freed-Hardeman University in January of 2009.  I found several advantages of their class format which consists of five eight-week sessions per year.  The first advantage is that by doubling classes in two of the eight-week sessions, I could complete my degree in two years instead of two and a half to three years that most other universities offered.  My company offers tuition reimbursement, but it was going to cost less to get my degree through FHU than a local university, so the decision paid off there as well.  Finally, one of my undergraduate classes is basically the same as a graduate class requirement, so I don't have to take that grad class.

A year later I am over half way through my MBA and holding on to a 4.0.  I have learned many things about leadership, resource management and marketing management, and I've learned how much I dislike financial management.  (A little secret: I really didn't dislike it too much because it really challenged me.)  Most importantly, my pursuit of an MBA has made me read again.  I read more in the last twelve months than I did the previous five years combined.  And now I remember how much I love to read.  (This statement will make my mom really proud and happy; she's a second and third grade teacher.)

This year, one of my goals was to read six books.  I want to read for pleasure, but I want to read to improve my life.  My grandfather, J. Walker Whittle, loves to say that "when you stop learning, you stop improving" and "if you're not moving forward, you're going backward" and other variations of the same theme.  He has been a life-long student and has more wisdom than anyone I know.  If he values learning that much, I know I should, too.  For this year, and for years to come, I will read to make myself better.  And When I read something of value, I'll share it with you.

A cold night in Alabama

I realize that we are over a week into the month of January, and I have a confession to make.  Rebecca and I finally got around to taking our Christmas decorations down on Saturday.  We didn't want to take them down because we are of the "purist" people.  That means we don't put up Christmas decorations until after Thanksgiving.  It seems like every year we forget just how busy December is and how hard it is to find time to put a tree up and decorate the house.  So we didn't even get our tree up until a week or two before Christmas.  After going through all of the effort, we wanted to make sure the tree and all of the decorations felt wanted, so we just left them up.

OK, now back to the story.  I put all of the boxes of decorations in the attic on Saturday afternoon.  As it got later in the evening, we got a little bit cold but didn't really think anything of it.  We just covered up in a blanket and played the new Super Mario Bros. for the Wii after Mary Beth went to bed.  (As a side note, that game is great and I think my wife is addicted.)  After I got a serious case of what I have termed "Nintendo thumb," we called it a night and went to bed.  Mary Beth woke us up crying a little before 2:00.  As I went to check on her, I decided that the house was too cold and went to crank up the thermostat.  When I did, nothing happened.  No response at all.  Dead.  Get the idea?  So we all piled up in the bed trying to get warm for the next 30 minutes, then decided that it was just too cold to sleep.  So, about 2:45, we did a quick Google search for hotels in Decatur, AL.  We couldn't justify spending much when we were only going to be there about six hours, but we didn't want to go to some shady place, either.  It's a fine line.  We ended up at the La Quinta Inn and had a warm room in which to sleep and get ready for church.  I think "La Quinta" may mean "place to go when you're thermostat doesn't work."

After church, we had a good friend who just happens to own a Heating and Cooling business come over to see what we needed to do.  I thought we might need to buy a new thermostat.  Rebecca was hoping it wasn't the entire heating unit.  After a few checks and about 10 minutes, our friend flipped a switch in the attic and told me to check the thermostat.  POWER!  HEAT!  He saved the day by turning the power on to the heating unit.  When I was putting decorations up on Saturday, I had inadvertently flipped that power switch.  So I felt like a big loser the rest of the day, but at least I was a warm loser.

Stay on target

I'm already finding it very difficult to keep up with my goals for the year, and barely over a week into the year!  That doesn't bode well for those goals I set.  I believe I didn't appropriate my time correctly and vastly underestimated the time I need for work.  Not my photography work, but my full-time job.  It's the one that pays the bills, so it takes priority over a lot of other things such as this blog and redesigning my web site.  Hopefully it's just the first-of-the-year rush and things will slow down in a few weeks.  If not, it's going to be a long year.

On a much lighter note, it snowed. In Alabama. And it stuck to the ground.  Not a lot of snow, mind you, but a little is better than nothing, especially when it hasn't been more than a degree or two above freezing all week.  Even large bodies of water are starting to freeze over.  It's a different winter world than I'm used to, and it makes me feel like a little kid.  Seeing the snow falling yesterday and again this morning just made me giddy inside.  I hope to leave my office to see several inches on the ground.  I doubt it will happen, but I'd love to go home, bundle up with my wife and 15-month-old, and play in the snow.

New Year, New Blog, New Goals

As we enter this new year, we are no longer in the "ohs."  Every new year, millions (probably billions) of people make resolutions, most of which will probably be broken some time before spring rolls around.  People resolve to lose weight, to read more, to watch less television, to be a better husband/wife/father/mother/daughter/son.  Resolutions are good, but I didn't want to make resolutions this year.  Everybody does it, so I wanted to do something different.  Therefore, I'm making goals for 2010.

Let me note now that I already typed out my goals for 2010 and saved them to my external hard drive.  Then my hard drive crashed, so I no longer have my original set of goals.  I think there were about 12 of them because 12 is my favorite number.  It seemed like a good number to me.  If I only made a few and didn't meet all of the goals, I'd beat myself up about it.  If I make too many, I'm again setting myself up for failure because I won't be able to meet all of my goals.

Without further ado, here are my goals for 2010 (the ones I remember, at least).

1.   Grow closer to God.  I want to make sure that people know that I'm just an instrument of the Almighty.
2.   Finish my MBA.  I'm on track to complete it in December.
3.   Redesign my web site.  Look for the redesign of J McKnight Photography to come early in January.
4.   Four weddings and a funeral. I want to shoot at least four weddings this year.  I was just kidding about the funeral.
5.   Blog regularly.  I want to update this blog at least twice every week.  One update will be photography related and the other will be personal.
6.   Read six books.  My plan is to read at least four business related books and two photography related books.  If the books happen to overlap, that's just a plus.  When I finish a book, I'll post a review here on my blog.
7.   Run in three 5k races.  This will give me a goal to stay in shape in a round-about way.
8.   Stop biting my fingernails.  This one's been on my list for a while.  Hopefully this is the year I succeed at doing it.
9.  
10.
11.
12.

I'll update this post as I remember the last five of my goals.