No matter what holiday you celebrate, I hope it is safe and a happy one!
December 20, 2007 By Leave a Comment
Forget the mall!
Wow this week has been crazybusy! I had planned to take my kids to the mall this weekend to see Santa. It’s my little one’s first Christmas and my older one’s first Christmas that he will remember.
We’ve done the Santa thing every year so far. My first year as a parent I had no idea how long the lines would be. I almost gave up. But then while we were shopping in PetSmart, I saw Santa–more importantly Santa with no line–so I did what any intelligent woman would do. I sat my baby on his lap and said, “Here you go!”
It wasn’t until I saw people lining up behind me with their schnauzers and dalmatians and cats and rabbits that I realized that Santa was here to see babies pets! Oops! He was a good sport and said as long as I paid my $7.95 he didn’t care what I put in his lap.
The next two years we did the mall thing which involved waiting in long lines only to have my son cry at the sight of a huge dude dressed in red with enough hair to make a small rug.
This year I discovered that you can’t just wait in line to see Santa. No. You have to have an appointment! Hey anything to avoid standing in line! However, all the appointments are taken from now until Christmas but you can be placed on a call list in case there is an opening. Wow, it’s easier to get a doctor appointment during flu season than to see Santa.
I was really disappointed and wondered how I would explain this to my three-year-old when someone at the library asked me if we were coming to the Christmas Cabaret.
“The what?”
“The Christmas Cabaret. We’re doing a play, and singing, and Santa will be there.”
“Santa? SANTA!” (imagine me as Will
Ferrell in the movie Elf)
So forget the mall! We are going to the library!
My kids had a great time. As did all the kids. I was so impressed by the program that the staff at University City Regional Library put together. I miss working there! And Santa was wonderful! He knew my kids names–he is Santa after all. He even had a talk with my son about helping me get out of the house on time in the morning. You rock Santa!
December 19, 2007 By Leave a Comment
Preparing for Goodbye
Tomorrow will be a difficult day as we say goodbye to Helene with a party and hopefully a nice send off from Charlotte. If you have any thoughts or wishes you’d like to share, send them my way and I’ll pass them on to her. There will be lots of food and some music from Dewey and the Decibels.
December 11, 2007 By Leave a Comment
ELW2007: Reflection
This was PLCMC’s first year participating in Employee Learning Week. Since I only learned about it a week before there was not much time to plan ahead. As soon as the dates for next year are announced I’ll have to mark my calendar. There’s a training group that I belong to that always concludes a presentation with two questions. What did you do right, and what would you do differently next time. So here goes.
What went right?
The timing was perfect, even with the short notice. Since I just returned from an almost year-long maternity/medical leave and our other trainer has been temporarily reassigned, not much training has been done this year. My only goal was to generate some excitement about learning and to inform staff of the opportunities available to them. I think I succeeded in that as long as they read their email.
What would I do differently?
Plan ahead! It seems like a small task to send out six emails in six days. But it’s funny how something so small can snowball into something bigger. It reminds me of the school house rock video about the bill. There is a chain of events that needs to take place. So to send an email out about a benefit the following has to be done first:
- Find the information about the benefit…in our case it is all on our Intranet
- Check with HR to make sure the information is correct
- Draft the email
- Revise the email
- Have someone else review the email (thanks Sarah Poole!)
- Revise again
- If needed, send to HR for review or approval
So in other words it’s more than just typing an email. 
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