Getting it Done

     Last week I was incredibly productive. After spending weeks being super exhausted (or it at least seemed like weeks) I finally had a reasonable amount of energy. And I had a plan. I had to take a personal day on Monday for Travis's IEP meeting so I wanted to get started on an order for a couple of hoodie dolls that has been in my book for a few weeks. I actually managed to get a lot done on Monday, which is a day I usually never get anything done on dolls. 

     On Tuesday I finished up the last bits of the hoodie dolls and moved into prepping for this casual western doll with a cool flamingo shirt and another hoodie doll. I got a good amount of work done on Tuesday, though I don't remember exactly how much. 

     Wednesday I also was really productive and I believe I either finished up the flamingo lady and hoodie doll or came incredibly close. I may have finished them up. I was very efficient, full of energy (or enough to continue being productive) and finishing so many things was very motivating. 

     With the 3 hoodie dolls and the flamingo western doll finished I had 3 orders I could move to the finished section of my order book. And I still had technically 2 days to work on dolls. Since my Best Customs entry needed Breyer dolls my plan was to quickly knock those out on Thursday and then have all of Friday off from doll work so I could have a 3 day weekend. It was a good plan and it almost worked. 

     Thursday I was still fairly motivated but I was also running out of steam. I did manage to get most of the 2 Breyer dolls finished, but I just couldn't make myself totally finish. I left off with the lady needing her face repainted, and the man needed boot bottoms, a belt, pockets, and buttons. Collectively those things don't take up a whole ton of time, and I could have forced myself to finish. But I decided that it was better to listen to what my body was telling me and I stopped for the day. 

     Friday was a struggle. Since my custom horse was so close to done, and I had time to make the Breyer dolls, my plan had been to get those projects finished and take the photo for the contest on the weekend. It was a good plan. A reasonable plan. And entirely doable plan. But Friday was a struggle. It took me an hour to talk myself into getting out the paint box. I started on the hooves with the light shell color (should have been a bit lighter, but whatever) and I repainted just the eyes on the Breyer doll. She still looks like a doll, there is not really a way to make her not look like a doll, but she looks better. Then I got back into the now-dry hooves with pastels. I have forgotten just how long a model horse pedicure takes. And I could easily have taken a lot more time than the hour and a half that I took. But I made it through and now I had my lady doll finished and my custom horse finished and I was again (mostly) energized. I got some sort of nice shots of my finished horse and grabbed the doll stuff to watch NCIS with Ethan and to finish up the man doll. 

     I did it. 

     It was basically in the plan to do the hooves on Friday and since there was not all that much left on either of the dolls, that is mostly what I did. So I did pretty much stick to my plan. And I got everything finished. Just when I told myself a would. I am happy. I went through a bit of time when I was really struggling to get things done. At all. I was definitely not getting them done when I said I would. I was not taking extra months (or years) but even an extra week is not something I usually do. So I am hopeful that my work verve is back now. I still have some pretty lofty savings goals and that requires actually working and saving money. I do love making dolls and I still make more with dolls than I do working at the school (every time someone says I should take a break on dolls and go back to school I laugh and say that makes NO sense financially) but the fact that the school will pay me even if I take a day off is pretty awesome. Anyway, work verve is a good thing and I am finally getting things done!