I took my sabbatical week off during the week of 8/1. (You can learn more about my small scale sabbaticals here.)

I was supposed to take it off the week before, but I had so much to do, so I decided to push it back one week.

The week before I’d originally planned to take my week off, I was planning on making 4 tutorial videos for Sakura of America, and it took a lot longer than I anticipated (duh!)

And at the last minute I was invited to be at a craft show, and I agreed, so I spent hours preparing for the show at the same time.

It became obvious to me that I wasn’t going to finish the video project and tie all the loose ends before the end of the week. 

Rather than doing a “half-on, half-off” sabbatical week, I decided to push it back one week so I could finish everything and fully enjoy my time off the following week.

Or so I thought.

Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to tie all the loose ends by the end of that additional week, so some work did spill over to my sabbatical week. Sad face 😦

I’d put in long hours the week before and worked the craft show all day Saturday 7/30, so I was really wired going into my week off.

Plus my husband Dave had been away for 2 and a half weeks for work and came back on late Saturday 7/30 night. Originally, he was going to come home on Sunday 8/1, so it threw me off the loop.

And whenever he comes home late, I go to bed at my normal bed time but just can’t fall asleep until he gets home…

As an introvert, even though I love and miss my husband very much while he’s gone, I also enjoy my quiet alone time. And it usually takes me a few days to adjust to having him around again.

Oh, and we had a couple of guests stay over at our place with kind of a short notice… and I’d already scheduled my social time with some friends that week (Max 3 social engagements per week!). So I ended up having a bit more people time than I’d wanted.

Even though I generally have a good time when I’m with friends, I prefer to have them scheduled in advance and need to have a good amount of down time in between to recharge.

And as for work, I got an inquiry from a customer who wanted to place a big rush order of my block printed tote bags on the first day of my sabbatical week.

Initially, I said no because there was no way I could have the goods ready within the timeline, but the customer was really interested in working with me.

So I tried to make it work by having them screen printed rather than me hand printing them. And that meant a lot of back and forth with the print shops and the customer throughout the week…

After all, the customer decided not to place the order because the timeline didn’t work for them. Which was fine, but I couldn’t relax completely until all the loops were closed… 

I also have a new class to promote, followed up with people who’d just signed up for my email list, and Instagram just rolled out their Snapchat thingy (a.k.a. Instagram Story) and I got embroiled in that too!!

The Seafair, which is a big summer festival in Seattle, was going on during my sabbatical week, and we live very close to where the Blue Angels perform. Their performance is cool and all, but the noise is totally unbearable. It is SO LOUD.

So on Saturday, I tagged along Dave’s teaching gig at a university to get away from home. They had a pretty loose, hands-on day for his class, and I got to hang out with Dave part of the day and read, too.

On Sunday, I ended up doing chores and went to see a movie (BTW, loved the new Ghostbusters movie!!) to get away from the Blue Angels noise again… 😀

Before you know it, my sabbatical week was over. O.V.E.R. Sigh.

It wasn’t the most relaxing week off, and I was pretty bummed about it.

Self-care is a top priority of mine, and not having a regular down time is pretty hard on me. When I can’t get enough rest, I try to breathe and be more compassionate with myself. I do what I can to take care of myself and just accept the things for what they are.

With that being said, I did spend some time reading. I’ve been reading “The Highly Sensitive Person in Love” by Elaine N. Aron, Ph.D., and it’s fascinating! (In case you missed it, I talked about my Highly Sensitive nature in this post.) I love exploring my inner world… ❤

I also made some art for fun during my sabbatical week.

These dahlias were inspired by the beautiful community garden I was at for the craft show ❤

I also got to spend more time with Dave than usual and slept more (including naps!) so I’m more refreshed to start my work week.

I’ve got a couple of trips coming up this summer, too, so even though I didn’t get a full time off last week, I’m glad some important work got done! It’s a balance, I guess…

Hope you’re getting some relaxing on this summer!

xo Yuko