Goodbye, Winter Break

So. I finally got to spend some time with my lovely sister over Christmas break. She left for home again this past week. It was fun, although hopefully next time I’ll have more free time to see her and we won’t have a blizzard smack dab in the middle of her visit. The best part was our ‘girl date’ with my oldest daughter. We drove to Joann fabrics with her and ate at Steak and Shake, and then later the same day, we had a ‘boy date’ and took my 3-year-old to pick up Chinese food and to buy a coloring book at the dollar store.

We’re starting to get some financial breathing space again, now that I’ve been back at my job for a couple of months. Enough space, at least, that I’m not freaking out at the thought of filling my gas tank or picking up some groceries. Things were pretty tight for a while when I first came off maternity leave. I do need to pick up more hours than I’m currently working if we’re going to pay off our car loan anytime soon, but I’m trying to hold off on that until the baby is old enough that I no longer need to pump at work. One of my biggest worries lately is trying to pump enough milk for the time that I’m away from her. I just don’t have the massive milk supply that I took for granted with my two older kids.

I found some nice chunky purple yarn at the thrift store on one of my outings with my sister, and I’ve been making a baby hat with it, using one of these:

It’s simple enough that I can manage it while balancing a sleeping baby on my lap. I decided to make similar hats for my older kids, so I picked up some rainbow yarn for my girl, and a darker pattern for my dark-eyed boy.

Today is Saturday, the last weekend of Christmas break. My two older kids are outside, sledding with their cousin and with the two friends that my daughter had spend the night last night. They moved to our school district over break, which we’re very excited about. This is one of those rare weekends when my husband and I are both home at the same time. Lately I’ve scheduled most of my shifts for weekends (thank goodness for self-scheduling), which works out best for not needing a babysitter, but unfortunately also deprives us of family time together.

Lately, I’ve enjoyed going through all the archives of Bluebirdbaby. I love her photos, and her general spirit of optimism and creativity inspires me.

I’ve also been enjoying this song over and over, ever since I heard it on the Warm Bodies trailer the other day. I told my husband that he has to take me out to see this movie. Not counting grocery shopping ‘dates’, we haven’t been on a real date since my oldest was a toddler (6 years ago!) so I’d say it’s high time.

Last Friday

Well. I have to admit that after last Friday’s events, I went to Kroger the next morning after work and went on a bit of a spending spree, buying gift cards for both of my older kids’ teachers, classroom aides, and for my son’s SLP and OT, with the plan to put these in their Christmas cards, along with a heartfelt ‘thank you’ note to each and every one.. Of course, buying them a Starbucks gift card is completely inadequate thanks for all that they do for my kids every weekday. I appreciated them before, of course, but before Friday, it never occurred to me that when they sign up to work with little kids, they also accept the responsibility to protect the kids from danger, even to the point of sacrificing their lives as several adults did last week. It’s hard to think about it.

And now it’s winter

So this fall has been really hectic. The baby has had one illness after another, brought home by her generous siblings, culminating in bronchiolitis (viral pneumonia). For several days, I was worried that we would end up in the hospital over this, but despite all her wheezing and retracting, she satted 97% in the ped’s office even before the treatment they gave her there, and after a few days with the home nebulizer, she turned the corner. The last night of every 4 hour nebs, she seemed to be on the verge of turning the wrong kind of corner, but the next morning, her wheezing finally started to decrease, and she started breathing easier and tolerating less frequent nebs.  Now she is nursing a zillion times a day, trying to make up for the decrease in eating while she was sick.

Thanks to all this night nursing, I am low on brain power and I have felt like an idiot at work lately. Forgetful as all get out, which obviously is not a good trait in a nurse. I was conned into working a weeknight this past week, and let me tell you, sleeping less than 5 hours total, then getting up at 6 am and shuttling the kids around all day, then going to work from 6 pm to 6:30 am, with no nap beforehand, is no recipe for good nursing care.

M and I have had a couple of weekends off together lately, and it was so nice. We could actually get stuff done. It just almost made me want to sign up for more weeknights, in order to aim for more weekends off. But after the other night, I learned my lesson, and remembered why it is that I normally strive to work weekends-only.

So. Back to work this weekend, then off until next Friday. Back to normal-ish, thank God. Now to go investigate where my half dressed 3-year old has wandered off to, and why there are mysterious clanking sounds coming from the direction of my bedroom.

So tired. Waiting for the phone call from work- I’m 95% sure that I will be called in tonight. It’s one of my designated holidays to be on call. If I do get called, great, time and a half to refill my sad-panda bank account. If not though, that would be swell, cause HALLOWEEN.

Also, holy cow is it nice to be working again. Working or not working isn’t in any way an optional thing given our budget, but I feel very blessed to have a job that I love.

Impressed

Kid2 did a 35 piece puzzle all by himself just now! Dang, kid! While dealing with a virus, no less.

An excellent essay

You may be really surprised at how much is possible if the child never gets the idea that he “can’t.” Can’t is a horrible word, perhaps one of the most disabling words in the English language. Don’t concentrate on what your child cannot do; concentrate on what he can do, and build on that every chance you get. As you do, “can’t” will get smaller and smaller with the  passing of each day

The above quote is from Thanks Mom: What My Mother Did Right by Frank Klein. Found this page today while googling to decide how I feel about my son’s preschool teacher telling him not to flap his hands. When we took our oldest to be eval’d over hand flapping and tics, the doc told us to ignore it unless it bugged her socially, which it hasn’t thus far, for her. He never seems nervous or upset when I pick him up from school, so I’m not sure how I feel about this. I think we’ll just keep ignoring the flapping at home, and let the teacher do what she does at school, unless it starts to become a problem at either place.

Gah. Parenting is tough.

 

Finally joined Pinterest. I can see how people get sucked into the place. I’m supposed to bring snacks for the Fall Party at my daughter’s school. Didn’t find more than a couple of snack ideas that I liked, but found plenty of crafty and gardening things that I would love to try. Someday.