Back to Work

I am officially back to work full time now, and so far things are going well. In reality, I started back to work last week (ergo the blog silence) and worked half of Monday and all day Tuesday. It helped to take a bit of the shock off of the return. Don’t get me wrong, I am not weeping or gnashing my teeth (I always love that biblical description) at my return to work. In fact, I welcome the structure to my day, the eating of lunch without children pulling at my clothes, and the accomplishing of work. It makes a girl feel all useful and stuff. But needing to get up in the morning, dress, and look human by 7:30 so that we can get everyone out the door is a bit taxing on a non-morning person. Mr. D does help with getting Gabe dressed, although I do need to lay out his clothes to prevent the kid either looking like a) a clown or b) a refugee with clothes that are too small (ok, my fault for not being faster at the season change but my gawd man can’t you see that his pants are just waaaaaay too short?).

SC is transitioning well to the daycare routine. Given that she loves to watch other people, especially when they are in motion, having a room full of one-year-olds must be utterly fascinating for her. The caregivers there are wonderful and I trust them to care for my kid (makes the return to work that much easier). My mom is getting a little frazzled with both kids in her house two days a week, but my dad is there too and gets Gabe out of her hair periodically. It will get easier as SC gets bigger and, oh, actually starts taking naps, but at least she’s a pleasant awake-all-the-time kid. My mom does question the exclusive breastfeeding, though, and thinks that I should just not bother and give the kid formula. “What does it matter,” she asks all the time. Well, it matters to me, and it feels awfully good that I have been able to provide for her this well. She has actually had formula twice (once because the daycare forgot that I brought frozen milk and had run out of fresh...it was an abnormally crazy day, and I don’t fault them...and once when I needed to leave SC with Mr. D and didn’t want to dig into my precious frozen stash at home...see, I dispense it too). She thought it was pretty yucky tasting, but drank it anyway.

Please note that I am not in any way dissing formula. Gabe was only getting half of his daily liquid from me for the first six months and then gave up the boob entirely. And I have already told everyone who might ever feed the kid that if they run out of milk- give the kid formula. The cost savings of the milk is nice, the cuddling is nice. The constant need to eat from ME and only from ME is not necessarily nice, especially when I have many things to accomplish in a short amount of time. So, it’s definitely a two-sided coin, and mine tends to flip many times a day.

Hallo-wasn't

I know that there are far greater offenses to make one qualify for world's worst mother, so hopefully ignoring the fact that it is Halloween, especially when it is your daughter's first Halloween, doesn't put me in the WWM hall of fame. I think the combination of sleep deprivation and Gabe's lingering respiratory infection just made it that much less attractive to go parading around for candy that we really don't need. I debated dressing the kids to visit a couple of select neighbors simply for the sake of visiting, but then when SC fell asleep, the deal was sealed and we stayed in. We'll get excited next year...maybe.

Twelve days until I head back to work. Part of me is excited by the prospect of a chance to eat lunch with both hands while both breasts are fully contained. (I think SC smells my food and wants her own...Every. Single. Time.) And part of me will miss cuddling with SC for no good reason at any time of day. But given that I have a HUGE grant application due mid-December, I don't have a lot of choice in the matter. As it is, I will have to go into a**-busting mode to get the darn thing done on time.

Ah, the fun never ends. Maybe I should have had the kids score me some candy.