About sixteen years ago, I met him for the first time. My trainwreck sibling brought home this adorable puppy he had no business adopting because he had not one thing in his life that wasn’t a mess. I was furious at my sibling – he didn’t even take care of himself, how could he drag
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April 27, 2016
Free fun: the patented homebody edition
Lest you ever have the mistaken notion that PiC and I are a happenin’ couple…or whatever means “cool” these days, let me regale you with our Saturday night.
Some people get dolled up and go to Disneyland’s Club 33 for a drink and whatever else you do there.
Us?
Well, our dinner was a little late. While I tried to finish booking travel arrangements before running off to cook, LB had snuggled up next to me to crunch on these puffed cereal squares PiC had found at Trader Joe’s. They’re good, we all eat them.
Ze waved hir cup at me and tried to help me type so, of course, “No, LB, do not break Mama’s computer with your grubby fingers. Sit down.”
Ze sat.
Ze crunched.
Ze offered me a square.
“No thanks, honey, that’s for you.”
Ze took a bite, then offered it again. This time demonstrating what ze wanted with an open mouth, saying “ahhhh”. Nothing like your kid turning your tricks against you.
“Oh, no, DEFINITELY no thanks, that’s really for you. Here, see? I’ll eat this one.” I popped an unlicked square in my mouth and crunch-crunch-crunched. Ze smiled, satisfied, I thought.
Nope. Fool.
Ze took another square and offered it again. “No, thammmf!” Ze jammed it in my mouth. My hands were protecting the computer and ze knew ze had me. To really make sure of it, ze pushed half hir hand into my mouth so the cereal was not coming back out.
Laughing, I turned to PiC who wasn’t helping even a little bit, and gestured wildly. He took a picture. THANKS.
I turned back and *jam* another cereal square. And another! Ze grinned madly, this was fun!
But I still have my standards, if there was drool on it, I wasn’t eating it.
After the dozenth very aggressively offered cereal but was uncompromisingly shoved into my mouth, ze sat back on hir heels and started eating again. A clear dismissal, or at least an easing of hostile sharing.
Soup’s on!
Dinner was the usual. Rice and fish spoon-catapulted all down my front. Milk dribbling down hir dimply chin, both parents gingerly treading around and through the rice moat surrounding hir high chair. You know, the usual.
Bath and bedtime are always good. They’re the easiest part of the day and no matter how hard the day was, you’re guaranteed lots of grins and laughs. That makes the wind down of the night so much easier.
Closin’ down the bar
I joggle at PiC’s elbow as he does the dishes, impatiently. Just when it’s my turn to rinse, I disappear, having just remembered it was time for Seamus’s medication. My timing is impeccable. But the magic hour rolls around when we’re both parked at the table and it’s time. FOR MONOPOLY!
Not the board game, though it’ll come as no surprise to anyone who’s read a word of this blog, I loved the board game and finagled a game as often as possible. No, we’re “playing” the supermarket board game where you get game tickets for certain purchases from Safeway. Our regular purchases always earn a few, and we stick the individual pieces to the paper board game piece in the faint hope of filling all four or five parts of a property to win anything from a $5 grocery gift card to a $500K vacation home or $1 MILLION DOLLARS.
PiC reads off the numbers in his loud Bingo voice, and I cheer or boo the pieces, gluing pieces to the sheet when we hit on an empty space. To date, we’ve won 3 instant win vouchers for 2 more game pieces and we’re one or two pieces away from winning big or small on a variety of stops on the board.
It’s all VERY exciting.
Right, I’m not fooling anyone, I know the rest of the world actually engages in real fun but look, this is our kinda fun, alright?
Besides, what if we did win?
We’re close on the $5 grocery card, $15 grocery card, $2,500 Big Joe Grill and groceries (what say I skip the grill and get that all in groceries?), $200 cash, $1,000 grocery card and $1,000 family vacation.
PiC and I have an agreement that if we did win, we tell no one. Except if he gets the $5 gift card, he’s singing it from the mountaintops. I’m not sure if this blog is exempt from the “tell no one” agreement yet, but I think it should be.
:: PiC says the real value is our goofball selves having Family Time, I say the real win is the million dollars. What would you want to win if you had to pick one and it wasn’t the $1M or $500K home (because I seriously doubt anyone will win those)? Do you think anyone’s really going to win anything? Have you ever? We’re going to need a new free and easy pastime when the game is up in May, suggestions?
April 25, 2016
A closet catastrophe in search of style with comfort
I read Katherine’s post on dressing as a new mom with a tinge of guilt. Never a fashion plate, I took some meanhearted comments about baby weight heard when I was still pregnant too much to heart, and went far in the opposite direction of refusing to give a hoot about worrying over dressing well when I had a baby to keep alive, a career to also keep alive, and so on. “Getting dressed” didn’t mean very much more than changing from one set of comfy pajamas to the next, on harder days, and into cargo pants and tees on the easier ones.
There’s a happy medium between not caring about how you look and being obsessed with your appearance to the exclusion of all substantive things. My life fits in the middle, caring when it matters to me, and leaving it the rest of the time, but I’d left that by the wayside.
The casual nature of my job didn’t help. The SF-standard CEO in tee-shirts and flipflops isn’t just a stereotype! To make matters worse, I’m digging through a wardrobe that still has clothes dating back to 1999. Because I might go somewhere warm again, someday! And it still fits! And… no, that doesn’t mean I should still wear them. For someone who came from having very little, discarding things that still “work” is a hard notion to wrap my head around.
Now that I’m out walking more, dressing down and even sloppily is my camouflage, protection against the street harassment. I can’t walk across the street with LB alone without being harassed, and this isn’t one of the worst neighborhoods in town.
I’ll keep dressing in “ugly” camo for those jaunts because life is too busy to waste time wishing fiery deaths upon that worthless scum that catcalls, stalks and harasses women on the street. For the rest of the time, though…
An essential part of being a professional, secondary to high performance, is presenting myself professionally.
It’s time to shape up. It’s never been easy to put together a wardrobe that looks professional but can be worn day to day. Like Cloud, I’ve never had lofty ambitions in the fashion arena. I don’t need to be fashionable, I need to be not frumpy. Finding where that coincides with my need for comfort and low maintenance level, is the challenge.
We’re not in a position to replace my entire wardrobe in one go, now that I’ve paid off Uncle Sam for the year, but I wouldn’t do anything without an action plan either.
First, the purge
I’m starting the process by ruthlessly digging out the sartorial deadweight.
Those old sweaters that I bought back when I was cold all the time and was just desperate for warmth, any warmth. Like a bear facing winter, I was adding layers with cardigans that did the job but nothing for my appearance. Same for the long sleeve shirts that are now too tight in the arms. PSA: Lifting a 25 lb weight between 1-6 hours a day will do something to your biceps. I’m guessing that Hulking out of my sleeves isn’t the current look. But whatever the look is, I like my blood circulating, thank you very much.
Pants are problematic. I’m staring down a pile of pants, they’re all a little bit off. Those jeans are 19 years old and look like it. These jeans are a breath too tight. The newest pair of jeans are too long and loose. The older jeans are tight but the right length. It feels like the best thing to do would be to toss all the oldest and start over but I can’t bring myself to do that. I don’t have a good replacement yet and I’ve learned the hard way not to go purging willy-nilly. As Donna and her commenters pointed out, ever so timely with this post, it’s not a good idea to go overboard. Then again, I have a bit of history with breaking my pants with new jobs. It’d be better to lose an old pair than new when I move on!
There are about a dozen geeky tees that I refuse to let go of. These have a place in my life but we need to do better. This has sparked the thought that I need to design a business casual line of geek-inspired clothing to replace the geeky tees that aren’t interview or boardroom ready. Would I be my only customer? I could live with that.
Next… I need help!
If I were tall and willowy and Gina Torres: everything she wore in the first few seasons of Suits, get in my closet! Kerry Washington’s styling in Scandal is also impeccable. If I were way cooler than I am, I’d be cool with the wardrobe for Maggie Q from Nikita. But not their shoes. I can’t do any of their heels.
Then again, none of their clothes are kid-friendly. I wore a nice blouse and slacks to a parent volunteer thing and came home with three kinds of fluids on me from kids who used my shoulder as a landing pad for their drippy faces. There’s always one kid who thinks I’m their person.
Naturally, I’m none of the above. I’m short, slim to the point of being skinny. My knees (and every other joint from the hips on down) are a no-heels-zone. They need support and cushion, it’s not optional. The ideal uniform is easy to put together, baby friendly, me-the-klutz friendly, and travel friendly.
If we still lived in the southern half of the state, this Polka Dot Silk Wrap Dress and this silk chain link print shift would be in my shopping cart just waiting for a great sale. But if 60 degrees doesn’t feel like freezing anymore, it’s still not warm, I don’t care what you say. I know you’re laughing at me, Canadians – I’m at peace with that.
In truly temperate weather, I’m in a cotton shirt, jeans or stretchy slacks, a draping light cardigan or sweater. I love my Bobeau fleece and Caslon drape neck zip cardigans. They don’t sell the zip cardigans anymore so I’m glad I gave into the temptation to buy it in both colors. In cold weather, I have one great winter coat but my ability to go from light to heavy layering is limited.
Shoes are typically flats or flipflops or sneakers. I’d love more classic styles but loafers and other similar shoes often look like clown shoes on me. Alternate suggestions?
In real life, I adore Jean’s and Kelly’s styles. Also Wendy’s. They’re even close to my body type. But as you can see, they’re far more polished, and oftentimes fancier, than I.
On second thought…
It turns out the act of writing this out is clarifying. When I started writing, it was mostly a mess. But I’m starting to see that my ideal style looks put-together and feels great to lounge and work in. That’s not impossible! Right?
My idea of matching colors is appalling, let’s get that out in the open right now. I think the general rule of thumb here is to remove all pieces that aren’t in a complementary color palette and restrict any new clothes to a simple color palette. Does anyone know how you do that?
I gravitate toward dark greens, blues, black. They’re easy, combined with white, though white is not awesome for me with an over-active child to chase and feed. Is tan and beige a good alternative? I really like the look of a crisp white blouse but probably that life isn’t for me.
Every so often, a bright color grabs my attention and I can’t resist. That’s one root of my current crisis. For example, I went wild and bought dark red slacks a while back. I like them but they seem to go with exactly one blouse. Like pantry cooking, people will helpfully suggest several combinations, but I currently own none of those other pieces!
That means I need a list of acceptable colors that would go with the basics that I already own. Ideally, I should be able to mix and match all tops and bottoms.
Now that I have a semblance of a game plan, I’m eager to start making this work.
Sidebar: Though we don’t dress each other, PiC and I share a similarly relaxed approach to style but it’s so much easier for him to look effortlessly business casual. Why is men’s clothing so much simpler?
:: What’s your style, how long did it take to refine? How did you figure out the color and the matching pieces thing? Who do you rely on for advice about this stuff?
:: The comment was “She still has ‘baby weight’. It’s been two years! I’d kill myself if I still had baby weight two years later.” I’m used to hearing horrible comments about women and their weight but that got my goat.
April 20, 2016
Puppy-in-training
LB will stop dead in hir tracks whenever Seamus gets his dinner. These days, it’s less the calculating “Can I get there in time to see what he’s eating and grab a handful?” and more of a thoughtful, head cocked, wheels turning in hir head expression. I don’t think it’s any coincidence that ze is now experimenting with eating face-first or carrying hir plush toys in hir mouth. Also I think ze has now established that dog kibble is not actually a super treat. The hard way, of course.
The Negotiator
This kid can count like a dog can count. When I pull out crackers to share, ze gets one and I get one. Except not. Ze stuffs hir cracker into a cheek and immediately flings out a chubby, imperious hand to demand the other.
When offering hir one of two toys, ze maneuvers so that ze accepts one and then swipes the other one before you have a chance to pull it back.
Ze will accept offers of trade, except it’s a bait and hook scheme. Ze offers me an item, clearly wanting what’s in my hand, and then refuses to relinquish the proffered toy. The toddler always wins.
Food is good, unless it’s not
Even as ze is more opinionated about having to examine all food that goes into hir mouth, most of it is eaten pretty happily. Most rejections are of the Eh boooooored variety in which case it goes over the shoulder or is casually dropped down by hir side. Life’s too short for boring food, I guess.
We share meals with LB, ze doesn’t get a special meal or special preparation beyond cutting up spinach so ze doesn’t choke. And like Seamus was extra motivated to take his medication as soon as Doggle started cruising by and asking for some, it’s motivated hir to eat more and better through the conviction that I’ll eat hir food if ze doesn’t.
I will.
And it’s great.
Su comida es mi comida
Last month, my food in my bowl was hir food for hir mouth. Now ze is insisting that what ze eats, I must eat, pointing hir fork at me with an insistent “ey!” Ze is slowly learning “no thanks” because ze already knows the command for “put it in YOUR mouth” so the two of them together means I won’t be eating that twice-slobbered banana please, thank you, and ewwww.
Yes, I said “command”. Ze is like a puppy. These are useful commands.
Give it up, puppy
Ze demanded the orange slice I was going to eat. Fair enough, I’d stolen it from hir bowl in the first place. Ze held it flat on hir palm then SQUEEZED! as if to say “I just didn’t want you to have it.”
The juice splattered everywhere and one stream hit hir right in the eye.
Never try to dominate Mom. The universe is on my side, kid.
Independence
You know that feeling when someone’s doing a thing that you can do much better but you have to sit on your hands because they’ll never learn if you do it for them? It pays off. After months of practicing pincher movements and accidentally flinging food over hir shoulder, ze can steer a small spoon with its contents into hir mouth AND pick up the crumbs that didn’t make safe landing.
April 18, 2016
My tech boom and the day it all went south
We aren’t early adopters.
Setting up new gadgets, or paying for them, isn’t fun the way it was when I was 13. Or was it 15? Honestly, I can’t remember when communication technology first crept into our lives, but I was part of the generation that adopted pagers for fun at $3/month. We’ve come a long way since then, with the smartphones and the touchscreen computers, and the phablets.
(Can’t you just hear the old age settling in? Or is that creaking our bones?) Either way, new technology here is unusual, but we can’t seem to survive without it.
It was a big deal when PiC surprised me with an iPad so that I could still work on days that my fingers had checked out of Hotel California.
It was a huge deal when we graduated from only upgrading our phones when offered a cheapie free phone in exchange for a renewed contract (remember that?), to buying the exact one that he wanted.
It was the biggest deal to buy a new laptop, only the third one I’d bought in 16 years, that was exactly what I wanted and needed for all my work and personal-work life.
Riding high on the clouds of “high” tech is exactly where they want you
…when the machines turn!
First, it was the brand new laptop. Less than a month old, but more than the 3 weeks to qualify for a return, the laptop randomly, and without warning, turned off.
At first I chalked it up to carelessness, obviously I’d let the battery run down. Right? After leaving it plugged in overnight, satisfied it had had more than enough time to get a full charge, I cracked my knuckles (mentally) and set in for a good day of work. Only to sit in front of a black screen, head cocked, wondering if it was just me.
It was and it wasn’t. In expert-speak I believe this is called “The computer hates you-itis”. Something was seriously wrong and thankfully, I had sprung for the premium service plan: parts and labor and in-home service, for three years. Responses were guaranteed within 2 days.
What they didn’t tell me was the policy only guaranteed that they would acknowledge you had a problem in 48 hours, they didn’t say that they would fix that dang thing in that time. Great!
Resigned to waiting 5-7 business days for the hardware to be shipped to the service tech, who would then schlep it to our house to actually revive my computer, I started to work on my old laptop, Backup #1.
Backup #1 had gotten the memo, though, and ten minutes in, the fan started rumbling like it was going to implode. Or explode. The jury’s still out on which would be worse. Shaking my head, I pulled out an even older laptop and, transported back a decade to Win 95, tried to get some work done. Except its ability to keep more than two tabs open has been long-lost to the mists of time.
iPad? I could work on the iPad! Except all my passwords were locked up in Dead Computer. In 1-3 minute bursts, I coaxed Backup #1 to give up the passwords, one painful bout at a time. But of course, the iPad decided that it wanted charging and by the way, it also didn’t feel like letting me view attachments.
That was Backup #3 down. Doubtfully, I hauled out an old netbook that only ran Win 7 starter, and if you can imagine a tiny computer laughing in your face, that was Backup #4.
Driven into the arms of Apple
Desperate to get some work done, any work done, at this point, I commandeered PiC’s old MacBook.
Quick background: Once upon a time, I was the indifferent owner of an iPhone and a MacBook. They worked ok. Well, except the iPhone – both I and the Genius Bar are convinced that thing was possessed – but generally, the user interface was ok and they lasted a long while. After they died a relatively dignified death, though, going back to PC and Android was a breath of fresh air. I’m neither an Apple fanatic or a PC devotee, I just want a thing that works and lasts years.
The transition was simultaneously a huge relief and almost equal frustration. There are basic programs on PC that make my work flow more easily that just aren’t available to Apple users. My Apple-sworn friends helped me with substitutes but none were as useful as my originals. There are not so basic programs I’d have to buy again for the MacBook that I just didn’t want to spend the extra money for.
But the computer turned on and stayed on and, at this point, that was about as high as my blighted expectations could rise.
For a long horrible moment, I wondered if I’d have to spring for a new Mac ($$$$) and buy a whole new Apple set-up ($$$). We could pull the money out of savings but we’re just catching up after several huge expenses from the end of last year and the beginning of this. Then I told myself, Self, don’t get ahead of yourself. You’re just stressed and stresseder. Let’s see what happens with the repair and go from there.
Then my phone died.
My soul wept. Actual tears may have been shed. I can’t remember, I went into a sort of fugue state at that point.
I had to wait five weeks for that repair.
The Mac was available, and working for those five weeks, thank goodness. Y’all, if I had one more backup computer die on me I would have lost my mind, bought three brand new computers, and burned every one of the others in a massive sacrifice to Electronica, the god of broken technology.
I can sort of laugh about it now that the primary computer has been repaired. Sort of.
Backups #2 and #4 for sale are still being listed for sale as old scrap or whatever it takes, and putting that money aside for New Backup #2 because who here trusts my computers anymore?
:: Has Skynet ever taken over your day?
It feels like I keep overpaying for my gear, even though I do usually hunt down bargains, because I’m looking for quality too. Do you have any super reliable ultrabook (I need very lightweight gear) or phone recommendations? Is there a secret to gear that works?
*Part of Financially Savvy Saturdays on brokeGIRLrich and, *
April 13, 2016
Everyone is down. I repeat, everyone is down.
PiC’s taken to bed with a high fever, LB’s the one who brought home the fever and is still sick, and I’m pretty broken as well. Seamus is the only one still going on all pistons. You’d think he’d have more concern for his survival in this situation. Instead, he steadfastly sticks by us with an air of unconcern.
LB has been waking around 3 am, right at 6 hours past Motrin o’clock, crying pitifully. Ze’s congested, and burning up again. I stumble around prepping the syringe of Motrin and a small bottle of milk. Ze will be thirsty and hungry to boot. PiC’s woken up and came to refresh the humidifier, cuddling LB so I can administer the dose and changes hir diaper. My heart breaks for hir small hiccups and cries as ze struggles to find a way to be comfortable. I send PiC to bed, he’s far worse off than I am, and send Seamus off as well. He’d woken up sometime after I did and came to join us as we tended to LB, sprawling bedside.
Seamus ambles off, amiably and LB dozes fitfully on my chest. Ze hasn’t slept on me since ze was four or five months and as terrible as we both feel, this brings back fond memories. Except now ze is three times larger and heavier. I roll hir off me gently and tuck her into my side so I can breathe too.
We manage four hours of restless but blissful dozing, and we’re up again. PiC stumbles in as I change hir diaper. He of the functional immune system feels better after a few hours of unbroken sleep so it’s my turn. He takes over while I catch a couple hours, then we switch again. He has to go to work for a few hours, so he leaves for the office while I clear up and get caught up on the morning’s work. The tidying can wait, I only have so much energy and my brain needs it all for work.
LB is so exhausted that the nap stretches an unheard of 4 hours, and I can relax a little bit. I’ve gotten so much done, despite a raw throat, roaring headache, and multitude of aches, that it feels like we can survive this day.
PiC gets home around 1 pm and makes us all lunch. Reluctantly, thinking ze will take up the rest of the day, I log off and we have a quiet meal together.
He’s in charge of hir now so I can carry on working and resting but he’s lucked out. Ze is still so worn out barely two hours after waking, we hear a pitifully tired “put me to bed” cry. We comply and he collapses for a short rest.
We’re not usually this sick and this is definitely as sick as LB has ever been. What a rough induction into cold and flu season? Whoever thought “what better way to challenge our Team Parent skills than to kick out our legs and push us down a hill”, if I find you, there’s a punch coming to your nose.
What did I learn?
Many of these days are about survival, and that’s ok. We don’t have any help other than paid daycare a few days a week so we are careful to spell each other and are maybe more considerate of each other’s needs than if we had more help.
We don’t have to navigate family and complicated related feelings because we’re isolated and don’t have family help. It’s occurred to us that this has actually worked out for us. We’re stronger as a team because we’ve learned to work through our strengths, weaknesses, assumptions, and all of the complications that naturally come up through a long relationship. As much as we miss our parents, far or gone, this hasn’t been without its benefits even on those really hard days.
:: Are you in close proximity to family? Is that a good or bad thing?
April 11, 2016
Life, death, and taxes, my friends. But unlike the other two, taxes happen on schedule every year.
And this year, boy o boy am I not so ready.
Life doesn’t discriminate
Between the sinners and the saints
It takes and it takes and it takes
And we keep living anyway
– Wait For It, Hamilton
In 2014, I started using a CPA to put together the return itself. I still compile all our financial documents and a spreadsheet listing everything, including our itemized deductions, so really the CPA just has to plug the numbers in and advise me on the trickier parts like the investment property.
It feels absolutely silly in retrospect to feel guilty over hiring it out but it was hard to fight the feeling that as the Family CFO, I was abrogating my responsibility by doing so. Of course I could do it myself but I don’t have that kind of time to spare, and the headache was getting to be too much. See? Even now I feel like I have to justify the decision.
Never mind. This year, I’m extra grateful for making that decision because what we’re looking at would have been much worse at the butt-end of 20 hours of tax agony.
It’s a long story, and I can’t get into the specifics of it, but we have an on-paper only “income source” from a family thing, from which we don’t derive any true income. This year, there was a huge one-time income bump that we wouldn’t see but, of course, would impact our return. I knew we’d owe something. That part I was braced for.
The other part, the first draft of the return, staggered me. No, let’s be honest, it knocked me on my ass. Might have actually stopped breathing for a few solid minutes.
We would have had a modest tax refund this year from both state and federal. Instead, the bill totals up over $13,000. It’s not that we failed to pay quarterly taxes, this is truly a one-time thing, and it won’t be a problem going forward after this year. That’s cold comfort in a cold spring, but payment is due on April 18th this year, so, yay grace period?
We’ll have to use our long-term savings to pay that sucker, which sucks, but at least we can swing it. Meanwhile, let me sit down and put my head between my knees until the world stops spinning.
Have you filed? Are you likely to get a refund or a bill?
*Part of Financially Savvy Saturdays on brokeGIRLrich, Disease Called Debt and I Am the Future Me
April 6, 2016
Around 6 am, the snorfling starts. This kid is nothing like me – goes from asleep to wide awake in less than three winks – so any waking movement is The Real Deal.
PiC’s already up and initiating the daddy+baby morning routine so I pass out again, dozing until 7 am.
I brush my teeth and check email for any emergencies. Nothing this morning so I take over feeding LB, give Seamus his morning meds, and strap LB into the stroller and head out for a walk. PiC usually takes them for a walk before I get up but since I’m up early, he might as well get a head start on getting ready.
We come back 30 minutes later for blocks and song: ze stands at the block box handing me one at a time, bobbing hir head to my song. Ze hands me one block, I hand hir another. Rinse and repeat.
Ze spies PiC around the corner, not paying attention to either of us. Opportunity! Ze makes a crawl-dash for the dog’s water bowl. Seamus’s water bowl beckons to hir irresistably. We head off some dashes, the others result in flying hir to the sink after ze has a good splash in his bowl. Seamus is NOT amused.
Hands washed, it’s book time. I start to read Tremendous Tractors at the book bench, ze leans up against the bench to listen for half a page, then starts sorting. This book is for … you. This book is for … you. This book is for … Seamus. This book is for … you. Halfway through reading, Busy Hands has handed me the entire stack of books. Rinse and repeat for the second half of the reading.
Next up: musical toys. Some toys are for sharing, like the blocks and Legos, some are for pulling apart and flinging about. This is one of the latter. Ze prefers to fly solo as ze wrestles the rings off the stand and discards them over a shoulder. Naturally I very helpfully undo all hir work as ze finishes, placing the parts all back on the stand again. This is worth about 20 minutes.
One of hir other musical toys goes off. Over my shoulder, I see Seamus grin and tuck his paw under his chin. THANKS.
A frown, an eye-rub. Then a bigger frown and a double eye-rub. Ze won’t admit it but the fatigue is upon hir and it’s time to warm a bottle. We’ll be weaning off the bottle soon, so we’re in a transition period of bottles before naps and sippy cups after. We bounce on the yoga ball on the way to the sofa. Bottle clutched in chubby hands, tiny feet propped up on my lap, we relax for a few minutes. And I check email again. All’s quiet, just routine stuff, so I enjoy a moment of almost-cuddling with my squirmy worm.
Bottle polished off, ze hands it to me and contemplates hir full belly with a half smile. Time was, ze would finish bottle and throw it like a football. I like this new development. LB settles down after 9 am and Seamus gets breakfast. Now, it’s my time: get a glass of water, find my glasses, my computer, and dive into work. But first: sweatpants!
I get an hour and a quarter on Nap 1. I mowed down all urgent and important emails, jot to-do list for the rest of my work day. Caught up on some projects and even unexpectedly finish a call early so I process an Amazon return and package up the box to drop off at the post office. Prep the first load of laundry, it’ll be ready for drying sometime when ze gets up.
A wail. That’s never good. Ze normally wakes up and plays for a while, then yells for rescue, but ze has been running a fever the past few days and evidently ze’s miserable again. I hold hir for a while. Ze doesn’t want food or water, doesn’t want to be put down but doesn’t want to be held like that either. We sit on the ground with some toys, sadly looking at one, then another, until my silly song and toy rattling coaxes a smile to the surface. Soon enough it’s submerged under tears, again. This calls for a change in scenery, and we also need milk.
Seamus is appalled. We’re obviously going outside, but we’re not taking him with us??? It’s literally unbelievable. He walks out the front door to wait outside because surely we don’t mean to go anywhere without him. Except, we must. We’re going to walk to the grocery store and he’s not allowed inside. I’m certainly not tying him up outside, someone might steal him. And I can’t tie him outside with LB. I think that’s frowned on.
Heavy with guilt, I lock up, leaving him to contemplate the traitorous nature of Humans.
The outing helps hir mood. I pick up groceries, then we struggle our way back home. It’s a long bracing walk but I seem to have caught hir bug. Everything is heavier, more exhausting. It takes us 45 minutes, round trip.
I get a text from PiC as we arrive home and start coaxing some food into the somewhat refreshed baby. Between bites, we realize that he’d failed to plan his day all the way through and now needs to be picked up. He’s tried asking a few friends if they were in the area but I thought it unlikely so I dose hir up with ibuprofen (doc’s orders!), strap hir into the harness, and we plod back outside to the car.
Mom and baby to the rescue: we pick up PiC from the nearby transit stop, and we make a quick stop at the pharmacy for my meds before getting back home.Usually I have them mailed but the pharmacy screwed up this refill.
Snack time part two commences with a bun and a pinch bowl of raisins. These are perfect for letting hir feed hirself: small enough to fit infant-appropriate serving size snacks, the bowls are sturdy and flexible, ze thinks they’re toys as much as food vehicles. Ze upends the bowl, wears it as a hat, chews on the side thoughtfully.
It’s been 3 hours since Nap 1, so I prep another bottle for hir and peel my shoes out of hir hands again. Someday, this child will stop trying to lick my shoes. Until then …. I cuddle hir on my lap with a bottle. Usually ze lays on the ground snuggled into hir Boppy but today I’m too tired to pick hir up again so lap it is. NOPE, ze struggles back up. I push hir back and offer the bottle again. Well, ok. Ze drinks, pops the bottle out to show me hir progress halfway through, squirts hirself in the face with milk, and finally finishes.
Off to bed. There are some protests. There may be some bar rattling. But once I’ve initiated naptime procedures, I don’t look back. That ze knows of, anyway. *glances at the monitor*
2:11 pm: Silence. Ze has passed out. I might, too. But no, I have work to do. I could eat but am dragging-tired so peel a couple of clementines and dive back into work.
Ze sleeps two whole hours, waking in time to go on a walk with Seamus. As he chows down on early dinner, LB and I work on snacks. I cut up bananas and ze shakes up the yogurt cup. We have fruit, yogurt and some toast. Ze makes a complete mess of drinking milk from a sippy cup, again, so I mop up the milk spattered floor while ze pulls out the Legos for another pass at “building”. This means clapping them together and putting them back in the box, waving a special one at me every so often.
Hir patience seems unusually good for being under the weather so I take advantage of the free hands to prep dinner. He never expects it but the night feels like it goes so much more smoothly if dinner is ready just as PiC’s getting home. Most LB & me nights, that doesn’t happen, but ze is hanging out and entertaining hirself with the Legos so the stove and oven are fired up.
PiC rolls in a bit after 6, some surprise thing held him up, but we’re still on track for a quick dinner and put LB to bed by 7:30. Excellent! I hide in the bathroom to decompress for about 20 minutes, and then get back to work. Meanwhile, PiC puts together LB’s lunch for the next day. I usually do that but he’s got it today.
My concentration is excellent the first three hours, then call it an early night closing in on midnight. My aches are getting the better of me and I’ve cleared the day’s work, go go efficiency! It’s best to lay my broken body down for actual rest.
What did I learn?
Being flexible is the only way to survive combo days. If I try to stick to a rigid schedule like I might set for a daycare day, my focus is fractured and I do nothing well. Being present in the moment means ze and I are fully engaged when ze needs me, and then I’m fully engaged with my work when I’m working.
PiC handles all the out of the house chores like dealing with all the auto chores, picking up milk or medication, or dropping off packages. This leaves me free to use my energy where it’s most needed. Don’t get me wrong, he does plenty around the house, too, but that’s for another post.
I used to think we should hire out some of the work at home but honestly as we settle into routines, it doesn’t feel like we need to anymore. Which is good because as it happens, there’s not much extra room in the budget anyway.
We had a long discussion recently about our routine, it gets a bit flabby when it seems like you’re doing the same things over and over, but you’re really slipping into chaos bit by bit.
We’re committing to an 11 pm bedtime and to carving out specific hours on the weekend for my work. Unrelated? Not at all. We rely on each other heavily but if we’re both sleep deprived, then we’re no good to each other. So, more sleep. And more dedicated time on the weekend to engage with my work because sometimes I just need more hours on that front.
:: How set is your daily routine? Do you prefer a set schedule or taking it as it goes?