Free at last

I am DONE with my temp job.  And it's possible I could have stayed a few more weeks, but all that getting ready for work and pumping milk and no time to go to the store and laundry explosions and scary-messy house and day care issues and no time to eat that went with working just sort of turned me off to the whole idea.  For now.

I admit it was nice to be able to get AWAY from the house and pretend to be like a grown-up or something for a bit.  Talking with other adults during the day and using that shriveled up part of my "working brain" was a nice change in pace from the "hanging out and nursing a baby all day" part of me.  But with the day care costs and the parking fees and the gas, I wasn't actually making much money on the deal--a lot of hassle for, well, nothing.  Nothing but the satisfaction that the folks at this company are very nice and always seem very impressed with my work.  If only they would find something more permanent for me.

Because, despite all those issues of going back to work...I REALLY need to go back to work.  Money is beyond tight, and those diapers aren't getting any cheaper!  The biggest issue is that we are using the state healthcare since John's contractor has HORRIBLE healthcare.  It is kind of OK, but kind of pricy, and if I could just find a job with benefits--even if I'm only breaking EVEN with the day care costs--then we'll end up ahead with the healthcare costs.  I'm not sure how we'll manage the before/after school and then before evening activities chaos, but, like most families, I guess we'll figure it out.  And I keep reminding myself that I have an almost 13-year old who will be most helpful with getting the younger kids off the bus and started on their homework before Mom and Dad get home.

Still.  Ugh.

So!  Christmas is just 10 days away, and we have managed to buy TWO gifts.  Eep!  At least the tree has been up for the last two weeks.

Mary got a qualifying time in one of her strokes a few weeks ago (I think her 100 freestyle, but I might be mistaken), and she was ONE SECOND from getting a qualifying time in her 500 freestyle.  And for those of you non-swimming readers, that means that she did 20 laps in the pool.  We are getting a lot of comments from other swim parents about how much she has grown as a swimmer in the year and a half that she's been doing this.

Izzy continues to impress with her swimming skills.  But she is still cranky and crotchety in the mornings.  And she is still being forgetful of homework--and orchestra materials.  John and I know that THIS kid is the one that needs more one-on-one attention, but frankly, I can't really pull it off since I've ALWAYS got the baby with me.  And John is now coaching Keith's basketball team.  So, the most attention-starved kid seems even more attention-starved than normal.  John took her with him to the grocery store the other day, and the poor child talked NON-STOP the whole way there, the entire time in the store, and the whole way home.  Oh!  To have a doppelganger to help pick up the slack here!

Keith, as mentioned, is now in a basketball league.  And John, as mentioned, got suckered into coaching.  It's keeping them super busy in a time of year when we're already up to our eyeballs, but Keith, despite being a short, little guy, really enjoys playing basketball, so...there you go.  And his stinky feet are just STINKIER now!

Sophia is still just a delicious baby--who is starting to grow OUT of being a baby now.  NOooo!  She is nine months old now and has been pulling herself up and starting to cruise and pointing and using her pincer grasp (yay!  we're at the "stick her in the high chair and throw her a handful of cheerios" phase!) and maybe really trying to talk (we swear she is trying to say "tree").   STILL not sleeping through the night, though.  She usually falls asleep around 8 then wakes up at 9 to play until I finally manage to nurse ALL the milk right out of my body to get her to go back to sleep around 10.  Then she wakes up at 2.  THEN she wakes up at 5.  I think I have figured out that the 2am wake-up is mostly John's fault.  That's usually about when he goes to bed, and I think his walking around and settling down for the night wakes her up--and now it's become a habit.  I still mostly don't care.  I deal with the wake ups when they come.  But we seriously need to get all this house rearranged so that she can get OUT of our bedroom!

I have lost even MORE weight and so now my pants are starting to slide down.  This is normal for me at this point post-pregnancy.  I feel that the stress of working in addition to working very strange hours with NO lunch break have not helped with the unintentional losing of the weight.  So I am also glad to be done working since I may actually have time to eat lunch now--and all those holiday goodies will help, too.  heh.,

Hey!  Now we've got FOUR gifts bought.  Thank you, online-gift-buying place!

Have I mentioned that Sophie will still not consistently take a bottle?  That ended up being an interesting part of going back to work.  I had two regular sitters who split the week of watching her.  Then I had two back-ups for if/when the original two could not do it (this was an interesting week with my using all four friends for five days of work!).  Amusingly, all four folks had different methods of attempting to get Sophie to drink her milk.  Sometimes they were successful with the bottle (usually not).  Sometimes she was drinking out of a cup (which really worked the best, but some folks didn't seem to want the hassle).  Sometimes she would only ingest an ounce or two before they would give up and just feed her the baby food.  And...I was OK with it all as I knew she was nursing so much when she was with me (including those 2am and 5am feedings).  I can just imagine the worry I would have felt if this had been my first baby!  Yay for realizing that she's just FINE if she missed out on her bottle the 5+ hours I was gone from her during the day.  (Although you should SEE how much milk is currently residing in my freezer.  Milk that will probably NEVER get drunk, but HOW could I possibly throw it away?!)