I swear I picked up the wrong girl from daycare today. Emily was absolutely crazy tonight. This morning, we were snuggled up in the chair reading books while Audrey slept, and she snuggled in close to me, saying, "I love you, Mom. You're a nice Mom." (I like to tell her she's a nice girl.) It was so sweet! But as we pulled into the driveway arriving home, she cried and cried and cried that she wanted to go back to Ms. Amanda's, which she sometimes says but today she just wouldn't stop wailing. Within the following hour's time, she ran around the porch making marks on the walls with crayons, she threw toys at her sister, and peed her pants on the couch. What happened?????? I guess it started before we left today: Shortly before we left, she ran from me when I told her not to play with garbage bags, and then promptly pooped her pants. She doesn't seem to think anything bad about time-outs, and having poop in her pants isn't enough of a negative to drive her to avoid the situation (can you imagine?), although she does ask me to clean her up right away. I can't get her attention in order to try to treat anything as a teachable moment. I'm just trying to keep Audrey alive and unharmed, and my house from being demolished. Except when she's singing her ABC's on pitch, doing puzzles, talking about her happy/sad/angry emotions, naming colors, kissing her sister gently, reciting lines from her favorite books, and volunteering to take her plate into the kitchen from the table. How can she be so mature and bright and then so completely impossible the next second? Why does she have to be so TWO?
Audrey is finding her hands, and she's in the zombie stage right now. The look of amazement on her face is so incredible, as she's reaching for something and realizing she can feel it and move it and watch it all at the same time. She's up once each night about 4 AM most days, which is fine with me. She's pretty predictable for sleeping throughout the day, and we may have gotten on to a solution for her bottle-aversion at daycare: she's just too distracted to eat! I tried feeding her before we left on Monday, and she wouldn't nurse until it got quiet, and today she ate pretty well from the bottle better when shielded from activity with a blanket. Yay! She's been a little needy lately, wanting to be held, but I think that's just because I have to leave her sometimes while I clean up / discipline her sister and she gets lonely and bored. Having a baby is easy - what was I thinking was so hard two years ago?
I have been feeling pretty stupid about taking the girls to daycare lately. I feel like I just can't get it right, and the last thing I want is for my sitter to be annoyed with me when she's looking after my precious girls. If I can't set her up for success, it's my girls who have a hard time. And besides, I like her a lot and don't want anyone to have a hard day because of something I did or didn't do. At least I haven't forgotten Audrey's milk yet (I did that with Emily - forgot her milk, forgot nipples, forgot bottles entirely), but I have forgotten to leave Emily's outdoor gear. I was late picking them up last week by about 10 minutes, and I showed up too early that same day. I haven't worked with Audrey and her bottles like Amanda would prefer, but it's just too much work when I have such an easy alternative available. I even feel guilty because I ate spicy food for dinner one night, which did not agree with Audrey the next day, leaving Amanda with a very fussy, gassy baby. Emily had a time-out there for not picking up her toys, which is something we haven't emphasized here at home much. I forgot to change Audrey before I took the girls today (due to the pooped pants), so the first thing on her daily sheet was to change a wet diaper. *sigh* One of these days, I'll get into the rhythm, right?
Last weekend, we went to a waterpark with some friends, and had a really nice time. Emily was pretty excited to go swimming, even though she was probably only in the water for half an hour or so. Travis had a good time on the water slide, which apparently was pretty wicked and even better after a couple beers. I got to talk to some other friends who are fighting the same terrible-two's-plus-infant things that I have been. It felt good to get out and be social, and yet come home, have bathtime, and have everyone sleep well that night. Plus we watched the ISU women win, and that's fun too.
I told my boss today that I am thinking of looking for a different position at IVS, but I don't really know how to begin because part-time positions aren't ever formally posted - you just have to come across something by word of mouth. He was pretty surprised and was really interested in why I would want to leave the department, and I told him I was tired of feeling like my work wasn't worthwhile. I have yet to be on a project where I have actually gotten to do design work from the ground up, although some projects have been better than others. All the projects, though, have included massive amounts of documenting others' work, annoyed objections to my review of things that were implemented without my input, and lots of being told that my job is easy that anybody can do it, and should be doing it, too. I will be thinking this over more in the next few months, but I guess the nice thing to take from today is that my boss was really wanting to keep me in the department. At least somebody thinks my work is valuable! Travis is fighting frustrations at work, too, and went to bed at 9 tonight because he couldn't sleep last night, frustrated with work. I know we'll both get through this, but these workplace transitions are always hard. Maybe this is the stress that's tripping Emily over the edge... but it's the only stress in our lives. We really have it pretty good!!
I got to sub for some friends' volleyball team the other night, and it was SO FUN. I had forgotten how good it feels to focus on something and work up a sweat and get my heart going. It took me several hours to wind down afterwards, and since it was a 9:00 game that was kind of a sleep-killer. I have been reeeeally stiff the past two days, but it was totally worth it. I think this weekend will be worth it, too, since my sister-in-law is turning 30 and Travis volunteered to stay home with the girls so I can go socialize. We'll see if I can stay awake and keep up with the party!
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