Time.

90 days......

Ninety days, it doesn't seem like so long, that is until you (me) start a new job, and are not supposed to take any time off during a "probationary period."  Well, I was getting antsy, and I guess God knew it, because it gave me strep throat over the weekend.  His way of slowing me down?  So, I took off work yesterday, on what would be day 54 of my new job.  So, I didn't make it.

9 months......

That is how old my baby girl is turning TOMORROW.  I can hardly believe that she is 9 months old already.  My last baby.  My last little snug bug.  It's crazy how fast time flies.  It truly makes me want to stop the clock, slow us all down and just enjoy this life a little bit more.  Times are flying by and I just want to soak them up.

6 years......

This is almost how long I've been married.  SIX years on March 7.  It seems like it's been much longer than that, almost forever, but at the same time I feel like we were just going on our short honeymoon trip to Gatlinburg.

3 decades plus 3 years......

How old I am!  I'm an old person!  I cannot believe I'm 33.  I feel like I'm 18 in almost every way.  I'm having the best time of my life, at the best point in my life and I just hope life keeps getting better as it has so far.

I don't know what exactly made me want to write about time today, but as this day has been ticking by ever so slowly, the topic of time has been on my mind so of course, I must write about it.

What are some "time" things that are going on in your world today?

the daycare hunt

Its rough folks, I’ll tell you, it’s rough.

It all started when I got this pesky little thing called a new job.  You see, my husband and I worked for the same company until the beginning of this year.  Our office was approximately a 30 minute drive from our house (on a good day).  Because it was so far – we elected to have our kids in daycare near our office instead of near our home.  For many reasons, but the largest being that if they needed us for any reason, we’d be close.  Since I started the new job, Tim has been solely responsible for dropping the kids off and picking them up each day (at two different locations….).  And, its been working, but this is where it gets complicated.

You see, baseball season begins for Tim at the end of March.  This is the same baseball season that I’ve talked about  where I become a single mom.  Well, the difference this year, is that at rush hour after work is through, it can take anywhere from 45 minutes to an hour and a half to get to the area where Tim works, and where the kids are in daycare.  So, I knew that I’d never make it to both places to pick up the kids each day before they close, nor did I want to spend my entire evening driving to and from that area with two kids in tow.  So, I was forced to start the daycare hunt closer to my work and our home.

I began searching back in December, almost as soon as I was offered my new position.  I preferred to have Kate in an in home daycare like she was currently in, and I wanted to find a preschool for Cooper.  I didn’t really think it could be that difficult to find something that would work for each of them.  I didn’t care if they were in the same place, as we were used to them being in different locations.  My main focus was getting them the best care possible, with a secondary focus to not spend more than I make on that care.

I probably called 20+ places, visited 6-10 of them, and finally  found a place for both kids!  And bonus!  It’s the closest place to my house!  The cherry on top?    BOTH kids are going to go there.  I’m telling you, I struck gold here ladies and gentlemen.  Cooper starts this week in fact, and Katy will start either in April or after her first birthday, basically as soon as they can fit her in.  I’m very fortunate to have Stephanie and my mom who will be able to watch Kate until she starts there.

But honestly, that search was painful.  We are picky, yes, but we should be, right?  I mean these are our babies!  We want the best for them!  I visited some places that I wouldn’t send my least favorite person to for care. 

There was a place that literally didn’t have enough standing room for 3 adults due to the toys all over the floor.  When I asked if the toys everywhere was normal, the answer I got was “yes, this is actually a pretty good day.”  I was shocked to say the very least.  Did this place really think I was going to let my baby learn how to crawl in a place where she could hurt herself on the hundreds of toys covering the floor??? 

I toured another place where the kids ate lunch at tables in their classroom, and since they were just finishing up, I got to see what that led to….   I’d never seen such a food mess in all my life.  I think there was more food on the floor than could have possibly been consumed. 

Another place I visited had babies eating table food (some at 6 months) and guess what part of their table food was….. COLE SLAW.  Seriously, feeding a 6 month old cole slaw?  Maybe I’m weird, but that seems a bit insane to me. 

Like I said, I found a good place to send my kids.  I am lucky.  I do not envy anyone who has to start this process.  We were so fortunate until now that we didn’t have any of these problems.  When Cooper was born we had care lined up, we did switch him when he was 6 months old, but after that, we’ve had the best daycare situation.  I feel confident that this new daycare is going to be equally good for both of my kids.  Please folks, if I can give you one bit of advice….  Don’t settle for something that you don’t think is good enough.  If you search long and hard enough, I think you’ll find some place you’ll feel good about.  At least I think we did in the long run.

Have you had problems finding daycare for your kids?  What was your hunt like?  Did you get lucky right off the bat???

Extended weekend, sad news, lots of tears, and someone, please stop the snow

Friends, the weekend seemed to have ended normally this morning, as my family got up, got ready and headed out to work as usual.  But then around 12:30, as I was working - I received and email.  My office was closing at 1pm due to the impending weather.  I knew we were supposed to get some snow later on in the day, but I didn't know it was going to be enough to cause our office to close.....  I quickly rescheduled my 1pm meeting, and finished up a few things and hightailed it out the door.  I hadn't eaten lunch yet, so I headed home to eat and log back into work.  It was a fairly productive afternoon, even if the kids and Tim got home about an hour after I did.  We spent the afternoon together, me holding Katy while working, Tim and Cooper playing soccer in the living room.  I love my family.

Sad news for so many people in my life recently.  My neighbor friend lost her husband a couple of weeks ago, at the age of 39.  I'm sure you've heard about Baby Harper by now, and if you can, make a donation to his family here.  I cannot stop crying about these two angels.  As a wife and a mother, I cannot imagine what these ladies are going through.  My heart is broken for them both.  Tears have been flowing frequently in my house because of my friend's husband, and now adding the loss of Harper into the mix, they are free flowing.  I trust that God has a reason for everything - and I believe that these guys are in a better place - but that does not make the loss any less painful, at least in the short term.  Please say a prayer for The Young family - they need them right now.

Finally, if there is anyway for us to move past some of this snow that's been hitting us since Christmastime, I would really really appreciate it.  We've had the snowiest winter in many years and I'm ready for it to END.

Mimi times two.......

So this little one…..

Wants everyone to know what she knows……

She is going to have a brother or sister this year!!! 

Stephanie and Ryan are going to bless us with another grandbaby come August!!! 

KB is pretty excited too, She’s even doing some studying….

We are excited to say the least!  Cannot wait for Baby Bramlett #2!! 

A day in my life - (my new job)

I know I'm not the only one performing a juggling act on a daily basis, but since I am writing this blog for me, to keep records of what goes on in my life at any certain time, I thought I would go ahead and document a day in my life early in my new job.  Tim still takes the kids up to the city where he works for their school and sitter.  We are in the process of searching/switching them to a new location closer to my new job, which is less than a 10 minute drive home.  I hope to write a post about that process in the next few week or so.  

In the meantime, read on if you're interested in my life.  Once I finish collecting enough milk for Kate to finish up her year of breastmilk, I totally plan to take that time and add exercise back into my life.  IT IS NECESSARY!!!  I didn't include this below, but I pump once in the middle of the night, so that's a total of 5 times per day, at least 15 minutes of pumping, plus storage time, so that's at least 100 minutes of time that I should get back for exercise or something else once I'm finished!  

my week day schedule

6:00 - 6:50 - Wake up, feed Katy girl, pump, dress Kate, help get Cooper ready for school, get coats on the kids and help Tim get them out the door and in the car.

6:50-7:10 -  Make my lunch and pick up the kitchen (if there is time)

7:10 - 7:45 - Shower, dress, get ready for work, make coffee and head out the door.

7:45 - 7:55 - Drive to work.

8:00 -10:30 - Fill up water and work at my desk.

10:30 - 11:00 - Pump, restroom break, fill up water again.

11:00 - 12:00 - Work at my desk, meetings etc.

12:00 - 1:00 - Lunch

1:00 - 2:45 - Work at my desk, meetings etc.

2:45 - 3:15 - Pump, restroom break fill water again.

3:15 - 5:00 - Work at my desk, meetings etc.

5:00 - 5:10 - Drive home (or go to grocery store for dinner needs)

5:10 - 5:45 - Change clothes and start dinner, wait for Tim and kiddos to get home

5:45 - 7:00 - Finish cooking, play with both kids, have dinner, clean up dinner, get ready to feed Katy

7:00-7:30 - Feed Kate & watch Cooper play some kind of sport (he's obsessed)

7:30 - 8:00 - Get both kids ready for bed.  Jammies on both, lay Kate down, read Coop books and Bible stories, brush teeth, tuck him in.

8:00 - bedtime (varies) - Prepare lunches, pump, prepare lunches for next day, anything else needing done (laundry, etc)

Well, that's it.  That's my day.  

Cleaning Routine..... FAIL

If you remember, a few weeks ago.... I wrote about our plan for a cleaning schedule.  Here is a copy of what was our plan.

Well, some plans workout, and some don't.  This one, well, it didn't.  I didn't know if it would, I truly hoped that we'd be able to succeed with this schedule.  It didn't seem all that difficult, but alas, we failed.  We did okay for the first 3 days?  Then, crash and burn.

My mom retired from being a teacher this school year.  She is enjoying her time off, but would like to keep busy, so she has volunteered to do some housecleaning for us, my brother and my grandma.  I LOVE her for doing this for us.  She's going to come up and clean our floors and bathrooms every other week.  Since these two items are my major pain points in my house, this is going to solve all of our cleaning problems!  At least I think that it will.  I'm going to pay mom, because cleaning my house absolutely deserves payment.  She came up for the first time yesterday, and oh my goodness, I'm loving  this solution already!

For the record, I think that a cleaning schedule is a good plan.  I think that it can work, and I think eventually we'll give it another go, especially when mom decides she's sick of cleaning my house.  But for now, we've got a solution (THANKS MAMA) that works, and until we discover a couple more hours in our current 24, we'll stick with this!

Good luck to those who are giving the cleaning schedule a g (Gina!!)  I know that you can make it work!

Happy Hump Day Friends!

Katy is EIGHT months!

Miss Kate, I don’t know why time is flying by so quickly.  You’re eight months old (1/26/2014), and if I blink a few more times, you’ll be nine months, so I just want a PAUSE button. 

We found out, that you are not allergic to amoxicillin, thank goodness!  At least you weren’t when you took your 10 days worth of meds for that nasty ear infection you had. 

  

Anyway, back to Katybug. Sleeping......  You continue to do great in this department.  You’re sleeping through the night 90% of the time.  Ten percent, you’re waking up around 11 or midnight and crying, and it seems there is nothing we can do to improve this.  We hold you, rock you, etc, but you don’t stop, so we end up having to let you cry it out.  It usually only takes 5-7 minutes at the most.  You’re not talking as much anymore either.  Once every couple of weeks you’ll wake up sometime in the middle of the night, but usually you sleep through. 

Bedtime is between 7-8.  Some nights you’re ready to eat right at 7pm and then you’re in bed directly after that, other nights, you stay up until 8, and perhaps you would stay up later if we let you, but 8pm is bedtime.  You don’t cry when we put you to bed, we are so thankful for that.  You wake up and talk in your bed sometime between 5:30 and 6am.  Unless you’re screaming, we let you talk until 6.  That’s when I get up and feed you.

Speaking of eating.  You’re doing great still with 4 bottles per day.  Morning bottle is 6-6.5oz.  If you do stop before 5, I will give you a couple of tablespoons of cereal to up your milk intake.  You have a midmorning bottle between 9:30 and 10 and again you drink between 4-5 oz.  You’re eating 1 tub of second foods now for lunch.  Then an afternoon bottle, usually 5-6 oz.  Then for your night bottle you drink 3-4 oz and we give you four heaping tablespoons of cereal with 4 oz of milk at night.  At 8 months, you’re eating like a champ!

 

Napping is tricky with you.  You LOVE your sleep sacks.  You sleep best when you have one on.  You can take 3 short naps (usually on the weekends) or you could take 2 pretty long naps at this point.  It really depends where you are and what’s going on around you.  You’re so funny!

Kate, you’re still in a size 3 diaper.  You’re still in a few 6-9 months clothes, but most of them are too small, and you’re in 9 or 9-12 months clothes at this point.  You’re a slobber bucket!  You are slobbering everywhere.  I foresee some teeth in our future little lady! 

This last month you’ve really grasped the concept of getting up on all 4s.  You’re not doing much once there, and you only stay this way for a little while, but crawling will happen sooner than later I’m afraid!

Katy, your eyes are still blue. You are still chewing on everything!  Your hair is coming in slowly but surely.  Your eyelashes seem to be growing a little too, that makes me happy!

Katybug, you are a mama’s girl.  You cry when I leave the room, you literally try to leap out of anyone’s arms if you see me.  You want me to hold you all of the time.  I LOVE this so much!  Cooper was such a daddy’s boy and he still is.  He loves his Pop and so far you love your Mama. 

Your laugh is so great to hear, you are laughing more and more these days and I absolutely cherish every sweet little laugh.  That smile is precious and I just adore you! I’m one proud mama that’s for sure!  Happy EIGHT Months Kate,  I love you, you sweet sugar booger!