Hitting the Wall

"What do you do?"  People ask from time to time.  Well that is a bit of a loaded question these days.  I usually respond with some variation of a stay at home mom who watches kids in my home OR full time student.  It feels like too long of a response to include it all in one answer for some reason.  But in actuality my full response would be something like:

"I am the primary caregiver to an extremely active almost toddler.  In addition to this crazy girl I also watch a 10 month old who is going through a spell of separation anxiety and since he thinks he has two moms he clings to my leg hardcore.  There is also a near two year old who has decided to enter the "terrible twos" early who on the regular full on tantrums if the other kids even look at her and has decided hitting is tots cool if she's mad.  Finally there is a preschooler who comes from time to time who's tag lines are 'I'm bored' and 'Will you play with me?' (he's so sweet I hate telling him no!).

I also told my husband that if I stayed at home with our daughter I would take on all household chores and responsibilities (since I clearly thought I would have oodles of time-smh!).

On top of all of this I decided to fast track my way through a doctoral program taking four classes a semester this year which includes writing the first half of my dissertation and taking my comprehensive exams (three 15 pages composed over the course of a single week).  All of this while monitoring three tiny people who are like moths to a flame to the computer or seem to need my attention every few minutes if I use my standing desk."

On paper this plan seemed like a great idea.  Stay home with my daughter, make a little extra money by providing her with some playmates, maximize the tuition payment by taking as many courses as I could at a time.  In reality turns out it was not my brightest idea and maybe one of my worst:(.

From 5am (or sometimes before) until 9/9:30 at night I am going full throttle.  I refuse to stay up any later because the only thing sustaining this pace is a decent night's sleep (along with prayer and wine of course).  However, after a couple of months of this I. have. hit. the. wall.

There are 7 weeks left in the semester.  My parents were already planning to come down for a week around Isabella's birthday and I've asked them to come down for one more week at some point before the end of the semester.  I truly do not know if I'm going to make it...

11 Months

"I do like these hair bows mama.  It just might be in a different way than you do!"

This baby has such sensitive skin.  Her own drool can irritate it sometimes when she naps:(.

This is 11 months.  

Hard to believe in one month this baby girl will be ONE!

10 Months

 This is 10 months.

 Hugging Aiden--"I love my doggy!"

"There has to be way for me to climb over this.  Hmm let me see..."

Field Trip

We did it!  We took our first field trip with both babies:).  We just went up to the local library, but both Isabella and A laughed and smiled like we went to Disney.   While I have often gotten looks and been asked when I take all of the kids on walks if they are related this is the first time I have been asked if Isabella and A are twins.  Now A is big for his age so size wise that's a legit question; however, A is black so?!?!

We celebrated our adventure with a trip through the Chick-Fil-A drive through which was more of a celebration for me, but whatevs:).

One Small Step...

for Isabella, one giant leap toward becoming a big kid!  I knew it was coming, but it kind of came out of nowhere.  I had all three kids and was sitting with one of them near Isabella who was playing at the activity table.  All of the sudden she just let go of the activity table and took two tiny steps in my direction before plopping down on her butt. 

THIS is why I have made the choices I have made.  THIS is why I go without new clothes.  THIS is why we will live in this house with the tiny upstairs for the foreseeable future.  THIS is why I am ok budgeting like a miser.  THIS is why I am ok with working well past the age of 65 because my retirement savings is pitiful and won't get any better in the near future. 

THIS is likely one of the many reasons God's plan laid out the way it did, so that THIS could be an option. 

I am so blessed to be in a position that THIS could be an option for me. 

I would not trade THIS for anything.

Attitude Adjustment

I'd like to tell you it's the toddler I watch that needs the attitude adjustment, but sadly that's not the case.  The one in need of the attitude adjustment is me.

This morning I was cranky and honestly I couldn't tell you why.  In fact I didn't realize just how cranky I was until lunchtime. 

Lunchtime is the one time of the day I let the dogs roam free in the house during child care days because all of the kids are in high chairs.  The dogs want to be where we are so they are of course in the dining room.  This used to work well for the most part.  There was the time I realized the toddler's high chair was too close to the couch because our older dog realized if she sat on the back of the couch she had a better angle at potentially sharing the toddler's lunch, but once I made that minor adjustment we were good to go.   The other two kids were just eating purres so the dogs had no interest, so the dogs would hang out nearby but there was really no interaction.  However, now all three kids are eating varying degrees of finger foods so the potential puppy smorgasbord has tripled and at least ONE of the kids wants to help these puppies out any way she can.

Isabella LOVES hand delivering bits of her food to the dogs.  At first she would laugh hysterically which immediately gave her away if I was distracted with another kiddo, but now she just grins so it's sometimes harder to catch.  The other two kids are less direct and morsels of food only fall from their tray by accident.  However, monitoring Isabella has become like a full time job at lunch.  When I keep the dogs in the kitchen (which is their homebase) they can see us at the table and whine and cry pitifully which is sooo annoying.

 For some reason at lunch today this exchange became too much and I came pretty dang close to yelling (it was directed at the dogs and not the kids if that helps at all).  I took a deep breath and we got through the rest of the meal, but I couldn't shake the dark cloud over my mood. 

Then suddenly phrase popped into my head:

I immediately opened the gratitude journal app on my phone.  I downloaded it a couple of years ago and used it daily for about 6 months then when we started into the summer of IVF I got out of the habit.  I started again on January 1, but hadn't opened it for the day yet.  Honestly it was kind of like magic.  I jotted down a couple of positives about the day and immediately felt better.  

Isn't it amazing that such a little thing that is so easy to do makes such a big impact?  Isn't it equally amazing how quickly we forget?

Weekend Update

Leap 7 continues to strike fear in our hearts.  Ok, tad dramatic, but Leap 7 continues to keep life shall we say interesting at our house.

On Friday, my friend Amy brought her kids over to play with Isabella and A.  As soon as Amy walked into the playroom Isabella melted ALL the way down.  I guess she thought Amy had come to babysit:(.  So she was totally clingy (despite playing JUST FINE before they got here) until she got up from her nap and they were gone.  

Her beautiful 1.5-2 hours naps also appear to be a thing of the past.  They have now been replaced with a one hour nap and a 40 minute nap.  This is cool AS LONG AS she sleeps more at night.  Which I guess she is if you add the 2 hours of cosleeping we do when she gets up between 3:30/4:45 to eat.  After that she fidgets quietly for 30 minutes to an hour while I hold her in bed and then sleeps for another 1.5-2 hours so our new get up for the day is like 6:30/7pm.  This would be even more amazing if she did it in her crib, but I am too chicken to try it yet.

Friday we met up with some women I worked with at my last school.  Things sound like they are getting interesting over there and I may be getting more requests for references (I have gotten two so far).  The Executive Director is going to be the downfall of that place and it sucks.  That school (well the elementary school) was my first "baby".  I created it from literally nothing.  It gave me a distraction from the pain of IF.  It was far from perfect, but it was a place where the needs of kids were put first and I was proud of that fact.  It's a shame how one narcisist can have so much power and his band of merry men and women (the secondary principal and board) can be so complicit.  

Saturday we met my brother for lunch and Isabella cried when she saw him until she realized I wasn't leaving her...dang this kid has a complex!  Our couch date was writing lists.  Yep, J.T. was equally excited when he heard:).  They were top 10 lists we wrote about each other.  It actually turned out to be quite sweet.  Maybe not high on the fun scale, but I think it was something we both needed.

Sunday I discovered my baby only wants to eat if feeding herself.  Now I realized this last week when it came to solids, but drew the conclusion that this included her bottles too.  I am all for independence, but this feels nuts!  Since keeping a bottle at the ready for her to drink from as she chooses she is back to her regular amount of consumption.  She will only let me give her the very first bottle of the day and a few ounces at the end of the day.  I am finding other ways to work in my snuggles (like the co-sleeping), but I'm hoping this is just a phase.

In other big girl news, Isabella can now stand for about a minute or so without holding on to anything and can stand from a seated position.  I see a step or two coming before February is over.  Where is my baby?!?!?