I did it all for the discount . . ..

I am ashamed to admit it . . .

I'm still working at Younkers. I signed on for 3 hours a week.

But I just can't give up the discount. After I passed the one year mark last month I get 25% off of all clothes, including clearance. And when I use the coupons with it . . .

Yay!

Tonight is my first night back so we'll see what Jeff thinks about me staying at work when I get home . . .

Is it hard?

Everyone who has finally noticed that I'm back at work asks the same question.

"Is it hard leaving your girls everyday?"

There is no easy answer because

1) Yes is is hard to leave my girls at daycare instead of getting to watch them everyday.

2) It is nice to know that Alaina is getting good social exposure to other kids and learning in a structured manner that it would take me months to plan out let alone execute.

3) It is nice to challenge my brain with things at work and interact with adults during the day

But most of all, my working allows us to continue to live in our big house. Jeff and I sat down before we had Kayla to look at our finances and see if I could stay at home.

You know how everyone says there is always a way? Well there was a way for me to quit working full time. We could . . . .

a) have me work part time when Jeff is at home 20 hours a week, but Jeff and I would never see each other and the girls would only ever be with one parent at a time. Not to mention I would never get to do anything on the weekends.

Or

b) move out of our house back into a very small apartment with barely enough room to sneeze without running into each other. And doesn't that sound fun?

Anyway, Kayla will be two months this thursday which will be very exciting except when I have to take her for her immunization shots.

Yuck.

Yo - Yo!

I'm getting really pumped for theater events this season.

Someone put some event brochures for the LEID center down in the lobby at work so I snagged one and posted my upcoming shows in my cube.

I'm so excited for Yo-Yo Ma in May that I could just puke!!

That and Tiff and I are going to see the traveling show of "So You Think You Can Dance?" in Omaha on Nov 3rd.


And to top it all off . . .NWU is doing Applause, Applause again in which the students perform assorted musical numbers from historical broadway shows. They did this my senior year and it was so amazing! I can hardly wait!

West Wing baby

I can't even remember who gave them to me . . . but I have season one and two of the West Wing on dvd. I started watching them while on maternity leave and got so into them that I borrowed the rest of the seasons from the public library. I personally think that this show helped soften the nation to having our current president, but that's just my opinion.

But my love of the West Wing led to the greatest discovery.

It puts Kayla to sleep.

Picture a dark house, with a soft blue glow coming from the tv and a show that features almost no action scenes, no teenagers, and with no commercial breaks. AKA - no screaming, gunfire, loud noises, crying or other hullabaloo. (great word!) I bounch on a big exercize ball until Kayla slowly dozes off which usually takes hours but with the loving glow and witty charm of West Wing for us - the glow fo Kayla, the charm for me. She is out in ten minutes.

And last night while watching Donna said my word!

Snarky

I heart The West Wing and all of its wonderful characters.

A lost dream.

MBG and I used to spend hours pouring over the American girls catalog in the summer.



We plotted and planned exactly how we would purchase our favorite historical dolls and all of their accessories.



In the end we didn't buy a single thing. I think we just couldn't justify buying an $80 doll when we could buy books and jewelry instead.



But yesterday I got an urge to go look at that doll that I desired so much for 3 summers.


And what I found was a tragedy.

The doll that I had picked out was discontinued last year. I couldn't believe how sad I was hearing that no other little girls would dream about having their own victorian Samantha doll like I had.

No planning or saving,
no wishing or hoping.

Sniff, sniff.

If I really wanted, I could buy her on ebay for probably $150. But if I wasn't willing to spend $80 as a yound girl for her, why would I want to spend more now?

I guess the dream is often sweeter that the reality.

"To sleep; perchance to dream . . "

For some reason Kayla was waiting to start daycare to gift me with a good night's sleep. She's been sleeping from around 11:30 pm to 5-7 am and now sleeps just a little during the day. All of which is fine with me.


But Alaina has been having trouble sleeping through the night.

Last night I woke up to see the shadowy outline of Alaina standing in front of me holding my contact saline bottle.

"Mommy, my eye hurts."(Last week, Alaina was having a terrible time with her left eye, so I had her lay down and I put some saline in to rinse out the irritant.)So I walked her back to her room and had her lay down so that I could put some drops in her eye.

But before I could rinse out her eye, she rolled over to go back to sleep. Jeff was baffled to find my contact saline in Alaina's room this morning. ; )



I find it a little unsettling to be woken out of a dead sleep by my toddler every other night. Especially since she never says anything to wake me up, she just silently stands there until my mommy senses kick in and I wake up to the sound of her bending over to look me in the eye.

But the big question in my mind is . . .

why doesn't she ever wake up Jeff?

I tried . . .really I did!

I tried to blog while on maternity leave, but looking back my efforts weren't so good.

I'm back at work and Kayla is at her first day of daycare . . .I'm going to have to go visit at noon because I have to drop off another bottle . . .

Which makes me very unhappy. I tried so dang hard to pump when I could to build up my milk supply so that I wouldn't have to 'bus' milk around town.

And then MSPI struck.

I have approx 10 oz of milk in the freezer waiting for Kayla's digestion to acclimate to soy and milk again. 10 oz just waiting to be used.

But not for another two months.

Kayla also has the worst case of baby 'back-ne' that I've ever seen too. It was so bad I took her to the pediatrician to see if it was a rash.

But to close, here are a few things I learned while on Maternity leave.

1) There is always at leave on version of CSI, Law and Order or The West Wing playing all day on TV.

2) I should not be allowed to watch any of the above shows for more that 2 days of leave because I start telling myself that I should study law, forensic science, or politics just so I can pontificate like my favorite characters.

3) I hate hemming things by hand.

4) Ironing curtains sucks.

5) Having to read the ingredients of everything you eat sucks big time

6) The public library is a blessing and a curse

7) I do not trust anyone with a Y chromosome with the exclusive care of a baby under 6 weeks for more than 30 minutes. And the women that I trust with one for more than 2 hours is very short indeed.

8) Movies are getting too long if I can't figure out how to go see one in between nursing sessions for Kayla.

9) Those stupid mittens they make for babies are useless. A good pair of their socks over their hands works much better.

10) those stupid mittens are not for keeping baby from scratching their face, but are to keep babies from trying to nurse from their hands and howling in frustration when trying to sleep.

11) I'd rather have to break my child of using a pacifier, than have a child who refuses to suck on one for comfort.

I could go on, but I have to go home to scrounge for food, go to daycare, and maybe sneak in an eposide of The West Wing over lunch.