Please excuse the rambling nature of the post. I have had very little sleep the past couple of days. Everything is fine...but yeah.
Tuesday I had my OB appointment. All was good, it was the Norma 36 week check-up. Sometime later that evening, the baby shifted to my right side and I had the worst Sciatic pain radiating down my leg. I didn't sleep much that night at all. As usual, when I don't sleep hardly at all, the baby was very sluggish most of yesterday but still moving so I wasn't worried. But definitely a decrease from the day before. By the time I went to try and sleep, the baby wouldn't move. And the baby ALWAYS moves when I lay down for bed. So I spent 2 hours doing everything under the sun to convince baby to move, to no avail. I guzzled tons of water. I finally headed to L&D at midnight. To be put on the monitor and the baby immediately started rolling around and kicking me like crazy. Little brat. So cue another night of not much sleep. This morning the baby is making up for it and going crazy in there. A sign of things to come from this one, perhaps?
Last time I wrote, I talked about how sick I had been with a stomach flu. Well, turns out it actually is my gallbladder, which is full of stones. So much makes sense now. When I went to work Sunday I asked got the ultrasound tech to scan me really quickly to check my gallbladder, and boom there they were. I haven't been sick since, so for now I am just getting the name of a good doctor to have handy and pray that it doesn't become an issue until I can at least recover from the C-section. There is a small chance it will resolve on its own after pregnancy, and I am hoping that is the case. Or at least that I can be someone who can live with the stones with little problems, which is possible when the stones are small, which they are. Thinking back, I think I have likey had issues since my last pregnancy, because I had several similar episodes where I have been the only one in the house that got sick. So maybe I will get lucky.
Baby boy is officially in the toddler tantrum phase. It is really interesting to see the other kids reactions to it. I am teaching them how to ignore it and how to keep him safe when he starts flailing about. The biggest trigger for him is the word "no". When he hears it he gets so angry. So we are working on diversion tactics when he wants to get into things that could get him hurt or aren't for him. I forgot just how frustrating this time could be!
I feel like I have wrote about this ad naseum but that friendship of mine that was struggling...well, I pulled back a bit in order to let things sort of cool down while emotions are high. And I thought it was actually helping. Although for all of the things that I apparently "do wrong" such as not responding to text messages as in depth as I could and my lack of availability (things she has said to me) she is quite guilty of them as well. At any rate, I was making more of an effort to text and talk and ask how things are and we have talked as recently as Sunday. But then last night I get an out of the blue text asking if I am free today, which I am not. I told her about plans I previously had, and put the phone down to handle a kid issue. I was about to text back that I only had one weekend left of work and that after that we could plan to do something, but before I had a chance a nasty text pops up and it is her lashing out and saying "I deserve better after all these years". So yeah. I was at a loss. Because I didn't expect her to get mad I had plans the night before she apparently had a vacation day I didn't even know about. There were a million things I wanted to say back, but I didn't. I just said "I am sorry you fee that way." I guess what I am able to offer right now isn't enough for her. It makes me sad, but what can I really do??
I have been working on mending my relationship with my mom, as much as I can. Having some breathing space between the incident and concentrating on my family has helped. It doesn't mean I have forgotten what happened, but I have let it go some, enough to allow us to have an unspoken truce. I still feel incredibly guarded, because I am sure the same issues will come up again. It is almost inevitable that will happen. But I can't focus on that because it just drags me into a big dark hole I don't have time to be in. She is the only mom I have got, so I have to find a way to have a relationship with her we can both live with.
So glad to have my last 2 shifts at work coming up. I feel like once I am done with those, I can breathe a bit easier and really try and relax and finish up the last couple lingering things I have around the house. Today I am feeling very anxious. Probably from the lack of sleep.
Last weekend we did our local farm trips. The pumpkin patch was on Saturday and it was FREEZING!! Seriously the elevation at that farm combined with the cloudy sky and wind, it was crazy cold. No one who came out expected it to feel like that, you could tell because no one was dressed for the cold. It was a little comical actually. We decided to go back in 2 weeks to do our hayride and get our annual family picture when hopefully it is sunny and a tad bit warmer!
Thursday, October 22, 2015
Monday, October 12, 2015
The Best Laid Plans...
I had the worst night's sleep ever Friday night, as in I didn't really ever fall asleep all night. I finally got up when my alarm went off at 5am to get ready for work. Despite having no sleep, I managed to have a pretty productive day at work and didn't really feel as bad as I thought I should have. The drive home made me a little sleepy and I knew if I wanted to participate in the homecoming-dance prep later than evening I would need to rest. So I came home and laid down for a little bit. When my husband woke me up, I felt worse than when I laid down; I was headachey and had a sour stomach. I had my husband get run out and grab me a soda to sip over ice, and I went on with the evening. Less than 2 hours later I realized I was going to be sick, and by 1am I realized I was going to need to call out of work. I had another stomach bug, but I was in so much pain I almost thought it might be my gallbladder. It was pretty bad. I spent most of Sunday in bed. I was worried about the baby, as I was way sicker than I had been earlier in the week, but baby was moving plenty. I was getting dehydrated but thanks to all the excess swelling I had been having, my body had plenty of fluid to draw from. My ankles haven't been so small this entire pregnancy. I am on the upswing today thank goodness. No idea how I got this twice in a week unless I re-infected myself. Knock wood, so far no one else has gotten it. I pray it is contained to just me.
I seriously never call out. My phone was blowing up with texts asking if I was okay because I never miss work. My last call out was years ago, I can't even remember when or why. I think everyone thought I must have had the baby. Anyway...I am only part time, so I earn PTO but not that much, and I have only been a benefited employee for a short time, so it's not like I have even ever had the chance to rack up any major accrued bank or anything. I work 12 hour shifts so missing 12 hours is a big chunk of time for me to use to cover my day off; we don't have separate sick time. Leading up to my Maternity leave, I had calculated my PTO hours right down to it, so I would know when I could start my paid leave, and cover the exempt period before benefits kick in. Needless to say, having to use 12 hours 3 weeks before my leave starts leaves me short. Not by much, but I had figured everything including my budget, based on still getting 2 full checks before my 66.67% leave pay kicks in. Even if I back my leave up and work right up until I deliver, I won't have earned enough PTO in that short amount of time to make up for it, because I still have a waiting period until benefits kick in. I would still end up short eventually. Le Sigh. I thought maybe I would be saved in that the holiday hours I would earn for Thanksgiving would show up, but it's 30 days before the holiday when you can use them...and I will already be on leave which makes me not eligible to even accrue them in the first place. So crap. I have never actually had a paid maternity leave, so it's doable, but so frustrating when I actually have the paid time this time and I planned so hard. Blah!!!
I seriously never call out. My phone was blowing up with texts asking if I was okay because I never miss work. My last call out was years ago, I can't even remember when or why. I think everyone thought I must have had the baby. Anyway...I am only part time, so I earn PTO but not that much, and I have only been a benefited employee for a short time, so it's not like I have even ever had the chance to rack up any major accrued bank or anything. I work 12 hour shifts so missing 12 hours is a big chunk of time for me to use to cover my day off; we don't have separate sick time. Leading up to my Maternity leave, I had calculated my PTO hours right down to it, so I would know when I could start my paid leave, and cover the exempt period before benefits kick in. Needless to say, having to use 12 hours 3 weeks before my leave starts leaves me short. Not by much, but I had figured everything including my budget, based on still getting 2 full checks before my 66.67% leave pay kicks in. Even if I back my leave up and work right up until I deliver, I won't have earned enough PTO in that short amount of time to make up for it, because I still have a waiting period until benefits kick in. I would still end up short eventually. Le Sigh. I thought maybe I would be saved in that the holiday hours I would earn for Thanksgiving would show up, but it's 30 days before the holiday when you can use them...and I will already be on leave which makes me not eligible to even accrue them in the first place. So crap. I have never actually had a paid maternity leave, so it's doable, but so frustrating when I actually have the paid time this time and I planned so hard. Blah!!!
Friday, October 9, 2015
All Kids Really Are Different-An Unofficial Case Study
We all know every baby is different, every kid is different and not one approach works for every kid, even in the same family. I am here to provide proof, as it took me having my fourth kid who through me for a loop to figure all this out, once and for all.
My Firstborn:
She was impatient from the get go. Refused to settle down and nurse right away, would turn it into a screaming match until you have her a few sips of a fast-flowing bottle, and only then would decide to latch on and nurse. This went on for the first month of her life. Refused to be put down to sleep in any position besides her tummy...so she was a tummy sleeper from the start. Bad mom, I know. As soon as she could pull herself up the first thing she learned to do at 9 months-ish was climb onto a tiered corner table and throw pictures off and break them. I knew I was in trouble then. Around this time she started fighting sleep in a major way. No rocking, swinging, cuddling, or reading could settle her down. She would thrash around and scream. So she cried it out for about 40 minutes every night before she finally gave up and would go to sleep. At just over a year she figured out how to push a chair against anything high up she wanted to reach, including the front door chain. By 18 months, she refused to nap. Period. I could spend the entire day trying to get her to sleep and she wouldn't ever. She also hated if you changed her room around or added anything extra into it. I will never forget the terrified screams when I thought she might like some quiet music to sleep to. The evil CD player on her dresser just had to go. She was a terror from ages 2-4. Her sleep was atrocious...she went through a 2 year plus period thinking 4-5am was time to wake up no matter what. I would spend half the early morning hours trying to convince her she needed to be asleep. I thought I was losing my mind, until my sweet understanding pediatrician assured me it was only a phase she would eventually grow out of and told me of his own parenting sleep issues and how he made them tolerable. About a year later she did eventually get better and sleep all night long. But she is still at 15 on a totally different schedule them the rest of the house. She was also the kid, and still sort of is, that you can't show anything to. She refused to learn to write her name with me so she learned at school. She will only want you to show her after she has butchered whatever it was she was working on.
My second child...she took to nursing like a champ and stayed that way for about 10 months. Her infant sleep quirk was that she would get so over-stimulated that she would scream until you put her down...then scream hard for 30 seconds before falling to sleep. She has been the most easygoing of all my kids, even now. As a toddler she wasn't too terrible, could easily be talked out of a tantrum, and loved her naps. As a baby you could put her down and she would sleep on her own. Once in a regular bed, if you laid with her for 1.5 minutes and cuddled she would be sound asleep. She never had any issues waking at night or up at the crack of dawn. She is also pretty easy to figure out. When she was 3 or 4 we started noticing she was stealing cans of soda and drinking them and was getting into trouble but wouldn't stop the behavior. Finally I asked her why and she honestly told me could I just move the sodas where she couldn't find them because she tried but couldn't resist them, that she didn't know how to not drink them. It was the funniest thing, but at least we understood and could help her!
My third child, my first boy. From birth, literally in the hospital this started, he would only nurse every 5 hours and sleep the rest of the time. I never thought it would last but it did. If I tried to nurse him sonnet than 5 hours, like if we were going out somewhere, he would eat them throw up everything all over the place. When I pumped at 6 weeks for the first time I got 8 ounces from each side, he was eating that much. By 6 months he gave up nursing completely in favor of real food, anything and everything that we ate just squished up. He also continued sleeping like a champ. He had no desire to try and stay up late, and needs his 12 hours of sleep, even now. He isn't a party animal who can hang and stay up. If we are watching a family movie and it's 8:30, he will ask to go to bed. He was an easy toddler to handle for the most part, and is still a pretty easy kid despite being hardheaded at times and doing dumb thing, like stealing my stash of candy and thinking I won't notice.
All of these guys started sleeping through the night by 8-9 weeks old. I did nothing at all to help with this. I would just feed them and put the to bed at a normal, reasonable hour.
Baby Number Four has taken everything I knew as a parent about baby sleep habits and thrown it all out the window. From the start, he has wanted to sleep no where else except in my arms. He has never gone to sleep easily for any stretch of time. If you got 2 good/easy days of naps and nighttime sleep with little hassle, the third night would change that. There has never been a consistent way he has ever gone to sleep and stayed that way. Nursing to sleep was the most consistent, but he would likely wake up within the hour and not be able to settle down. Drowsy but awake? Forget it. That might have worked 2 nights out of 200. My pediatrician would ask at every appointment "sleeping through the night?" "NO." And I would get the same lecture about how he could do it and I knew how to get him to do it. Yeah, no I didn't. I did nothing different with him than I did with my other children. But he would never make the leap. He finally slept though the night at 14 months. Right after I totally weaned him. And only in a room by himself. (He slept in our room still at that point because we had not yet moved and were not going to put a baby who was up all through the night in with other kids who had to go to school). Could this have been the problem, that he was still in our room? I doubt it. because we wouldn't even go upstairs to bed until he woke up the first time, even if it meant sleeping on the couches until them, ever hopefull each night would be THE night he slept. Also, my third child slept in our room until he was 8 months old and I was sure he wouldn't be waking up other kids. I never had to worry there, though. We moved, and he started sleeping well in his new space. We could start putting him down drowsy and he would fall asleep in his own. Until he decided he had enough of that and needed someone to stay until he was almost asleep. And then until he was completely out cold asleep. And now lately he has decided he wants to protest even that. So lots of nighttime sleep fighting. It doesn't matter if he is just tired enough or overtired. I have tried adjusting so many things I just give up. Last night in a tired exhausted state, I decided since he wanted to fight so much that he could cry it out. I did the whole comfort after X amount of time, go back reassure, space time out, go back reassure...for 2 hours. And he wasn't giving up. He would settle just enough to seem almost asleep, and then the utter screaming and wailing would come envy and be louder and last longer than the time before. I finally called it and resigned myself to the fact that bedtime is going to be a nightmare with him...until he changes things up yet again. How this is going to work with a new baby, God only knows. Other than the sleep thing, he is an awesomely sweet little baby who loves to cuddle and give kisses more than any of my other kids. He also is so smart but refuses to truly talk, but he has so many people doing things for him he doesn't have to. I bet when Bonus Baby comes around he finds his voice.
So yes, despite being the same people we have always been, and parenting all of our kids in pretty similar ways...it is obvious that not all things work for all kids. I truly wasn't so aware of this until my fourth baby came along and I was first hand seeing just how different one baby could be in ways I had not seen previously.
My Firstborn:
She was impatient from the get go. Refused to settle down and nurse right away, would turn it into a screaming match until you have her a few sips of a fast-flowing bottle, and only then would decide to latch on and nurse. This went on for the first month of her life. Refused to be put down to sleep in any position besides her tummy...so she was a tummy sleeper from the start. Bad mom, I know. As soon as she could pull herself up the first thing she learned to do at 9 months-ish was climb onto a tiered corner table and throw pictures off and break them. I knew I was in trouble then. Around this time she started fighting sleep in a major way. No rocking, swinging, cuddling, or reading could settle her down. She would thrash around and scream. So she cried it out for about 40 minutes every night before she finally gave up and would go to sleep. At just over a year she figured out how to push a chair against anything high up she wanted to reach, including the front door chain. By 18 months, she refused to nap. Period. I could spend the entire day trying to get her to sleep and she wouldn't ever. She also hated if you changed her room around or added anything extra into it. I will never forget the terrified screams when I thought she might like some quiet music to sleep to. The evil CD player on her dresser just had to go. She was a terror from ages 2-4. Her sleep was atrocious...she went through a 2 year plus period thinking 4-5am was time to wake up no matter what. I would spend half the early morning hours trying to convince her she needed to be asleep. I thought I was losing my mind, until my sweet understanding pediatrician assured me it was only a phase she would eventually grow out of and told me of his own parenting sleep issues and how he made them tolerable. About a year later she did eventually get better and sleep all night long. But she is still at 15 on a totally different schedule them the rest of the house. She was also the kid, and still sort of is, that you can't show anything to. She refused to learn to write her name with me so she learned at school. She will only want you to show her after she has butchered whatever it was she was working on.
My second child...she took to nursing like a champ and stayed that way for about 10 months. Her infant sleep quirk was that she would get so over-stimulated that she would scream until you put her down...then scream hard for 30 seconds before falling to sleep. She has been the most easygoing of all my kids, even now. As a toddler she wasn't too terrible, could easily be talked out of a tantrum, and loved her naps. As a baby you could put her down and she would sleep on her own. Once in a regular bed, if you laid with her for 1.5 minutes and cuddled she would be sound asleep. She never had any issues waking at night or up at the crack of dawn. She is also pretty easy to figure out. When she was 3 or 4 we started noticing she was stealing cans of soda and drinking them and was getting into trouble but wouldn't stop the behavior. Finally I asked her why and she honestly told me could I just move the sodas where she couldn't find them because she tried but couldn't resist them, that she didn't know how to not drink them. It was the funniest thing, but at least we understood and could help her!
My third child, my first boy. From birth, literally in the hospital this started, he would only nurse every 5 hours and sleep the rest of the time. I never thought it would last but it did. If I tried to nurse him sonnet than 5 hours, like if we were going out somewhere, he would eat them throw up everything all over the place. When I pumped at 6 weeks for the first time I got 8 ounces from each side, he was eating that much. By 6 months he gave up nursing completely in favor of real food, anything and everything that we ate just squished up. He also continued sleeping like a champ. He had no desire to try and stay up late, and needs his 12 hours of sleep, even now. He isn't a party animal who can hang and stay up. If we are watching a family movie and it's 8:30, he will ask to go to bed. He was an easy toddler to handle for the most part, and is still a pretty easy kid despite being hardheaded at times and doing dumb thing, like stealing my stash of candy and thinking I won't notice.
All of these guys started sleeping through the night by 8-9 weeks old. I did nothing at all to help with this. I would just feed them and put the to bed at a normal, reasonable hour.
Baby Number Four has taken everything I knew as a parent about baby sleep habits and thrown it all out the window. From the start, he has wanted to sleep no where else except in my arms. He has never gone to sleep easily for any stretch of time. If you got 2 good/easy days of naps and nighttime sleep with little hassle, the third night would change that. There has never been a consistent way he has ever gone to sleep and stayed that way. Nursing to sleep was the most consistent, but he would likely wake up within the hour and not be able to settle down. Drowsy but awake? Forget it. That might have worked 2 nights out of 200. My pediatrician would ask at every appointment "sleeping through the night?" "NO." And I would get the same lecture about how he could do it and I knew how to get him to do it. Yeah, no I didn't. I did nothing different with him than I did with my other children. But he would never make the leap. He finally slept though the night at 14 months. Right after I totally weaned him. And only in a room by himself. (He slept in our room still at that point because we had not yet moved and were not going to put a baby who was up all through the night in with other kids who had to go to school). Could this have been the problem, that he was still in our room? I doubt it. because we wouldn't even go upstairs to bed until he woke up the first time, even if it meant sleeping on the couches until them, ever hopefull each night would be THE night he slept. Also, my third child slept in our room until he was 8 months old and I was sure he wouldn't be waking up other kids. I never had to worry there, though. We moved, and he started sleeping well in his new space. We could start putting him down drowsy and he would fall asleep in his own. Until he decided he had enough of that and needed someone to stay until he was almost asleep. And then until he was completely out cold asleep. And now lately he has decided he wants to protest even that. So lots of nighttime sleep fighting. It doesn't matter if he is just tired enough or overtired. I have tried adjusting so many things I just give up. Last night in a tired exhausted state, I decided since he wanted to fight so much that he could cry it out. I did the whole comfort after X amount of time, go back reassure, space time out, go back reassure...for 2 hours. And he wasn't giving up. He would settle just enough to seem almost asleep, and then the utter screaming and wailing would come envy and be louder and last longer than the time before. I finally called it and resigned myself to the fact that bedtime is going to be a nightmare with him...until he changes things up yet again. How this is going to work with a new baby, God only knows. Other than the sleep thing, he is an awesomely sweet little baby who loves to cuddle and give kisses more than any of my other kids. He also is so smart but refuses to truly talk, but he has so many people doing things for him he doesn't have to. I bet when Bonus Baby comes around he finds his voice.
So yes, despite being the same people we have always been, and parenting all of our kids in pretty similar ways...it is obvious that not all things work for all kids. I truly wasn't so aware of this until my fourth baby came along and I was first hand seeing just how different one baby could be in ways I had not seen previously.
Pet Owners-Advice Needed
So. I need some advice here. I am going to try and document everything as objectively as I can in hopes someone might be able to see what I can't seem to figure out.
Since we have moved here, we have gotten two complaints annomyously through the county regarding barking dogs. The first time I will totally admit was probably our fault. We were new here, the dogs were adjusting and in overdrive with all the new stimuli, and we didn't have a fence that could keep them in, so they were tethered and they hate that. They would get tangled and stuck and bark out of frustration. Within a few weeks of being here, though, we had invisible fence put in and combined with them getting settled in to the new environment, things have settled down considerably.
My husband got a call yesterday informing us of a second recent complaint. The biggest issue I have with an anonymous complaint is that there is no frame of reference as to when the barking issue is happening, or if there is anything that might cause it happening in the area. So I have no idea how to begin to address it. Also, I am not sure how someone can determine it is one of my dogs, when surrounding neighbors all have larger dogs that bark. If someone is coming close to my fence to look into my yard, my dogs will bark to alert to intruders. Especially the German Shepard, that's what she was bred to do. Because it isn't a formal complaint which requires leaving a name and contact info, all the county can do is give us a verbal warning. I don't know what exactly happens if they do get a formal complaint. Investigate us I guess? Park outside the house for a day and listen for barking?? I just don't know.
For the purpose of trying to figure this out, I can tell you that the dogs are never left outside if we are not at home. They go outside a million times a day at 10-20 minute intervals, hardly ever longer than that unless someone is outside with them. If the kids are playing outside, then the dogs are with them. My two beagles do not like to be out for any extended period of time, so they park/whine/howl when they are done. I don't ever let them just bark outside because it drives me crazy to hear them. Sure there have been times when I haven't been able to go open the door right away, but it is never for longer than maybe 10 minutes if I am in another part of the house. My German Shepard is usually happy to be outside longer and is pretty quiet outside unless she is barking at someone. We also share a fence with a neighbor who has large dogs and the dogs will bark at each other and run up and down the length of the fence. Again, when I hear it getting too noisy I bring her in.
Inside the house the dogs are quiet. The only time they bark indoors is if someone is at the door, or they can see someone through the window near our house, or if they are wrestling around playing. Otherwise they are pretty quiet and lazy.
Here is what I know triggers their barking:
-when they are at the door to go outside and when they first go down the porch steps. They are like kids who are racing and have to be first in the yard. Once they are in the yard they run around and don't right away.
-when they are playing/fighting over something in the yard...a smelly spot to dig, something they caught in the yard, a bone, or a stick. They will bark at each other and try and steal it.
-other dogs/people. They are getting better with the dogs next to us, I think a lot of the barking they do now is more friendly dog playing/taunting than vicious and territorial. They also will bark at people walking by our house, but again they are getting better at ignoring things.
-the change of seasons makes them a little extra vocal and wound up but after the first week or so they tarted to settle down.
-wanting to come back inside. Especially if it is raining.
Seriously, these dogs do not ever get left alone. The kids even know to let them in as soon as they start to bark. I could see if I left them out for hours at a time or if they were outside when we were not at home, but we don't do either of those things. If they are outside for 30 minutes at a time alone that is a long time.
So I don't know what to do. Do I just shrug it off and not stress and worry about it? Am I maybe missing something here? Do I just wait it out until there is a formal complaint? I don't want to get in trouble with the county or have issues with any neighbors, since we plan to be here for a long time. Getting rid of my dogs isn't even an option. I don't know many neighbors here yet. The ones directly next door with 2 big dogs seem to be fine. In fact, before we ever moved in we met them and I said how we had dogs too and we're going to be sharing a fence so it was probably going to be loud while they adjusted and they shrugged it off and were totally cool and said "it's ok they will get used to each other".
Should we talk to them and see if they notice any issues/triggers? I would hate to put them on the spot like that, we don't know them that well. I looked up anti-barking collars but I don't know how helpful they are when you have multiple dogs. I can't very well add a shock collar since they wear one for the fence they wouldn't understand. It doesn't really help when I don't know when this is happening. Or if maybe whomever complained just caught them on a rare noisy day before I could bring them in.
Uggghh. If anyone has anything to contribute here, I am totally open to anything. Unless you tell me to get rid of my dogs or clip their vocal cords. I am not okay with either of those options!
Since we have moved here, we have gotten two complaints annomyously through the county regarding barking dogs. The first time I will totally admit was probably our fault. We were new here, the dogs were adjusting and in overdrive with all the new stimuli, and we didn't have a fence that could keep them in, so they were tethered and they hate that. They would get tangled and stuck and bark out of frustration. Within a few weeks of being here, though, we had invisible fence put in and combined with them getting settled in to the new environment, things have settled down considerably.
My husband got a call yesterday informing us of a second recent complaint. The biggest issue I have with an anonymous complaint is that there is no frame of reference as to when the barking issue is happening, or if there is anything that might cause it happening in the area. So I have no idea how to begin to address it. Also, I am not sure how someone can determine it is one of my dogs, when surrounding neighbors all have larger dogs that bark. If someone is coming close to my fence to look into my yard, my dogs will bark to alert to intruders. Especially the German Shepard, that's what she was bred to do. Because it isn't a formal complaint which requires leaving a name and contact info, all the county can do is give us a verbal warning. I don't know what exactly happens if they do get a formal complaint. Investigate us I guess? Park outside the house for a day and listen for barking?? I just don't know.
For the purpose of trying to figure this out, I can tell you that the dogs are never left outside if we are not at home. They go outside a million times a day at 10-20 minute intervals, hardly ever longer than that unless someone is outside with them. If the kids are playing outside, then the dogs are with them. My two beagles do not like to be out for any extended period of time, so they park/whine/howl when they are done. I don't ever let them just bark outside because it drives me crazy to hear them. Sure there have been times when I haven't been able to go open the door right away, but it is never for longer than maybe 10 minutes if I am in another part of the house. My German Shepard is usually happy to be outside longer and is pretty quiet outside unless she is barking at someone. We also share a fence with a neighbor who has large dogs and the dogs will bark at each other and run up and down the length of the fence. Again, when I hear it getting too noisy I bring her in.
Inside the house the dogs are quiet. The only time they bark indoors is if someone is at the door, or they can see someone through the window near our house, or if they are wrestling around playing. Otherwise they are pretty quiet and lazy.
Here is what I know triggers their barking:
-when they are at the door to go outside and when they first go down the porch steps. They are like kids who are racing and have to be first in the yard. Once they are in the yard they run around and don't right away.
-when they are playing/fighting over something in the yard...a smelly spot to dig, something they caught in the yard, a bone, or a stick. They will bark at each other and try and steal it.
-other dogs/people. They are getting better with the dogs next to us, I think a lot of the barking they do now is more friendly dog playing/taunting than vicious and territorial. They also will bark at people walking by our house, but again they are getting better at ignoring things.
-the change of seasons makes them a little extra vocal and wound up but after the first week or so they tarted to settle down.
-wanting to come back inside. Especially if it is raining.
Seriously, these dogs do not ever get left alone. The kids even know to let them in as soon as they start to bark. I could see if I left them out for hours at a time or if they were outside when we were not at home, but we don't do either of those things. If they are outside for 30 minutes at a time alone that is a long time.
So I don't know what to do. Do I just shrug it off and not stress and worry about it? Am I maybe missing something here? Do I just wait it out until there is a formal complaint? I don't want to get in trouble with the county or have issues with any neighbors, since we plan to be here for a long time. Getting rid of my dogs isn't even an option. I don't know many neighbors here yet. The ones directly next door with 2 big dogs seem to be fine. In fact, before we ever moved in we met them and I said how we had dogs too and we're going to be sharing a fence so it was probably going to be loud while they adjusted and they shrugged it off and were totally cool and said "it's ok they will get used to each other".
Should we talk to them and see if they notice any issues/triggers? I would hate to put them on the spot like that, we don't know them that well. I looked up anti-barking collars but I don't know how helpful they are when you have multiple dogs. I can't very well add a shock collar since they wear one for the fence they wouldn't understand. It doesn't really help when I don't know when this is happening. Or if maybe whomever complained just caught them on a rare noisy day before I could bring them in.
Uggghh. If anyone has anything to contribute here, I am totally open to anything. Unless you tell me to get rid of my dogs or clip their vocal cords. I am not okay with either of those options!
Thursday, October 8, 2015
Another Week Down, More Friendship Woes, and Gratitude
I wish I could say that my lack of blogging and being productive was due to so many exciting things going on. But sadly, nope. I somehow managed to simultaneously come down with a cold and stomach flu at the same damn time. Better now than in a couple weeks, I suppose. But still. It has really been no fun. My tummy is still kind of wonky, and I feel just generally icky. And I have z.e.r.o. energy. Meanwhile time is just trucking along and I am falling behind and running out of time to do all the things I would like to have finished and in order. Oh well??
On the home front, everyone is doing really well. I managed to pull myself together enough on Tuesday to take Baby Boy to his dental check-up and have a meeting with the other room moms and the kids teachers to go over things for the year. I am helping with 4th and 5th grades so I can be involved with both my kids classes. Plus, those grades pair up for field trips and parties because one of the classes is super small, like 10 kids I think. We only have to send in a snack for Halloween, and then there is nothing until Christmas, which is a big party. They have a set place for the spring field trip but we are going to try and change it up to something more hands on and fun. I am hoping I can get a little bit of time at work this weekend to do some research for that, as I am still without a laptop at home.
I know this next part isn't super popular to write about, but it has been on my mind a lot lately and I need a place to put my thoughts on this so bear with me for a minute here. Things with the best friend have gotten worse. I am not sure what to think anymore, only that she is stuck where she is in her life and everyone else keeps moving forward. She can project her feeling onto me and blame me and be mad at me, fine I can handle it. But when you use my kid to "get back" at me or get to me, that is where I totally draw the line. Here's what happened:
Over a month ago when she ran into my husband and was complaining about me to him, she had also been talking to my teen, who is her Goddaughter. She had mentioned that on my teens actual birthday how she had longstanding plans and wanted to take her out to dinner the following weekend. She texted me about it, and I said that was fine, whatever she wanted to do. She initially wanted to go on a Friday, but my daughter asked if they could do a Saturday as Friday is football at her highschool and it's a huge deal to go to all the home games. I guess they agreed on a date, but I wasn't entirely sure when it was going to happen. Last week my friend texts me staying the day and time to pick her up (in a group text that included my husband, which annoyed me as he was at work and he doesn't have a desk job, but that is a whole other grievance.) Anyway, it was an early time for dinner, but she doesn't like to wait to eat so I was like whatever. But then I remembered to check our server schedule for Church and realized my daughter had a commitment to be at the 5pm service. That is another long story, but I couldn't get her out of it without causing trouble because they had recently adjusted the schedules for us in a huge way and we agreed to be available for this particular time slot. I texted my friend to tell her about this, just thinking they could go a little later but not specifically stating that. I got back a pretty crappy text that she "hope teen would have considered this before making plans"....Ummmm What?! First of all, my teen doesn't get or make the scheduled. She isn't driving and doesn't know what are plans might be, so I handle this and plan around anything else that might be going on. I actually haven't been on top of keeping track and had not written anything on the calendar so my teen wouldn't have known regardless. I took a beat and then communicated all of this through text, and also said that she could just meet us and get her after church at 6 if she wanted. She sent back a snarky response of "well if she can wait that long to eat" which meant that she was annoyed to have to wait, because with our 30 minute drive back home and getting food on the table, we wouldn't eat until later anyway. My friend is really not flexible...whenever we meet with a group of people, she won't wait until everyone is there she will just sit and order her food, while the rest of us snack on chips and salsa waiting on everyone else. That is just how she is. Anyway, later in the week she sent some confusing text about where she was picking up my teen and where she was going to take her to eat. I asked my daughter to clarify with her what the plans were.
On Saturday when I had a second at work I checked in with my daughter to see if everything was straight. She said yes, but she was a little bummed because she was told they weren't going to the place she picked because it was too far from where church was and didn't make sense to go to. (She had been asked to pick the place as it was for her birthday.) I reminded her that there was a location in between church and home and that she could tell her godmother that if she wanted. At 4pm she talked to her and that was all agreed on and everyone was happy. She would see her in 2 hours. After Church I hit the restroom and headed out to the car, where I found my husband standing looking angry and waving his phone. Apparently she waiting until we were in church, and 30 minutes before she was supposed to pick up my daughter, to completely back out saying her back hurt. I had come fraught to church from work and was too tired to say much, but my husband was really upset.
In the end, at least so far, she has not explained or offered a make-up date. She did call my daughter but it was to ask her when she leaves for homecoming so she can "see her off" and is totally skipping over everything else. I feel so bad for my daughter because she is 15 and isn't jaded and still sees the best in everyone. I know she is hurt and disappointed but she would never say anything. My husband seems to think she just didn't want to eat later and have to pay for a more expensive place than a local diner, and that is was too suspicious that she waited until we were in church and couldn't respond back to back out. I guess my daughter is handling it in her own way because she told her she was meeting friends and didn't want a whole big to-do over everything. I wish I could feel differently, but the truth is that I have seen her do this before to her other godchildren when she is upset with their parents. I don't know what to do about any of it. I also know that the end of a pregnancy is a really bad time for me to handle anything emotional and upsetting like this. I don't tend to make the wisest choicest with my words.
If you are still reading thanks for letting me vent that out!
Tomorrow is the homecoming parade and football game. The parade goes right in front of our house so we have a prime seat. A bunch of the highschool kids are going to hang out and watch the parade, I have an easy one dish oven dinner planned, then they are going to walk to the football game. Smaller-town living is really, really awesome! This totally wouldn't be possible where we used to live. Saturday when I get home from work, we are going to try and new Chinese place I have heard great reviews about, and just have a quiet family dinner before the dance. We haven't had Chinese since we moved because I am wary of trying new places I don't know about. I have asked several people who all point me in the same direction so here is hoping it's as good as it's supposed to be.
In Church on Saturday the hymns really got to me. Music has a way of moving me and gives me goosebumps and can bring me to tears. It always has. Especially after losing my father, Church music is general I sometimes have a hard time sitting through. Anyway, when I knelt down to pray I realized how so many times I knelt in those same pews over the past 8 years and have prayed and begged God for things...help when my marriage was in trouble and I was lost, a baby after I had miscarried...strength when I felt weak...approvals when we were trying to move...to name a few of the bigger things. When I knelt down on Saturday for the first time in a very long time the only thing I felt was absolute pure gratitude for the life I am living and for everything in it. Despite some difficult relationships in my life, the only thing I felt was blessed and thankful and wanting for nothing. So I gave thanks and let my soul be at peace. I am choosing to stay focused on that feeling that washed over me in Church and let it carry me through.
On the home front, everyone is doing really well. I managed to pull myself together enough on Tuesday to take Baby Boy to his dental check-up and have a meeting with the other room moms and the kids teachers to go over things for the year. I am helping with 4th and 5th grades so I can be involved with both my kids classes. Plus, those grades pair up for field trips and parties because one of the classes is super small, like 10 kids I think. We only have to send in a snack for Halloween, and then there is nothing until Christmas, which is a big party. They have a set place for the spring field trip but we are going to try and change it up to something more hands on and fun. I am hoping I can get a little bit of time at work this weekend to do some research for that, as I am still without a laptop at home.
I know this next part isn't super popular to write about, but it has been on my mind a lot lately and I need a place to put my thoughts on this so bear with me for a minute here. Things with the best friend have gotten worse. I am not sure what to think anymore, only that she is stuck where she is in her life and everyone else keeps moving forward. She can project her feeling onto me and blame me and be mad at me, fine I can handle it. But when you use my kid to "get back" at me or get to me, that is where I totally draw the line. Here's what happened:
Over a month ago when she ran into my husband and was complaining about me to him, she had also been talking to my teen, who is her Goddaughter. She had mentioned that on my teens actual birthday how she had longstanding plans and wanted to take her out to dinner the following weekend. She texted me about it, and I said that was fine, whatever she wanted to do. She initially wanted to go on a Friday, but my daughter asked if they could do a Saturday as Friday is football at her highschool and it's a huge deal to go to all the home games. I guess they agreed on a date, but I wasn't entirely sure when it was going to happen. Last week my friend texts me staying the day and time to pick her up (in a group text that included my husband, which annoyed me as he was at work and he doesn't have a desk job, but that is a whole other grievance.) Anyway, it was an early time for dinner, but she doesn't like to wait to eat so I was like whatever. But then I remembered to check our server schedule for Church and realized my daughter had a commitment to be at the 5pm service. That is another long story, but I couldn't get her out of it without causing trouble because they had recently adjusted the schedules for us in a huge way and we agreed to be available for this particular time slot. I texted my friend to tell her about this, just thinking they could go a little later but not specifically stating that. I got back a pretty crappy text that she "hope teen would have considered this before making plans"....Ummmm What?! First of all, my teen doesn't get or make the scheduled. She isn't driving and doesn't know what are plans might be, so I handle this and plan around anything else that might be going on. I actually haven't been on top of keeping track and had not written anything on the calendar so my teen wouldn't have known regardless. I took a beat and then communicated all of this through text, and also said that she could just meet us and get her after church at 6 if she wanted. She sent back a snarky response of "well if she can wait that long to eat" which meant that she was annoyed to have to wait, because with our 30 minute drive back home and getting food on the table, we wouldn't eat until later anyway. My friend is really not flexible...whenever we meet with a group of people, she won't wait until everyone is there she will just sit and order her food, while the rest of us snack on chips and salsa waiting on everyone else. That is just how she is. Anyway, later in the week she sent some confusing text about where she was picking up my teen and where she was going to take her to eat. I asked my daughter to clarify with her what the plans were.
On Saturday when I had a second at work I checked in with my daughter to see if everything was straight. She said yes, but she was a little bummed because she was told they weren't going to the place she picked because it was too far from where church was and didn't make sense to go to. (She had been asked to pick the place as it was for her birthday.) I reminded her that there was a location in between church and home and that she could tell her godmother that if she wanted. At 4pm she talked to her and that was all agreed on and everyone was happy. She would see her in 2 hours. After Church I hit the restroom and headed out to the car, where I found my husband standing looking angry and waving his phone. Apparently she waiting until we were in church, and 30 minutes before she was supposed to pick up my daughter, to completely back out saying her back hurt. I had come fraught to church from work and was too tired to say much, but my husband was really upset.
In the end, at least so far, she has not explained or offered a make-up date. She did call my daughter but it was to ask her when she leaves for homecoming so she can "see her off" and is totally skipping over everything else. I feel so bad for my daughter because she is 15 and isn't jaded and still sees the best in everyone. I know she is hurt and disappointed but she would never say anything. My husband seems to think she just didn't want to eat later and have to pay for a more expensive place than a local diner, and that is was too suspicious that she waited until we were in church and couldn't respond back to back out. I guess my daughter is handling it in her own way because she told her she was meeting friends and didn't want a whole big to-do over everything. I wish I could feel differently, but the truth is that I have seen her do this before to her other godchildren when she is upset with their parents. I don't know what to do about any of it. I also know that the end of a pregnancy is a really bad time for me to handle anything emotional and upsetting like this. I don't tend to make the wisest choicest with my words.
If you are still reading thanks for letting me vent that out!
Tomorrow is the homecoming parade and football game. The parade goes right in front of our house so we have a prime seat. A bunch of the highschool kids are going to hang out and watch the parade, I have an easy one dish oven dinner planned, then they are going to walk to the football game. Smaller-town living is really, really awesome! This totally wouldn't be possible where we used to live. Saturday when I get home from work, we are going to try and new Chinese place I have heard great reviews about, and just have a quiet family dinner before the dance. We haven't had Chinese since we moved because I am wary of trying new places I don't know about. I have asked several people who all point me in the same direction so here is hoping it's as good as it's supposed to be.
In Church on Saturday the hymns really got to me. Music has a way of moving me and gives me goosebumps and can bring me to tears. It always has. Especially after losing my father, Church music is general I sometimes have a hard time sitting through. Anyway, when I knelt down to pray I realized how so many times I knelt in those same pews over the past 8 years and have prayed and begged God for things...help when my marriage was in trouble and I was lost, a baby after I had miscarried...strength when I felt weak...approvals when we were trying to move...to name a few of the bigger things. When I knelt down on Saturday for the first time in a very long time the only thing I felt was absolute pure gratitude for the life I am living and for everything in it. Despite some difficult relationships in my life, the only thing I felt was blessed and thankful and wanting for nothing. So I gave thanks and let my soul be at peace. I am choosing to stay focused on that feeling that washed over me in Church and let it carry me through.
Thursday, October 1, 2015
Counting Down, Sickness, and Other Happenings
Man, where does the time go?? I keep meaning to sit down and finish one of my many posts in draft, and have ideas for a few more but I just can't seem to get it together. Part of the problem is that my laptop decided to stop working a couple weeks ago, so that really leaves just my phone, which sucks to do any major typing on, so apologizes in advance for the multiple typos that will probably occur. At work, I can't seem to get any down time to myself with which to blog. The rest is just pure laziness!
I lost all of last week due to Baby Boy being sick. He was running a pretty high fever most of the week and just miserable. I am pretty sure he had hand, foot, mouth based on his symptoms. All he wanted me to do was hold him or sit with him. If I left his side to even go to the bathroom he had a meltdown of epic proportions. I also couldn't get him to take a longer nap, and he was up a lot at night with a fever, which made for an even harder week to say the least. That is probably the sickest he has been to date.
We made it through the family cookout and get together a couple weeks ago. I know I wasn't super social and not much fun, and a lot of crap pissed me off about the entire ordeal. I had gotten stuck a little later at work and hit traffic coming home, had enough time to change and start grilling. It was hot that day, and I was already miserable, and like half the prep and set up that was supposed to happen before I got home didn't, so I was stuck looking like a harping cranky bitch. Oh well. I have since said that no more of these get together are going to happen unless someone else is doing all the work for it. My usually on the ball and helpful husband was mostly to blame for all the nonsense. The entire evening for me pretty much sucked. I could write an entire post on just how pissed off I was.
I have 4 and a half weeks to go until Bonus Baby arrives. People keep asking me if I am excited, and I am, but it still seems so far away, even though it's really not. But I guess that is because I have so much keeping me busy, so I am not just sitting around waiting. I think once I work my last shift before my leave starts it may really start to hit me. We still have no set names picked out. We are sort of in the ballpark for a girls name, but no where close to having a boys name. Besides feeling tired and huge, I am doing pretty good. I do have some sciatica and my right thigh gets numb sometimes, but last time I had a ton of pubic pain and pressure that I am not getting this time, so I will take it. I set my Amazon prime up for the diaper subscription, and got the budget all in order. I really don't think there is much more for me to do on that front to be ready.
I took my teen shopping for a homecoming dress. She is just going with a group of girls, which will be a fun first dance experience for her. It was a good opportunity to talk about style and being individual and not having to wear or do what everyone else does. She is trying to figure out her own style and what she is most comfortable in. She is definitely more cool and rocker vs. all pink and girlie but I can see her sort of question it when she hears other girls taking and seeing how they dress. Some of the girls where heels every day to school, which is ridiculous to me. Anyway, the outfit she choose looks really awesome on her and I think she will be comfortable in it and also look really cool. I should also note here that her school has really struck dress codes and rules to begin with, and the principal just sent out a personal email yesterday explaining that no suggestive dancing is going to be allowed and chaperones would enforce the rules. I don't even know what all the terms are or even mean exactly, but basically no dancing that looks like dry humping is my understanding of it. Which is nice for a parent to hear.
My cat has been acting like a jerk lately and not peeing in her litter box. I am not a cat person, I think they are a little too pissy for my taste. And she is a Tortie Shell and from what I understand they are really obnoxious and more pains than most other cats. She isn't sick and her box is where it has always been and it is clean, so I am pretty sure it's just her being a jerk. She gets like this every so often. I might go out and buy her a few new toys and see if that helps. She is definitely not ignored, that's for sure.
I don't know if I wrote about this before but the one major thing we wanted to be able to do for this winter was convert our fireplace back to its original state. The people we bought from had placed a wood stove insert into the fireplace, likely for added warmth. Which is odd because the HVAC system is new and the house is super well insulated with new windows as well. Anyway, with kids it just isn't the safest because it isn't flush with the wall by design, so there is a huge portion that would be accessible and get hot. Even a large gate around it would still leave room to reach over and touch the top and get burned. Plus, the chimney isn't rated for that kind of heat and if we damage the lining, that is a several thousand dollar repair. The whole insert easily slides out, it is just super heavy. But we needed the fireplace doors and screen, wood grate, tools, and mantle. Easily a $500 project, as the cheapest new doors and screen set is $250. I tried craigslist but people wanted $250 for their beat up looking, used doors. Finally I found a salvage shop nearby, and it turns out my husband has a relative who works there. So he went down yesterday and found the doors, grate, and tool set and only paid $50 for all of it, which was 1/3 of what they were marked as. The most expensive piece we need to get is the mantle, but a $500 project just turned into something that will cost under $200! Probably less if he keeps checking and can find the mantle piece we need second hand. I was worried we wouldn't be able to do it at all with my leave coming up and the reduced pay that comes with it. So glad we researched this.
I am really excited it is October. Fall is a lead in to my favorite time of year. We have a couple of trips to local farms planned. One is a petting zoo with pony rides, a cow train, and other neat fall things. The other is the bigger farm where we pick apples and pumpkins and go on a hayride. They also have a hay maze and hot apple cider and apple fritters. It has been our tradition for 15 years now, and it never gets old. The cool fall weather is always a lead in to the winter season, and Christmas is my absolute favorite time of year. I look forward to it all year long. We even start decorating in November! This year we have the added bonus of welcoming a new baby in between the seasons so it is going to be extra special. And also fly by pretty fast, I am sure.
Hopefully I can get my laptop working again. Typing on my phone is a real pain!
I lost all of last week due to Baby Boy being sick. He was running a pretty high fever most of the week and just miserable. I am pretty sure he had hand, foot, mouth based on his symptoms. All he wanted me to do was hold him or sit with him. If I left his side to even go to the bathroom he had a meltdown of epic proportions. I also couldn't get him to take a longer nap, and he was up a lot at night with a fever, which made for an even harder week to say the least. That is probably the sickest he has been to date.
We made it through the family cookout and get together a couple weeks ago. I know I wasn't super social and not much fun, and a lot of crap pissed me off about the entire ordeal. I had gotten stuck a little later at work and hit traffic coming home, had enough time to change and start grilling. It was hot that day, and I was already miserable, and like half the prep and set up that was supposed to happen before I got home didn't, so I was stuck looking like a harping cranky bitch. Oh well. I have since said that no more of these get together are going to happen unless someone else is doing all the work for it. My usually on the ball and helpful husband was mostly to blame for all the nonsense. The entire evening for me pretty much sucked. I could write an entire post on just how pissed off I was.
I have 4 and a half weeks to go until Bonus Baby arrives. People keep asking me if I am excited, and I am, but it still seems so far away, even though it's really not. But I guess that is because I have so much keeping me busy, so I am not just sitting around waiting. I think once I work my last shift before my leave starts it may really start to hit me. We still have no set names picked out. We are sort of in the ballpark for a girls name, but no where close to having a boys name. Besides feeling tired and huge, I am doing pretty good. I do have some sciatica and my right thigh gets numb sometimes, but last time I had a ton of pubic pain and pressure that I am not getting this time, so I will take it. I set my Amazon prime up for the diaper subscription, and got the budget all in order. I really don't think there is much more for me to do on that front to be ready.
I took my teen shopping for a homecoming dress. She is just going with a group of girls, which will be a fun first dance experience for her. It was a good opportunity to talk about style and being individual and not having to wear or do what everyone else does. She is trying to figure out her own style and what she is most comfortable in. She is definitely more cool and rocker vs. all pink and girlie but I can see her sort of question it when she hears other girls taking and seeing how they dress. Some of the girls where heels every day to school, which is ridiculous to me. Anyway, the outfit she choose looks really awesome on her and I think she will be comfortable in it and also look really cool. I should also note here that her school has really struck dress codes and rules to begin with, and the principal just sent out a personal email yesterday explaining that no suggestive dancing is going to be allowed and chaperones would enforce the rules. I don't even know what all the terms are or even mean exactly, but basically no dancing that looks like dry humping is my understanding of it. Which is nice for a parent to hear.
My cat has been acting like a jerk lately and not peeing in her litter box. I am not a cat person, I think they are a little too pissy for my taste. And she is a Tortie Shell and from what I understand they are really obnoxious and more pains than most other cats. She isn't sick and her box is where it has always been and it is clean, so I am pretty sure it's just her being a jerk. She gets like this every so often. I might go out and buy her a few new toys and see if that helps. She is definitely not ignored, that's for sure.
I don't know if I wrote about this before but the one major thing we wanted to be able to do for this winter was convert our fireplace back to its original state. The people we bought from had placed a wood stove insert into the fireplace, likely for added warmth. Which is odd because the HVAC system is new and the house is super well insulated with new windows as well. Anyway, with kids it just isn't the safest because it isn't flush with the wall by design, so there is a huge portion that would be accessible and get hot. Even a large gate around it would still leave room to reach over and touch the top and get burned. Plus, the chimney isn't rated for that kind of heat and if we damage the lining, that is a several thousand dollar repair. The whole insert easily slides out, it is just super heavy. But we needed the fireplace doors and screen, wood grate, tools, and mantle. Easily a $500 project, as the cheapest new doors and screen set is $250. I tried craigslist but people wanted $250 for their beat up looking, used doors. Finally I found a salvage shop nearby, and it turns out my husband has a relative who works there. So he went down yesterday and found the doors, grate, and tool set and only paid $50 for all of it, which was 1/3 of what they were marked as. The most expensive piece we need to get is the mantle, but a $500 project just turned into something that will cost under $200! Probably less if he keeps checking and can find the mantle piece we need second hand. I was worried we wouldn't be able to do it at all with my leave coming up and the reduced pay that comes with it. So glad we researched this.
I am really excited it is October. Fall is a lead in to my favorite time of year. We have a couple of trips to local farms planned. One is a petting zoo with pony rides, a cow train, and other neat fall things. The other is the bigger farm where we pick apples and pumpkins and go on a hayride. They also have a hay maze and hot apple cider and apple fritters. It has been our tradition for 15 years now, and it never gets old. The cool fall weather is always a lead in to the winter season, and Christmas is my absolute favorite time of year. I look forward to it all year long. We even start decorating in November! This year we have the added bonus of welcoming a new baby in between the seasons so it is going to be extra special. And also fly by pretty fast, I am sure.
Hopefully I can get my laptop working again. Typing on my phone is a real pain!
Friday, September 18, 2015
A Day in The Life-School Year Edition
During the school year my days feel a whole lot longer than in the summer, even though the daylight hours actually get shorter.
My day starts around 6:15am when the alarm goes off. My husband needs to get up, and the alarm wakes me up. I usually jump up to pee before he gets out of bed, then I lay back down while he is getting ready. On a good day, everyone is still asleep right now. Sometimes I will hear baby boy on the monitor, and down the hall I usually start to hear my teen getting up and getting ready. She is pretty good about doing her own thing to get ready and out the door on her own, which is nice.
At this stage in my pregnancy, I try not to have too much scheduled for early mornings, so lately my husband had been letting me stay in bed for an extra 45 minutes. He has been taking care of getting the other kids awake and fed and ready for school. I never really go back to sleep but being able to lay there and rest has been nice. Between 7am and 7:15 I get up and head downstairs. Like clockwork, once I hit the third trimester I started waking up nauseous again, so I take my acid reducer with a few sips of water and say goodbye to everyone.
Lately baby boy has been waking up starving, so by the time I come downstairs he has already been fed. He will take my hand and lead me over to our recliner where we will snuggle and watch some cartoons for a little while. I am thankful for this because it gives my tummy time to settle down. I usually check my phone for emails and do any banking I am able to do on my phone. It takes about an hour or so, but I go from nauseous to starving pretty quickly. This is when we turn off the TV and I get myself some breakfast and baby boy gets his first snack. I usually let the dogs out again at this point so they don't bother me for food.
After we eat, we head down to the basement where the playroom is. My full-size freezer is also down there, so if I haven't already I try and figure out what we are going to have for dinner. I check to make sure the cat has food and water, and sort and start any laundry that has piled up overnight. I do laundry every day. Sometimes there is still a load to be switched from the night before. I get winded easily now so I try and combined trips to the basement and get as much done as I can. Baby boy and I hang out down here for a long time. It's a no TV time, so we play and I will sometimes bring down a magazine to look at in between his playing and my chores.
Starting in the 10 o'clock hour I start keeping track of the time. Sometimes he starts getting tired so I try and watch his cues. He recently switched to taking pretty short naps, usually under an hour. Because of this I have been trying to keep him up until 11:30 or so unless he is in really bad shape. So we do a variety of activities to keep him engaged. If he is playing contently I take this time to make any phone calls and follow up on any paperwork I have, but nothing too involved that I couldn't stop at a moments notice. When I see him starting to really wind down I will get him another snack. Sometimes it is pretty close to noon, so I will feed him lunch instead. We clean up, he gets a change of clothes, dry diaper, and I lay him down. Due to seperation anxiety and me being too tired to fight, I started staying with him until he is asleep. I know it is a horrible habit but it became the path of least resistance because he would spend forever screaming and not sleeping and I just couldn't deal. What happens when Bonus Baby arrives I have no idea, I will deal with that then but for now this works. So I will sit next to the crib and rub his face and arm and usually he is asleep within a few minutes.
While he is sleeping I try and take this short time to grab a shower. Sometimes I have enough time to actually get out, get dressed, and grab something to eat. When he wakes up he is almost always cranky, and will sort of throw a fit. If I have eaten I will sit in the recliner with him with a show on for the 30 minutes it takes him to chill out. If I haven't eaten I will eat while he is waking up, and get him a snack and drink ready to go. I have to be careful of the time because I need to be out the door by 2:30 to go and pick up the kids from school. If I have any errands to run, I try and do them before I pick up kids, which means I am leaving the house at this point. So much depends on how my time management has been, and how well baby boy is cooperating. Occasionally I will have to make a stop after I pick up the kids, but I try not to because even that extra half hour can mean I hit traffic getting back home.
On a good day where we have no appointments or stops to make, we are back home by 3:45. I get the older kids a quick snack, and once homework is done they take their brother out to play so I can start dinner. In the past couple weeks I have been hitting a wall of exhaustion around now. When I fee this way I usually grab a glass of water or sometimes a decaf coffee and put my feet up for a few minutes before starting dinner. My husband is usually getting back home around now so he is great about taking over so I can get myself together enough to make dinner.
I am also lucky that the older kids are pretty good about doing what they are supposed to. We finally got them to a point where they get dressed for school on their own with little fuss, get homework done right away, and can get their own snacks if I need them to. They are also good when asked about helping with baby boy, for the most part. I am always there to supervise and mediate of course, but teaching them to be responsible for themselves is important to me. We also gave them a new job this year of making their own lunches the night before. They know the rules of what should be in their lunch, and they are learning what they pack they need to eat. They are also learning how to portion, so if they come home more hungry one day, they know they need to pack a little more. They also enjoy having their own choices. We are really working on the clean up after yourself part though haha
This part of the day kids are scattered around, so once I have dinner pretty close to ready it is time to try and round everyone up. This can mean simply checking the basement or out front, and often sending someone to the playground across the street to gather up kids. We all sit down to eat together every night, so it is our time to talk about our day, what's ahead for the rest of the evening and next day, ect. One of the 2 middle kids is always the first one done, so once they take their plate to the sink they make their lunch and if it's a shower night they head upstairs to do that. (I try and get dinner on the table early, but it has seemed to be 6:30 by the time I get it together lately. I move a lot slower right now haha)
Baby boy usually gets his bath after dinner, so my husband usually does that. My teen helps clear the table and wrap leftovers. I sometimes try and work on any other bills/paperwork I have to still do, or switch laundry again, or dishes if I feel up to it. Lately I sit and put my feet up watching the front door for kids going in and out. My older son has wanted to be outside at the park every night and since he has done pretty well with being up later and waking up early with no crankiness I let him. The kids know my deal breaker for staying up late(r) is crankiness and whineyness the next day! I finish up as much as I can. A few times a month I have to do budget/finance stuff so that takes all my brain power.
Baby boy goes to bed the same way at night as he does for his naps, so between 7:30 and 8:30 I get him to sleep. The last week or so he has been so tired he is a screaming mess, thrashing in my arms as we say our prayers, but he falls asleep pretty quickly. I head back downstairs between 8 and 9pm after I have tucked everyone in. My teen is on her own schedule so she is usually floating around still. Sometimes my husband and I will watch something and hang out for a little bit. I am tired enough to go to bed right away, but I am bad and don't usually make this a priority which is stupid, because at this point I am way too exhausted to do anything productive anyway. So at some point I go to sleep.
My days are way more productive when I am not pregnant, when it's not so hot out still, and when we actually have appointments scheduled. This week was a fairly easy week, but next week I have things scheduled every single day. I don't know why my schedule works out that way, but I will have a down week, then a crazy one. Next week is dentist appointments and physicals, with early dismissals, a no-school day, and another birthday party to prep for. One child had 2 days off of school this week, I had one meet-up for lunch scheduled, and today I have 2 side dishes to make for a cookout tomorrow. (See the post titled Randomness Glaore for details on that!)
My day starts around 6:15am when the alarm goes off. My husband needs to get up, and the alarm wakes me up. I usually jump up to pee before he gets out of bed, then I lay back down while he is getting ready. On a good day, everyone is still asleep right now. Sometimes I will hear baby boy on the monitor, and down the hall I usually start to hear my teen getting up and getting ready. She is pretty good about doing her own thing to get ready and out the door on her own, which is nice.
At this stage in my pregnancy, I try not to have too much scheduled for early mornings, so lately my husband had been letting me stay in bed for an extra 45 minutes. He has been taking care of getting the other kids awake and fed and ready for school. I never really go back to sleep but being able to lay there and rest has been nice. Between 7am and 7:15 I get up and head downstairs. Like clockwork, once I hit the third trimester I started waking up nauseous again, so I take my acid reducer with a few sips of water and say goodbye to everyone.
Lately baby boy has been waking up starving, so by the time I come downstairs he has already been fed. He will take my hand and lead me over to our recliner where we will snuggle and watch some cartoons for a little while. I am thankful for this because it gives my tummy time to settle down. I usually check my phone for emails and do any banking I am able to do on my phone. It takes about an hour or so, but I go from nauseous to starving pretty quickly. This is when we turn off the TV and I get myself some breakfast and baby boy gets his first snack. I usually let the dogs out again at this point so they don't bother me for food.
After we eat, we head down to the basement where the playroom is. My full-size freezer is also down there, so if I haven't already I try and figure out what we are going to have for dinner. I check to make sure the cat has food and water, and sort and start any laundry that has piled up overnight. I do laundry every day. Sometimes there is still a load to be switched from the night before. I get winded easily now so I try and combined trips to the basement and get as much done as I can. Baby boy and I hang out down here for a long time. It's a no TV time, so we play and I will sometimes bring down a magazine to look at in between his playing and my chores.
Starting in the 10 o'clock hour I start keeping track of the time. Sometimes he starts getting tired so I try and watch his cues. He recently switched to taking pretty short naps, usually under an hour. Because of this I have been trying to keep him up until 11:30 or so unless he is in really bad shape. So we do a variety of activities to keep him engaged. If he is playing contently I take this time to make any phone calls and follow up on any paperwork I have, but nothing too involved that I couldn't stop at a moments notice. When I see him starting to really wind down I will get him another snack. Sometimes it is pretty close to noon, so I will feed him lunch instead. We clean up, he gets a change of clothes, dry diaper, and I lay him down. Due to seperation anxiety and me being too tired to fight, I started staying with him until he is asleep. I know it is a horrible habit but it became the path of least resistance because he would spend forever screaming and not sleeping and I just couldn't deal. What happens when Bonus Baby arrives I have no idea, I will deal with that then but for now this works. So I will sit next to the crib and rub his face and arm and usually he is asleep within a few minutes.
While he is sleeping I try and take this short time to grab a shower. Sometimes I have enough time to actually get out, get dressed, and grab something to eat. When he wakes up he is almost always cranky, and will sort of throw a fit. If I have eaten I will sit in the recliner with him with a show on for the 30 minutes it takes him to chill out. If I haven't eaten I will eat while he is waking up, and get him a snack and drink ready to go. I have to be careful of the time because I need to be out the door by 2:30 to go and pick up the kids from school. If I have any errands to run, I try and do them before I pick up kids, which means I am leaving the house at this point. So much depends on how my time management has been, and how well baby boy is cooperating. Occasionally I will have to make a stop after I pick up the kids, but I try not to because even that extra half hour can mean I hit traffic getting back home.
On a good day where we have no appointments or stops to make, we are back home by 3:45. I get the older kids a quick snack, and once homework is done they take their brother out to play so I can start dinner. In the past couple weeks I have been hitting a wall of exhaustion around now. When I fee this way I usually grab a glass of water or sometimes a decaf coffee and put my feet up for a few minutes before starting dinner. My husband is usually getting back home around now so he is great about taking over so I can get myself together enough to make dinner.
I am also lucky that the older kids are pretty good about doing what they are supposed to. We finally got them to a point where they get dressed for school on their own with little fuss, get homework done right away, and can get their own snacks if I need them to. They are also good when asked about helping with baby boy, for the most part. I am always there to supervise and mediate of course, but teaching them to be responsible for themselves is important to me. We also gave them a new job this year of making their own lunches the night before. They know the rules of what should be in their lunch, and they are learning what they pack they need to eat. They are also learning how to portion, so if they come home more hungry one day, they know they need to pack a little more. They also enjoy having their own choices. We are really working on the clean up after yourself part though haha
This part of the day kids are scattered around, so once I have dinner pretty close to ready it is time to try and round everyone up. This can mean simply checking the basement or out front, and often sending someone to the playground across the street to gather up kids. We all sit down to eat together every night, so it is our time to talk about our day, what's ahead for the rest of the evening and next day, ect. One of the 2 middle kids is always the first one done, so once they take their plate to the sink they make their lunch and if it's a shower night they head upstairs to do that. (I try and get dinner on the table early, but it has seemed to be 6:30 by the time I get it together lately. I move a lot slower right now haha)
Baby boy usually gets his bath after dinner, so my husband usually does that. My teen helps clear the table and wrap leftovers. I sometimes try and work on any other bills/paperwork I have to still do, or switch laundry again, or dishes if I feel up to it. Lately I sit and put my feet up watching the front door for kids going in and out. My older son has wanted to be outside at the park every night and since he has done pretty well with being up later and waking up early with no crankiness I let him. The kids know my deal breaker for staying up late(r) is crankiness and whineyness the next day! I finish up as much as I can. A few times a month I have to do budget/finance stuff so that takes all my brain power.
Baby boy goes to bed the same way at night as he does for his naps, so between 7:30 and 8:30 I get him to sleep. The last week or so he has been so tired he is a screaming mess, thrashing in my arms as we say our prayers, but he falls asleep pretty quickly. I head back downstairs between 8 and 9pm after I have tucked everyone in. My teen is on her own schedule so she is usually floating around still. Sometimes my husband and I will watch something and hang out for a little bit. I am tired enough to go to bed right away, but I am bad and don't usually make this a priority which is stupid, because at this point I am way too exhausted to do anything productive anyway. So at some point I go to sleep.
My days are way more productive when I am not pregnant, when it's not so hot out still, and when we actually have appointments scheduled. This week was a fairly easy week, but next week I have things scheduled every single day. I don't know why my schedule works out that way, but I will have a down week, then a crazy one. Next week is dentist appointments and physicals, with early dismissals, a no-school day, and another birthday party to prep for. One child had 2 days off of school this week, I had one meet-up for lunch scheduled, and today I have 2 side dishes to make for a cookout tomorrow. (See the post titled Randomness Glaore for details on that!)
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