Saturday, 30 June 2007
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I got a G rating for using the word puke?
Crap. Fart. Those turkeys.
That reminds me, I've got to start swearing less. The Sprout is impressionable and I am a drunken sailor.
Puke?
Finally!
Thursday, 28 June 2007
I finished the most recent Harry Potter with only weeks left until the next one. Yay! That also means I finished a maternity leave goal. To read more. Hopefully it starts a trend. ajd and I are trying to watch less TV and read more. Which is good, because Sprout notices the TV. Its also good because I keep asking for books and then never reading them. If I can figure out hands free pumping (I have a few different ways of doing it, just have to make them work at work), then I can read while pumping at work. Double yay! I may actually be smart again. ;)
I wanna be cool too!
Me!Me! I wanna do this too. I've been waiting ages to do one of these on a blog.
1 Where is your cell phone? bag
2 Relationship? stressed
3 Your hair? fluffy
4 Work? Monday
5 Your sister? in-law
6 Your favorite things? baby
7 Your dream last night? tortured
8 Your favorite drink? water
9 Your dream car? roomy
10 The room you're in? office
11 Your shoes? barefoot
12 Your fears? daycare
13 What do you want to be in 10 years? happy
14 Who did you hang out with this weekend? Sprout
15 What are you not good at? posessivism
16 Muffins? Chocolate
17 Wish-list item? books
18 Where you grew up? commune
19 The last thing you did? read
20 What are you wearing? denim
21 What are you not wearing? ring
22 Your pet? untrained
23 Your computer? old
24 Your life? wonderful
25 Your mood? tired
26 Missing? sex
27 What are you thinking about? bebe
28 Your car? dented
29 Your kitchen? cluttered
30 Your summer? short
31 Your favorite color? pink
32 Last time you laughed? breakfast
33 Last time you cried? afternoon
34 School? money?
35 Love? plentiful
36 Tag? anti
We're off to see the wizard.
Monday, 25 June 2007
Its my last week of leave, so I figured I'd better get around to taking one of those trips I planned on taking when I knew I would be off for part of the summer. We're heading up North to see the house my brother's girlfriend is destroying. (I know, I need to let go, but as far as I'm concerned, its still my house, dammit) We're also going to show off the Sprout to whomever I can find still living in the purgatory that is known as my home town. I was going to stay at the house, but decided against it after the forcast said it would be in the high 90's. The house doesn't have AC, and the Sprout has not been aclimated to hot weather since her parents live in a frozen cave. Wish me luck. I hear that she painted my old bedroom bright orange and blue, and actually made sure there were outlets in the original bathroom. Too bad, you haven't really lived until you've blown dry your mall bangs by running an extension cord from your bedroom to the bathroom for your hot pink hair dryer. I may however hand the Sprout off to my mom so I can enjoy a cool bath is six foot long claw tub they installed. Hrm. Maybe she's not so bad, that tub was sitting in our yard for years, and she got it installed.....
I feel lighter.
Friday, 22 June 2007
The haircut was a success. I've had my hair this length before, but not quite like this. Its shorter and a little funkier. 
While I was gone, the Sprout ate half of her bottle, then less than an hour later, when I was home, got hungry again and finished it off. She was far better with this one that she has been with any others. When I was giving her the second half, she really got in to it and finished it off. I read about the trick after I had already figured it out on the LLL site. We used a bottle that has the same nipple shape as the pacifier she likes. It happens to be the one that her Dr. recommended. I got the idea that if she got used to sucking on it without having all the milk getting in her way, it would make the bottle easier to take. I was right. I now feel better about her not being a hassle for daycare. At least until she gets gassy like she did last night and won't tolerate being in any position but curled up in a ball.
Dry run.
Thursday, 21 June 2007
Since I am just over a week away from actually being back at work, I've started to work on our morning schedule. Being a person who adores sleep more than just about anything except her child, husband and dog, this is an important thing. (my favorite is of course sleeping with child and dog, and sometimes husband)
Its tricky figuring out just how late you can sleep and still make it out the door on time. So far, so good. I can wake up at a reasonable time and still clean up and feed the Sprout. It will require a certain amount of pre planning, such as making sure the Sprout's bag is packed the night before, that the food for the Sprout is all portioned out and ready to go, and that I don't have any ironing to do. It also requires wash and go hair. I've got an appointment at 1:45 today to help deal with that. Wish me luck.
Sometimes...
Friday, 15 June 2007
...when you're feeling good about how things are going because you wrote a really snide email to an elected official, and the Sprout is eating, and the Boof seems good, and you and you dad are getting along for the first time since he regularly took you out for malts when you were 9, and even though ajd is out of town on his first business trip, you're feeling good.
Somtimes, with all that, life bites you in the ass. Because the Sprout pukes all over everything right after getting in her jammies, and while you're trying to clean up and deal with that, the Boof poops in the living room, and the kitchen isn't clean enough to setup the baby tub, and the Sprout gets cranky about being all trailer park naked 'cept her diaper.
But sometimes, even with all of that, you setup the Sprout in her bouncy seat in the kitchen so you can clean up enough to wash the puke off her, and she looks especially all trailer park in nothing but her diaper, and you almost miss that for first time she actually reached for a toy and was able to grab on to it and you could tell that she was pleased with herself. And then she bounces and gets excited when the toys bounce too, and holds out long enough for you to give her a bath, and feed her to make up for what she puked, and you get a Sprout that looks like this. 
Sometimes, life is so good.
Oh my.
I saw this article in the Strib today (apologies if you have to login to read it). Having known some really loving wonderful large dogs, including chow chows, I was a little irked. So I sent off this letter to the guy who is proposing the bill. I also copied my representative.
Subject: Mr. Lesch, you make me ashamed to call myself a member of the DFL
I've always thought of us DFL types as better informed. You obviously don't know anything about dogs if you think that it has to do with the breed. It has to do with the owner. Unfortunately there are some crummy owners out there, and crummy owners tend to favor certain dog breeds that they think are cool by their reputation. Its a self perpetuating issue, but the banning dogs, good dogs, isn't the solution. A teacup yorkie is just as capable of a horrible bite, but because its a small dog, people ignore it. I can tell you from experience that a miniature schnauzer hurts just as much as a big dog. If you're going to start banning dogs, lets ban stupid people too. I propose starting by banning you. Or better yet, why not try education and information. Penalties for not being a good owner of all dogs that bite, not just big ones. Assistance with spay and neuter so that there are less unwanted dogs. Why not a little positive instead of negative.
Sincerely,
Veggie
District 58A
This is what I got in response. I'm hoping it means he got that I was joking about the banning part...
Dear Veggie:
I've already been banned - several times over in fact, so you're going
to have to take a number and wait in line to ban me. Thanks for your
thoughts, though.
John Lesch
Oh, it took him less than an hour to respond to someone not in his district. He's an email addict!
2 months old
Tuesday, 12 June 2007
Sprout is two months old today. Time has really flown by. To celebrate, a couple of pictures. 
And there was much rejoicing.
Monday, 11 June 2007
New manager rocks! Totally wants us to have home lives separate from work, and understands where I'm at with the whole baby thing. Is encouraging me to return to work at a slow pace, gets the breastfeeding limitations, and oo'd and ah'd over Sprout. The upcoming projects will not mean after hours work like I feared. I feel confident about going back to work in three weeks. I have a couple of little things to take care of like a small fridge for my pumped milk (they make silly little ones that will work great). I also took a look at how Sprout was feeding from the nipples that she was using and I don't like it. Going to try suggestions from Dr. for a different brand and see if she will take them with less work. I want it to be easy on the daycare folks so that they will have more time to snuggle and love her instead of fighting with feeding her.
Oh, 8.5 weeks of leave from work = 2222 unread emails. And I still have three weeks until I will really start reading them.
And not an elastic waist in the bunch.
Friday, 8 June 2007
I realized that part of my dread about going back to work was because I didn't have clothes for it. Its hard to get in the mindset when you're afraid all you're going to have to wear is sweats and milk stained t-shirts. I really needed to get back in that frame of mind because I meet with my new manager on Monday to discuss the back to work plan. I need to feel confident in my ability to do my job so I can feel confident asking for flexibility.
So, I've gotten the work clothes thing taken care of. It took a trip to Albertville, Kohls, a local Lane Bryant and Penney's. Penney's didn't pan out, but everything else was good. It wasn't fun. However, I did find stuff that will be both comfortable, and not look like I'm wearing a burlap sack. It also should fit me down a size. The plan is of course to not get any bigger... just smaller. My favorite thing is a pair of Levi's. I do love my jeans, and these make me feel a little snazzy.
Next issue, shoes. I do believe that my feet have expanded a little, or rather not returned to their previous size. Not sure if its permanent or not. I do know that I can't live in my Birkenstocks forever though.
Oh, and because she just can't seem to stop growing... I got the Sprout some stuff too. We should be set for comfy/easy clothes for daycare. And enough of them so that even if she goes through two outfits a day, I don't have to do laundry every other day.
Irked.
Wednesday, 6 June 2007
My bad luck with nurses who don't listen continues. A good nurse is worth their weight in gold, a bad nurse...
Sprout got vaccinated today, and one is done orally. I know from giving her Prevacid that she has to be sucking on a finger if you give her anything orally or she won't swallow it. I told the nurse, and she still just squirted it into her mouth while I was trying to get her to suck, which she obviously wasn't doing. To make it worse, she did it TWICE! So she choked, aspirated a little, turned a little purple trying to cough it up, and freaked me out.
I have fortunately learned that I have every right to ask for someone else to help me, so we got another nurse, and the Dr. came back and made sure she got it all up. But not before I was totally freaked out and a little teary.
/rant
Hi-ho.
Monday, 4 June 2007
Hi-ho, hi-ho, its off to work I go.
The main disability part of my leave ends on Wednesday. And since I decided I didn't want to lose a day to a holiday, I'll be back at work on July 2nd. That means, four more weeks. And up until today, we didn't have daycare lined up. Not for lack of trying. After my first choice gave up the spot I wanted for two employees, I was left scrambling. I have very high standards, and there seems to be a certain lack of professionalism among home daycare providers. So we are going with a center in our neighborhood. Its housed in a church, and is small enough to have a family type feel, but big enough that staff sickness won't put me in a bind. Its signifigantly more expensive than home daycare, so eating out and lattes are going to be out. So are vacations for awhile. If I seem pretty blah about the whole thing, I am. I never thought this would be me, but between it just being fun to be a mom, and the concern if anyone will care for her as well as I will, I don't want to go back to work. It doesn't help that I'm going back to a new manager, a very changed job, and two huge projects that I already know have issues. I may start buying a lottery ticket a week. Just in case, you know.
Along with the cost of daycare, is the cost of dressing for work. I was already at my largest when I got pregnant, and despite losing the first 40 of the 70 or so pounds I gained rather quickly, the rest is taking the usual pound or two a week (like it should since I am breastfeeding and need to make sure that I feed that appropriately). Then there is an issue of skin. I seem to have skin that won't cooperate the same as Syl. So, that means new clothes. Clothes I don't want to have to buy or spend much on because I don't want to be this size for long.
