Sad Day =(

I quit my job today.  I did it for the best of reasons, to stay home with my baby Ruby, but I am still feeling sad about it.

I'm really going to miss this place:

Back in the beginning of this year, my boss asked me what my plans were for once the baby was born.  I told her I didn't know.  I honestly didn't.  And when time came to turn in my contract for the 2012-2013 school year, I still didn't know.  I knew I'd want to be with my baby, but I didn't want to leave my classroom either.  Being the amazing person that she is, she told me, "Unless you know for sure that you aren't coming back, turn in your contract.  If you have that baby and in May you decide you can't leave her, I will understand, and I will not be upset.  There's many people here that would love to take your classroom if I need to replace you."  So, I turned in my contract.  

I guess I always had an out, but when my boss asked me in June when I came to visit with Ruby, I still didn't have a daycare lined up, and I was still torn on whether to go back.  In a perfect world, I'd take some more time with my girl, and then return to my classroom at our Park campus just like I'd never left it.

Except this world isn't perfect.  At our school if you leave your classroom, someone else will take it.  And if they don't want to leave when you want to come back, it's too bad for you, because they now have claim to it.  In fact, that's how I got my room with the big windows pictured above.  Another teacher got pregnant.  Her baby was even due right before school started and she came back almost right away, but in the interest of consistency, they put someone who'd be there the whole year (me) in that room, and she got a job basically as a substitute at our other campus.  Lucky for her, a classroom opened up for the following year up there when a teacher moved, but that rarely happens.  People don't like to leave their classrooms because chances are, you'll never get it back.

It's now the end of July.  Staff goes back to work in one month.  We had to make a decision, and even though I wish I never had to make it, I knew I owed it to my boss to do it asap.  Keith felt confident we could make it work financially (I'm still really scared about this part of it), and that I should stay home with her since it made me sick to my stomach to think of leaving her.

I was so scared to tell my boss.  I felt I'd waited too long, and that I was letting her down and leaving her in a hard place.  She is such a caring person, but I just didn't know if she would be upset that I hadn't made this decision earlier.

She could not have been more understanding.  She said, "Jenny, there's not a mother in the world that hasn't been through this.  I gave you an out, and I'm not mad.  And you know you always have a place here."  She said a lot of other kind things, too, and I am just so grateful to have worked for such an amazing person.  She said that when I was ready to come back, there'd be a job for me in some capacity.

Then she told me the best/most interesting thing.  She said she might just close my room for the year and disperse the students into other classrooms at our main campus.  Enrollment right now is low anyway, and there aren't even any boys in the class right now so parents might prefer it.  If she does that, there is a small chance that I could go back to my room next school year (if they decided to reopen it).  I think I will keep my fingers crossed for that, and in the mean time count myself SO lucky to have found such an amazing place in the education community.

Week in iPhone Pictures

I take too many pictures with my phone.  Ok, there's no such thing as too many, but seriously, I have a lot.  I needed an outlet for them.  Enter Amy's week in iPhone link up.  Ahhh, that's it.  The perfect way to get them out of my phone - by week!  I actually have the last two weeks here because I started this post many, many days ago, but kept getting interrupted by a little girl who doesn't take any naps.  Plus I basically have no photo-editing software, so I had to figure something out (I used Picasa).

July 15-21

Sunday: Lounging after breakfast with Grandpa.  Monday: A progression of smiles during a quick trip to visit Daddy at work.  A lovely sunset.  Tuesday:  Wearing her Ruby shirt to baby class.  Wednesday:  Squirming around on Mommy & Daddy's bed.

Thursday:  Hangin' out on the playmat, waiting for relatives to come over.  There's nothing like a freshly washed stack of diapers.  Friday:  Little Miss No-Naps strikes again!  Saturday:  Lazing in jammies.  Taking pictures of a cute outfit from Auntie Jen.  Ahhhh, finally, a nap.

July 22-28 

Sunday:  Playing with Daddy.  Monday:  Mama's bird's eye view.  An outfit that lasted about 5 minutes. Picked up some supplies at the craft store.  Trying to get away from Daddy on the yoga ball.  Somebody found her hand.  Tuesday:  Strong baby!  More hand chewing at baby class.  Handprint keepsake finally finished.

Wednesday:  A good nap.  Strollin' like a big girl.  Thursday:  Playing with her "guys".  Picnicking at the winery.  Weird-looking cloud.  Friday:  Somebody's sleeping in my bed!  Making faces.  Boppy lounging.  Saturday:  Fruity onesie.

Making these was fun!  Hopefully I'll be able to keep it up.  Go see what everybody else was up to over on Amy's blog.

Embrace the Camera

Before I embrace the camera today, lets just take a peek at how funny this picture of Ruby and Keith is:

It's like she's saying, "Um, Mom, a little help here please?"  And yes, my child is wearing "jeans" and a long sleeved onesie at the end of July.  Welcome to Washington.  Anyway...

My mom came over today, and I intended to have her take pictures of Ruby and I, but... she was sleeping most of the time!  Mom was a little bit sad, but miss grouchy-pants needed that nap.

Things have been going a little bit better on the sleep front.  Yesterday she actually slept IN HER CAR SEAT for an hour during baby class.  I couldn't believe it.  Then she slept from bedtime until, well, until about midnight because she'd busted her swaddle, but I was able to wrap her back up and she slept until 4:00 like normal.  Then after that, she slept until just before 9:00.  She woke up happy, just "talking" to herself in her crib until I came in to get her.  Which took a little while, because I was dead.

No, not actually, but I was so.freaking.tired.  See, Ruby is not the only one that hasn't been sleeping.  I've been having really poorly timed insomnia.  I usually have a lot of trouble getting back to sleep after I feed her.  Yesterday after her 4:00am feeding, I never made it back to sleep.  Barf.

I'm usually the one that puts her to bed, but she was still awake and grouchy when she finished nursing.  I was so tired, I couldn't deal.  Keith took her to her room and bounced her on the yoga ball for what he said was an hour.  It was probably about half that, but I don't even know because I fell asleep instantly.

So, here we are, embracing the camera with the only picture I took today where you couldn't see the massive dark circles under my eyes.  And trust, I made Ruby endure many a iPhone self-portrait this afternoon.  Pretty much any room we were in in the house, we took some pictures.  This is the only one I got.

I feel like I'm always making excuses for not doing a better job at embracing the camera.  But hey, at least it's happening!

Little Miss No-Naps

I don't think there's a single mom-blogger that hasn't written about sleep.

Seriously.

For the most part, we've been pretty lucky in the sleep department.  Once we got Ruby sleeping in her crib in her own room, she has been a pretty fantastic nighttime sleeper.  I know, this makes other people jealous.

I set my expectations pretty low, but she gradually stretched her first round of sleep out longer and longer (once we figured out her preferred bed time).  She's gone up to 9 hours before, but has been generally holding steady at about 8.

Naps are a whole different story.

This is the face of a child who will not sleep.

'Round here, Ruby has earned herself the nickname "Little Miss No-Naps".  Yeah, this kid hates naps.  She was doing pretty well with taking a morning nap (thank goodness, this is when I showered!), and for a while would fall asleep around 4:30 each afternoon.  In the middle, she'd catnap.

Now?  Now we're lucky if we get a 30min nap out of her.  The naps have stopped.

"Hi Mommy!  I don't care if I was yawning a minute ago and I'm all swaddled up, I'm going to keep my eyes open as wide as I can!  Isn't that funny?"

I will admit, I am not the best at picking up on her tired cues.  She can be outright yawning, however, but she still won't nap.  Keith or I will swaddle her up, and go bounce her on the yoga ball in her room, and she will plaster her eyes open as wide as they can go and just stare at you.  She doesn't even blink, I think because she's trying to keep her eyes open wide.

This makes for a very grouchy baby.

And now?  Now she's waking up more in the night!  Usually she'd go to bed around 7:30, wake up somewhere around 4:00, and then again between 6:00-7:00.  She had even been only nursing for about 5min at the 6:00 wake up, so I thought she'd be dropping that feeding soon.  Totally reasonable.  

Then she started having that first waking earlier and earlier.  Last night?  She woke up at 1:24!  Of course, she woke up again at 4:00, and 6:00.  What gives, baby?

Everything is better with sleep...

I think part of it is, she's become a champion swaddle-buster.  She even got an arm out of one of those velcro SwaddleMes.  If she gets her arms out, it's all over.  She wants them out, but she just cannot stay asleep like that.  Sigh.

Today I am trying to get her swaddled as soon as I see a single yawn.  I know with bedtime before, I was missing her cues and she would get overtired, then not sleep (seriously, do not try to put this kid to bed after 8pm, she won't have it).  This morning she took an hour nap.  Right now, she's been in her crib for 20min, but she's rolling around.  Fingers crossed, fingers crossed.  Stay asleep, Little Miss No-Naps.

And now, I'm off to go download the Wonder Weeks app for my phone.  Something tells me this may be my explanation for the lack of sleep...

Embrace the Camera

Something awesome happened.  My girl, she likes books.

I am a total bibliophile.  It is my every hope that Ruby will be someday too.  I had tried reading to her in the past... she just wasn't into it.  In the past week, however, something clicked.  She likes books!  We can sit in her chair in the nursery and read several of them at a time.  I'm in heaven.

Keith needs to work on his photography skills...

Her fave right now is Chicka Chicka Boom Boom.  Unbelievably, I hadn't read it before she was born.  I knew it was wildly popular though, and when I was pregnant, I used some of my Scholastic Book Club teacher points to "buy" a whole bunch of books for her.  With Chicka Chika Boom Boom came Chicka Chicka 1,2,3.  She likes that one too, especially the end sheets with the numbers on them.  Love, love, love it.  She'll also tolerate Dr. Seuss books if they're not too wordy (hello Go Dog Go!), but doesn't have the attention span for the Berenstain Bears yet.

She will.  I can't wait.

Linking up with Emily today!

Ohhh, the Cuteness

Just another Wednesday, hangin' out with my girl. =)

I heart Tuesdays

I heart them because Tuesday = baby class day.  When I was pregnant, I knew for sure that I needed to get some real live mommy friends.  Bonus points if these mommies had babies Ruby's age.  The hospital I delivered at offers these parent-baby classes, broken down into three month age chunks.  Perfect.

Except I wasn't sure I was going to go.  I tend to be pretty introverted in social situations (at first anyway).  I knew I wanted to, but...  Anyway, there was another woman in our Hypnobirthing class who was getting ready to have her second child.  She spoke so highly of the parent-baby classes she'd attended with her first child, telling us that she still had great friends from there, some of whom would even be watching her older child when she went into labor!  Ok, I was sold.

Yep, she had to wear her new Ruby shirt to class today.

I waited a long time (too long) to actually go.  I think she was 6 weeks already?  But I knew from the first class that I totally loved it.  The vibe is just so totally perfect for a brand new mom, because everyone is a brand new mom.  Everyone has all the same problems and successes that you do.  Everything your baby is doing that you wonder, "could this possibly be normal?" IS normal, and all the other babies are doing it too!  Everybody is nursing, a lot of them without covers even.  I came home the first week and told Keith there were boobs and baby butts out everywhere (because we just change them right on the floor, of course), and that I loved it.  It was a totally safe place to learn to nurse in public, and just get comfortable caring for my baby out of the house.  Add to it that our facilitator is totally knowledgeable and has a very "follow the child" slant that is right up my alley, and well, I look forward to Tuesday every week.  

It is just so refreshing to experience the sisterhood of new-mommydom.  I come home every Tuesday afternoon with a sleepy baby and a positive attitude.  You can best believe if it is Tuesday you will find me at my happy place: parent-baby class.