Time passes so quickly...

I can't believe how the time is flying. I want to write. I want to keep track of everything that is happening. The goods days and the bad days. But sometimes you just have to live your life. There is an expression that I am very fond of, it is "Life is what happens while you're busy planning." I am a planner, but I try to keep this expression close to my heart, to remind myself that sometimes, you just have to go with the flow, and live. Because otherwise things will pass while you're not looking.

For this reason, this post might come off as more like a list than a blog entry. But in my deepest desire to record E's life and development. Something, will be better than nothing.

Last I wrote I was back at work a week. This time, two weeks have passed and I've been back at work for 3 weeks. What a difference. It really doesn't take you long to get into a routine. Mostly because without one you would drown in chores instantly. But upon returning to the workforce I was hit nearly immediately with the one thing that I hadn't missed while I was gone. Germs. I was sick with a horrible cold the second week I was back at work. There are a lot of people who explained to me that this was due to the fact that I had a child in day care. Honestly, I don't blame the day care. I blame my job. I mean really, at day care kids get sent home because they thought about sneezing (a slight exaggeration) but at work people will be throwing up in the bathroom with the flu and still not go home. Overworked Corporate America really does need to re-evaluate their priorities. But it is what it is. I was sick.

Now you know what comes next right? I was sick, so E got sick. After I was sick I sent her to Grandma's house where she stayed for a day instead of day care. But everyone declared her fine to return to school, and back to day care she went. (This will come back to haunt me later)

I would like to tell you what I did two weekends ago, but that is the weekend of what I will fondly refer to as "The Great Flood". On the scale of Noah's Ark, but different. We didn't float away, but just barely. The only interesting thing that happened this weekend was that E decided she was done with being Swaddled. She was a big girl now and wouldn't stop crying until we un-swaddled her. I thought surely that we would be up all night the first night of her not being swaddled. But we were only up twice. And since that's how many times she'd been getting up when she was swaddled... well... it wasn't much of a difference obviously.

This then launched me into my third week back at work. This is when things really got interesting. At about lunch time, I got my initiation phone call. You know the one. The "This isn't an emergency but we just wanted to let you know that E seems to be running a little fever and has been having some really poopy diapers. We think she might be sick. You don't have to come get her yet. But we just wanted to let you know." So, being a first time Mommy, I of course left work to go get her. We went to the Drs and they declared her fine. So Tuesday. Back to school she went.

She made it through the day on Tuesday, but I couldn't help but laugh when I picked her up and was told she had pooped 7 times while at day care that day. She is only at day care for 9 hours. That's a little less than once an hour. They were "worried" clearly feeling that she was a little sick. That was ok. Mommy was off on Wednesday, so E would stay home with me, and we would take it easy and rest.

Wednesday was a fun day. It started off pretty simply. But since E had been pooping so much. I had a lot of laundry that needed to be done. So after I got her set up I set off to the basement to start a load of laundry. Somewhere between the top and the bottom I went airborne! And when the birds and stars stopped circling my head, I realized I was in pain and sitting at the foot of the stairs. And I had not gotten there by walking. I shook it off and went on with my day. After all, I couldn't sit at the foot of the stairs and cry. E was all alone upstairs.

On Thursday, just to be safe, Mommy sent E to Grandma's. She had slept for a total of 6 hours while in Mommy's arms on Wednesday and another good day of rest seemed like a good idea. So Thursday was rather uneventful.

Followed promptly by Friday when I brought E to day care and talked to the teacher. Assuring her that E was doing MUCH better and that she missed being at school. Then crossing my fingers and praying I didn't get a phone call, it was Friday. She only had to make it through today and then it would be the weekend.

This past weekend was filled with little things. It was the first warm weekend this spring. And we once again encountered E's dislike of warm temperatures in her room. With fans inserted and clothing shed we were able to get her to sleep at night. But if this is any indication of what is to come this summer, I better start researching her AC right now. We also took this nice weather of a sign that it was time to move past the infant bucket seat. Time to move E into her convertible car seat. She likes it better (she's been riding in one in Grandma's car). She can see out the window in this car seat. So it feels as though the only remaining infant item is about to go by. And my baby is becoming less of a baby and more of a little girl. And she's only 5 months old. I can't imagine how I will feel when she is actually a little girl.

I mentioned that the weather was nice and I took the opportunity to head out to the outlet mall. It was nice to walk around with E and be in the warm sun. Since as I just mentioned she doesn't like to be hot, I had to dig around and find some clothes we bought before we had E that were gender neutral but not too heavy. A pair of brown cotton pants. With a short sleeve onsie. She had on a pair of pink and brown stripe socks to match the pants. And much to my amazement I was told multiple times about how cute HE was. I was heartbroken. Who could possibly think my adorable little girl was a HE! And what kind of mind games did they think I was playing with HIM considering the PINK socks? *sigh* Oh well.

E has two new behaviours worth mentioning. The first is that she has learned she can shriek at the top of her lungs. Sort of like screaming but then she'll look at you and laugh. It sounds like she is crying and really upset, but she's not. She's just shrieking and screaming and screeching because she can. I hope it's a short phase. If it's not, I really might take Daddy up on those ear plugs. Also, E has learned how to bang toys against any surface that may present itself. If she is in a highchair the tray will work just fine, and if she's in the jumperoo the toy tray on that works wonder as well. She will grab the toy, whatever toy it may be, and start to bang it profusely against the tray. The behavior itself isn't that interesting. But if only you could see her little face while she does it. She takes this banging very seriously and concentrates very hard on executing the best banging possible. She does not laugh or smile. I don't know what her toys have done to her but she is determined to teach them a lesson. And as Grandpa said this weekend "Beat them into submission." Well now that I've seen how she handles "situations" I will definitely try to stay on her good side. She will however be much better off if she would learn how to control her banging and not smack herself in the face every time she flails her little hand around with the toy in it. Oh well. These things too shall come.

That is all I have for this period, I hope it's not so long between now and my next post. All my love to the working Mommies and Daddies! And as always - who dropped the pacifier?