…discovering that being a mom is just another part of being me
According to one of those growth charts, I put in Amelia’s stats and based on the info I input it says she will be 5′9″ tall at age 18! I seriously doubt she will be that tall. None of the women in my family are that tall. Even Eric’s family that has fairly tall women, none of them are that tall.
It’s craziness!
I think Amelia is learning proper handwashing at daycare. This morning, after breakfast, we went to the bathroom to brush her teeth and wash her hands. She turned on the water, I gave her some soap and she started singing “Happy Birthday”.
I’ve read that to properly remove the germs, you must wash your hands for 2 rounds of “Happy Birthday”, which supposedly equals 20 seconds or something like that.
I’m feeling quite domestic this weekend. I baked a blueberry pie. Yes, I cheated and used a ready made crust and pie filling from a can, but hey. It was my first time making a pie and it was delicious. I made it yesterday early afternoon and I’ve just about eaten the whole pie by myself. Gasp! No wonder I’ve gained about 5 pounds this weekend. Yikes!
I also made a small pillow for Amelia. 
I cut up an old yucky pillow, washed the cover and removed about 1/2 the stuffing, then sewed it back up. Now she has a small rectangular pillow instead of a big standard size pillow.
I finally figured out that it was the big pillow that was giving her a hard time falling asleep. It’s been a week that we’ve been struggling with her going to bed, then getting up several times during the night. So I thought about it and thought maybe it was the pillow. I switched it out last night for one of her small pillows that she used before and it worked. She went to sleep and I never heard a peep out of her again til morning. So I made her a small pillow. I hope she likes it. We’ll be trying it out tonight.
DH was gone for the weekend so it was just Amelia and I. We’ve gone to the grocery store about 4 times this weekend. I made cinnamon rolls yesterday for breakfast. We’ve played outside almost all day today. Yesterday, we played with the play dough. And I’ve just about got the laundry done. Plus I’ve vacuumed the living room twice this weekend also. I did manage to read a bit, knit a bit last night and watched football. Wow!
Oh yeah. As part of my purging, I’ve going through and getting rid of some cookbooks. So I downloaded a recipe software and am entering in some of my favorites out of each book that I’ve either really liked, or want to try but haven’t gotten around to it. I’m then going to take the cookbooks to work and see if anyone wants any of them.
Ha! This is what happens when I get domestic and my SAHM personality kicks in.
Here is the cake that I made for Amelia’s 2nd birthday. I think she liked it. At least everyone thought it tasted great…It was gone by the next day!
It was a small gathering with just family. My parents, my sister, her fiance’s cousin, and DH’s cousin, her husband and their little girl (Amelia’s cousin) were all that were there. But Amelia got to sort of play with 2 little kids. Her cousin and another baby who will be family when sis gets married next year.
So this post is being made by Mars Edit. Trying it out as a possible editor for offline blogging. I’m not sure I like it. I’m trying out a few to see which I like best. So many people rave about this editor though, I figured I’d give it a try.
Since we switched Amelia to a toddler bed, she’s gotten in the habit of getting up around 5am and coming into our room and snuggling with us, sometimes falling right back to sleep in my arms and sometimes trying to play so we end up turning on Disney so she can watch it while we try to get a little more sleep before the alarm goes off.
My husband snores. I’m sure I do too, but since I’m such a light sleeper, it’s hard for me to fall asleep with all his noise. So I tend to go sleep on the couch, if earplugs and/or shoving him doesn’t work. This was the case last night and I ended up bedding down in the living room around 11:30pm. Around 1am I woke up and decided to try going back to bed. When I got there, I saw that he had a visitor. Apparently while I was in the living room, Amelia woke up and wandered into our room. I found her asleep on our bed next to DH. I woke him up and asked him if he knew she was there. He chuckled and said that no, he didn’t realize that she had climbed into our bed. It was so cute. I took her to her own bed and she barely noticed.
Of course, promptly at 5am, she came into the room again and climbed into bed with us. She curled up in my arms and we both fell back asleep til the alarm woke me up around 5:30.
Ever since before my daughter was born, I’ve had dreams of being a stay-at-home mom. These feelings only grew stronger the day I had to leave my daughter with strangers at daycare and go to work. She was only 11 weeks old. That was one of the hardest days of my life. And every day I struggle with guilt that I must be at work instead of taking care of my baby girl.
I know she’s getting excellent care at her daycare center and her teachers adore her and spoil her. She gets to play all day with other kids her age and do crafts and games and fun things. And I know that if she were at home, she wouldn’t be exposed to nearly as much as she does now as school. But I still feel that as a parent it’s my responsibility to take care of her. Sure, some people would say I am in a way taking care of her by working and making money to provide for her, but I still don’t like it. If my husband could work and make enough to provide for his family, then I should be able to stay home and physically take care of our daughter. But our financial situation doesn’t allow for that, although I know it’s our own fault for living the way we do.
She turns 2 today and even now, every day, my desire to stay home with her grows stronger. My husband and I want to move back to FL to be closer to family, so every once in a while I search for job opportunities in the state. But lately, I don’t even want to explore potential job opps because I don’t want to go back to work doing the same thing. I don’t even want to go back to work doing something different.
If I could work from home setting my own hours, it would be an ideal situation because then I could keep my daughter at home with me all day and just work when she’s napping, after she’s gone to bed, or when she’s having a down time. So I’ve been trying to explore work-at-home opportunities and even some of those don’t appeal to me if I have to do the same darn thing I’ve been doing for the past 8 years. But if it’s the only thing available that isn’t a scam then I might consider it. Then here is the biggest challenge, finding something that won’t put us in a major financial crisis (I provide 1/2 of our family income) and that gives decent health insurance. Our family’s health insurance is through my employer because it is much better and cheaper than through my husband’s employer. So this is a real obstacle I must figure out a way to get around.
I am exploring a few options, but so far, things don’t look all too hopeful. But I keep searching, because I’m not sure I’ll be truly satisfied again til I’m able to stay home with my daughter.
mamaLove is the personal site of Rayne Bair. Happily married since 2001 and proud mama of one adorable little girl. This site details a journey through motherhood and trying to find myself apart from being mommy. learn more ...
Keep up with the latest at mamaLove.
Note: Progress does not include blocking. Only knitting/crochet, seaming and weaving ends are taken into consideration. :)
