Okay, so I already broke my deal with myself to go on here in the afternoons. It's just so nice to end the day by sharing it with all of you!
I officially have a child-care giving friend and today was my first official day of, what I am calling, work! (Though I must say, it's pretty damn fun for "work"!) They only hung out for two hours(9:30am-11:30am), but it was good. I set up my Sewing Nook at the end of our hallway more by organizing all of my fabric, old and new-to-me, and neatly stacking it on the shelves my room-mate so kindly put up for me above my desk. That was about all I had time to accomplish (he came a bit late and I did some eating and such before getting down to business). However, throughout the course of the evening I was able to crochet cuffs which will be the ankles of lovely Arabian-style pants, as overalls, and a short and wonderful vest to go with them. All that is left is to sew the pants (hopefully tomorrow finds me doing this, maybe during T's nap?).
I am excited for when he will be caring for her Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday for three hours each morning. We are easing into it, as there have been many transitions lately and Mom has been also having a hard time, which she feels. So today was two hours, and we are skipping Tuesday, however Wednesday will be a three hour morning for them. This works out really well, as he will be watching her from right after breakfast to lunch. She'll come back, ideally eat lunch and then go down for a couple hours of napping, freeing me up to continue any projects I am wanting to do more work on, or perhaps complete a few of the endless tasks on my eternal list! ^.^ In addition to this, it is possible that another close friend of mine will watch T for 2 days of the month, once every two weeks, for up to 5 hours. We'll see how this goes. This could also come in handy to allow me to work part time, say one day a week, as I feel this may be necessary for me to bring in the money needed to support T and I. As for babysitting, I am hoping to receive a Child Care Subsidy from the government and am sending in the application form tomorrow. This will mean I will only need to put a fraction of money into childcare, as opposed to all the money I could possibly earn while my child is being cared for. *Few*
Today after T returned and went down for her nap, I finally got out the poster-board, as I've been truly wanting to do for a time now, and started the process of making a schedule for T(and myself), based on the one I found on this video. Now to laminate it, make labels and laminate them, and find a wonderful picture of T to use to show where in our day we are. Hoping to have this done soon.
T is doing well. She has been tricking me, this is about the third time now. She will say she is ready for bed, we'll do the whole bed-time prep. deal, get into her bedroll, nurse, and this is where is starts to become evident, and she's super awake, enjoying the nurse.
Now, I have, as long as I've been in this Mother role, been an advocate of "on-demand nursing", and self-led weaning as well. However, I have been getting more and more tired and feel that the amount she nurses is taxing me more than it is benefiting her. So, I have recently(for about a couple weeks now) stopped giving her milk every time she asked. I now will nurse her if requested upon waking in the morning or from a nap, I will nurse her to sleep at nap and night time, and if/when she wakes up throughout the night. This is better than the anger and/or frustration I very obviously felt with each nurse, which was a LOT of nursing. And when I started this, I was pleasantly surprised at how well she took it. She was quite happy to be distracted, or else didn't take long to get over it. And so, either I am misinterpreting her or, as she confirmed when I asked her, she is tricking me by saying she's ready for bed so that she can get a nurse. And clever girl she is for it works, and as much as I don't want to nurse her again once she's genuinely ready for bed, I don't really see another option that makes sense for us. I feel tired and aggravated after going through the entire bedtime routine, laying down with her and nursing her in bed, getting sleepy from this myself, all to have her pop right out of bed ready for more adventure. At this point I just do what I can to keep my sanity and let her tire herself out.
Having said this, I am deeply wanting to establish routines and some sort of schedule to help get us into a flow that feels good for both of us. That is why I, at last, started working on the poster board schedule. I really don't think that this is a large project except for the way that I interpret the whole situation as big and hard. Thankfully my Mother is most likely coming after Thursday to help me with this aspect of my current life. I admire her ability to do what she does and want to learn from her how to do some of those things myself. She is great at meal planning, bread making, time using. All sorts of things.
And to be fair and truly honest, sometimes you just need your Mommy, even if you're a Mama yourself!
So tomorrow I look forward to T's Music Together class in the morning. I think it will be my last, or at least second to last, time going with her for this section(and it's her first time doing this class, which is AMAZING, btw, I highly recommend it!). This is because my friend will begin watching her on Tuesdays soon, and so he will be taking her! I will miss it, but I am also glad for the experience she will still have and that she will be able to bring her friend into that world as well. ^_^
Oh yeah, and depositing rent and all of that fun official stuff I also need to do tomorrow. Well, it'll be alright.
Have a beautiful night or day and thanks for reading!
-Sarah Christina
PS-Also, before typing this, I found this crazy synchronistic writing while searching for another wondrous blog to add to the list of those inspiring Mama blogs I follow!
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