Fifteen Months Ago . . .

Where were you 15 months ago today?  Do you remember December 31, 2008?  

I do, I remember it like it was yesterday.  

I was at CHEO (Children's Hospital Of Eastern Ontario) with my one week old, tiny, little baby boy who had been born a month early on Christmas Day.  

It should have been a simple trip to the orthopedics clinic to get the first cast on his little club foot.  And that in itself was traumatic enough for me - nobody wants their to be anything wrong with their newborns, even something as minor as Liam's club foot.  After that, we were to make a quick stop in Emergency for blood work as Liam's pediatrician thought that Liam might be "a little jaundiced".

Unfortunately, that quick stop abruptly turned into a three day stay as Liam's bilirubin levels were VERY high and was indeed jaundiced.

So, 15 months ago tonight, I was alone at CHEO, staring at my poor little baby, in "Bili-Bassinet."  I couldn't even hold or cuddle him except when he needed to nurse.  Henry had to come home and take care of the pets and my cell phone battery was dead, so I was really truly alone.  It was one of the worst nights of my life.  And a New Year's Eve that I will always remember.

Liam in the Bili-Bassinet at CHEO, December 31, 2008

But despite his bout of jaundice and being re-admitted to CHEO four days later with a urinary tract infection that required five days of IV antibiotics, my teeny, tiny, born a month early baby is now a full of energy, happy, smart, playful 15 month old little boy!  You would never know that he had such a rough start.  He is my pride and joy.  I can't imagine life without him.  I can hardly remember what it was like not to have him around.  He grows and changes every day.  And although sometimes I think that he is growing far to fast, I love watching him learn new things and develop more personality.  Only time will tell what kind of person he will grow into as the days, weeks, months and years go on but I am going to do everything I can to enjoy every minute of it.

Liam, playing at home, March 2010

People Never Cease to Amaze Me . . .

Usually when I say that people never cease to amaze me, it is because someone has done something incredibly stupid, but this time, it is a good thing!

Remember a few weeks ago when I blogged about the mom trying to bring her sick child to daycare?  If not, you can read about it here, No, I Won't Change The Rules For You.  Today, this same parent had to be called because her son had a fever and needed to be picked up early.  I was expecting her to be annoyed and frustrated as she usually is when things like this come up and I must admit that I was just as well pleased that I was working in the office this afternoon and wouldn't have to see her when she arrived.

As luck would have it, I needed to go up to the toddler room just as she was leaving with her son.  I felt myself tense when I heard her voice in the stairway, but there was no where for me to go to avoid her.  So I braced myself for her tyrant of complaints.  But I couldn't have been more wrong!  Despite being concerned that her son was sick, she was friendly and pleasant.  She asked me about his day, as I am his main teacher and was with him all morning.  We talked about his language development recently.  And then she apologized to me for the way she acted a couple of weeks ago.  She told me that she was just having a really bad day.  She knew that she had been out of line and rude to me.  And that she has felt bad about it ever since.

Even though I had long since gotten over her little outburst (blogging about it got a lot of the anger and frustration out of my system!) having her take the time to apologize to me today really made me feel good.  I have always felt that I have a really good rapport with this parent (which not all the staff have, as she can be difficult) I was a little worried that the rapport I had worked hard to build with this woman had been destroyed over her mistake.  I now know that she doesn't feel that I was at fault.  She values the care I give to her son on a daily basis.

I wish I were . . .

. . . an ostrich so that I could bury my head in the sand and ignore
then world. I have no idea why osriches bury their heads in the sand,
but if I could, I would bury my head to ignore everything today. I
would ignore the loud, whinning, and crying of the children. I would
ignore the fighting, pushing, scratching and biting. I would ignore
the message that weren't given and everything else that is stressing
me out today.

Yes, if a genie were to come toe right now, that would be my wish, to
be able to bury my head in the sand like an ostrich in order to ignore
the world.

Why not just ask for enough money to be able to quit my job, you ask?
Because there will always be things that annoy me that I want to
ignore, like my messy house, my mile long to do list. All the
annoyances in life will never go away, that why I wish for the abilty
to ignore them completely.

However, my ultimate wish would be to be able to quit my job so that I
could stay at home with Liam and write for a living. Not that I really
think that I have what it takes to be a writer, I don't know if I
could really write something that anyone would pay money to read, but
that's my dream life.

Until I find that genie, I will be here, changing diapers and trying
to control kids who sometimes seem to act more like wild animals than
little children. I am so glad that it is Friday and that the day is
half over!!!

Sent from my iPhone

Manic Monday Music Moment #3

Well, I totally dropped the ball on doing this as a weekly post!  Oopps!  Anyway, I am back at it and ready to go!


The song that hit me this week was Miranda Lambert's new single, "The House That Built Me".  It really made me think of my childhood home.  There are so many memories in that house and yard, some good, some bad, some happy and some sad.  And like the song, my parents build the house themselves.  The only difference is that my parents still live there.  I can and do relive many of the memories and special moments every time I visit.  I don't expect my parents to leave their home any time . . . well, ever, but if they ever do decide that it is time to move on, there will be a lot of sadness as we leave those memories and special places behind.


I know they say you can’t go home again
I just had to come back one last time
Ma’am I know you don’t know me from Adam
But these handprints on the front steps are mine

Up those stairs in that little back bedroom
Is where I did my homework and I learned to play guitar
I bet you didn’t know under that live oak
My favorite dog is buried in the yard

I thought if I could touch this place or feel it
This brokenness inside me might start healing
Out here it’s like I’m someone else
I thought that maybe I could find myself
If I could just come in I swear I’ll leave
Won’t take nothing but a memory
From the house that built me

Mama cut out pictures of houses for years
From Better Homes and Gardens magazine
Plans were drawn and concrete poured
Nail by nail and board by board
Daddy gave life to mama’s dream

I thought if I could touch this place or feel it
This brokenness inside me might start healing
Out here it’s like I’m someone else
I thought that maybe I could find myself
If I could just come in I swear I’ll leave
Won’t take nothing but a memory
From the house that built me

You leave home and you move on and you do the best you can
I got lost in this old world and forgot who I am

I thought if I could touch this place or feel it
This brokenness inside me might start healing
Out here it’s like I’m someone else
I thought that maybe I could find myself
If I could just come in I swear I’ll leave
Won’t take nothing but a memory
From the house that built me



If you aren't familiar with Miranda's music, I really encourage you to check it out.  I have loved her since the moment I heard her first single, Kerosene.  She is a rocking country girl.  And despite having released 3 albums with 10 singles, she just recently had her first number 1 hit with White Liar.  She is one of my favorite female country singers, but she seems to sometimes get lost in the shadows of some of the other overrated, not so country girls in the industry.  (I won't mention any names right now, but let's just say that I think a certain someone should just run away with her hockey player and never come back!  But that's just my opinion!)  I just hope that Miranda keeps write and singing with the same passion and attitude that she has shown so far in her career!  

Gotta love toddlers . . .

I spent the last two days at work in the office.  I was a nice quiet way to end the week.  I quite enjoy my days in the office, although I'm not sure that I am at the point in my career where I would want to do it all the time.  Filling in for my supervisor is enough for me right now!

When I am in the office, I don't get to see much of the kids, so when I do go into the program, they are very exited to see me.  They jump up and down, they scream, they yell "Hi Nicki" about a dozen times, it is much the same as someone who freaks out at seeing their favorite celebrity.  It really does good things to a person's ego!!!

This afternoon, I did get to spend a little bit of time with my kids in the backyard.  I couldn't help but laugh at one of my guys.  He is two and half and although he has been able to speak well for quite some time, until recently, he has been fairly quiet, mostly just speaking when spoken too.  However, he has been speaking a lot more in recent weeks and it makes me smile when he comes up to me and says anything without me having to prompt him to talk with me!  Today, he just made me laugh.

He comes zooming over to me in a cozy coupe car and stopped mere inches from bashing into my legs.  "Hi Nicki, Hi Nicki, Hi Nicki." he says excitedly.  "What are you doing??"

"Watching you and your friends play," I responded.  "What are you doing?"

He looked at me for about 10 seconds and said, "Watching you play, Nicki."

He spent the rest of the time I was outside riding the car around the yard.  Every time he passed me he said, "Nicki, I'm watching you play."

It's moments like this that remind me why I love my job.  This little boy started in the infant program before I went on my maternity leave as a 9 month old infant.  He screamed bloody murder and would not take a bottle from us for the first two weeks.  It just amazes me how quickly they grow and learn.  Makes me wish that we had more time with them before they move on to the preschool program, just so that I could watch them continue to develop into little people.

Spring Has Sprung . . .

The sun is shinning, the snow if gone, the birds are singing, the tulips are popping through the ground . . . it makes me want to jump for joy that spring is finally here.

But wait, it is only the middle of March.  Officially spring won't be here for a few more days.  So, is this it?  Is winter really over or is Mother Nature just messing with us??

As much as I hate to say it, I really don't think we've seen the last of winter.  I really don't want to think about driving to work in the snow again until December.  I want to put the snow shovel away in the back of the shed and pull out all the garden tools.  But I know that if I do, Murphy will call up Mother Nature and I'll just have to dig my way into the shed without a shovel to get it out again.  I am afraid that old Jack Frost hasn't left for him summer home yet and will be back for at least one last encore.  An encore that I for one will not be cheering for.

So, I will leave the snow shovel out.  I will stay away from my gardens and flower beds for a little while longer in hopes that I don't do something to jinx us and bring winter back.

Mother Nature, if you are reading this, please, pretty please, let the nice spring weather say.  My sanity depends on it!

Jack Frost, if you are reading this, we've had enough of you and the cold weather that you throw at us.  Please move on to your next victims.

Spring Forward . . .

Spring forward?  As much as I love the longer days, I hate what it does to my mind.  My sleeping is messed up - it feels too early to go to bed when  I know that it is late enough that I NEED to sleep, it is dark in the morning and seems way to early to have to get up and get ready for work.  And the kids at the daycare have been acting as tired and cranky as I feel, so I can only assume that they are feeling the same way.  So I must ask, is it really worth it?  Why do we put ourselves through this twice a year?  Why can't we just pick one or the other (standard time or daylight savings time) and stick with it all the time?  If it were up to me, we would stick with DST all year long, I like the longer days.  In summer, the more daylight to do stuff outside, the better.  And anything to get more daylight in the winter is a good thing!  But nobody ever asks my opinion about these things.  I don't know why, someone really should know to ask me what I think and then change the way the world works accordingly.  However, until the powers that be figure that out, I will just have to complain about things like this and you will all just have to read about!

Blogging from my iPhone

Let's just see how this handy dandy mail to blogger feature works. I
set up secret mail to blogger e-mail adress, now I am sitting at the
laundromat waiting for the munchkins laundry to wash and instead of
being completely bored out of my mind, I am blogging. How cool is
that? Pretty cool if you ask me, which I know you were about to do.

I going to leave at that for now, because my thong, I mean typing
(see what I mean) on my new iPhone are a little slow and I will be
annoyed beyond belief if I type a big long post and this doesn't work!

And my laundry is call me . . . It is saying "put the damn phone away
and come get me out of the wash and put me in the dryer."

No, I won't change the rules for you!

Does everyone think that the world revolves around them and their needs?

I had a mother bring her son into the daycare this morning with antibiotics for a throat infection that was diagnosed last night.  He was given the first dose of meds last night and promptly vomited.

There were so many problems with this situation that I hardly knew where to start!  First off, I explained that vomiting aside, the child needed to be on antibiotics for at least 24 hours before returning to daycare to ensure that they are no longer contagious and that they aren't going to have an adverse reaction.  Then, there was the issue of the vomiting.  Kids have to be free of vomiting for 24 hours to be at daycare as well. And vomiting could be a sign of an allergic reaction.

Of course, Mommy was not at all happy when I said that he couldn't stay.  First she said that the vomiting wasn't from the meds and that we could call her right away if he vomited again and she would come get him.  So, I explained about the vomiting rule and told her that we've had others with stomach viruses.  Of course, she quickly decided that he had only vomited because of the medication.

I my head, I was screaming "Do you really think that I'm that stupid that I wouldn't realize that you totally just contradicted yourself?"

However, the Head Teacher Nicki prevailed and I stayed very polite and professional, apologizing profusely for the inconvenience.  All while unprofessional Nicki was quickly losing the little bit of sympathy that she had for this woman.  Had she read her daycare policy book that every parent is given when their child starts daycare, she would have known ALL of these things.  I was still thinking that this could still just have been an innocent mistake.

That all changed and every bit of sympathy I had went out the window when she snottily replied that"I don't know what I'm going to do now I have to leave for Winnipeg in two hours."

That's when I knew for sure that it was all a play on her part to get the kid into daycare today when she knew that he wasn't allowed to be there.  She thought that she would be able to get me to change the rules for her.  As a parent, I know how hard it is when you have somewhere you need to be and you have a sick child who cannot attend daycare, but there are reasons why we have these rules.  And I am not going to risk myself to change the rules for YOU!
 

Weekend? What weekend?

Another weekend has come and gone?  Seriously?

Where the hell did it go?  I have no freaking idea!

What the heck did I accomplish?  Absolutely nothing!

I really did have big plans for this weekend.  I was going to clean up the house.  I was going to organize a bunch of Brownie stuff (to hopefully get some of it OUT of my house!)  I was going to go through all the munchkin's clothes and take stuff to the consignment store.  I was going to do our taxes.  I was going to do some baking.  And I was going to dye my horrible hair.

I didn't do any cleaning.  I didn't even look at the Brownie stuff, so I will be stuck with it all in my house for at least another week.  I started to go through the munchkin's stuff tonight, but had to stop so he could go to bed.  I didn't look at the taxes . . . I don't want to look at the taxes . . . I just want the refund to magically appear in my mail box.  Baking, I baked and decorated a birthday cake for my mother in law, but didn't get anything else done.

And well, my hair is still horrible, I don't remember the last time I dyed it, but I think the roots are now longer than the part that is still coloured from the last time.  On top of that, there is far too much gray in it for my liking, seriously, where did all this grey come from because I would really like to send it back with a nasty message to stay the hell away from my head.

So, it's back to work tomorrow.  Back to making another list of things that I want to do next weekend, "when I have time".  Will I ever learn that I don't have time on the weekend?  And that I really don't have any more desire to do these things than I do during the week?  Probably never!

It's time again for The Colors Magazine monthly writing contest.  See the details and January contest winners here.

Do you Work after Work??

I work from 7:15am to 3:45pm, Monday to Friday, for 40 hours a week, I get paid to do my job.  Is it wrong of me to feel that after 3:45pm is MY time??  Time for my family, my friends, my housework, my volunteer endeavors, NOT time to be dealing with work related matters?  Especially questions that could have been dealt with during work hours?

I don't have as much time with my family as it is and I really resent being expected to spend time at home responding to an e-mail of questions that could have easily been asked and answered in a face to face conversation.  But there is no e-mail to print and save if you have a face to face conversation.  The e-mail is a record of the "wrong" answers that I gave.  Although I am sure that I will never be told directly by the person who initiated the e-mail that I was "wrong", someone else has and will have to continue to do the dirty work, I do know how my response was perceived.  And it has changed how I will do things from now on.

Next time, the e-mail will go unanswered.  The questions will get answered face to face the next day,  Sorry, but after 3:45pm is MY time and it's going to stay that way.