Still Sick, No outings for us.

Saturday 8/30 So I have been sick the last few days, well the whole week, but the last few days I have been extra tired, runny nose and sinus fluid in my ear, soar throat and headache. We did not go swimming yesterday and I was very disappointed, but in addition to me feeling under the weather, Holly was very snotty and congested and just fell asleep for a nap around 3 so there was no way I was going to wake her when she had not been feeling well.

On Thursday night we went to the supermarket and we had so much fun. For the most part Holly sat up in her car seat on the front of the wagon, and she was so curious looking around at everything and playing with her loopy toy,. after about 45 minutes she was tired of just sitting, and I would carry her around for maybe ten minutes then set her down again, and she was happy to have this diversity. She was so popular in the store. There were a surprising amount of other kids, and they all wanted to touch and see the baby, as well as other moths with strollers and car seats who wanted to know how old holly was.

There was one cute 7 month old baby who was actually sitting in the top seat of the wagon with a strap around her to keep her centered. I was shocked this worked, but she seemed content and happy. Her dad said once she could sit up on her own on the floor, she was able to sit like this in the cart. Joel was at Dream Dinners and i was picking up what seemed like a small list but what ended up costing like 250$ I did get some baby food that I wanted to try out this weekend, but Holly seems to have had a bit of a relapse this time with stomach symptoms, so no new foods yet. but i got rice cereal, organic carrots, sweet potatoes, and sweet peas, and pears, and pears with oatmeal. last week at the doctors office we asked about starting Holly on solids and she said once she turns 6 months, which is like in 11 days. She recommended starting her on rice cereal mixed with pears, she said we could get fresh organic pears from Berkeley bowl, or baby food pears and mix it in, apparently the rice cereal or solids can make them constipated but the pears helps with this. However when buying the cereal, pears were a level 2 food, and pears with oatmeal were level 2, this was on all brands, whereas the others I got were level 1. So I am not sure exactly what I will do as we introduce these, i need to do a little more research.

On Friday Katie came over at 12:30, I had to wake Holly from her nap, so she was a little cranky at first, but since Katie had not seen her for a week or two she was amazed with how much she had progressed, particularly her fine motor skills of playing with holding, grasping and passing toys. She will take her crab toy from my hand hold it, look at it turn it put it in her mouth, look at it again and then turn to another spot and stick it back in her mouth. She also was playing with some teethers that she holds with two hands and gnaws on. She was also quite verbal, and she isn't usually very talkative during her sessions, so this was also new for Katie. They had fun, but she got fussy after a bit, needed to take a break to eat, and then by 2:00 was completely done. Cranky however, she took over an hour to fall asleep for her nap. She did sleep for about 90 minutes though once I got her down.

Since I have finally gotten access back to my email, I started going through it all. I had over 2500 messages since I last checked it, plus a few hundred more, from June/July that were important reports, ect. that I had not yet read though. I spent several hours in the afternoon while Holly slept, and in the late evening going through and organizing as much as I could. It was very overwhelming. I was able to catch-up with Monique and talk on the phone for about 2 hours and hear about all the goings on, it was very overwhelming, and I didn't really know where to start, as the first 3.5 months of my leave even though I was not working, I was reading email, and at least aware of any drama, changes, new issues, projects, ect. But yesterday 2 months worth of stuff hit me all at once.

Oh and on Thursday we also went to daycare orientation. I won't write too much about this because it just makes me angry. Some of the stuff could make sense if it was the philosophy you believed, but for example, even babies, every child must be there by 9:00 AM. This is so the classroom does not get disrupted and so there is consistency and routing. Also they strongly discourage visits, indicating that when your child sees you they think its time to go home, and doesn't understand why you would leave again without them. They have all these policies about signing them in and out, having to pick up and drop off the exact time each day, having to call in advance for any absences, having to have a doctors note before they can come back to daycare if they were out sick, ect. In my life, I want to take her to daycare one day from 11-5:30 and the next from 8:30-3:00 If the center is open from 7:30-5:30 and I pay the same amount whether she is there 10 hours or 5, I don't see why I can allow them to meet my needs and for me to take her when it works for my family. Since I was required to write down a schedule for her, I wrote 8:30-5:30 as her normal times, but I intend on taking her at around 9:00 and picking her up around 4:00 every day, but since I can;t promise to never be there after 4:00 I wrote down the later time. Joel says he thinks the actual classroom teachers will be much more flexible, and I can work out these details with them, and since she is a baby, this issue of consistency won;t be much of a big deal yet, but that it would be a problem for us, if she was an older child.

But since we plan on changing to the other daycare in January, it is not worth the stress to make any waves now. It is sad, because as rigid as they are, to me they seem pretty inconsistent and disorganized, they didn't schedule or inform me of the Orientation until a few days before, and the information about what to bring the first day was different from what the teachers told me to what the director told me to do. I worry about things like feeding, because formula goes bad after an hour, and she doesn't always drink her entire bottle at one time, she drinks maybe an ounce, then 15 minutes later 2 ounces, then in 90 minutes will be hungry, but would need a fresh bottle, so she might drink 2 ounces and then in another 90 minutes 3. So she has drank from 3 bottles and had 9 ounces. But they tell me to make and bring 8 ounce bottles, pre-made. So I am not sure how to handle this, and they refrigerate them. and then warm them, and she just drinks them at room temperature. Also the gDiapers will be different, and I am hoping they don;t give me a hard time about that as well. When I was visiting, they had a tendency to put the kids down a lot, and she doesn't sit on her own well yet, so she needs to be held, she will cry if they just stick her laying down int he crib to play, she needs to be interacted with the entire day. Plus she has been sick, so she is already crappy feeling and cranky, and fussy and whining... Oh geeze, I need to change the subject so i don;t upset myself again.

On Saturday morning, I was feeling particularly sick, and Holly had woken up at 4:00 AM and didn't want to go back to sleep, she was really playful, so she was up until 5:30. Joel let me sleep until 11:00 when Sally came. She had a wonderful session with Sally, even if it was only for about 35 minutes, she was ready for her nap and already getting sleepy. But sally was very impressed with her talkativeness, and her grasping and moving, and just has a beautiful way with her, that gets her to turn, stretch and move around the way she needs to me. After I had some breakfast and went back to sleep, Joel is amazing and let me sleep until 6:00. But he said he has such respect for me, and can;t believe I make it through all day alone, around 5:30, he said, its almost time for daddy to come home from work, and understood, how by the end of the day I am ready. She had two poopie Diapers today, and they were super watery, diarrhea, so he thinks she has a stomach thing.

This was further confirmed by her vomiting up most of her food twice in the afternoon. Triggered by a little coughing fit. She was cheerful after spitting up her food, and it hurt us more then her, but she was pretty cranky. Joel insisted it would not help, but after her not falling asleep for 3 hours and knowing how tired she was I gave her a 1/2 dose of Motrin in her last bottle, while she did not have a fever, I was convinced she must just have minor aches and pains from teething and feeling crappy and that it would help. Joel said it was for me to feel like I was doing something and would not help, but she did fall asleep shortly after and is still asleep and getting rest. Tomorrow morning I get to have a massage which will be loads of fun, and hopefully she will be up for an outing, we are thinking of maybe going to the bookstore, just to get out of the house.