Blog
October 8 I made my first successful trip with all three kids last weekend - to Ava's birthday party. I'm glad we went someplace familiar and friendly. The girls love being at the McGuires' house, and there were lots of people willing to hold Campbell. I was able to sit in the shade and relax the whole time. Liz said I looked very calm, but I think I was mostly exhausted. Tomorrow night I'm going out for my first girls' night out with Campbell; I'm going to dinner with a few friends and leaving the girls at home with Brandon. I think it will be good for all of us. The girls really need time with one of us without the baby there. I think they're getting tired of hearing, "After I finish feeding/changing/burping the baby" all day long. MY recovery is starting to go better. I really had unrealistic expectations for myself. Before I had Campbell I had planned to run/walk a fun 5K race at the end of October. Now I know that there's no way I'll be able to do it. I haven't even been able to start walking yet, and my legs feel so weak. I also get winded really easily. I think I'm going to start taking short walks this week, provided I feel ok. My incision doesn't hurt as much, and I don't need the stool to climb in bed any more - all good signs I suppose. I can't imagine having had multiple c-sections; although I've heard the recovery from second and third ones is easier. What I really want to be able to do is crunches. My stomach, while pretty flat all things considered, is pretty flabby, which drives me nuts. I have my follow-up appointment in a few weeks, and I'm hoping I'll get approval for exercise then.
September 28 One thing I didn't like about the c-section was that they whisked Campbell away so quickly. I barely got to see him in the operating room, and by the time they took me to recovery, he had already had his footprints done and been given his first bath. Brandon got to watch all of it, but he didn't take any pictures. The recovery has been a lot more difficult than I had anticipated. I've been really, really sore, and I haven't been able to be up and around like I want to be. I took my first walk on Wednesday; I went all the way around the block with a rest stop at Heidi's to catch my breath. Sheesh. But each day gets better. And Campbell is definitely worth all the pain and the slow recovery. When we were discussing options with my doctor, I told her my only goals were a happy, healthy baby and a safe delivery - nothing else mattered. We got both, just not the way I anticipated.
September 4 For the first three weeks of school I was a bit concerned that she didn't have homework of some sort - math or spelling work sheets or something - and I don't know why. I don't have any memories of doing homework until I was in fourth grade at Pine View. And I remember most of my homework as being an absolute nightmare - lots of studying and writing and MATH. I remember math just being a nightmare once I got to geometry. I also hated the special projects - like building solar systems and making dioramas. Book reports I liked, though, as long as I got to select the book I read. So now Ella's life of doing homework begins. Fortunately she is showing signs of liking worksheets and math puzzles. I've bought her a few books with spelling and math sheets in them, and she tears through the exercises. I have to slow her down so that she doesn't finish the whole work book in one sitting. She's also now started playing school with Lily. She puts math problems up on her chalkboard, and I'm allowed to give Lily hints about the answers. I figure that wanting to play school and wanting to do worksheets bode well for her immediate academic success.
August 31
New York in Mrs. Astor's Age I know there are more, I just can't remember them right now. My brain isn't functioning at full capacity these days. I've ordered a book on 9/11 by a New Yorker writer that's getting good reviews and a book on a society that investigated paranormal occurences - a prominent member of the group was William James, brother of author Henry James. I've also ordered Edith Wharton's autobiography A Backwards Glance and the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. Everyone but me seems to have read the book already, so I'm making up for lost time. Plus it will be a switch from the more serious reading I'm doing. I also have Madeleine Albright's newest book sitting on the coffee table waiting for me. But instead I got distracted last night and picked up Anthony Bourdain's Kitchen Confidential. I've been watching his show on the Travel Channel and have fallen in love with him. I read the book when it came out, but I figured it was a good book for some light reading. In addition to the books, I've also been reading The New Yorker cover to cover each week and picking up other random magazines like Texas Monthly and Vanity Fair and reading all their articles. They've had some good ones lately. My only hope for not going bankrupt on books is that I've been released from modified bed rest and can be up and around now. So maybe nesting projects will take precedence over reading. But then I'll be doing things like going to the Container Store and buying storage systems. It's always something.
August 28 Lily was very excited about school and her new teacher this morning when she got up, but as we pulled into the parking lot, she started telling me that she'd miss me too much to stay at school. When we got into her classroom, she wrapped herself around my leg and refused to let go, or to even look at her teacher. I sat down and Lily climbed into my lap and buried her head in my neck. It wasn't until her friend Erica arrived that she showed any interest in letting go of me. Fortunately, once she and Erica started playing, she didn't mind that I was leaving. I peeked back in once to make sure she was doing ok, and I saw her happily playing in the kitchen center. Phew. I hate to admit it, but I wasn't nearly as broken up about Lily's going to school as I was Ella's. I suppose it's because kindergarten is a much bigger step - real school - than preschool is, even when it's five-day preschool. For now, I'm going to enjoy having the mornings to myself. I have a list of nesting projects lined up if the doctor gives me permission to be active again. I'm hoping I'll have at least two weeks of child-free mornings before new baby arrives. I need the time to rest and prepare.
August 21 She's going to be a difficult patient, I can tell. The first thing she did this morning when she got up was pull off the dressing the doctor put on. We've now been through three different band-aids - she keeps pulling them off or complaining that they have fuzz on them. It hurts her foot to walk, so she's sitting on the sofa calling for service - food, drink, lovies, etc. She takes after her father. I borrowed some ice cream for the girls from our neighbor Lisa last night, and she welcomed me to the club. Her son, Walt, has been to the ER many times for strange, random injuries. I think they have a standing account at Children's Hospital. I'm not sure this is a club I wanted to join, though. The only good things are that it was a minor injury and that I wasn't the one having to deal with it. I would have been in tears.
August 19 Ella has hit the ground running at school and seems to be thriving so far. I'm sure we'll have some adjustment issues once the newness of it all wears off, but I'm just glad she's enjoying it for now. When we get to school each morning, we head to the cafeteria to line up with her class and wait for Mrs. Spears. The past two mornings I've had to grab Ella to get a quick hug and kiss before she heads off to her classroom - she's so ready to go that she forgets about me. When we pick her up in the afternoon, she's bubbling over with information on her day. Brandon and I ask her lots of questions at dinner time, trying to get specifics on her day. But instead we get news about her classmates and recess time - not exactly what we're digging for. I asked the teacher about visiting the classroom, and she requested that I wait until after the first two weeks. I'll be making an appointment to visit in that third week so I can see for myself what goes on. I am looking forward to walking Ella to school someday. I'm still on restricted activities for another week, but even if I weren't, it's too hot to even consider walking. Each summer I hit a point where I get bitter and hostile about the heat, where I take the weather personally. I hit that point this week. It's been over 100 degrees all week - 104 on Wednesday - and I've had it. Everything is so brown and crispy. Half of our lawn is dead. Liz invited us to the pool with her on Wednesday afternoon, but we didn't go because I couldn't bear to walk from the house to the hot car. We went to the neighborhood pool on Thursday after school, and it was barely tolerable. I know that being pregnant makes my tolerance for the heat even lower, but I get this way every summer. You'd think that after 12 summers in Austin I'd have adapted, but I doubt I ever will. All I want to do in August is hide in the house with the blinds closed and the air conditioning on high. Someday, when I win the lottery (provided I actually buy a lottery ticket), I'm going to buy a house in Hadley, NY and spend summers there. Hadley is in the Adirondacks, on the banks of the Hudson - it's cool and green and beautiful.
August 15 I was discussing with another mother from preschool and the preschool director yesterday how strange it was going to be to change from the preschool where parents are welcome to come for a visit whenever they want and where they work in the classrooms to kindergarten where access is much more controlled. I'm not going to be able to just pop in to Ella's class because I've arrived early for pick-up. It was also strange to not know what she was doing all day. At preschool I knew the classroom routine - playground time, circle time, snack, etc. I could look at the clock and know what they were up to. With kindergarten, I don't. The school gave us an outline of a schedule, but "learning centers" doesn't tell me a whole lot. It really is a leap of faith to send your baby off into the unknown like that. As soon as Lily's back in preschool at the end of the month, I'm making arrangements to go in for a visit so I can see what happens during the day. Ella came out of school with a huge smile, jabbering non-stop about her day. I didn't get a lot of specifics, other than she likes recess, she rested on a flowered mat, she likes the cafeteria, and she has a new best friend but she didn't remember her name. I'm just glad she came out happy and ready to go back tomorrow. I think she's going to thrive in school.
August 14 The best part of the trip for me, aside from just being at the beach, was watching Brandon playing with the girls. He's had to work so much this summer and has missed out on so much fun stuff with them, that it was fun to see him just sitting in the sand digging with them. He spent a lot of time riding the waves with Ella, teaching her to body surf. And he carried Lily way out into the water to bob up and down on the big waves. He built sand castles with them, flew kites, dug big holes in the sand and buried the girls in them. He played and played, which all three of them needed. The girls are definitely my daughters with their love of the sand and water. We'd have to fish Ella out each evening under protest. Her fingers would be all wrinkled and pruney from being in the water so long. Lily liked splashing in the little waves and bobbing with Brandon, but she also loved just digging in the sand. Brandon's dad just bought two condos in Corpus as rental properties, and I'm hoping we'll be able to use one of them once in a while. I'd like to get the kids to the beach more often than once a year. It's too much fun for everyone to just do one trip.
August 2 Speaking of New Baby, he or she is certainly acting like s/he is going to arrive early. I've been having contractions for several weeks now, and the more I'm up and around, the worse they are. So I'm making a concerted effort to not do so much. I'm even going to have the cleaning lady come once a week for the next two months - that's a huge concession for me. I'm also letting Brandon go to Target to provision for our beach trip, another huge concession. I went to three stores yesterday and spent the rest of the day having contractions. I guess that was too much. Of course, I had just seen the doctor that morning and told her that the contractions had settled down a lot, which they had. Brandon's more concerned that our beach trip is going to get cancelled than he is that the baby is going to come early. I just want to make it through the week at the beach. We leave tomorrow, and I can't wait, even though I am dreading the drive. We're going down two days ahead of the Roes and staying at a hotel before we move into the beach house. Brandon decided we needed a longer stay. We were going to go camp out at the condos that B's dad just bought in Corpus, but the power isn't going to be turned on until Monday, which doesn't do us any good. I'm willing to pay the extra at the hotel if it means more beach time. The girls are beyond excited. Lily isn't quite sure what she's excited about - I don't think she really remembers being at the beach last summer. But she sees how excited Ella is and is feeding off that. I told her I'd show her pictures of last year's trip when she gets home from school today. Maybe that will jog her memory.
July 26 I am having a hard time coping with Ella's impending kindergarten days. It just doesn't seem possible that she's big enough to go to real school, yet here we are, three weeks away from kindergarten. Brandon took her to Target today to buy her school supplies. He also let her pick out her first-day-of-school outfit. It's not anything I would have bought for her, but he said she carefully considered all of her options and made her choice. He doesn't shop for clothes with her, so he doesn't know about guiding her choices. I usually let her select one of two or three options, rather than letting her run loose in the clothing department. At any rate, she's very proud of the outfit, which is pink and has lots of sparkles. I guess when you're almost six, that's all that matters. I've been rounding up baby gear this week, taking stock of what I have and what I need. I gave away most of the girls' newborn stuff - onesies, gowns, sleepers, blankets, etc. I didn't think that I'd be needing them again. When I was sorting through what little I've saved, I found Ella's first Halloween outfit - a sleeper with pumpkins all over it. I held it up as she went tearing through the room and almost cried. It's so tiny, and she's so big. Time has just flown. After I took stock, Lily and I went to Babies R Us. It's scary, but the place is just as bewildering now as it was when I first went, almost six years ago. At least I knew what I was looking for. I felt sorry for the first-time parents I saw wandering around with the scanners in their hands and blank looks in their eyes. I remember all too well how lost I was when I tried to register for stuff when I was expecting Ella. At any rate, I loaded up on onesies and gowns and blankets - all gender neutral. I figure that after the baby is born, if it's a boy, the grandmothers will go nuts buying little blue outfits. And if it's a girl, I do have a fair amount of tiny girl stuff packed away still. And if we go through clothes quickly, I'll just do lots of laundry.
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