Festive Tuesday: Classic Stocking Holder

I’m a FT working mom and my partner also works FT. Honestly, something has to give. I’m not crafty/good in the kitchen to begin with, and I value time with my kid more than anything. So my solution is to buy stuff. I buy cookies, buy food for daycare potlucks, I always sign up for the non-food items (you need plates and napkins – awesome), and I buy my munchkins Halloween costumes. Yes, homemade is great, healthier, etc. But, at some point, your sanity is worth more. And, your kid will not care either way. It is not possible to do all of the things all of the time and succeed at all of them. I’m still trying to find time to exercise and put night moisturizer on my face (don’t ask). So please, for the love of all that is holy, we need to put less pressure on ourselves.
And, my lovely partner forgot to bring my kid his sheets to daycare yesterday, so wee one was sleeping on a gross cot. OMG. Must not get too angry.

I’m 37 weeks with baby 2. Baby 1 was an emergency c-section because of failure to descend (I fully dilated, pushed for 3 hrs, no dice). My OB said she was on board with a VBAC at the beginning of this second pregnancy, but now she’s showing some hesitation because the baby is on the larger side, still hasn’t engaged, and is in the posterior position. I want to avoid a c-section. Any words of wisdom? Feeling discouraged.

I feel like this has been well-discussed here, but I’m still flummoxed on infant sleep situations (and it’s for my second kid, so I should have this figured out!). We got a hand-me-down arms reach co-sleeper with the idea that the baby can sleep in our room. (We plan to use the co-sleeper set up as a bassinet, not docked to our bed.) However, I was surprised to see that 3 sides of the co-sleeper are fabric – not breathable mesh, but solid fabric. Isn’t that problematic once the baby starts to scoot around and especially roll over? We were hoping to use the co-sleeper for 4-6 months before transitioning to a regular crib; is that unrealistic? Would a mini crib work better for this purpose? (We don’t have room for a full crib in our room; baby will eventually share a room with the toddler but we wanted to delay that until baby is (closer to) sleeping thru the night.) I’m confused because the new recommendation is that baby sleep in parents room for 6 months, and yet the sleeping arrangements for that don’t seem safe for a 6-mo-old.

Big daycare meeting today to discuss my kid being separated from the group too often (think excessive “time-out”) and the amount of sitting they do during the day (1-1.5 hours at a time and then for every transition, which the owner has assured me is only supposed to be two 20 minute blocks). Last night my 3 year old was playing with his animals and put the camel in time-out by yelling “sit against the wall” and it broke my heart that this is a message he is probably receiving daily. We love this center for my infant, and the director and owner (not a chain, so she has a lot invested) seem open to constructive critisism, and the 3 year old’s teachers are new to this age group and younger, so I’m trying to give them time to learn before switching him. But, ugh.

Spent all of last night mulling quiting my job and becoming a stay at home mom because I just don’t want to deal with this crap anymore. This after I had finally come to a place of “peace” with the fact that I enjoy working and never actually want to become a stay at home parent.

Parenting is such a trip. Mostly just looking for words of encouragement today.

My kid tried to pull one of those stocking holder things down on her head a couple days ago. It’s very heavy, and just a little tug on the stocking brought the whole thing down. Thankfully it didn’t hit her. Just a reminder to keep them out of reach. Great on a tall fireplace mantle where the kid cant even reach the stocking, not so great on a kitchen counter.

Ugh. I just need to vent. Last night I got into the stupidest argument with my husband. Daycare is having a thing today where parents (let’s be real. mothers.) bake cookies for the teachers. So yesterday I found a recipe, went to the grocery store on the way home from work, picked up the kid, made dinner, and had it waiting on the table when my husband got home. After dinner I baked 3 dozen cookies. I asked my husband if he wanted to try one. He said he didn’t feel well and no he didn’t want a cookie. I flew off the handle. I go to all this stupid extra effort and he doesn’t say thank you and doesn’t even want to try a cookie. Doesn’t say anything nice. This is part of a big overall pattern of him never saying anything nice to me. Or being thankful in any way for all the extra bullshit I do all the time. Things that are not expected of him because he’s a man but reflect poorly on me if I don’t do them, because I’m a woman. There was still no reason for me to fly off the handle at him. This has been happening a lot lately. We’re at a bad place in our marriage. Its funny how it crept up on me. I always heard that having a small child was hard on a marriage but I had no idea that this was what that meant. That I’d be sobbing in rage because my husband didn’t want to try a cookie. Of course, it’s not really about the cookie. I also think my birth control is making me insane. I have been such a rage monster since I started the depo shot. Sigh. It’s going to get better, right? Things are going to be okay?

Then, to top everything off, I got to daycare and the cookie swap is next week. This is not entirely my fault, since one of the emails they sent out had the wrong date on it, so I was not the only person bringing in cookies today. At least I could laugh about that.