Sunday Evening Post

I’m not really in the mood to write anything, but Neal is working all night (just like last Sunday!), Sally is soundly sleeping, it is 9:10 PM on a Sunday evening, and there isn’t a ton to do. I’m aiming to go to bed early tonight, and I’m afraid that I’ll start writing and not want to stop (which sometimes happens), and ruin my chances for extra sleep.

I just read a bunch of random thoughts from my sister, so I’ll think I’ll jot down some random thoughts of my own:

-Sally is so sweet and I’m so grateful to be a mom. She talks about her baby brother frequently and the things that she’ll do for him (give him blankies and binkies; share her sippy with him—I really hope not; hug him; share toys with him). The other day she kissed my stomach repeatedly, saying that she was kissing baby brother.

-Sally isn’t screaming much at bedtime anymore (thank goodness!), and has had a few naps lately. It’s been nice. I don’t expect that she’ll go back to napping every day for 2 hours like she was doing 6 weeks ago, but I think I can expect at least one good nap a week out of her.

-My friend Rosemary and I have started a babysitting swap. When it was her turn to watch Sally this week I had planned on getting some work done but ended up going shopping and buying some new picture frames—something I’ve been wanting for a long time. It was so nice to shop alone!

-Neal and I have done a lot with his family lately, which has been fun. We spent the last two Saturdays, at least in part, with his siblings that are still at home, and on Tuesday we all went ice skating as a family at Crown Center (I opted out: clumsy person + big belly + ice = a disaster waiting to happen). I had fun on the sidelines with Sally. Neal was the only member of the family who stayed on his feet the entire time.

-My pregnancy is going well for the most part, but I’ve had some unpleasant pregnancy symptoms lately, including heartburn, blurry vision, and heart palpitations accompanied by dizziness (the most common symptom, and becoming more and more common all of the time). All of these things happened when I was expecting Sally, but not until the very end of the pregnancy. The blurry vision especially scared me when it happened with Sally, but I looked it up in a pregnancy book, and apparently it is a common symptom. I’m sleeping well except that I don’t get enough. 99% of the time that is my own fault. Neal and I have a hard time getting to bed at a decent time. We are too fond of our “normal people” time to cut it short by an early bed time—no hospitals, no patients, no singing of silly songs, no one to pull our hands off of the computer, etc. At some point, though, we’ll have to balance the scales, since sleep can’t lose out forever.

-Sally is starting to say lots of funny things. One example: a few days ago she was pretending that she was a kitty. Neal joined in the game and said that he was a doggy. When he asked Sally what Mommy was, she said “Mommy piggy!” Neal and I couldn’t contain our laughter. A few days later she pointed at me and said “Mommy piggy!” and laughed and laughed at herself.

-I love being a stay at home mom, despite the hard days. I’m learning that I can make hard days fewer and farther between by how I respond to situations and how I plan my day. In most cases when Sally is upset or cranky, I can look back and see things that I could have done differently. I’m trying to find a good balance between doing the things that I want to do and doing the things that Sally wants to do. Of course I don’t want to put my priorities aside and let Sally run the show, but I also don’t want to be so set on getting the things done that I care about that I overlook Sally’s feelings and desires. I’m finding the joy in spending an afternoon (or even 20 minutes) in an unmade bed reading story after story with sweet, curious, bright, little Sally while the laundry sits unfolded, the dinner waits to be made, and voicemail answers the phone.