After suffering through a heart-wrenching loss on Saturday, I needed a pick-me-up for this long weekend. (For those of you who have no idea why I am in mourning, let's just say I will be cheering on the Jets next weekend.) The Husband told me that at least we won free dinner, but that is no solace for a true football fan. (He also bet against my team--and for his--to win the dinner.) So, for the second-half of the long weekend, I made a conscious effort to focus on activities for the baby to make up for the confusing flurry of cheers and screams on Saturday.
Sunday, we took a road trip to Winchester. I forgot how pretty the scenery is on 66. We left right after church, hoping that Baby Girl would sleep on the way out there. No such luck! When we were about 15 minutes away, she finally was tired enough to sleep. We drove around the historic area for 10 minutes to give her some more rest before we woke her up. We were also searching for an elusive "white house" where my in-laws got married by the justice of the peace. Winchester was the first location from Pittsburgh where inter-racial couples could get married in 1968. This location blows my mind since we learned that most restaurants still are closed on Sundays from leftover blue laws. We ended up eating at Old Towne Cafe which had an upscale cuisine for reasonable (at least in our Washingtonian opinions) prices. I had a grown-up grilled cheese snadwich and tomato soup, and husband ate bratwurst and got a too-die-for hazelnut torte.
But the real reason we went to Winchester was for the Shenandoah Valley Discovery Museum. Baby Girl had a blast playing with many of the machines. There were definitely areas that were too old for her, and compared to Port Discovery or the children's museum in Portsmouth, it was tiny; nevertheless, she had a blast sending balls down homemade "rollercoasters," discovering animals and food in the Native American room, sitting in the apple truck behind the steering wheel, climbing in honeycombs, and playing with magnets. At just about two hours, the lack of nap was clearly hitting, and she began to have a meltdown. We figured this would be perfect timing to head back in the car, give her a bottle, and enjoy a ride home with a napping baby. She, however, did not think a nap was warranted, and instead sang to us the entire way home.
On Monday, we decided to try to tire her out again. We got up normal time (for those of you without kids, that's about anytime before 7 a.m.) and had a leisurely breakfast. We headed out to the Mount Vernon Rec Center's pool. There is an indoor "beach" area there. It's a wading pool with zero-entry, water spouts, and a tower of buckets which fill and drops water. Husband said he was thinking back to "You Can't Do That on Television" and had said "water."
The last time Baby Girl was able to go in a pool, she had just mastered crawling. She was so excited to be able to walk in the water. There were only two other toddlers and four preschoolers there. It gave her plenty of room to walk. However, she was very upset if anyone touched the ball she had played with. Apparently sharing is not in her growing vocabulary. After about 75 minutes, her lips started turning blue, despite the fact the pool was heated. We dried off, when she confirmed that she had been a"good, good, girl," and headed home. Of course, she feel asleep in the 15 minute car ride home today!
Thanks to the long weekend, I can check one thing off my resolution list.
Monday, January 17, 2011
Monday, January 10, 2011
A new year
I have always loved the new year. Growing up, I actually got to celebrate two new years. The new year that mattered the most came in August when we'd go back to school. I'd vow to get focused, take neater notes, do all of my homework before homeroom. Sometimes years went well; some did not.
The thing about working at a college is I actually still get two new years each year. One I celebrate with people around the world in January and one with all the students in August.
After having 11 days off over the holidays, I came back to work last week fairly rested, but in no mood to make any changes to what was an established routine. The reason? Classes do not begin for another week. So in my procrastinator's head, if classes didn't start, then why change? Things will settle down more this week. I begin teaching again, which means that the routine will change again. So today is the real beginning in my mind. Christmas decorations went down over the weekend (although we still have to change out the dishes tonight), so there should be nothing to stop us from getting a handle on this thing called life.
So what is my new year's resolution for 2011? Actually there are a lot. And I decided to share them since actually writing your goals down makes them more achievable. One thing you may notice is most of my goals involve my husband agreeing. This year when I asked what his resolution was he said, "Oh, I don't really know. Lose weight, maybe." I took it upon myself to let him know how he would be involved in mine and after a few minutes of thinking, he agreed. So here they are:
1. Understand our finances. While husband was out of steady work for seven months in 2009, we somehow managed to get out of debt (minus the car and mortage) and still save well. I don't think either of us have yet to figure out how we did that. I'd like to learn what works best and how much we need to save to...
2. Buy a house. We have really outgrown our condo and with interest rates being low, we would both like to find a place where our daughter can play in a yard. As you can imagine, yards are lacking on the third floor of a walk-up. Plus we'd both like to stop carrying groceries up the stairs in three trips, timing out laundry, and buying parking permits for our family and friends to come and visit us. But to do that, we need to....
3. Finish up our home improvements. There is a list of a dozen fairly large projects that need to be done before the condo is market-ready. And since I can't find an application for Designed to Sell, we'll take any help you'd like to offer.
4. Make a menu for the week in advanced. I really need to get organized in the kitchen. Now that I have to feed Toddler, making sure we do not order out three times a week is rather important. We are rather fortunate that she does love Thai and Lebanese food, but a healthy American dinner will also help us with resolution #1.
5. Reinstate date night once a month. I never thought I'd be one of "those moms" whose life seemed to circle around the baby. But over the year, I was. I do attribute most of it to breastfeeding for 363 days. (It was nice of the baby to self-wean right before her one year birthday, even if I wasn't ready for it.) But apparently she was. And since I am no longer needing to be attached, literally, at bedtime, I think it's time for the hubby and I to go out and be adults again.
6. Have one Toddler Day a month. I figured since hubby and I are going to go out without, we should plan one weekend day a month that is all about Baby Girl. I'm thinking about things like a trip to the zoo, building a tent in the living without paying attention to the mess, open play time at a toddler gym. Just enough that it is out of the ordinary, will allow her to burn off some energy, and give me some time not to think about running errands or grading papers.
7. Scrapbook an average of one page a week. That should put me at 52 pages at the end of the year, which may just complete my 2008 album that I am still working on. I started with thinking that I should try for two a week, but my goal setting instinct took over and decided that it needed to be achievable. And since I only did about eight pages in 2009, I figure 52 is almost six times more than last year.
8. Read a novel a month. You would think that teaching English would make me read more like a novel a day, but between being a mommy, wife, working full-time, grading papers, and being a tv junkie, it just didn't happen last year. And since I am teaching a course I haven't taught before, I'll need even more prep time and to reread with the students.
9. And the traditional: lose weight.
So it's three weeks into the new year and what have I done? I am 42 pages into House Rules, so I have a long way to go.
What are your goals for this year?
The thing about working at a college is I actually still get two new years each year. One I celebrate with people around the world in January and one with all the students in August.
After having 11 days off over the holidays, I came back to work last week fairly rested, but in no mood to make any changes to what was an established routine. The reason? Classes do not begin for another week. So in my procrastinator's head, if classes didn't start, then why change? Things will settle down more this week. I begin teaching again, which means that the routine will change again. So today is the real beginning in my mind. Christmas decorations went down over the weekend (although we still have to change out the dishes tonight), so there should be nothing to stop us from getting a handle on this thing called life.
So what is my new year's resolution for 2011? Actually there are a lot. And I decided to share them since actually writing your goals down makes them more achievable. One thing you may notice is most of my goals involve my husband agreeing. This year when I asked what his resolution was he said, "Oh, I don't really know. Lose weight, maybe." I took it upon myself to let him know how he would be involved in mine and after a few minutes of thinking, he agreed. So here they are:
1. Understand our finances. While husband was out of steady work for seven months in 2009, we somehow managed to get out of debt (minus the car and mortage) and still save well. I don't think either of us have yet to figure out how we did that. I'd like to learn what works best and how much we need to save to...
2. Buy a house. We have really outgrown our condo and with interest rates being low, we would both like to find a place where our daughter can play in a yard. As you can imagine, yards are lacking on the third floor of a walk-up. Plus we'd both like to stop carrying groceries up the stairs in three trips, timing out laundry, and buying parking permits for our family and friends to come and visit us. But to do that, we need to....
3. Finish up our home improvements. There is a list of a dozen fairly large projects that need to be done before the condo is market-ready. And since I can't find an application for Designed to Sell, we'll take any help you'd like to offer.
4. Make a menu for the week in advanced. I really need to get organized in the kitchen. Now that I have to feed Toddler, making sure we do not order out three times a week is rather important. We are rather fortunate that she does love Thai and Lebanese food, but a healthy American dinner will also help us with resolution #1.
5. Reinstate date night once a month. I never thought I'd be one of "those moms" whose life seemed to circle around the baby. But over the year, I was. I do attribute most of it to breastfeeding for 363 days. (It was nice of the baby to self-wean right before her one year birthday, even if I wasn't ready for it.) But apparently she was. And since I am no longer needing to be attached, literally, at bedtime, I think it's time for the hubby and I to go out and be adults again.
6. Have one Toddler Day a month. I figured since hubby and I are going to go out without, we should plan one weekend day a month that is all about Baby Girl. I'm thinking about things like a trip to the zoo, building a tent in the living without paying attention to the mess, open play time at a toddler gym. Just enough that it is out of the ordinary, will allow her to burn off some energy, and give me some time not to think about running errands or grading papers.
7. Scrapbook an average of one page a week. That should put me at 52 pages at the end of the year, which may just complete my 2008 album that I am still working on. I started with thinking that I should try for two a week, but my goal setting instinct took over and decided that it needed to be achievable. And since I only did about eight pages in 2009, I figure 52 is almost six times more than last year.
8. Read a novel a month. You would think that teaching English would make me read more like a novel a day, but between being a mommy, wife, working full-time, grading papers, and being a tv junkie, it just didn't happen last year. And since I am teaching a course I haven't taught before, I'll need even more prep time and to reread with the students.
9. And the traditional: lose weight.
So it's three weeks into the new year and what have I done? I am 42 pages into House Rules, so I have a long way to go.
What are your goals for this year?
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)