Last Day // First Day

Friday was Nora's last day in her toddler classroom.  I tried to capture a "last day of school" picture, but she was too busy pointing out her elbow, the airplane, and the flowers.  Moving up to the two year old classroom is a bittersweet change for us.  We'll both miss her toddler teachers-- they took such good care of her, helped her to learn so many new things, brought out the best in her personality, and helped put me at ease about leaving her so I can work.  We know she's ready for the move, though, because she really loves being around older kids, moving up means she'll be reunited with her older friends, and it will give her the chance to learn new and different things.

Although she's been visiting the two year old classroom for several weeks, Monday was her first full day there.  When I picked her up in the afternoon, I asked how her day was and she gave it some thought before answering, "Good!" That was when I really knew she is getting to be the "big girl" she claims to be, because on her first day of day care and her first day in the toddler room, she burst into tears as soon as she saw me.  

I had tried to take her first day of school picture that morning, but she wasn't much more interested in posing then, either.  Here she is dancing to her favorite song and demanding that I sing it "more Mommy, more!"

These may not be the best pictures I've ever taken of her, but all I can think when I see them is: my dear little spirited Nora Jane, I hope the sun always shines on you each time you start a new chapter of your life.

The Toddler Room: Effects on Toddler and Mama

Nora loves the toddler room.  Why wouldn't she?  Yesterday when we walked in, one of her friends said "Nono!", rushed over to her, gave her a hug, and then led her by the hand over to the play carpet.  Her "friends" in the toddler classroom are actually her friends.  She gets a snack or a meal every twoish hours.  She blows bubbles, completes art projects, reads books, sings songs, plays outside with toddler-appropriate equipment, and dances to music.  She no longer even considers crying when I leave or when I return.  Mama, that's for babies, I imagine her thinking.  She has even started regularly napping for over one hour on her cot because her teachers had the good sense to place her next to their best sleeper.  Evidently, when she wakes up, looks over and sees that he is still sleeping, she pretends she is, too.

Nora started in the toddler room at 15 months, so she would've had a considerable amount of language development since that time anyway, but we feel like she's had a language explosion.  I couldn't even begin to create a comprehensive list all the words she says regularly with increasingly better clarity.  She is a little parrot, repeating everything we say and every noise she hears.  When Billy clears his throat, she clears hers.  When I lock the car as we walk into the house, she chirps "beep!"  When she pets or kisses Oscar she tells herself "nice, nice" because we are always emphasize using "nice touches" with him.  After we sing about the people on the bus going up and down, she walks around chanting "uppydown, uppydown, uppydown."  When her Uncle Nate is on FaceTime and asks her what's on TV in the background, she says "I dunno!" with perfect inflection, like she means it. This ear for sounds and pitches comes from Billy, I am sure.  He hears background noises that I am completely oblivious to, like when we are watching a sporting event and he gets annoyed by the pep band playing the same songs too much.  "There is a pep band?" is what I am always thinking.

As a working mom, most of the guilt I had about leaving Nora with others during the day has been eradicated by her sheer excitement about being at school.  Now that she is at an age where social interaction is more beneficial for her than my one-on-one doting attention would be, day care is a good place for her to be.  This should be good for me, too, and emotionally it is.  But professionally, I am realizing that guilt is a powerful motivator.  I got so much more done every day when regret about leaving her to complete my exam reading was dripping out of my pores, when the sight of every young child out and about with its mother made me cringe, and when Nora burst into tears nearly every time I arrived to get her at the end of the day.  But Liz, you couldn't have maintained that level of productivity much longer without losing your mind, you might be thinking.  I hear you.  (If you are actually thinking, Liz, operating at that level of productivity has already caused you to lose your mind, I politely decline to hear you.) My hope is that it's just taking me a little bit longer to adjust than it's taking Nora.  Now that she has settled into school, and I have settled into teaching, and I am beginning to settle into my library job, I hope this will lead to me settling into prospectus writing.  This week we are off for Spring Break, so I have made some good progress.  Time will tell, I guess.

Did you catch the part where I mentioned that she dances now? Over the weekend we discovered that she is especially partial to "Jump in Line" by Harry Belafonte.  Whether she likes this because of its beat, its instruments, or its prominence of what she thinks is the word "Nora," who knows.  But since her other main preference is for electronic music and rap songs about thrift shops, we gladly watch her pretend she's a hurricane in all kinds of weather... on repeat.

Nora's Last Day of School

Friday was Nora's last day of school.  We have had a universally positive experience with the child care providers we chose this summer, but the school was just too far from our home.  Though we know switching schools is the best decision for our family, we were really sorry to take Nora out of her current class.  Her teachers have taken such good care of her that she warmed up to them very quickly. They were also very sympathetic and understanding with me as I made the adjustment to leaving her.  Nora may have "only" been there for a little over four months, but in the scheme of her life, that's a long time!  When she started there, she couldn't crawl well, and now she is running all over the place.  I will miss getting the chance to see her interact with her classmates, as well.  At first, they really had no idea what to do with one another, but recently they really started playing.  They could hug one another, hand one another toys, walk over to see what one another were doing, and the like.  I am thankful that she was there for picture day so that someday I can show her this group shot of her first class!  I need to write a little description of each one on the back so I can tell her about each of them.

I was already feeling emotional when I went to get Nora on Friday as a result of the Connecticut school shooting.  When I picked her up I just hugged her as tight as I could until she gave me a look like "Geez, Mama, what??"  After I gave her teachers their thank you/holiday baskets, we made the rounds to give cookies to the other staff members who have also helped make her comfortable there.  I don't know if they knew about the shooting yet, but I was thankful to have an excuse to hug all of these women, too, because the news heightened my attention to the fact that the people who choose to look after our children in this country are some of our greatest resources.  I'm not be surprised when teachers sacrifice themselves to protect their students, because I know that most teachers sacrifice a little bit of themselves for their students every single day.

It was also nice to see Nora say "thank you" to each of these women in her own way.  I could tell how much time everyone spends with her by the way she would lean toward them to be held or walk up and hug their legs.  Obviously she had no idea what was going on, but she was quite thrilled to be the center of attention.  I was also surprised to see teachers I'd never met coming out of their classrooms to say goodbye to her and say nice things to me about her personality and habits.  It would've been a lot easier to leave her behind on that first day if I could've somehow seen the future to know that her "goodbye" would be this heartwarming.  I knew I trusted the staff when I picked the school, and I have watched as it became evident that Nora enjoys her time there, but saying goodbye put all of that in relief and helped eliminate some of the residual guilt I had about putting her in full time daycare.

Now Nora's stuck with me for about a month until she starts at the new center closer to our house and gets to meet a whole new set of people.  I know that will be another transition for her, but I think it will be much easier than it was the first time.  She knows how to handle being away from us, she enjoys interacting with other people, and she likes the additional stimulation she gets in a social learning environment.  I'll have the option to take her for full days, but since my workload won't be as intense, my plan is to spend more time with her in the mornings before dropping her off.  I'll also be able to keep her home more if she gets sick or overtired, so that will be nice as well.  I've finished my grading, so I'm looking forward to being a full time mom through the holidays and our visit west to meet her cousin Everett, who should be arriving any day now!

Teacher Conferences

Nora and I both had conferences with our teachers this week, and both went well!

I had lunch with my advisor to discuss how my exam went and what I should be thinking about as I begin working on my dissertation prospectus.  He congratulated me on the day of the exam, but it was nice to hear his more specific feedback.  It was also helpful to talk through where I see my project going from here.  Coming up with a plan for what I need to do next helped me put a bookmark in my brain for when I get back to serious work again after the holidays.

Nora's school is also on a "semester" schedule, so her teacher had us come in for a parent/teacher conference.  Billy and I both enjoyed hearing a "professional" opinion about her development, and it helped put into perspective just how much she has advanced since she started full time care.  The evaluation rubric was broken down into skill categories like cognitive, behavioral, social, motor, and then each individual skill was ranked as "never," "sometimes," or "always."  It was cool to hear which skills she demonstrates most frequently at school, like how much she loves turning the pages of books and playing with different sizes of balls.  She had "always" marks all the way down the line in the "motor skills" category, so I guess that is her most advanced skillset.  We even learned something new about her-- she knows how to say "bubble"!  This expands her list of "words" to bubble, hi, no, yes, Oscar, Mama, Dada, and ball.  She doesn't pronounce them perfectly, but she says them the same way every time.  She clearly knows what hi, no, yes, ball, and Oscar mean, as well.  In fact, we both think it's funny that she will exclaim her version of "Hi Oscar" when she sees him but does not clearly refer to us as "mama" or "dada" yet.

Oscar was also the first to receive kisses, which she started giving this week.  She puts her mouth on you, says "mmmm" and jerks her head away as she says "mmwah!"  It is way too cute.  We've also been working on blowing kisses, so sometimes when she gets going, we can get her to put her hand up to her mouth and say "mmmwah!"

She does love her books.  She does not care for reading pages in order, sometimes "reads" the pages with her mouth, and often peruses two books at the same time.  On account of these things, I have decided she has a postmodernist sensibility.

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(That's her contribution to this blog post.  She likes to hit the caps lock key repeatedly to make the light on it go on and off.)

School Pictures

A few weeks ago they had Picture Day at Nora's school.  When I was getting her situated, I heard someone say Nora's teacher should take her over to the photographer after I left.  I don't remember why she was having a tough morning that day, but I remember thinking "Well, that's a terrible idea.  These pictures are not going to be keepers."

Turns out I was right.  Look at this gem:

The look of sorrow in her eyes is tragic in itself, but apparently children's staged photography has come a long way since we were in school.  Now they photoshop your child into a variety of scenes.  Like, remember that time she held an apple while sitting in a sunlit field?

Or that time when we had the house decorated for Christmas, and she peeked around the miniature front door to see who was knocking?

There was one photo where she clearly *thought* about smiling, but decided against it.

I think we'll stick with candids.  : )

A Day in the Life

A few weeks ago, my high school friend Jo did a couple of posts that documented "a day in the life" of her attempts to balance motherhood and with her career.  I was amazed and intrigued by how different our day-to-day lives seem to be, even though we're both professional moms who share similar values on a lot of parenting questions.  People are always saying things to me like "How do you get it all done?", so maybe they care to read about it on a micro level.  Plus, I've done "day in the life" posts before (see here and here), and I enjoy looking back on them.  So whether or not anyone is interested in this level of specificity, I thought I'd keep track of what I was up to on an average work-from-home Monday so that in the future, when this whole semester is a blur, I can remember what putting one foot in front of the other looked like as I prepared for my exams.

10:08pm Sunday night: Billy turns off the TV and we say goodnight.  I'm surely asleep by 10:11.

11ish pm: I wake up to the sound of Nora's coughing fit.  She does this once every night, and we don't know why, but our pediatrician is unconcerned about it.  I try to figure out why she's doing it at this time, since it normally happens around 4 or 5am, while I listen to see if she needs me.  She doesn't.  If the coughing wakes her up, she goes right back to sleep, so her mom does the same.

5:22-6:00am Monday morning: I wake up.  I get up to pack up the lunch for Nora that I prepared the night before.  I fix her bottles, pull clothes and sheets from the laundry, and prepare her school bag.  I make coffee, eat breakfast, feed Oscar, and let him out.  Once Billy is up and in the shower, I go get dressed.

6:00-7:00am Nora's already awake and waiting patiently, so I get her up.  I change her diaper, get her dressed, nurse her, and we say goodbye to Billy, who is leaving for work.  I finish getting her things together and start to get excited about getting out of the door early when I realize that I can't find her left shoe.  I spend at least 15 minutes searching the house and the car for it.  Luckily, she sits patiently in her pack and play and "reads" a book, laughing at me as I get increasingly frustrated.  (How do you lose baby weight?  Lose everything else first, and you'll make so many trips up and down the stairs that you won't need to exercise.)  When I finally give up and sit down to put a different pair of shoes on her, I see the toe of her left school shoe peeking out from behind the boxes I need to mail today.

7:00-8:00am I get Nora in the car and drive her to school.  In the car, we listen to Alice Walker's narration of The Color Purple.  I spend about two hours commuting every day, so audiobooks on my iPhone have allowed me to make use of this time.  I limit my listening to those novels which I've read  before and otherwise wouldn't have time to re-read.  I wonder what others in my program would think if they knew how many pages I've reviewed in this way, but I don't care.  I drop Nora off at school, get her situated, get her teacher up to speed since she was on vacation last week.  I drive back home.

8:00-8:20am: I shower and get dressed (again).  I realize I am starving so I eat a piece of last night's pizza.

8:20-10:00am: I finish reading Morrison's Beloved, review my notes from when I read it in a grad class, and write up my exam notecard on the novel.  I cross it off my list and triumphantly place it on the top of my "finished" pile even though I still have to figure out 4 lesson plans for it in the near future.

10:00-11:25am: I read Amy Kaplan's intro to Cultures of United States Imperialism and take notes on it.  Somewhere in this block I also took a 12 minute power nap.  I do this almost every day, sometimes twice.  Billy thinks the idea of a 12 minute nap is absurd; I think it's the only thing that keeps my brain functioning.

11:25am-12:05pm: I eat another piece of pizza, I check facebook, I work on this blog post, and I talk to Billy briefly on gchat.  I spend about 20 minutes of this window attached to my pump and yield just over 4 ounces.  (So it goes these days.)  I portion this out to Nora's bottles for tomorrow and rinse my pump parts.

12:05-12:55pm: I read Donald Pease's follow-up intro to the Kaplan one from earlier, take notes on it, and put that book in the finished pile.

12:55-2:10pm: I plan our meals for the week and make my grocery list.  I go to the post office to mail a few packages, but the empty parking lot reminds me that it's closed for Veteran's day.  I go to the grocery store, get our groceries, and stop for our mail on the way home even though I should have remembered that there is no mail today.  Facepalm.  I put the groceries away.

2:10-3:00pm: I begin reviewing Didion's Slouching Towards Bethlehem.

3:00-4:05pm: I listen to The Color Purple on the way to and from picking Nora up from school.  I chat briefly with her teacher and learn that Nora said "Wow!" while eating her lunch and she had fun playing outside.  She seems to have gotten over her hesitations about walking on the rubberized, padded playground matting.

4:05-5:00pm: Nora and I meet Billy at home to begin the best part of my day!  We play with her together for about a half an hour.  Today, this means watching her run around the living room and playing peek-a-boo by putting a bucket over her head.  Then I prepare asparagus and stuffing to eat with the rotisserie chicken I got at the grocery store.  While I'm waiting on those things, I watch Nora pull all of the food containers out of "her" cabinet and make her lunch for tomorrow.

5:00-5:30pm: Nora, Billy, and I sit down to eat dinner as a family.  She seems to have fallen out of love with vegetables, but she still takes a few bites of asparagus.  She can't get enough rotisserie chicken and she discovers that she likes stuffing.

5:30-6:10pm: After dinner, we play for a little while longer.  Then Billy cleans up the kitchen and washes the dishes and bottles while I get Nora ready for bed.  Bathtime, jammies, brush her teeth, empty her diaper pail when I remember it's trash night.  While I do that she "reads" herself Go, Dog! Go!.  This apple doesn't fall far from the tree.

6:10-6:30pm: I watch Friday Night Lights on my phone during Nora's bedtime nursing session.  I could be listening to my audiobook, but watching good TV while cuddling my baby is my one singular indulgence every day.  When 20 minutes is up, we say goodnight to Dad, set Nora down in her crib, and she's done for the night.

6:30-6:45pm: Billy has funny things he found on the internet to show me.

6:45-8:10pm: I finish reviewing Didion, read my notes from when we read her in one of my graduate classes, write up my notecard, and put Slouching Toward Bethlehem in the "finished" pile.

8:10-8:30pm: While waiting for tech support on audible.com to help me with my audiobook account, I get caught up on jezebel and gawker for the day.  An Elmo scandal? Why!?!

8:30-9:15pm: I begin reading Vonnegut's Slaughterhouse-Five.  Oscar helps.  I normally try to work until at least 9:30 but I become convinced that my brain itself is "unstuck in time" and quit a few minutes early.

9:15-10:00pm: I bring my laptop up to the bedroom, where Billy is flipping around between Maryland basketball and Monday Night Football.  I work on this blog post and we relax until bedtime.

All in all, it was a pretty standard but rewardingly productive day.  As it turns out, it was a good thing I got so much done yesterday because today was a complete wash in terms of getting my own work done.  (I spent the whole day teaching and grading.)  Tomorrow, I get to work from home again, which means crossing more texts off my ever shortening list!

Dear Nora

Dear Nora,

I know you have been wondering, in your own 11 month old way, why I have been leaving you with strangers all day.  Someday when you are older you might wonder why I chose to put you in full time day care even though, financially, I didn’t have to.  There are people who would tell you that a mother should sacrifice everything for her child-- that the mother’s needs are unimportant in comparison to what’s “best” for the baby.  Others might think it is selfish for me to ask you to make this difficult transition so that I can commit more of my time to my schoolwork.  I wanted to write down all the things I’ve been telling you about why we’ve decided that this course of action is the one that’s best for our family, so that someday if you ever wonder, you can look here and be reminded.  And because sometimes I miss you so badly in the daytime that I need a reminder, too.

I believe it is important for mothers who want to work outside the home to have the opportunity to do so.  As a working woman, I know that having a career has increased my sense of self worth.  It has given me the chance to be of service to others, which makes me feel better about my place in the world. It has shown me that I have plenty of skills, knowledge, and expertise that make me valuable.  It has given me intellectual stimulation and fulfillment.  These things make me a happy and content person, and that helps me to be a better wife to your dad and a better mom to you.

Being your mom is my best job.  The rewards of watching you grow and helping you learn surpass the rewards of any other job I’ve ever had, not just by a mile, but by a marathon.  However, you will not always need me the way you have needed me up until now.  You’ve already learned to go to sleep on your own, to move yourself around the room, and to feed yourself.  I don’t think it’s fair for me to continue to rely on you to be the sole source of my self worth.  Making me happy and content should not be your burden to bear.  As you get older, you will also need me to model for you the things a woman can do.  I think you will value me more as a person and as a mom if you see that I have accomplished things I’m proud of as a person and as a mom.  I hope that by pursuing the things I want inside and outside the home, it will show you that you deserve whatever you want inside and outside the home, too.

Although it has some drawbacks, I think it is good for you to be at school, too. You already enjoy more stimulation than I can give you, which I know because some of your happiest moods are when you’re around a lot of people or in new places.  When I spent those few days with you at school, I could tell by the way you played with the other kids and investigated the room that you were going to have a lot of fun there.  I can tell when we arrive there in the morning that you are happy to see your teacher and anxious to get going with your playtime.

I have chosen an occupation that is as hard as it is rewarding.  I wish I did not have to devote as much time to it right now as I do.  It’s tempting to think I should have waited until after I’d passed my comprehensive exam to have a baby, but then I wouldn’t have you.  Until now, the fact that I am in graduate school has given us so much more time together than if I had a typical teaching job.  It allowed me to take off the semester you were born, to spend very few hours apart when you were between 3 months and 7 months, and to spend all of our time together for the three months after that.  If I can pass this test, it will mean that in the future, you’ll get to spend a lot of time with your family and a little bit of time with your teachers and your friends.  I think that will make you the happiest you’ve ever been.  I will be able to proceed with my schoolwork at a pace that allows me more time to spend with you and Dad, and I think that will make me the happiest I’ve ever been, too.

For all these reasons, I think the sacrifices you, Dad, and I are making right now are justified by the benefits they will afford our family in the end.   There’s a chance I won’t be able to do what I’m trying to do, but that won’t make this all for naught.  In life we don’t know how far we can go until we try, and it is unwise to let fear of failure guide our steps.  Whenever we are willing to give something a go, doing so enriches our lives even if we don’t end up accomplishing what we initially set out to do.  If I don’t pass my test, I’ll be thankful that you and Dad gave me the best chance I had at succeeding, I’ll know it wasn’t the right path for us, and we’ll decide together where I should go from here.

Thank you for adapting so well so far.  Remember how, when I picked you up last week, you were happy to see me but you kept playing with your friend instead of wailing and crawling toward me immediately?  That made me so proud.  I’m sorry you’re finding it so hard to sleep at school, and Dad and I trying to figure out how to help you get more of the sleep you need.  Please know that when I am away from you I am thinking of you all the time, hoping you are crawling around happily, pulling yourself up on that ballet bar, and helping your friends drag all the toys off every shelf.  Please remember that this is something I am doing for all of us even though it is going to be hard on all of us for the next few months.    Please trust that Dad and I love you more than anything, and we are doing the best we can to make the best life for our family.

Love, Mama

Daily Report

When I pick Nora up from school, I get a report card that tells me what she did. But the comments from her teachers are way better.

"She is quite a little daredevil!"
"She was giggling during her ride in the wagon."
"It is so cute how she nods her head when you ask her a question!"
"She is really adjusting well. Her mood improves every day."

Yes, sounds about right, yes, and thank goodness.

Week Two

I have seven minutes before I have to wake Nora up, so I thought I'd post a quick update and say thank you again to all of you who sent me notes after my last post.  Whether or not I am ready for the exam depends on whether the amount of time I have to give is enough to complete enough reading and thinking to be adequately prepared for the test.  Only time will tell, I think.

Week two got off to a better start yesterday.  I was afraid Nora would start crying as soon as she realized she was back at school but, as usual, she did fine with the drop off.  I taught my students for the second time, and I was pleased at the level of talking that went on during our group activity and class discussion.  Most of my students claim to be fairly confident as readers and writers so we will see how the class pans out.  Walking back to my office from the classroom, I felt a bit more like myself again instead of feeling like a ball of emotions, so that felt like a step in the right direction.

Nora still started crying uncontrollably when I picked her up, but her teachers reported that she had a much better day.  (They say this every day, which makes me think they must have been stretching the truth when they told me, on the first day, that she "did well."  I guess it's relative.)  She didn't refuse her bottles, she ate her lunch, and she even drank water from the straw cup, which she has refused to do since she started there.  The biggest step in the right direction, though, was that they managed to get her to take two naps.  Each was only about thirty minutes long, but since she was napping for 30 minutes total each day last week, it was a big improvement.

Well, six of my seven minutes are up so I will end it there.  I'm also including a picture Billy took of us yesterday.  Last week was too much of a whirlwind to get a first day of school picture, so a second week of school picture will have to do.  I am still struggling to figure out the best way to manage my time, the commute to Nora's day care and to campus, and how to develop a routine that maximizes my work time, but hopefully by the start of week 3 I'll have a firmer handle on that, too.

Early Thoughts on Our New Arrangement

Dang.  5:30am comes quick.

Leaving your precious baby is like soccer tryouts.  Going in, you think you just need to survive day 1.  At the end of day 1, you realize day 2 is going to be even worse, because you're going to have to do all the same things over again but this time you're going to be sore from day 1.

What's worse than pumping?  Washing bottles.

Why didn't it occur to me that putting on mascara these past two mornings was a bad idea?

What will happen quicker: Nora's adjustment to being in day care or her teachers' adjustment to having six new kids with new schedules?  Are they even reading the form I filled out?

You literally can't go anywhere without seeing a mom with her baby.  Even a college campus.  One minute it makes me feel warm and fuzzy, the next it makes me tear up.

It's not fair to put a baby in day care when, in the same week, she really starts crawling and you have to put away a set of the clothes she's outgrown.  You're supposed to get adequate time to mourn/celebrate each new stage individually.

Did they get any tennis in today?  Remember when I used to know everything that happened at the US Open?

What would Kim Clijsters do?

I hope she knows I'm not just doing this for me.  That eventually, I think she will like being there.  That eventually, she'll be thankful to have grown up with a mom who had a rewarding career.

How many baby photos at my desk is too many?

How is it possible that packing the car for a day of being apart from your baby requires three times as much stuff as a day when you're taking your baby everywhere?

Who are all these people walking around my department?  Have I really been gone so long that someone I used to speak to regularly is calling me Melissa?

Why is screaming at the top of her lungs her manner of letting me know she's happy to see me at the end of the day?

How will you know if she spent most of her first day crying?  Her face will be red the whole evening.  How will you know they're telling the truth when they say she cried less on day two?  Her face will get back to normal shortly before bedtime.

Dang.  10pm comes quick.