Picture postcard for the new year (albeit not so new anymore)

From Christmas: Boy, how time flies. Truly frightening.

Kid A is 8 months old today!

In honor of the occasion, some more photos:

Again, from Christmas. We call this "Christmas Drunk," also known as "too much Christmas." And it was only the first one (of three)!
Early January, just before her 6-month birthday. I like this one because her face has changed so much from the months before (and has changed so much since then). I also totally dig her expression:

Priceless.

At the end of January, we took our first family trip to a museum, the De Young in San Francisco. Kid A did so well; she loved looking at all the different shapes and colors (and people!). This was her little cafe stop snack break.

Although we don't have photographic evidence, a few weeks after this outing, we took her to the Monterey Bay Aquarium (which I think I may have written about), and she loved, loved, loved it.

We like to buck convention when it comes to gendered clothing; here's our "little prince" enjoying the delights of the Cheerio:

The weekend of my birthday, our dear and dearly missed friends were in SF, and we caught up with them and their twin boys for a little visit. Here's Kid A's first playground swing ride:

From last week, lovin' both "grandpa" and breakfast (the latter being much more present than the former):
Life's been super busy, and I wish I had time to write words, but perhaps another time. Love to all!

New stuff, good stuff, old stuff ... blue stuff?

I finished the first week at the new job. It's a mixed bag, really: I'm happy to have a job, I'm not happy about how little I'm going to be seeing my child. She's sleeping great at night, and she's now sleeping a total of 11-12 hours each night. Which means: I get home a little before 6:00, and she's down for the night between 6:30 and 7:00. She will usually wake up for another feeding between 8:00 and midnight, but it's a total of about 20 minutes or so that she's up, and then she sleeps through until somewhere between 5:30 and 6:45. And I drop her off at Carmen's at 7:00, and I'm off to work. Yeah. That's going to suck. I have a feeling I'm really going to be living for the weekends.

It was great, though: they observe Lincoln's birthday (which is also my dad's birthday), and they observe it on the actual date. Which meant that I had Thursday off. And they also observe Presidents' Day, this coming Monday, so I'm at the dawn of a three-day weekend. So my first two weeks are short weeks, which is pretty nice. (Sadly, though, there won't be another holiday until Memorial Day, so I'm looking at a pretty lengthy dry spell. Can't have everything, I suppose.) Nice to have a soft landing, as my friend Ryan would say.

Last weekend, we went down to my dad's house for a pre-birthday visit. Dad is doing surprisingly well, physically, but cognitively he's not going so great. He's having difficulty with mental functioning like math, reading and writing. He's supposed to be doing some brain-boosting video games and the like, but I'm not sure he's able to get his computer functioning in order to get going on that. He's also almost certainly going to have to move out of his house. He's 8 payments delinquent, and even if his lender approves a modification of his loan, I'm not sure the payments will be affordable. He got approved for Medi-Cal, but it's a share-of-cost benefit, and what they expect him to cover before Medi-Cal kicks in is about half of his monthly income. I'll be applying for some other stuff for him -- IHSS and an application for low-income housing -- but I'm just not sure what's best for him, or what's possible.

That said, it was a pretty nice visit. TM and I were both pretty tired, having hosted TM's family the night before for a little dinner party, so it was nice to have a mellow little visit and go to bed early. And Kid A did great -- slept straight through the night, something like 11 hours without a feeding. On the drive down, I was venting a little bit to TM -- sometimes it gets to me that my dad isn't normal, and I end up feeling sad and sorry for myself that we can't take advantage of all the fun things there are to do in that area -- and TM said, "Well, let's just start doing things that we want to do when we come visit. We have a family now; let's spend some time with your dad, and also spend some time doing stuff with Kid A." TM's parents are great about balancing together time and not-together time when they visit relatives or go on trips with their children and grandchildren, so he's had some good modeling in that respect. I, on the other hand, am blessed with two parents who can never quite get enough of their children, and so there's a lot of guilt (especially with my dad) about not doing/giving enough. And so, last Sunday morning, we got up when Kid A did, fed her, went out to the local coffee shop for our Salinas coffee ritual, came back to dad's and did a few more things around the house for him, and then broke the news that we were going to Monterey to take Kid A to the aquarium. He did his usual I'm-upset-because-you're-leaving grumbling, and I felt my usual guilt for not doing/giving/being enough, and then we left. And had a GREAT TIME.

Oh, the aquarium. I love that place. Kid A was her best Little Mesmo* and could not get enough of looking at the fish. The Monterey Bay Aquarium is an incredible, amazing place. The tanks themselves are stunning: lots of contrasting colors and interesting, unpredictable movement, perfect for a baby to get transfixed by. She stared and stared and stared all day, was happy in the Ergo carrier, and only fussed when she was hungry. We spent probably four hours there, longer than I would have expected, and she never cried, never fell asleep (even though I'm sure she was probably tired). When we left, we walked up Lighthouse Avenue to Gianni's Pizza (a place with a lot of memories for me, not to mention delicious pizza), and within a block or two, she was asleep.

* Little Mesmo is a name we have for her when she's utterly transfixed (i.e. "mesmerized") by something. It's that look of wonder and awe that all babies get when they are looking at something new, and wonderful, and awesome. "Little Mesmo" is also an idea we have for a series of books that we joke about from time to time, where the same story is told from two different perspectives, the baby's and the parent's. Yeah. Like that's ever going to happen. But we like to joke about it sometimes.

I'm turning 36 in a couple of weeks. No, actually, in 8 days. I told TM that what I want for my birthday is for him to do all the parenting one night a week so that I can go to a yoga class. We agreed on Tuesday nights, and even though it's not my birthday yet, we agreed that I would start going when I started working. So, last Tuesday night, I went to my first yoga class since before Kid A was born. It was great, and really hard. The studio is easy walking distance from our place (ah, pedestrian living, how I will miss you when you're gone), so from the time I leave the house until the time I get home, it's only 2 hours of being gone, but boy, it's some quality self-care time. I'm very happy about it. (And, of course, I'm waaay out of shape and way heavier than I'm happy with, so it also kind of sucks. But you gotta start somewhere, no?)

Ok, she's waking up from a nice, hour-long nap, so I'm off. Happy Valentine's Day to one and all!

The Ill-Advised 25 Things

My goodness, it's been a long time! I thought, at the beginning of my unemployment, that I'd be posting all the time. Obviously, that was not to be. I don't even know where the time goes. Okay, I can think of a few things. Kid A's a lot more fun these days, and when she's with me (she has spent some time with her care provider to keep some continuity, and to provide me an opportunity to handle some miscellaneous things), I have hardly a minute of down time. Facebook has proven endlessly fascinating of late: people have been exploding out of the woodwork of the past, and whenever I'm online, it's hard to tear myself away. And TM has gotten us completely sucked into Battlestar Galactica. Yeah, shut up. It's a good show.

In the interest of brevity, and in an effort to cover as much of the last few weeks as possible, I am inspired by the silly "25 Things About Me" that seems to have taken Facebook by storm.

1. We just transitioned Kid A to her own crib. This is night 3. I was surprised, on the first night, at how sad I was to have her out of our bed. If someone had told me before she was born that she was going to spend almost 7 months sleeping in our bed with us, I would have said that person was out of his mind. Just goes to show, I guess, that nothing, especially parenthood, ends up fitting in with one's preconceptions.
2. The transition to the crib has gone really really well. She's handled it great, and it really is nice to reclaim our bedroom.
3. I went to IKEA today and bought a new dresser for our bedroom. Yay!
4. I have been engaging my domestic goddess fantasies somewhat. Last week was all about cooking. (The last couple of weeks, actually.) Here is a partial list of some of the dishes I have made:
- chocolate chip banana bread
- havarti-and-oregano-stuffed chicken breasts with mustard sauce
- spinach and bacon quiche
- butternut squash pecan spice bread
- baby food (butternut squash and peaches)
- chicken thighs with tomatoes, capers, anchovies and olives
5. Kid A's diet is increasing in variety. She now eats peaches, pears, squash, sweet potatoes, carrots, avocado, Cheerios, oatmeal, bananas, and rice cereal. We haven't tried peas again since the first time (they made her cry!).
6. Kid A can now sit up independently and reliably. This means that she can play independently for longer periods of time, which is both fun to watch and also a benefit to getting adult things done (albeit brief adult things).
7. She has cut her first tooth. It's still pretty close to the gumline, so I haven't actually seen it, but I've been able to feel it for about a week now.
8. I officially have a job! I start on Monday, February 9. I just received my final offer letter via fax today.
9. I just realized that this isn't so much "25 Things About Me" as it is "A couple of things about me and 20-some-odd things about my daughter." *sigh*
10. I am surprised at how hard it has been to get the baby weight off. It kinda sucks, actually.
11. The various projects I had for myself -- the photos, the sewn scarf, the crocheting, the quilt-making -- none of them has materialized. I started the scarf, and I've cut out some pieces for the quilt, and I've made half of one crocheted baby bootie. Nothing completed.
12. My dad has got me worried. He's so depressed (or out of it, or something) that he never calls anymore. I'm trying to work on some of his financial affairs, since he's in pretty bad shape, and I call him every 3-4 days, but he never calls anymore. This is highly unusual for him. This has been going on for several weeks. I have no idea what's going to happen.
13. I turn 36 in 3 weeks.
14. Kid A turns 7 months on Friday.
15. I bought a new baby carrier (2nd hand, off the internet) for Kid A recently -- an Ergo -- and I love it. This morning Kid A and I went on a brisk (okay, cold) morning walk.
16. Having so many people from my past pop up on Facebook is tripping me out. It has me reminiscing, for sure, but also thinking, "Am I still who I was then? What changes? What stays the same?"
17. I have decided that someday, when Kid A is much, much older, I will probably return to grad school. Can't get enough, apparently!
18. I was 18 when I got my first tattoo. I have many tattoos now that I like, but that is the one that I dislike. Someday, I will get it covered up with a piece of ink that I feel good about.
19. Now that Kid A is grabbing at my face all the time, I badly want eye surgery to correct my vision! I haven't been able to wear contacts for years.
20. I am tired and should probably be in bed.
21. I can't stand forwarded emails that are all, "pass this on in the next 5 minutes and you shall have your hearts desire!"
22. I should probably make a list of all the things I have to do tomorrow.
23. One of my favorite little unemployment projects has been adding to my recipe collection. I started a journal-type book, into which I'm cutting and pasting (like literally, not the cyber kind of cut and paste) recipes that I've gotten off the internet, or from magazines, etc. I have quite a few new recipes to try, as well.
24. I was 21 years old when I got engaged; 25 when I got married.
25. Before I became a mom, I had dreams every night, and could almost always remember them in the morning. This used to be a regular topic of conversation for TM and me. Now I'm lucky if I remember one dream a week.

Wow, I did it. Not sure I would do that again as a blog post, but there you have it. I hope it wasn't too boring!

Long overdue

Well, hello there. It's been a while. Life's been a bit hectic, with getting fired,* enjoying the holidays, and beginning my new life as a (temporary) housewife. First things first: it would seem that I have a job. The county in which I interviewed in December finally called on the 30th to say that they would like to "move forward" with my "hiring process." It's by no means a job offer, but they go through these layers of background checks prior to making an offer. So far, I've done my fingerprinting, and am waiting for that clearance to be completed; then, they'll call to schedule a physical and drug test. THEN, they'll call to officially offer me the job. In the meantime, I am enjoying my time off.

* Of course, I got laid off, not fired, but it amuses me to say "fired." My first year of grad school, I interned with a guy who I just adored who was constantly worrying -- in a half-serious way -- that he was going to get fired. This cracked me up every time, because, as I kept telling him, you can't really get fired from a job you're doing for free. It's hard to screw up so badly at a mandatory internship that they tell you not to come back.

At any rate, I've been really busy, even after the layoff. My first week of unemployment flew by, because I scheduled lots and lots of things for myself. This week is shaping up to be a bit mellower, but I've written a long list of projects for my down time. There's no way I'll be able to get to all of them:

- scan, organize, and put away photos (probably a 4-hour project, once I have all the supplies I need)
- organize the bathroom cabinets and drawers
- thank-you notes from Christmas (yes, I realize it's already the 12th!)
- finish Kid A's baby blanket that I started knitting when I was pregnant
- crochet (I recently taught myself, and am making a hat. I am considering, though, unraveling it and starting over, since I was making stuff up until TM's mom showed me what I was doing wrong)
- scarf (a coworker had this amazing cloth scarf that I was inspired by and am planning to sew one for myself)
- quilt (out of the excess of receiving blankets that we have and are not using -- and probably never will)

Of course, this list does not include the various cooking and baking projects I'm planning to indulge in, or the exercise I plan to get, or the various mundane things I also plan to do (like cleaning the house for TM, so that he can spend his non-working time on the weekends with us, or paying bills). As you can see, I'm indulging in some throwback domestic fantasies, and am enjoying it. It's great if it's not the only thing I'm doing, and I know there's an end in sight. It would be truly not great if I didn't have a job to start in a few weeks.

Kid A update: she's eating! So far, she's had rice cereal, baby oatmeal (which she really digs), carrots (that I steamed and pureed myself), peaches, and peas. The peas were a little advanced for her; they were pretty thick. Next time, I think I'll thin them with a little formula. It's what I do with the carrots, anyway.

She's also sitting up extremely well. She gets excited about toys she's playing with or a toy she wants and ends up face-planting a lot, but she does great in the couple of high chairs she's been in (when we've been out at restaurants). So I just ordered a Stokke Tripp Trapp high chair online, and I can't wait for it to come. It should be here on Friday! Whee!

As I mentioned in November, we had some professional photos taken of Kid A. We wanted to wait until we gave the family their Christmas presents before posting them widely. Here are a few shots from our session. Kid A was 4.5 months old. (She just turned 6 months on January 6th!)







Well, Happy New Year! I'm off to clean the kitchen ...

O Holy Pink Slip

What a week. On Wednesday, I was officially laid off. It's now Friday, and soon I will be getting ready to go to a countywide "After the Layoff" workshop with who knows how many other people.

In my office, 38 people got pink slips. (And no, they are not pink. Sadly.) Only 13 CPS workers remain; only 2 workers remain in my Emergency Response unit (out of 15). The district I work in was hit harder than any other; we are the office that gets the bulk of the new hires. Even so, there are plenty of people with more than 4 years with the county who are gone. The people that I associate with child welfare in this county are gone. Damn good workers. Committed. Gone.

I decided ahead of time that Wednesday night would be the night to bring in our living tree and decorate it. For the first time in years, we have a Christmas tree. It's lovely. It's small, but it's got a string of white lights on it, and I was able to fit more than half of our ornament collection on it.* It really looks lovely, and it makes me happy to show it to Kid A in the mornings, all lit up, and talk to her about some of the ornaments.

* Our ornament collection is surprisingly large, especially considering how long it's been since we put up a tree. For years now, my dad's side of the family has exchanged ornaments for Christmas presents, and they have always given one each to TM and me. And for a few years in the early days, my dad got ornaments not just for TM and me, but for our two cats, as well. One year, he even got ornaments for the Yorkies we'd inherited from TM's grandfather ... Point is, we've got a LOT of ornaments. Go, little tree!

Tomorrow, our Christmas begins. We're heading up to my mom's, where we'll see my cousin and his wife and their twin boys for the first time since Kid A's been born. They live in Des Moines, and we took a trip out there in early January, so Kid A was with us, of course, but not on the outside. My brother is coming, too, with his girlfriend, who I'll be meeting for the first time, which is very exciting. And my uncle and his wife, who is excited to meet Kid A. It's a big weekend coming up. And of course it means that we have even less time to get ready for Christmas than usual, because I'm working pretty much every day except for the weekends and Christmas Day. (The rant about having no time off for the holidays and yet being laid off on the 31st would go here, had I the time to write it. Imagine what you might say, and that's pretty much what I would say, too.) Surprisingly, I'm pretty ready. I've still got a number of presents to wrap for later Christmas celebrations, but TM said he would help me with that, so I'm not stressing. He's got the next two weeks off, you bet he can help!

Last night, I baked a pecan pie and a pumpkin pie for this weekend. I'm super anxious to find out if the crust turned out well. I'm a big crust person, and to me, a pie is only as good as its crust. When we were in Mendocino for our 9th wedding anniversary, the Mendocino Bookstore clerk gave me a simple pie crust recipe that calls for Crisco instead of butter. She swore that Crisco's the secret. TM was joking that his mom would be appalled; when we talked pie crust with her after that, she said, "Oh yeah, that's what I use." We'll see if Crisco is the answer. I'll report back.

Tonight, we're going to take Kid A to TM's department Christmas party at the chair's house. None of his colleagues have met her, so it'll be fun to show her off. Hopefully, she won't get too tired and cranky -- the party starts right at her usual evening naptime. Fingers crossed!

If I don't get a chance to post again until after the holidays, Happy Christmas, Happy Hanukkah, Happy Solstice, Happy Kwanzaa, and a Happy, Jolly Good New Year to all!

Stone soup

The Board of Supervisors of my county voted today to cut millions of dollars, hundreds of jobs. Read the article, it does a better job of explaining the details of the approved budget cuts.

I was at that Board of Sups meeting today. From a little before 9:00 this morning until nearly 2:00 this afternoon. Public comment was still going on (wrapping up, though) when I left. Hundreds of people spoke. Social workers, eligibility workers, clerks, foster parents, adoptive parents, attorneys, community members, former CPS clients all turned out and spoke from the heart. Adult Protective Services faces huge cuts in a tiny department. It's brutal.

One of the sups said at one point during public comment, "You make it sound as though we have a choice about making these cuts. We don't. We have no choice." The point was that we know cuts have to be made, but the cuts as proposed will break the Bureau. Some estimates from workers and supervisors indicate that 80% of the workers in my district office will be laid off. Workloads for remaining social workers will double. APS will lose over 60% of its small workforce. One of the people who spoke sounded like an individual with lots of job security -- 30 years with the county, and a pretty high-level individual. He got a warning letter.

Things are bad all over. It's an incredibly scary time for me. I never thought that I would see the kinds of headlines that have been all over every media source for the last few months. I never thought that good, secure, necessary, federally-mandated county jobs would be subjected to the axe like this. I never expected that this country would face another Great Depression, but it looks like that's exactly where we're headed. I feel super lucky for the opportunity to have already had an interview with another county. Things could still work out. But I'm appalled at what's happened here. I'm horrified at the careless disregard that this county is demonstrating toward its employees. I'm disgusted that they must have known this was coming, and over 100 people will be getting pink slips within the week, and summarily dismissed on New Year's Eve. I'm outraged at the mismanagement: less than four months ago, they hired four new people, and spent nine weeks putting us through an intensive training unit. The waste just sickens me.

Needless to say, the atmosphere in my office is dismal. My colleagues are angry, stunned, deflated, worried and depressed. We still have three weeks to slog through. We still have the long march of the pink slips calls, whenever those come out. We still have families to serve, investigations to complete, court reports to write, children to protect. We have to find new jobs, get our own families through the holidays, figure out how to hold on to our remaining assets. It's exhausting.

And tomorrow, I get to drive to Novato (over an hour away from where I live) for another day of training. For real.

Joy to the World

Man, I'm so tired, but if I don't write now, I suspect another weekend will go by without a post.

Kid A has not slept through the night since that first night, but nights are definitely easier since she's transitioned from nursing to exclusively formula. In fact, life in general has been easier. I think that, because I knew she wasn't getting enough from nursing, but I didn't know how much more she needed, supplementing with formula was always such a guessing game. Does she need 2 ounces or 3? Is she really still hungry, or is it time to try to get her to sleep? Is she hungry, or is it gas? Since the wean, it has been so easy. Now she's up to four ounces per bottle, and she wants a bottle every 2 hours or so. She makes these little grunts when she's hungry, and if she doesn't look tired during a feeding, that means she's still up and ready for more playing. It's just terrific, being able to tell what she wants and meeting those needs. Life is sweet these days.

Here's some things that she is NOT doing yet:
* sitting up on her own
* teething
* rolling over
* laughing (much)
* eating cereal (she plays with the spoon every few days, though)

What she IS doing:
* Standing. As often as possible, for as long as possible.
* Holding the bottle during feedings, and practicing putting it into and taking it out of her mouth.
* Refusing the pacifier. This started maybe two weeks ago, and she has been consistent both in refusing it when offered, and no longer needing it when going to sleep.
* Grabbing her feet
* Looking for dropped toys and trying to get them back
* Continuing her love affair with her hands and everyone else's
* Babbling, squealing, and raspberry-ing

This morning, Kid A and I went out to Peet's while TM slept in. On our way back, we stopped off at Home Depot, because they had some living Christmas trees on display. I picked out a tree and had them set it aside, and later in the day, TM and I went back with Kid A and purchased the tree and some new lights. TM did a little research when we got home, and learned that our tree shouldn't be indoors for more than 10 days, so instead of putting it up this weekend, we'll put it off a week. I'm going to try to put up some lights outside tomorrow.

I also called my mom today, since TM had more work to do today than he'd originally anticipated, and asked her to come down and help out with a little babysitting. Fortunately, she was able to spring into action and came in the late afternoon. Ironically, Kid A went down for a nap just a few minutes before Mom got here, and napped for about three hours. But Mom and I spent some time visiting while I dusted and put up a few Christmas decorations, and we even made a little garland out of old-fashioned colored glass ball ornaments and white curling ribbon. It's hanging from the curtain rod above our sliding glass door, and it looks very festive. When Kid A woke up, Mom played with her while TM and I rushed around, vacuuming and cleaning the bathrooms and whatnot. All in all, it was a great visit.

Tomorrow, we'll head back into our native lands to visit friends. Originally, the plan was to make eggnog, but now it looks as though we will be making gingerbread houses! How fun. We're also going to have a brief visit with some friends who just had a baby boy about a month ago.

December is already feeling so crunched: we have our first family Christmas gathering the weekend before Christmas at my mom's (my cousin and his wife and their twin boys will be in California over Christmas, and their first stop is my aunt's house, who lives across the street from my mom). That means I only have 2 weekends to get ready for Christmas, and this one's already half over! I'm kind of in denial about it.

My interview on Thursday went fine, I think. It's out of my control now. I did my best; we'll just wait and see.