Things are going great!

Update:



The past few days have been really great. I've seen friends, gone out every day, and Charlie is settling in to life with me and I'm settling in to life with her. We don't have much of a schedule yet (although I try, she determines when she falls asleep.... sometimes I rock her for hours and she won't fall asleep!) we do have a routine and that has been helpful.



Everyday we do one outside activity in the morning and one walk in the afternoon with one dog. The dogs have to take turns, which sucks for them, but I can only handle one dog and one stroller safely. I remind myself that 90% of the dogs in the world live in a worse situation, either starving in a third world country, or tied to a chain, or even just in a nice garden but never being walked. So a walk every third day is not ideal, but it will have to do.



One thing that I've found happening which is not great, but I can't help it, is I'm falling into the daytime TV black hole! After reading so much about Jon and Kate Plus 8 I finally turned it on one morning and I'm hooked! It's sad this family is splitting up... They are showing re-runs though and it is interesting to watch and see if there are any foreshadowing moments. For example, yesterday Jon had to chase a ball down the street and Kate said something like: "Daddy's running away!" and Jon came back and said something like: "I wouldn't run away in broad daylight, I'd sneak away." Stuff like that.



Now that I'm taking care of ONE child, I can fully appreciate Kate and what she does on a daily basis, taking care of 8 children! And she clips coupons! The amount of stuff she manages to organize and make happen for her family is truly amazing to me. I know people criticize her for being mean to Jon, but I haven't seen too much of that. I see a take charge woman who gets the job done, with 8 kids (6 under the age of 3). Amazing.



Then after Jon and Kate, comes "The Strictest Parents in the World" which is a show on the Country Music Channel (weird). The show can be summarized is a few sentences: Bad teens (usually from the big city Up North) get sent to the Bible thumping farm family (always Down South) and get their heads straightened out in a 30 minute episode. It's ridiculous how blatantly "red state" the show is.... but it's still awesome TV watching!



Then there is "The Littlest Couple" (a new show on a married couple of dwarfs - or "Little People"), "Ruby" (a show about a 700 pound woman) and all day long I could get sucked in, so it's good we have a plan for each day to get out of the house. How did I ever live without these shows??? I can't believe I was spending 8 hours a day at WORK instead of watching these shows!! Live and learn, I guess.



I also try and do one household chore per day, either sweeping or gardening or laundry, while Charlie is napping. So things are not totally out of control around the house. I had a friend come over for dinner on Wednesday and was not ashamed of the condition of the house and even had fresh flowers on the dining room table. She even mentioned: "There's not much dog hair in your house!"





Today as my chore, I cooked up a zucchini and tomatoes and onion from the garden. I just chopped everything up, and sauteed it in light oil over a low heat for a few minutes while doing other chores. Sprinkled on a little garlic salt and YUM!!! So far, I'm doing well on my vow not to feed Charlie refined foods or sugar. She's at the wonderful stage of eating whatever I put in her mouth without question, so I'm putting in lots of veggies and green things (she is currently teething on a large chunk of raw zucchini which she can't choke on, for example). Hopefully in doing this, she will have a wide array of tastes once she hits the stage of pickyness... or maybe she will never hit that stage! One can always hope!



Charlie is doing much better as far as letting me leave the room for a few minutes. We have "quiet time" everyday, whether she naps or not, in her Pack and Play next to my bed. She will play quietly while I read a chapter in my book. This is nice time for me, and I think it helps her to have time when she is responsible for amusing herself for a little while. She can do this for 20 to 30 minutes now, with occasional input and comments from me, with no problems.



The only remaining "issue" is when I go in the garden to pick up poo, pick blackberries, or weed the vegetable garden. She really hates being stuck on the deck in her highchair. I can live with this being the only issue though.


I'm getting lots of daily kisses too!

Sorry this is so "all over the place" but that is also the state of my brain. For example, yesterday I put my wallet on the roof of my car "for a second" in order to strap Charlie into her car seat, and forgot I had put it there. When I got to the store, a mile away, I had a mild heart attack when I realized my wallet was not in the seat next to me. Everything in my life is in that wallet.... Someone was watching out for me though. It was still on the car roof. Amazingly.

So life is settling down, and we are enjoying each other.