Quick update before dashing off to more schoolwork

So, looking back upon the delurking post, I got four comments- all from people who I know read the webpage, which seems like a giant failure to me. Even the person who spent 15 minutes reading various entries did not bother to say hi- okay, I’ll try again another time!

I’m starting to catch up on the overwhelming amount of work, so I guess that I’ll post quickly. K has been begging to leave with me when it’s time for me to go home the last week or so. I think she misses our time together as much as I do. I don’t know what to do to help her realise that I’m still here, I guess only time will convince her of this. On the other hand, she loves her new school and has adjusted really well to the new setting, which is great!

I watched X on Monday and he didn’t cry until he was tired. Not when mom handed him to me, not at any point until it was okay, because he was tired and had to have a way to communicate that. Yay!

I working on a paper in which I must take a stand- as the person in charge of a private adoption agency will I allow gays and lesbians to adopt? At first, I was thinking that’s a really easy essay to write, but now that I’m working on it, I realise that it’s hard to find sources that would argue either way, making it slightly more difficult than previously planned.

Got to run- I will possibly post more later, I have some cute K stories to share if I have the time and remember all of them.

Oh I almost forgot that I wanted to mention two of my google searches

• "The server hosting the feed returned a Forbidden message." <-- seriously, and I have this typed word for word from an error that Bloglines was giving me a month or so back! Hmm, I'm not entirely sure if you found what you were looking for, but one option is always attempting to unsubscribe/resubscribe to whichever blog is giving you the message, or the other choice is simply wait it out, it usually goes away in a couple of days.
• Princess Beatrice, Height <-- okay, here's the deal. Ever since I did that birthday meme where I said that Princess Beatrice was born on the same day as me I have gotten google searches. Apparently this person wanted to know how tall she is- sorry I can't answer that question (at least not without searching for it!)

Now I'm really off - bye!

Come out, come out wherever you are!

Upon realising that yesterday I had quite a few hits (including two searching for ‘sunset’ immediately after the meme post) and that I’ll be away from posting for a couple days, I’m officially asking for delurkers.

I love to meet new people- I think it’d be fun to know who’s reading my page- so say hi!! Let me know who you are and where you're from? If you have a blog leave a link- I'll come visit! Are you a mommy? Daddy? Nanny? None of the above?

I’m about ½ way done with the biggest of my projects and I’ve started several of the others- so this will be a good entry to leave up for a while and see what happens.

Sunrise

You Are Sunrise

You enjoy living a slow, fulfilling life. You enjoy living every moment, no matter how ordinary. You are a person of reflection and meditation. You start and end every day by looking inward. Caring and giving, you enjoy making people happy. You're often cooking for friends or buying them gifts. All in all, you know how to love life for what it is - not for how it should be.

What Time Of Day Are You?

So- I know that I really shouldn't be here, but I'm a major procrastinator. Regardless of the fact that I'm stressed- I wanted to put this up!

Pardon me...

... while I panic and fall apart for the next week. I don't know if I'll be back here for a while- I have about 100 projects due in the next week and no time to do so- including a project that I found out has been moved up a week- when I haven't even started it. I'm done- I wanna go home and cry- although I've done a pretty good job of that in the last hour or so.

Sometimes I feel like all I ever do is drive...

Yesterday, I got over the mountain at 2:30pm- only 23 hours after I left Oakland. They closed the road, and almost immediately after the guy at the hotel had swiped the credit card and I had signed the forms authorizing charges- they reopened the road. Not that it would have been a very great drive, but still.

Today, I drove to school for one class- which got out early, meaning that I actually spent more time in my car driving than I did in class today. But, on the bright side I finished my projects for my independent study class (except for one tutorial thing that I'm doing next Tuesday afternoon). I feel like a giant weight has been lifted off my shoulder.

I was supposed to be with X from 930 or 10am until 5 yesterday, but ended up going from 3-5 instead, because of inability to get over the mountain. It works out though, because in 2 hours with him I earn as much as I do in 5 hours with K- so it doesn't matter if it's a shorter visit. We went for a walk and hung out in the fresh air because it was so beautiful out. And, he didn't fuss until he was hungry- probably largely because he couldn't see mommy so crying out to her wasn't really an option. I mean, he had a couple little whimpers, but I changed positions and walked around or sat down and let him bounce in my lap and he stopped fussing before he started to actually cry.

Tomorrow, I pick K up from preschool and then Friday I have her all day long because mom is going out of town for a scrapbooking retreat. Saturday I'll have the kids for 3 hours or so, to let dad get yardwork done. However, he will have to take his son to baseball practice no matter how much that might get in the way of his yardwork because K's music class starts at the exact same time as baseball and they are not very close to each other. Last summer, he spent 5 times as much time in that yard than he did with his kids, which made me very sad for them.

I'd like you all to meet X!

Let’s talk about X (psst, over there ( in the sidebar). X is eight months old, and I have only watched him once, although I technically got the job two weeks ago. They went to visit grandma that first week, so I didn’t spend any time with him. Next week I’ll have him on Monday and then after that Mondays and Fridays. X has hit that point that all children hit where they are extremely attached to mommy, and only mommy to hold them, play with them, whatever else. Knowing that just about all children do this makes caring for infants a lot easier, but not too easy. Because, what do babies do when they want mommy? That’s right- they cry! A lot, and loudly to express their opinions.

X likes to bounce on an exercise ball- in fact, that’s how he falls asleep. So, when he fusses mom generally bounces him, because of the soothing effect it seems to have. When he started to fuss for mom (on top of having missed a nap, or two) she suggested that I bounce him. I’m thinking, great this’ll be fun. I bounced that kid for no less than an hour, and when I was finally done- I felt like I’d never be able to stand up again, that’s how much my back hurt! Hopefully, with practice it’ll get better- and less painful.

We did play a little bit, but mom sat nearby so that we were all playing together. Even just being in proximity to mom seemed to help a lot. And when we were bouncing, being able to see mom was the key. It didn’t matter that someone else was holding him, as long as he could turn his head and see mommy. Which is a good sign- because eventually he’s got to adjust to me, right? The fact that mom didn’t have to hold him means that he has the ability to be separated from her without distress- as long as she’s still around, which most of the time that will be the case.

Any advice for easing that transition? Feel free to leave a comment- if you leave an email address as well I’ll get back to you!

I’m supposed to go tomorrow morning- but I’m stuck about 150 miles from home due to snow. Stupid snow- I really wish that it would just be spring already. And, why is that it still managed to snow despite the fact that the weather was clear all afternoon on the bay- where the storm should have come from. This sucks!

Meme

I stole this from Granny who stole it from someone else- it’s pretty interesting, you should check it out (oh and I stole several days ago and never managed to get it up).

Look up your birthdate, minus the year, at Wikipedia. Then, list 3 events, 2 births and 1 death from the choices that the site gives you.

Three Events
1969- An iconic picture of the Beatles is taken to be used on their album Abbey Road.
1972 - Richard Nixon accepts the nomination as candidate for the presidency.
1974 - Watergate scandal: U.S. President Richard Nixon announces his resignation, effective the next day. ( How interesting that not only did he (in long the run) become ‘president’ on my birthday, but he also stopped being president! I knew that he resigned on my birthday, but not that he accepted the nomination the same day.

Two Births
1976 - Drew Lachey, American singer (98 Degrees)
1988 - Princess Beatrice of York ( I also get JC Chasez from NSync (yay for me, two bands that I refuse to listen too), Dustin Hoffman and several others, many of whom I’ve never heard of before!

One Death
2005- Fay Wray ( this was the only death on the list whose name I recognized, seriously, and I’m not sure who she really was, ‘cept for the fact I remember that she had died last year on my birthday!

This. Kid. Must. Be. Cut. Off.

(of all sugar that is). She is wild, crazy and well that’s about it. I can’t stop giggling with her- which is a good thing ‘cause otherwise I’d be stressing about the fact that I don’t have the homework I need for tomorrow and several other things.

I just asked her if we were going to go take a bath- her response: 'uh, no, proddy not'- excuse me, but where did those words come from. She’s singing a song (that I don’t understand a word of) and telling me ‘finish my songy’ Sure K, I don’t even know any of the words!

I cut 10 inches off my hair- and at this current moment she is playing with my hair- telling me to 'look up sky, I braid you hair'- which is something I tell her every single day. At least she’s learning new words I suppose.

I’m staying here tonight ‘cause mom is going to be home late, and K is determined that she’s going to sleep ‘in Anya bed.’ Which is amusing, because as I said earlier, this kid sleeps nowhere but her own bed. I think it’s humorous that she calls in ‘Anya bed’ or ‘Anya room’ when you consider that I’ve only stayed here a handful of times- but she associates the guest room with me. Every now and then at nap she’ll ask to sleep in Anya room- I always let her lay down there but if she doesn’t sleep after about 30 minutes then I put her in her own bed.

I put her to bed at about 730, not long after B got home from baseball practice- I managed to get him down about 15 minutes after he got home, with story time and everything! I’m rather proud of myself, because I’d be willing to bet dad rarely gets them to bed before 8 on Wednesdays after he gets home late.

First Day- long week

K's first day at preschool was Monday- I got there about 5-10 minutes early to pick her up, because I really didn't want to risk being late (I tried for 15 minutes, but stupid road construction took about 10 minutes of my time). Her teacher said that she did well, and I believe it- however, she certainly clung to me as if to say 'I'm so glad you're here, I don't know how I feel about this place.' To start the morning, she said to her mom 'mommy stay a little' and mommy stayed for about 20 minutes, when she left K was all smiles and everything was good. I have a feeling that she stayed happy for the whole time she was there. I picked her up today and again she clung to me, but I got words out of her, and I think that she likes school. It probably helps that the teacher passes out gummy bears as the kids leave her classroom!

Last night, we went to dinner because mom had a meeting, and dad's out of town. We had a great time, and K was super happy (if not super hyper) and behaved well. Which was good considering that she threw a 30 minute fit a daycare when mom dropped her off and slept for 1.5 hours at daycare. This is the kid who sleeps nowhere but her own bed- and I mean nowhere, we've tried! Tonight, we'll have a quick dinner and B has baseball practice, mom has another meeting and I'm staying the night. It doesn't make sense for me to drive home past about 930 when I have to get up and go to school early tomorrow, especially when you consider I'm about half way to school when I'm here (I leave my house by 6, I'll leave here by 630).

I got a hit for 'speech birthdays' today- I wish I knew what you were looking for, milestones? I'm not sure. I feel like I could enlighten if only I understood! I updated my blogroll (only one new link this time) and my kids list (one new kid, but he doesn't have an intro since I haven't actually spent a lot of time with him yet).

A Bit of Blogkeeping

If you’ve noticed- there’s a list of the kids who are mentioned on this page, along with their ages and siblings. If you click on the linked ones you’ll find the entry where I first introduced them (or in the case of K and B, most of these entries are about them, and I never really introduced them so their links are some of my favourites I guess). Those who don’t have links will be introduced in the coming days/weeks/whenever I get a chance.

I've had a lot of lurkers lately- and I'd like to welcome you all to say hi! I'm not scary I promise- it'd be interesting to see who's visiting me!

Now, K starts preschool on Monday- she’ll be pulled out 2-3 times a week for speech and at least once a week for physical therapy. They determined that she’s far behind physically, and not so much speech-wise (although regardless of her speech she qualifies because of her nodules). I think that the reason for a physical delay is because she’s so little (something like the 10th percentile in both height and weight)- there are a lot things you can’t do if your legs can’t reach that far (like climbing up the stairs one foot at a time). I’m going to pick her up from her first day of school, along with Wednesday and then starting next week I’m only going to have her on Wednesdays. That frees Mondays and Fridays for the two families that are neighbours (H and S in one family, X (age 8 months) in the other).

I got a hit this morning from someone searching for ‘naughty Anya’- now I don’t know what you were looking for but you probably didn’t find it here! Yesterday I actually got five hits from search engines (definitely my most so far- usually it’s maybe on or two) but the rest of the hits were from people looking for something about nannies. It's kind of exciting that my hits are beginning to become more and more diverse- on some level I suppose.

Two New Jobs, One Long Day

Yesterday, I had two separate jobs. One was for one (of two) families that I talked to when I turned down the other job. This family has a 4 year old, H, and a one year old, S. The mom wants me for about 3 hours twice a week- but she's super concerned about their lifestyle differences, and me being comfortable in the setting. For starters, they live way off the beaten path- in fact my car will not get to their house right now, so I park it at the top of a hill and they come get me- solely on solar/wind power. Secondly, they're going to homeschool H, with rather interesting techniques- I can't remember the name of the author who's ideas they're using, but when I find out I'll share here, maybe some of you will have heard of him before and have insights on the techniques he provides. And then, they're Jewish, which to me isn't a big deal, but to them it might be (I'm not sure yet)- as you can probably tell from previous posts, I'm Christian- what tipped her off to this was the fact that my signature in emails is a Bible verse. I'm totally able and willing to accept this job and work with their ideals, and while the religion issue will be one that I need help with that's okay. I can work with the rest of their beliefs and desires for their children. In fact, it's probably a good practice for when I'm in a classroom and have children whose parents don't agree with my ideology (on a lot of levels- academic, religious, discipline, etc)- I'll have to adapt in that situation and I'm sure that I can! Mom seemed to be okay with me, and I think that she could tell that I was pretty comfortable with her kids- especially H, since S napped for much of the three hours I was there, but when he was awake we all played together well- in fact, I'm going back next Friday (as far as I know, but I don't know times so maybe it'll change) for another three hours and then we'll figure out set hours.

The other family just wanted to be able to go to dinner without kids for the first time in approximately 3 years. They have a one-year-old and a two-year-old (he'll be three next month)- and they left me without asking a lot of questions. You'd think that maybe, just maybe you'd ask your first babysitter some questions- leave the name of a doctor, neighbour, something. But now, they wrote down their cell phone number, informed me that they might be out of range where they were going and that whatever the kids wanted to do was fine, bathtime was about 7 and they may or may not eat dinner. Yay my favourite kind of job- one in which I know nothing, not even if I'll be able to get ahold of mom and dad in case of emergency. Now, I know that last time I had a family who went really far away on their first outing with me watching their kids, BMC told me that if you find someone that you trust to watch your kids you will go as far as you can in a day and that I should take it as a compliment- but don't you want to meet me first? At least with that other family, I'd gone over once and met the girls before mom and dad took off- this family I showed up fifteen minutes early (like I almost always do), got a five minute tour and mom and dad left- I don't get it, sometimes parents baffle me. And then, when they got home (fifteen minutes late) dad handed me exactly 3 hours worth of pay- when I had in reality been there for much closer to 3.5 hours, gotten their kids to eat dinner, given them bath and played endlessly with them for the remainder of the time. If they call me again, we need to have a chat about paying your babysitter for the time that she's there, especially if you leave early and come home late!

Body Image

Last night’s discussion at Intervarsity was about body image. Now, I know that this topic has been discussed without end out here in blogging world. And yet, I want to provide my perspective- one that I avoided sharing during the last couple of weeks, in large part due to the fact that the conversation centered around spouses, and well let’s face it- I’m not married, heck, I’ve never even had a boyfriend. Therefore, my argument would have been highly debatable by those with more experiences.

Also, as a twenty-year-old college student (other than Haley I don’t think I have readers that are about that same age- if you are, say hi!). I can offer a perspective from someone just out of their teens, and recently entered into the world of college, where expectations about yourself and others change greatly. It's not uncommon for college freshmen to gain weight because of meal cards, and buffet style eating, or develop eating disorders because of lack of regulation and people making sure that you eat something- not to mention the pressure that goes along with looking just right. It's not much different between college and high school.

I’ve struggled for a long time with image- I’m overweight, and I have a hard time admitting it. Most of the time I’m okay-ish with my body but like most young adults there were always things that I didn’t like. That was until about eight months ago when I picked up this awesome book entitled Wanting to be Her: Body Image Secrets Victoria Won’t Tell You. Let me just say that this book changed a lot about me and my opinions about my body. It opened my eyes to the fact that our bodies were made this way for a reason- and while it’s important to stay healthy- healthy does not often mean thin.

Last night we talked about how people often look in the mirror and say bad thing about themselves- and the importance of saying something to a person who you hear saying these things. This is an interesting idea, because many people don't realise that they do it. It's so ingrained in our culture that we have to look a certain way and be unhappy with how we do look. Our challenge was to look in the mirror and find at least three things that we like about ourselves instead of focusing on the negatives.

Nothing I would have done would have been enough

When I finally got the courage (as well as a spare moment) to call the mother with the two young kids back and tell her that I didn't want the job, I lucked out to get her voice mail. I left her a message that plain and simply stated that I felt that the job was too many hours- especially with children who may or may not nap. After all, I have homework, and a lot of it right now- it is the end of my junior year of college. Well, today she called, and I answered it mostly because I thought it might have been K's mom, and I didn't want her to think that I wasn't going to answer her calls (although looking back, I could have just said we were upstairs and I didn't make down in time or something). Instead, it's the mother who's job I didn't want- who tells me that I've put her in a major bind and basically yells at me for not taking her job. Um, excuse me, but you're the one who went back on her word, not me. About the time that I was crying while on the phone last week, you might have considered looking for someone else to fill the position. Oh and you still have two weeks to find someone to fill in- heaven forbid you might actually have to spend 6 hours with your children.

I'll have to post about the newest potential opportunity I've got on the job front (I think I wrote a little a couple posts back, but a lot has happened since then). But, right now I've got to go write a paper about whether potential parents should be given a test- and if so, what types of questions should be on the test. I'm going to agree with this one, purely because I've procrasinated so long that it seems kind of worthless to spend a ton of time looking up new references- I'll stick with the textbook, thanks!

Baseball time!

I spent the weekend in Oakland (with a quick trip into San Francisco for dinner)- oh how good it felt to be back, I didn’t get there near as early as I would have liked, but just in time for the gates to open. This is because we had to put chains on the tires- (have I mentioned how I feel about the snow?) - and then we couldn’t get them off again. There was no doubt we’d pay the guy on the side of the road 30 bucks to put them on, but then there was no one to take them off again when we were done. However, what seemed to take a long time really only took 10 minutes.

When we got the game I went to the dugout and visited with my friends whom I haven’t seen since September, all of us were just so happy to be there that it didn’t matter that there was a chance of rain! And then, it didn’t- no rain whatsoever!! It was marvellous- and to top it all off the A’s won the game by 11 runs and my ‘boy’ got to pitch to close out the game. My best friend and I were on television, but since I was at the game, I didn’t get to see it. Maybe they’ll reuse the footage when the Giants come back in a couple months.

We went to dinner at Joe’s Crab Shack (cool place, check it out if you have the opportunity) in San Francisco- getting across that dang bridge was half the battle, actually paying the toll was the major battle! Once we’d paid the toll everything was smooth rolling until I got off at the wrong off ramp, although we managed to find our way around ourselves. Dinner was delicious- and way to much food, even though once we were all full we kept picking at each others food. After dinner we walked along the Embarcadero for a while and stopped at just about every shop there was! I really enjoyed spending some time in the city, because usually when I go to a game I only have time to go the game, hang out after and drive home. I hardly ever see any of the city that I’m visiting. When we drove back across the bay to the hotel where we were staying, I only got lost once trying to find the freeway- big improvement from last time, yay!

I could not believe the parking related hassles. How do people in S.F. deal with their cars? Or do they just not own them? Because, in less than 24 hours I paid over $40 just to park the car- that's ridiculous!

Tomorrow’s game is opening night- and I can’t wait- it’ll be great. The months between October and April are so long that it sometimes seems like baseball will never get here.