Aug
2014

Play dates a plenty!

IMG_8792I got to have two different play dates this weekend! One was with Reece and I got to ride a horse. The other was with Dhiya and I also got to ride a horse!

IMG_8777He said

This past week was a blur that ended almost as quickly as it began. We had the celebration of Gabi’s life last week and then before I knew it, we were approaching the weekend. I had Thursday off, and aside from the Saturday that I had off last weekend, the rest of the week was work related. Last week we had a marathon session writing and finalizing our reviews and this week was the launch of delivering them. This being my first experience on the delivering them side, I can say it was both enlightening and turned out to be way easier than I had anticipated. But, truthfully I shouldn’t be surprised as we have a very talented team that is very self aware and delivered some amazing results that I could share with them. I am almost halfway through my reviews and while it made the week fly by, I am feeling very good about them.

IMG_8782Emelia has continued her intense focus on all things gymnastics. Her behaviour this week has really made solid strides forward, with the occasional tests of our sanity that leave Danielle and I organizing who is making the quick run over to the LCBO. But those trips are greatly lessened in the last week as Emelia is focused on ensuring that she can be enrolled in gymnastics this fall.


But then again…

IMG_8787Of course as soon as I tempt karma and start to celebrate her better behaviour, bath time tonight quickly dispersed into a battle of how stubborn she can be. I literally typed that sentence and then as Danielle asked if I could do bath because of the burn boo boo on her arm that is infected (more on that later). I get up, hop into the bathroom and literally the battle began from the moment I arrive on scene. The argument starts with the bottle of conditioner she is holding which she assures me is a bottle of shampoo… and it erodes from there. The sky is white… the clouds are blue… And pretty soon Danielle is forced in to referee because she will not relent from the stubbornness.

IMG_8799I understand a large portion of this is me getting back what I gave as a kid, and I have earned these moments for the grey hairs I gave Mom and Dad, but I’d be lying if I said these are the moments of parenting that are my favourite. I know a good portion of it isn’t helped any that I can be just as stubborn and dig my heals in with her, and I think she and I need to figure out a way to better communicate when we arrive at these standoffs.

That said, she and Danielle are now off calmly working on bedtime, so order is somewhat restored in this bedtime routine.

There were some golden moments this week. There were two nights where she actually recognized and admitted she was tired which is a colossal step for her. But there was also one night this week where she and I connected so much so that I had almost completely erased all the tantrums of the last few weeks. We had the fortune of me only having one closing shift during the week which meant Emelia had both Danielle and I around in the evening and for bedtime. And Tuesday I was off and she actually came with me on an around town adventure so that we could do some research and create a budget for this home gymnastics bar that she saw on YouTube and wants to try and recreate. So as with life, there were ups and downs with Emelia this week. I am sure there are more to come. Such is the job of her parent.

IMG_8802Back to Danielle’s arm: Danielle managed to get a nasty burn on her arm from the stove when taking a pizza out for the daycare kids. We could instantly see that it was a doozie and got some gauze, Polysporin on and wrapped it up to protect it from the rigours of the daycare day. She was diligent about protecting it and keeping it clean and every day we were changing the bandage. By Friday evening we were concerned it was infected and when we went to change the dressing the oozing confirmed it. Off Danielle went to the doctor and home she later came with a batch of external and internal antibiotics to combat the infection. The cocktail of medicine is knocking the crap out of her, but we’re convinced it’s also doing the same to the infection as the last two days we have seen a lot of improvement to the burn.

IMG_8804Tomorrow and Tuesday are my days off this week which is great to have them back to back to give myself a chance to really recharge after the whirlwind couple of weeks we’ve had since getting back from our Prince Edward County vacation. I have a little trip up to Walkerton tomorrow to listen to and possibly pickup an old Marantz amp to play the Rega turntable through. With any luck with that vintage old amp and set of used Mordaunt-Short bookshelf speakers I have also found on Kijiji I will the perfect sound system – better than the crappy $40 phono preamp that I have now that delivers static about 10 minutes into anything I listen to.

IMG_8805But the bigger thing is – and don’t tell Emelia – Danielle and I have a weekend away planned together in Wolfie to celebrate my birthday and our anniversary all in one. We’ve booked campsite back at Lakeport State Park, and Emelia will spend the weekend with her Poppa and Grandma. It will be just the kind of weekend Danielle and I need—to reconnect and possibly even sleep in? It’s our fifteenth wedding anniversary this year, and honestly suits us that we’re not doing something extravagant and expensive. It will be a much needed weekend away where we don’t need to worry about proximity to the kid stuff. In stead we chose a site near the beach… far, far away from the playground. I am getting pretty excited about!

 

IMG_8806She said

This week was well a shit storm but it ended with two amazing days. The chaos started from the beginning, bright and early Monday morning. Suddenly after feeling I was in a stable place in daycareland and had it all worked out I had a sudden and shocking opening. It blindsided me and set a tone for the rest of the day. So with that to absorb I was dealing with the rest of my day.

After spending the morning with the children at the park we came home and I started prepping lunch. I had the veggies, fruit, cheese, chicken all prepped all I needed to do was take out the gluten free pizza from the oven. Now lets start that I have a strict rule with the children that I cannot have them in the kitchen when I am preparing lunch. Well, that was not being listened to, especially from the oldest children. After repeated requests to get out of the kitchen and to give space while I am finishing Emelia kept asking for god knows what. I turned to her as I was taking the pizza out of the oven and my knee hit the door and it closed on my right arm. Instantly it turned black. I calmly turned the oven off, put the pizza on the stove and told Emelia and the children to stay in the living room. I walked upstairs to see John who was still home and we dealt with it. I have to say I have no idea how I didn’t swear or scream out because it hurt like hell.

IMG_8807So for 4 days I was keeping it clean. During this time I had to prep the house for daycare interviews to fill my upcoming opening. Thankfully one of my amazing former families had highly recommended my care to their best friends and their friends had still not found the perfect match for their beautiful son. It was perfectly timed for them and in less than 24 hours I had a full daycare again. There will be a gap in income until this little boy starts and that will mean we have to watch our spending once again. But hopefully this is the last change in enrolment for a while.

IMG_8812Back to the burn, I went on my way, in a lot of pain but worked through it. Still going to the gym, bandaging it and cleaning it. By Friday I wasn’t feeling great, having strange pain up my arm and just feeling pretty worn out. But I had attributed it to really terrible sleep as a result of the pain in my arm and well stress as well. But as I had been doing each night once the children left for the day I took the bandage off to air the wound out for a few hours. Well lets say it looked horrible, the gauze was covered in infection and the whole area was swollen and looking really bad. Don’t need to go into much more detail than that but it was pretty gross.

IMG_8809Off I went to the after hours clinic, after waiting for an hour I got to see the doctor and instantly he said it was badly infected. A second or worse degree burn and that I could not re-bandage it but now I was on two strong antibiotics. One external and one internal. I got the meds from the pharmacy and they told me the lovely news that this medication had to be taken strictly every 6 hours 4 times a day. So I am setting alarms to take the meds late at night and very early in the morning. But considering the alternative of a hospital stay I will take my first world medication and deal with it.

IMG_8811The meds are making me feel like a bag of crap, it took until this evening before I could feel that they were finally kicking in. I am no longer swollen in the arm, the infection is no longer oozing (yes aren’t you glad I am a descriptive person), in time the other symptoms will pass and hopefully this infection will be a thing of the past. Good times I tell you.

So that was the week, thankfully the weekend was a whole lot better.

IMG_8808Knowing John had to work all weekend I had tried to plan out what to do with Emelia on the weekend and take full advantage of our short summer. A few weeks ago I had planned a play date with one of my best friends Komal and her two girls. And after a visit with one of my amazing daycare moms who I have become good friends with we had our Saturday planned as well.

Emelia has always been Reece’s ‘fake big sister’, so when Norma mentioned she was taking Reece and Presley to a county fair we had our plans for Saturday. John worked the later shift so we dropped him off, packed snacks and were on our way to Shedden a small town about 40 minutes away. It was an old fashioned county fair. Full of simple rides, animals to pet, horses to ride, crafts to be bought and trackers to be climbed on. All in all kid heaven. Emelia and Reece were like two peas in a pod. Norma and I have developed a great friendship and I know that long after our relationship as daycare and parent is done I hope that we will be there to see our kids grow up and keep our friendship going. She and I clicked pretty well from the first moments and over 4 years later the friendship has grown. I am so happy that I get to see her kids grow up and that her beautiful daughter starts care next month.

IMG_8810Before we knew it the day had flown by and Emelia and I had to hightail back to London to do the car swap with John so her could have the car at the end of his shift. We were home for only a quick dinner and then off again. We had been invited to Emelia’s best friends Anna and Grace with another classmate Katie to have a bonfire, play and roasting marshmallows. How could we possibly resist? Susan (the twins mom) and I have become good friends through the girls’ friendship and always have a great time. So wine and a good fire with great friends was a perfect way to end a pretty great day.

And there was more. Today! After doing our normal Sunday errands of groceries and meal planning Emelia and I were off to Komal and Matt’s to see their girls for a day full of fun and fresh air. Komal and I had talked back and forth about a couple options and finally we had decided that with beautiful weather we would go to Kustermans Berry Farm. More than just a farm to pick blueberries it is a kids dream. There are ziplines, a petting zoo, a massive bouncy ‘pillow’, berry picking, go-carts, horse riding. Basically a great way to just run around and be a kid. The girls had a blast. Emelia, Dhyia and Simya had an amazing time. The girls just kept saying that they could not wait to see each other again and that they were the best of friends. It was the sweetest thing. Emelia and Dhiya have already planned another playdate but this one might involved their house as Emelia has discovered that their basement has been transformed into a little gymnast dream.

So this week was full of highs and lows, my determination is that I will focus on the highs over the lows so this weekend was an amazing weekend filled with amazing friends and lots of time with my little girl. And honestly how much better can life be than that.

2 thoughts on “Play dates a plenty!

  1. Hope you don’t mind me reading your articles they are so good and I was a good friend of Gabi’s I used to do day care for her before my cancer I miss her very much. I am enjoying reading what you wrote thank you—-Gretta

    • Gretta, we don’t mind at all that you read this. We’re all picking up the pieces after we lost her, and it’s nice to have these connections as a result.

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