Just Barely...

Just Barely....That's how I feel about my survival of today!
Here is a recap of the last 24 hrs:
8:30 pm Sunday Freezer goes berserk and starts rattling like a jet plane. I call maintenance.
9:00 pm The door to my oven and the drawer below are no longer attached, a drawer and cabinet door are no longer attached and the fridge is away from the wall. The fridge is now quiet b/c it's unplugged. I'm not worried about the $100 worth of groceries that might go bad but rather the 18 bottles of pumped milk that might not make it through the night.
Periodically through the night I hear coughs and moans coming from both kids.
5:00am In between sobs I hear a seal barking. The toddler has croup--again. I go in to soothe him but not in time to keep the baby asleep. I put the toddler back into bed and feed the baby. I ask DH if there is any way he can take the day off to stay with toddler and take him to the doctor since it's my first day of work. That came with a resounding no, he had to teach three courses today. I crawl back into bed with less than an hour till the alarm is supposed to go off. I set it for 20 minutes later. But...
5:45 am I hear the toddler again so I turn off the alarm and go get him settled again.
6:00 am I shower and get ready. I then go in to get the boys ready. The baby is starting to stir so I get him ready first. I find the toddler out of his bed and asleep on the floor hugging Bubba, the oversized (his lifesize) teddy bear. In his sleep, he throws an arm over his face and ears to block out the light from the hall and the sound of waiting music coming from the phone that is on speaker. I'm trying to get through to the appointment line to get him in to see a doc.
6:45 am I put the baby in the jumperoo and go back up to get the toddler ready. I'm offered a 10:05am or 1:00pm appointment. Oh cause both are great choices on your first day of work. I agree to the 1:00pm so that I can at least get a half day in and hope that no one cares.
7:10 am Out the door into "where's Noah's Ark?" heavy rain with the kids.
7:25 am Drop off toddler for his first day of preschool. Snap a few pics. Run back to the car.
7:40 am Drop off baby for his first day of daycare. Snap a few pics and try to make sure the sitter understands what to feed him when and when he naps. Run back to the car.
8:00 am Get the spot the furthest away in the lot and dash to Social Studies office in the rain. It's SoCal so the campus is open and made up of various unattached buildings. Wonderful in nice weather, shitty in the rain.
8:10 am Make it into the classroom just as the bell rings. Sit through three classes and a planning period. Fast forward to...
Noon: Dash back across campus to car.
12:30 pm Pick up toddler who is in a different pair of pants from what I left him in. Clearly there was an accident. The teachers discover that he likes to pour things. Open top cup of milk poured into lunch---luckily it was mac and cheese.
1:00 pm See doc, get script.
2:30 pm Swing by the house for a sippy and the daycare paperwork that I left behind (grabbed the manila envelope last night).
3:15 pm Pick up baby who is dressed in the toddler's spare clothes. Apparently, the baby was tugging on his sweater and wanted to wear something else...Never mind that the clothes put on him were in a bag with his brother's name on it. Oh and did I mention that he didn't sleep at all. Yeah, she put him down but b/c he wasn't asleep w/in 10 minutes she decided that meant he didn't want to sleep. I guess the emphatic reassurance that he will cry it out and probably take 20-30 minutes to settle didn't sink in this morning or during the interview. I told her that he stands up for 10 minutes rocking back and forth. Then he realizes that no one is coming and screams for 10-20 minutes and then crashes. He did eat all of his breakfast but somehow didn't get much of either sippy of milk in him, and was served only half of his lunch. Really, if he eats a 1/4 cup of cereal w/ a stage 3 fruit for breakfast and doesn't drink his milk, why would you think that he'd only eat one stage 2 for lunch? She tried to feed him his second stage 2 for a snack but he was too tired to be interested. Hmph....!
4:00 pm Arrive at speech to discover that I'd had a mommy moment and was 30 minutes early. Reload kids into car. Toddler had just fallen asleep in the car and was PISSED to have been woken up. Drive 5 minutes to a Target, walk around for 10 minutes, buy Goldfish snack pack and Coke Zero, get back into car and go back to speech. Oh yeah, get a call from DH telling me he is locked out of the house! The maintenance man locked the front door and the sliding glass door. I admit it, we'd be a great target for a cat burglar b/c we don't lock the doors very often. Mainly b/c with our small car dealership (our four cars that we own plus the truck that we're car sitting) DH has so many keys that he usually doesn't take his big ring which includes the house key. So we just leave the doors unlocked. He asks how long we'll be. This is before I realize that I'm way early for speech so I say 1.5 hrs (he hears an hour). He'd forgotten that I'd decided to go to speech after all. This morning I thought I was going to cancel when I thought toddler was sicker than he really is.
4:30 pm Spend the next 45 minutes trying to get the baby to take a nap while the toddler is in with the therapist. No success. I try to call DH numerous times to tell him that we're going to be later than I thought. It either rings busy, goes to voice mail, or I get the call can't be completed message. He finally calls me and is annoyed that my estimation of my return was so off. Call does not end well.
5:45 pm I return home, feed the kids, call hubby to let him know he can get in the house.
6:15 pm Bath time for the boys.
6:30 pm Baby into bed.
6:45-7:30 pm Load the dishwasher, sweep the kitchen floor, pick out the boys clothes for tomorrow, pick out and iron my clothes for tomorrow, restock babies diapers for tomorrow, tidy up.
7:30 pm Put toddler to bed.
7:45 pm Start futzing around on the computer. Hubby chats with friend about coming to see one of the cars sometime tomorrow. "Let me pass the phone to Maria so you can let her know what time you'll be by during the day." Ah--hello-- I work now! "I'm leaving the house at 6:15 am and not coming back till 6:15pm."

I just reread this somewhat boring but very descriptive post and I'm tired just from reading it. No wonder I barely survived.

Oh the students seem nice enough. I'll have two sections of 11th graders in US History. Since the school's AP program is huge, most students go into AP US. Those who are barely breathing and awake end up in the two classes I'll be teaching (wonderful! I think most of us know how I feel about mainstream classes...) I'll also have two sections of 9th grade World History. The US History teacher wants me to observe for about two weeks before starting to teach; whereas, the World History teacher wants me to "take over" next week! Hopefully I do such a spectacular job on Monday and Tuesday that the W.H. teacher gives me a glorious review to the USH teacher and I can get started sooner in his class. They seem to have a really well devised plan and program, so it should be super easy for me to step right in and get going. They use Power Point for most of the lectures and have students do the same routine daily. It is odd to me that the classes meet daily. I'm used to alternating days so that one week a class meets 3x and the next week it meets 2x. Very odd!
I will be getting a very urban experience in a suburban setting. It will definitely be very different from my two years aboard Quantico where all the kids were the children of Marines and there were only a few hundred kids in the combined middle and high school.

Let's see how tomorrow goes--hopefully it's a full day!
Oh and I'll post some pics on the other site maybe tomorrow (if DH is off long enough for me to get on).

Big Brothering and Little Brothering

My boys have entered the stage that I've been looking forward to for nine months!--Well actually 18 months! They play together---not just in the same room or around each other but actually with each other. It's so heart warming to watch them interact with one another.
The toddler generally parallel plays with other children and toys, as in he plays along side but not necessarily with the same toys as another child. The baby doesn't really have friends yet to play with. So the fact that they play with each other is a huge milestone.
The baby crawls over to where the toddler is playing and pushes his way into the heap of toys or pulls himself up onto the furniture or activity table. That is one of the best sites, watching them play on opposite sides of the same activity table.
Today, the baby figured out how to climb all the stairs up to the second floor. The toddler ran up and down the stairs cheering him on. It's scary to realize that the baby is closer to toddlerhood than infancy. And soon they really will be able to play together, out in the yard or on the soccer field---or row together in a double or a pair (fingers double crossed that they follow me down that path).
Now my in-a-perfect-world-no sibling-rivalry children haven't completely mastered getting along. There is some snatching and some annoyance. There are some tears when the big one snatches from the little and several, "No, no touch!" from the big one to the little one. Especially where THOMAS (as in the Tank Engine) is concerned. They both gravitate to the toys with wheels which means they are both getting early lessons on sharing trucks. But generally speaking, they are really starting to get along and be friends.
In the beginning, the toddler wanted absolutely nothing to do with hugging or demonstrating affection to the baby. He would run in the opposite direction if asked to hug the baby. Now not only will he hug the baby when asked, he more frequently does it voluntarily. When asked, "do you love Mommy?" The answer is "Yes." When asked, "Do you love Daddy?" The answer is "Yeah...Daddy is the poot-der (computer)." And when asked, "Do you love Matt?" The answer is "Y-E-S!!!" That's exactly the way it should be!
The toddler is beginning to be able to say "lil brodda" and "big brodda". I'm glad to know that he's beginning to learn his role, at least one of them, in this family. I'm realistic enough to know that there will be fights and rivalry between the two of them, but I'm really trying to instill in them from the beginning that they are best friends. That's why I've kept them in the same room. Eventually, I want them to have their own rooms again. I know they need their space and individuality, but for right now I want to foster that closeness. I want them to know that no matter what other friends they make, wherever they may go, whoever they may date/marry, or whatever they choose to do, they will always have each other as their best friends. That's what big brothering and little brothering is all about.

This has always gotten me through: remember-- when all else fails, two things always remain the same--faith (however you individually define that) and family.