So I haven't posted in a while. This is because last Wednesday, I went back to work. That right, my maternity leave is over. The week before I went back I brought my baby to the babysitter to see that he'd take a bottle. He took it nicely. On Wed., he refused. I didn't know what happened. My schedule is such that I can go to the babysitter in the middle of the day to nurse him if I need to. Thursday, again he refused the bottle. Now, I have a lot of hours and I was also given four hours a week that I have to fit into my schedule to sit with girls one on one to help them out. So, I was trying to work out how I was going to do that and to shuttle back and forth to the babysitter (who lives pretty close to the school). On Sunday, I called her to see if I should come or if he took the bottle. She told me to come because he was hungry and by the time I'd get there she'd see if he took the bottle or not. I got there and she had him in his car seat and he was gobbling up the bottle she was holding. We warmed more up and he ate it very nicely. I was so impressed. So he does know how to take a bottle. This makes my life a lot easier. Now I can stay in school and pump instead of shlepping to her and nurse (which take a lot longer than the electrip double sided pump). Thank goodness that I don't have too many classes. I do have a lot of hours though. It was also nice to start slowly. I taught Wed. and Thurs. which meant that I had two days to recuperate. Then I taught Sun. and Mon. and today is my day off. I come home very tired and needing to nurse but my son is usually happily asleep in his car seat. I try to "rest" or relax as much as possible once I get home but that doesn't really happen. It's nice to be back and to get back into the swing of things. I'm happy as long as my baby is happy and as long as I have time in the afternoon to be with the kids. I do wish I had more time to sleep though.
There is a new girl in school who came from Miami. Being the token English speaking teacher, I was asked to tutor her and help her out with some of the basics. I feel so bad for her. She's so lost. She has no clue what's going on. In Miami she studied in Beis Yaacov which means that she doesn't know Israeli Hebrew. It's going to be like starting from scratch. Luckily she also undertands Spanish and there are two Spanish speaking girls in her class. I hope this makes it a little easier on her. Yesterday she was crying. I think that everything was just overwhelming her and frustrating. I hope that she is able to get olim hours and a teacher to help her out so that she can start to make up lost time. It's not easy making aliya at that age. I always say that either people should come when their kids are really young (like gan age) or when their kids are all older (like college age). Anyway, let's hope this schoolyear is fruitful and that I am successful at teaching the students middot as well as English.
Showing posts with label sleep. Show all posts
Showing posts with label sleep. Show all posts
Monday, January 19, 2009
Monday, November 3, 2008
Follow up Post
I'm doing much much better thank goodness. My kids are all sleeping and it's pretty early so I'm taking out some time for myself to blog a little. Yesterday I did much better. I tried very hard not to constantly call my husband at work and not to be overly negative. It's very hard for me because I really do complain a lot. I also tried to be calmer at home. I've pretty much given up on doing any housework and I've focussed on sleeping whenever possible. Unfortunately, this didn't work. The baby didn't sleep all morning until 12. After grabbing a bite I layed down for a short nap and then picked up my son.
He recevied a note from the Rebbe that his reading was on a very low level. Of course I don't think he realized that the note said that. I know that he's behind the other boys. Part of this is because he's an English speaker who was in an all English environment until he was 3. Part of it is because he's younger than the other boys and they push them to know how to read at a very young age. Part of it is also because he isn't surrounded by Hebrew all the time like the other boys. We also don't practice as much as we should just because there isn't time and he ususally doesn't have the strength. His history of acheiving reading can be another post.
So, I called my husband about that and hopefully we'll talk to the Rebbe tonight and see what's going on. I devoted time to my son when he was home because the baby was sleeping so I could give him undivided attn. Then it was time to pick up my daughter, the real challenge. We went to the makolet where she grabbed some chocolate and wouldn't put it back until she ripped it open. I wasn't so happy but I think I handled the situation well.
What really broke up the day nicely was taking my son to Talmud Torah in the afternoon. This is a program that we have to pay for on a monthly basis where a rav from the yishuv teaches them about the parsha. They get a treat at the end. It's organized by age. After picking up the kids from gan we rest a little and then head out to the shul where the TT takes place. There is a playground outside where my daughter can run around and get out all of her energy. It was nice to be outside and not cooped up in the house all day. This made a big difference.
The hardest part of the day is dinner and bedtime. She gets overtired and hyper. She pulls my son into her games and he also starts acting wild. They get into mischief together. Like I said, I was able to pretty much keep my cool and control my reactions. I was too tired from kvetchy baby to be able to blog last night.
Today, baby again didn't want to sleep in the morning. Luckily for me, he took a nap around 12:30 and slept until 2:45. This gave me a chance to rest as well. I left my kids at a babysitter until 3:30. Again, taking the kids to the TT really breaks up the day and is helpful in keeping me sane.
What I really need in an ideal world is someone to take my kids out and someone to clean up (do dishes, put away toys and other things my kids place on the floor, sweep up etc.) I am not getting to the housework and it's starting to pile up. My husband doesn't get home until after 8. Then he learns until he goes to sleep. He helps a lot with the morning routine but basically I'm on my own.
I guess I forgot how hard it is to have a newborn. My nutty daughter was the best newborn ever. She didn't cry until she was 6 months. She slept through the night at a very early age and in general did everything early. I always said to my hubby that I feel that she was never a newborn. That is part of the reason that it's harder this time. They are 2 3/4 of a year apart and my daughter is toddler. She is very active and demands a lot of attention. She was not like that as a baby and so I probably thought that having another one would not be too difficult. Boy was I wrong. I find myself nursing all the time and barely resting or getting anything done around the house. My son also nursed lots and very frequently so I remember what that's like.
Right now I'm just trying to stay positive and to realize that all of this is normal. This isn't easy but that's okay. Life isn't easy and G-d doesn't give you a test you can't pass. Hopefully I'll be able to prove to Him that I can pass this one.
He recevied a note from the Rebbe that his reading was on a very low level. Of course I don't think he realized that the note said that. I know that he's behind the other boys. Part of this is because he's an English speaker who was in an all English environment until he was 3. Part of it is because he's younger than the other boys and they push them to know how to read at a very young age. Part of it is also because he isn't surrounded by Hebrew all the time like the other boys. We also don't practice as much as we should just because there isn't time and he ususally doesn't have the strength. His history of acheiving reading can be another post.
So, I called my husband about that and hopefully we'll talk to the Rebbe tonight and see what's going on. I devoted time to my son when he was home because the baby was sleeping so I could give him undivided attn. Then it was time to pick up my daughter, the real challenge. We went to the makolet where she grabbed some chocolate and wouldn't put it back until she ripped it open. I wasn't so happy but I think I handled the situation well.
What really broke up the day nicely was taking my son to Talmud Torah in the afternoon. This is a program that we have to pay for on a monthly basis where a rav from the yishuv teaches them about the parsha. They get a treat at the end. It's organized by age. After picking up the kids from gan we rest a little and then head out to the shul where the TT takes place. There is a playground outside where my daughter can run around and get out all of her energy. It was nice to be outside and not cooped up in the house all day. This made a big difference.
The hardest part of the day is dinner and bedtime. She gets overtired and hyper. She pulls my son into her games and he also starts acting wild. They get into mischief together. Like I said, I was able to pretty much keep my cool and control my reactions. I was too tired from kvetchy baby to be able to blog last night.
Today, baby again didn't want to sleep in the morning. Luckily for me, he took a nap around 12:30 and slept until 2:45. This gave me a chance to rest as well. I left my kids at a babysitter until 3:30. Again, taking the kids to the TT really breaks up the day and is helpful in keeping me sane.
What I really need in an ideal world is someone to take my kids out and someone to clean up (do dishes, put away toys and other things my kids place on the floor, sweep up etc.) I am not getting to the housework and it's starting to pile up. My husband doesn't get home until after 8. Then he learns until he goes to sleep. He helps a lot with the morning routine but basically I'm on my own.
I guess I forgot how hard it is to have a newborn. My nutty daughter was the best newborn ever. She didn't cry until she was 6 months. She slept through the night at a very early age and in general did everything early. I always said to my hubby that I feel that she was never a newborn. That is part of the reason that it's harder this time. They are 2 3/4 of a year apart and my daughter is toddler. She is very active and demands a lot of attention. She was not like that as a baby and so I probably thought that having another one would not be too difficult. Boy was I wrong. I find myself nursing all the time and barely resting or getting anything done around the house. My son also nursed lots and very frequently so I remember what that's like.
Right now I'm just trying to stay positive and to realize that all of this is normal. This isn't easy but that's okay. Life isn't easy and G-d doesn't give you a test you can't pass. Hopefully I'll be able to prove to Him that I can pass this one.
Thursday, October 23, 2008
My First Day Back
Today was my first day back to regular mothering (plus a new baby). My father took the kids to gan with me and then left for Jlm. That left me and Uri home together, alone. We took a nice nap together. Then I woke up and did some laundry. I picked up my son from gan and when we got home he did his homework-he's really in gan chova but they call it kita alef. Anyway, then we walked to pick up my daughter because having to handle buckling in three carseats in the back seat of our car was too much for me. In the morning it took us a while to do it. I may have to switch the placement of the carseats or something.
So we picked up my daughter and boy was she happy to see us. The ganenet did say that she had a pretty good day for her. We took a walk to the makolet to pick up some conditioner b/c my daughter has lice and we're trying awefully hard to get rid of it. Then we picked up my hubby's suit which got stained with mud last time it rained. We walked back home and everyone had lunch. This was around 2:30. After lunch we folded laundry, cleaned up a bit, read some books.
Then it started to rain. Of course I knew that it would rain but I'm in no shape to take down a sukkah or schach. What can I say? I can't move my hubby to do something if he doesn't want to do it. The same thing happened with putting the sukkah up. I told him we should do it early b/c I know how to do it and I can guide him but he stubbornly refused. There was an excuse every Friday until after I gave birth. The day I came home, the last Friday before sukkot, he asked the neighbor for help. Unfortunately, because we moved an had to reconfigure our sukkah we didn't have enough of the right size boards. So we really couldn't put it up before shabbos. On motzei shabbos hubby got more boards from the hardware store and the neighbors put up the sukkah on Sunday. On Monday my dad and uncles put up the schach. Now if that's not last minute I don't know what is. Now hubby is in no rush to take down the sukkah. So what if it rains. We'll wait til the sukkah dries up and then ask the neighbor for help taking it down. I'm not as laid back as hubby. He can only do stuff on Fridays b/c that's the only day he's off. He gets home too late to do anything after work. So I'm leaving this to him and I'll try to watch calmly from the sidelines as we wait for our sukkah and schach to dry. Boy do I hope that those beams hold our schach up b/c if it lands in the mud nobody will be happy.
Hubby is going to a wedding tonight. I told him to go by himself. I didn't want to take baby and thought that it would be better if I rest rather than going. I can't really dance anyway so I would just go to socialize. I don't need to spend money on a babysitter for that. I would probably have a better time than he but because I just had a baby I was the natural candidate for babysitting.
Somehow I managed to deal with kvetchy baby and hyper kids. Baby fell asleep in time for me to make dinner and check my daughter's hair for lice. Fun fun. We ate and then I decided to read a new book to the kids. After that I changed them. All this was able to run smoothly b/c baby was asleep. Thanks babe. I put the kids to sleep while nursing. It went pretty smoothly. Now the house is quite. Kind of strange although I don't miss the noise one bit. I guess I'll have to go to sleep early or something. Wow, imagine that.
So we picked up my daughter and boy was she happy to see us. The ganenet did say that she had a pretty good day for her. We took a walk to the makolet to pick up some conditioner b/c my daughter has lice and we're trying awefully hard to get rid of it. Then we picked up my hubby's suit which got stained with mud last time it rained. We walked back home and everyone had lunch. This was around 2:30. After lunch we folded laundry, cleaned up a bit, read some books.
Then it started to rain. Of course I knew that it would rain but I'm in no shape to take down a sukkah or schach. What can I say? I can't move my hubby to do something if he doesn't want to do it. The same thing happened with putting the sukkah up. I told him we should do it early b/c I know how to do it and I can guide him but he stubbornly refused. There was an excuse every Friday until after I gave birth. The day I came home, the last Friday before sukkot, he asked the neighbor for help. Unfortunately, because we moved an had to reconfigure our sukkah we didn't have enough of the right size boards. So we really couldn't put it up before shabbos. On motzei shabbos hubby got more boards from the hardware store and the neighbors put up the sukkah on Sunday. On Monday my dad and uncles put up the schach. Now if that's not last minute I don't know what is. Now hubby is in no rush to take down the sukkah. So what if it rains. We'll wait til the sukkah dries up and then ask the neighbor for help taking it down. I'm not as laid back as hubby. He can only do stuff on Fridays b/c that's the only day he's off. He gets home too late to do anything after work. So I'm leaving this to him and I'll try to watch calmly from the sidelines as we wait for our sukkah and schach to dry. Boy do I hope that those beams hold our schach up b/c if it lands in the mud nobody will be happy.
Hubby is going to a wedding tonight. I told him to go by himself. I didn't want to take baby and thought that it would be better if I rest rather than going. I can't really dance anyway so I would just go to socialize. I don't need to spend money on a babysitter for that. I would probably have a better time than he but because I just had a baby I was the natural candidate for babysitting.
Somehow I managed to deal with kvetchy baby and hyper kids. Baby fell asleep in time for me to make dinner and check my daughter's hair for lice. Fun fun. We ate and then I decided to read a new book to the kids. After that I changed them. All this was able to run smoothly b/c baby was asleep. Thanks babe. I put the kids to sleep while nursing. It went pretty smoothly. Now the house is quite. Kind of strange although I don't miss the noise one bit. I guess I'll have to go to sleep early or something. Wow, imagine that.
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