A Year Later...

This week marked the one year anniversary of me ending maternity leave and being back at work. I have been working for as long as I was at home….working with a baby.

I am often asked if I like working, and I don’t lie: I do like it. I feel like being at work is time I can focus on my work without little hands grabbing at my pants saying “up”, or “mama! Toons!” (cartoons). I have made quite a lot of progress in the past year at my job, including an opportunity to go back to school part time to pursue an education in marketing. I may be crazy for taking this on. It will definitely be a challenge, but I think I’m up for it.

Every day, especially mornings and evenings are hectic; even more so in the summer time when my husband, who is a golf professional, is required to work long hours and we can go an entire week without having him at the dinner table. Some days I find myself thinking that I've mastered this whole working mom thing and then there are other days when I know that I’ll have to do the whole mundane routine over again tomorrow, and it has brought me to tears.

I’ve made a huge effort to get back to working out and eating ‘clean’, and have actually gotten myself down to my wedding weight. I have 2 windows of opportunity to exercise each work day; either at 5 am at home, or during my lunch hour at the gym. I have learned some great lessons in organization and preparedness as well as making my workouts as efficient as possible. I have two great resources to thank for this: the Nike Training Club app on my iPhone, and the girls of Tone It Up who offer nutritional advice and workouts.

Working out and being healthy benefits me and my family in so many ways. I find I have so much more engergy to get through the day. Mostly, it helps with my depression. If I go a few days where I’m eating like crap and not exercising, I really feel a difference in my attitude and outlook, and in the way I treat people, especially my family. I can have an explosive temper, and there have been a few times where I have regretted lashing out at, or in front of, Nikolas. I don’t want him to ever be scared of mommy getting mad. I have come a long way in controlling my temper, but still have to work on it. Working out definitely helps me have a positive state of mind and I’m better able to control my reaction to stressful situations.

I often wish I had more time to write, because I really love looking back at my stories and seeing how far I’ve come. One of the things that bother me is the name of my blog. “Is That Baby Puke On Your Shirt” isn’t really applicable to my life anymore, so I’ve been brainstorming some new names that would be a better fit to my crazy life. Anyway, I hope to increase the amount I write, and if you have any suggestions for names, pass them along!

Who Cut the Cheese?

I am about to go there. I am going to tell a fart story. This is your warning.

It’s inevitable. Fart jokes become the norm in a person’s household. Especially when there are boys involved. Well, now Nikolas is in on the joke.

Of course, since he was a little baby, we’d always stick out our tongue and make raspberry noises at him. It caught on quickly, and has become one of his favourites. In fact, it’s often how I’m greeted in the morning.

Me: “Good morning sweetie! Time to rise and shine!”

Nikolas: “BBBllllttthhhhhhh”

Or even more recently, on a 3 hour road trip to a family event, I was desperate to entertain the little guy. So what did I pull out? That’s right...I pulled out the “pull my finger” joke. Nikolas, by the way, thinks this is hilarious. He will now randomly run up to me, and pull my finger, just waiting for that sounds that makes him giggle so much.

Well, tonight topped them all. I was putting Nikolas down to bed and as he was settling in, lying on his stomach, he let loose a huge, loud FART. Never ever before has this kid ever acknowledged the fart. This time, he immediately looked up at me, and giggled like crazy.

What a milestone. My son and I laughed together over a fart for the first time. I am confident it won’t be the last.

Work It...

 Last week, I finally got myself a membership to a gym that is super close to my office so that I can use my lunch hour to work out. I’m planning to start with 3 days a week, and see where that leads. Once summer hits, I plan to do a lot of walking at lunch in the nearby ravine, but still will hit the gym for resistance training. I also have an elliptical machine at home, which needs to be put to use more often!

It’s definitely time to lose this “baby weight”. I’m at a weight that I was at long before I got pregnant and struggled then to get rid of, but now, it’s a different kind of weight. Things have shifted and even though the scale shows the same number, my body is certainly different. Either way, I’m not happy with my fitness level, and it’s time to get serious about improving it.

Over an hour-long lunch break, between driving and changing, I end up with 40 minutes of actual exercise time; 10 minutes are dedicated to a warm up, which leaves me with 30 minutes of resistance training. I need to find a good routine that can be done in that amount of time, and hit all the body parts in 3 workouts.

Soon, it will be time to start shopping around for a chariot so that I can go for bike rides again and bring Nikolas along with me! I’m so looking forward to winter being over and spending lots of time outside!

This is My Life….For Now and Forever?

This week I started working full time. Luckily for me, it’s a short week. Oh and I’m taking Monday off for a pediatrician appointment, so next week will be a short week too. Okay, so two weeks from now, I will have finished my first full week of (paid) work since before I went on maternity leave.

I have to say, I now fully understand the “supper time rush”. When your kid goes to bed at 7:30, you do as much as you can and as quickly as you can so that if you’re lucky, you’ll get 30 minutes of quality play time before night-night time.

My husband, on the other hand, doesn’t comprehend the rush. He gets home a full hour before Nikolas and I do. I’m not sure what he does with that hour, but I can say for certain that the dog is not getting walked, and supper is not being prepared during this “free time”. What a treat that must be! To come home and put your feet up for an hour!

I digress…

My days now look like this:

5:30 am: first alarm goes off. SNOOZE.
5:40 am: second alarm goes off…..wishing I could SNOOZE but instead I drag my ass out of bed and into the shower.
5:40 – 6:30: get ready and my act together before Nikolas gets up.
6:30 – 7:15: Matt and I tag-team getting Nikolas ready to leave the house. I’m leaving it mostly up to Matt right now. In a few short months, he will be gone to work before sun rise, and I’ll get to do it all on my own…..Yippeee!
7:15 – 8:00: Get Nikolas and I bundled up and in the truck, drop him off at the day home and rush to work.
8:00 – 4:30: Work. Check Facebook. Work. Check email. Work. Run errands at lunch time. Work.
4:30: RUSH to the day home to make sure I’m there before 5:00 because that’s when it closes, and she starts to charge by the minute. RUSH home.
5:15: RUSH to get supper made by 6:00, while trying to entertain a toddler, a husband and a dog.
6:30: Supper should be done by now. Clean up Nikolas and hunker down for some quality play time.
7:00: Get Nikolas ready for bed. Bottle, a story, and it’s lights out. I don’t even get cuddle time anymore. He just doesn’t want to be rocked to sleep, or held. He wants to be put down IN HIS BED.
7:30 – 9:00: Creep out of Nikolas’ room and clean up supper and toys. Get supper for the following evening prepared. Walk the dog. Do laundry. Get coffee ready for the morning. Try to get as many errands done as possible before I fall over from exhaustion.
9:00: Fall over from exhaustion.

And then we do it all again the next day! Right now I feel as if I’m staring down years and years of this routine and it’s a little depressing.