February 2019 Recap

Sorry… February appears to be the first month I have gone without posting a blog in at least 15 years! I am pretty well burned out on recapping daily events for now. Poor Edie won’t have much of anything to look back on, unlike Johnny whose early years are crazily well documented. Between the parenting of two kids and my full work schedule and home projects, there’s not much extra time to go around. And I seem to be getting much more tired at night of late. I think we’ll have to settle for a monthly recap going forward.

Edie has been a very easy baby through the first four months compared to John, in my opinion. When she wakes up at night hungry, Lauren nurses her, I give her a bottle, and she goes back to sleep instantly. I just go and set her in the crib and go back to bed. With John it was usually a half hour or longer to get him back down. She started daycare in February and all has gone well there so far. Overall she’s just so darn smiley and easygoing and low-maintenance. Maybe we’re just more seasoned parents, or maybe she’s just naturally easier. She’s using her jumper now. She’s rolling over and propping herself up, looking like she’s about to take off crawling. She had a teeny nibble of avocado, otherwise is still on a milk/formula diet. Not sure what else can be said about her!

John has been having a little bit of trouble of late, unfortunately. We’ve received notes and calls from his school telling us he’s been acting out, throwing things, hitting classmates, laughing in teachers’ faces when they try to punish him. His sleeping is as bad as ever. On a normal night it takes at least an hour for him to go down, and he’s almost always awake by 5am, in and out of our room asking how much longer before it’s morning time. I chaperoned John’s class field trip to the Thinkery today and he literally had at least 20 complete tear-filled meltdowns. Any little thing set him off, from someone bumping into him to someone talking loudly to him. After that, we spent much of the rest of the day together one-on-one, probably much-needed for him. We went to Torchy’s, Barnes and Noble, and then the Texas Stars hockey game at night. He was in much better spirits with just me. We’ll try to each spend more quality time with the boy and see if things change. I am also about to check out a weighted blanket, as has been highly recommended by his doctor and other parents.

Baxter is getting on my nerves worse than ever. With me at home all day every day, he spends most of his time at my feet. He sees me going to work and slinks in to the room and begrudgingly takes a seat under the desk, looking downright miserable. When I go outside, however, he runs ahead, happily chasing squirrels and birds, frolicking in the lawn. Just go outside on your own, dingus! You are not required to lay by my feet 24/7! He’s got John over there dropping food left and right at the dinner table, but keeps his head firmly in my crotch throughout a meal. I don’t understand why he still thinks of me as his master and wants nothing to do with anyone else in the family. I’m unquestionably the meanest to him and the days of me feeding him scraps and taking him for runs are years in the past. I tried walking him this week and he stopped several feet out the doorway and started sniffing some grass and refused to budge, so I just let go of the leash, did my walk, and came home to find him still in the same spot. I led him back inside and that was his walk—literally not even to the end of the driveway. How disappointing for him!

Lauren is over a full month back to work after maternity leave. She is certainly doing a handful. Every night after work she usually prepares dinner, puts Edie to bed, then spends at least an hour prepping for the next day’s meals and preparing the kids’ lunchbox and bottles and cloth diapers for school the next day. It is rare if she’s sitting down relaxing before 9!

I am busier than ever before. I am usually on morning duty getting the kids out the door, and tending to most of the home improvement and lawn needs. I am currently wrapping up staining the patio, with sights set on a couple more carpentry projects next including a Lauren-requested dinner table. There are thoughts of maybe trying to construct a Murphy bed for the guest room to make more space. Lauren and I tried to roll out a parenting podcast called Parental Settings, but free time and energy are at a premium… oh, and the house has to be quiet for us to record, so it can only be done late at night. Our plan to do an episode per week just isn’t working out. At work, I am not kidding when I say I have unquestionably done more in five months at this job than I did in my 18 months at the last job. Like, I’m actually busy and engaged the full eight hours per day, every day, which is not the norm from the previous 12 years of my career. I’m finally getting the full work-from-home experience with the house to myself. The first two or three weeks were blissfully nice, but yeah, I guess I’m starting to see a little how some people who do this for years crave a social life and adult conversations. I have a small ongoing freelance job that takes 2-3 hours per week, nothing major. I also have been working out when possible at LifeTime Fitness, popping in on a class twice per week over lunch. I had been doing a beginners-level strength class with a bunch of women and seniors, but Thursday tried a much more difficult class with people who more closely resemble me. It was a huge struggle, but I think I’ll go back and do it again.

Other than that, February was highlighted by Lauren’s 35th birthday, hosting a Super Bowl party, Dick and Marcie Glanzer’s eighth visit to Austin which was highlighted by a day trip to Waco, wildly ranging temps from a dusting of snow to low 90s, three kids’ birthday parties, Valentine’s Day at school, Johnny sleeping in a cardboard box, a near-ER visit for a spliced ear, and so very much more.

I’ve had multiple people ask me about the lack of blogging… hopefully this helps sum up why!

Now, enjoy these photos from February.