Goals

The girls and I made it through our first week by ourselves at home. Barely. Besides the obvious goals of making sure the kiddos were fed and somewhat clean, my only goal for Monday was to take a shower. Once I'd reached my goal I settled in, not wanting to overexert myself, and watched several hours of Food Network while keeping Sophie's tornado-like destruction to one room. I learned from Steve's deployment that watching a lot of TV does nothing for my morale. That lesson also applies to the hormonal, postpartum version of me. I'm a lot more emotional this time around. Add that to not getting enough sleep and Sophie's jealous tantrums and whining and you get a very irritable mom.

So, for Tuesday, I decided that I needed something more productive as my goal because watching that much TV makes me more emotional and cranky. Even when I'm watching food. My goal for Tuesday was to put up Christmas decorations. Still some rough spots, but overall better than Monday.

Somehow photos never do Christmas trees justice. OK, my camera doesn't do it justice.


Some of my favorite ornaments.

Each day got a little better after that. I managed to get a shower every day and got a few things done around the house. A few ladies from the ward brought meals last week, which was a total lifesaver. Thank you!! Around 4-5ish was when Sophie and I were our crankiest and it would have been almost impossible to spend more than 10 minutes in the kitchen making dinner.

Friday I decided that we needed a quick trip somewhere because we were going nutso from being inside all week. After tackling Target and a quickie in the grocery store, I decided that I need to rethink how I do my grocery shopping. I put Ivy's carrier in the front, Sophie and my diaper bag in the cart, and had enough room for one gallon of milk and a can of baking powder, which Sophie tried to open for several minutes. I put the produce in the front because I didn't trust her alone with a bunch of bananas. I'm not sure how I would have managed had this been a "real" grocery store trip. At Target I took Ivy out of her carrier, wrapped her in a fleece blanket and put her in my Bjorn carrier while Sophie sat in the front of the cart. That worked OK except Ivy is still ragdoll-like and kept sliding down the carrier all bunched up. Plus the fleece blanket was making me sweat. Taking her out of the carrier and wrapping her in a blanket is a pain, too, in the parking lot, and what happens when it drops below 60 degrees? And the option of having Sophie walk beside the cart is definitely out. Unfortunately, she's a runner, and I really don't want to resort to putting a leash on her. She would probably throw a fit if I tried. Ugh. I have some thinking to do.

Ivy, on the other hand, is an angel baby -- kind of like Sophie was before she decided she could have an opinion about things. Luckily Sophie's jealousy is directed more at me than at Ivy. She adores Ivy. The first word out of her mouth when she wakes up for the day, or even from a nap, is "AHH-vee!" She's always right next to me when I change Ivy's diaper or bathe her, but when I nurse her, Sophie decides that she wants to jump in my lap and read a book RIGHT THEN. I spend as much time as I can with Sophie, which helps, and I think she's realizing that Ivy's a permanent fixture in our home now.