Spring Break (adult style)
I just have to get through one more day and then I am on Spring Break.  While my students jet off to California and Florida, I will get to celebrate by... oh wait, working.  I remember when Spring Break meant a time of true vacation, forgetting anything that seemed remotely burdensome and having a few key items on the agenda: have fun, drink (when 21, of course), relax, and definately no work.  Now my Spring Break is one long string of "to dos," with very little consideration for things like "fun," or drinking (although perhaps those can be added back in... they seem like important items).  My goal is to accomplish a ridiculously long mental list of things that need to get done at work and at home, all of which is wholly unrealistic.  But I will do my best, because I have been promising myself that I will finally get to these things.  Some are important on a larger level, like research for a paper scheduled for public presentation painfully soon, research which is not in progress so much as intended to be in progress.  Others are important just to me, but will make me very happy, like vacuuming out the construction dust that I still find in the kitchen cabinets.  Other items on the list seem good for all involved, such as me getting caught up on even a little bit of extra sleep.  This would result in a kinder, gentler, more reasonable mommy and spouse, and I do think that all in the household would prioritize such a task.
Of course, I still need to figure out when - and how- I am going to do all of this.  Hmmm... new item for the mental list: "decide what to do first." 
The first week of the daycare center seems to be going well.  Everybody is pretty happy, but tired.  Noella is not really napping so well, and I hope that she can get some rest over the weekend. She has been enjoying the food there, with daily reports that she consumed an amount that surprises her teachers.  Mariel actually did nap in preschool today, a sure indication that she is worn out by the new friends, new environment, new routine.  Hopefully we will continue to adjust next week.  I think I am worn out by adjusting to the new schedule, too - especially in conjunction with the lingering cold and a cough that is keeping me up at night, meaning in two weeks I still have not had a full night of sleep!  I keep intending to take a picture or two at school, but just have not managed it yet.  It can be a goal for next week- I will put it on the Spring Break to do list.

'Cause every little thing is gonna be allright....

A strange thing happened this afternoon... all of the sudden, I started to feel better.
Not physically- I have been fighting the flu and a fever that ranges from 100 to 102 since Monday. I have not really slept or eaten much for a week, and I feel a little like a zombie.  A zombie with a runny nose, painful cough, and all sorts of crud in my chest.  I did manage to eat three small meals today, which seems positive- and I sure do have my fingers crossed for a night of actual sleep.
Emotionally, however, I am suddenly feeling much better.  We have chosen our daycare- Downtown Childrens Center, http://www.dccstl.org/- (don't you laugh at my link, Jen- people want to know this stuff!).  It is a bright, cheerful place with small classes (numbers, I mean, the spaces are really big and open), a good program, and a curiously happy group of kids and staff.  The four year old class will be a great, challenging place for Mariel, and the toddler room is the first of its sort that I've seen that I would actually enjoy dropping Noella off at.  She will need to move to one nap a day- on a cot!- but I think she is ready for it.
I got a bunch of grading done today, cooked dinner (I have not done that for a week), and we've even got laundry in.  Mariel and I even started talking about her all princess tea party birthday plans.   I think having chosen our next place is a huge relief for Patrick and I, and I do think it will be good fit for our kids.
I am struggling a little with the fact that I just found out that Mariel had been acting out a lot during the day, with behaviors that I have never seen before.  After a day and a half of getting opinions and advice from friends, family, medical and educational contacts and driving myself crazy trying to figure out how this happened (the classic parent "how could my kid act like this?"), I am actually starting to believe what everyone is telling me.  While certainly not desirable or appropriate, acting out like she has is been is far from abnormal.  So I am not scheduling a visit with a child psychologist yet (me?  overreact?  never!).  The gist of the advice: with clear, explicit rules and immediate and consistent consequences and good communication with her new preschool this should not be an ongoing issue.  Parents of assertive, strong willed kids out there, take note.  I hope these teachers are ready for me at my intro meeting with them tomorrow!
I guess I also feel a bit of sadness- I am also hearing that these behaviors are often a result of feeling insecure, powerless, or seeking more attention.  So, as a mom, I feel so sad that my child was in even the tiniest bit of emotional distress of some sort and I did not know when I could have at least tried to help her.  Isn't this supposed to be part of the mother's intuition thing?  I know that this is part of parenthood, that this is a miniscule drop in the bucket of problems and stress and guilt compared to what I have ahead of me (I do remember being a teenager, Mom, I do), but oh, to know that your baby was hurting and you didn't fix it?  I guess I didn't think I would already feel like this when she was only 3! 

I do have something to add to previous post- I just got word that my Grandmother, Frances, was taken to the hospital.  We still don't have too much information on why- my mom thought she fell- but please add her to your prayers.  Actually, depending on her mood, it might be good to add her doctors and nurses to your prayers, too.

Just pray.
They say that prayer works; I have seen studies that show some degree of difference in medical recoveries when patients are being prayed for.  I don't know if I always believe this, but it cannot hurt.  So pray for Mariel's friend Ari, in the hospital for treatment for Neuroblastoma, a particularly virulent pediatric cancer.  She was diagnosed over the summer, and turned 4 last week. Pray for a friend from Virginia, whose unborn baby was just diagnosed with a rare and potentially dangerous infection.  Pray that these children and their families grow and thrive and have to face situations such as choosing the right preschool.  I am.

Trying to maintain perspective...
I have highschool classmates in Iraq and Afghanistan, away from their children, their worlds, their security. One of Mariel's friends is in the Children's Hospital with cancer... so finding new child care is not the worst situation in the world, even if it feels awful.  This is what I am telling myself. 
It was a better day- we found a good in home daycare near us that could be a reasonable transition place, safe, comfortable, very impressive.    I did not (although I did want to) cry on the woman's shoulder, but I felt somehow better about her because I think that I could have.  Still, it is so hard to decide whether or not it is "right" when I have absolutely zero confidence in my ability to judge what is "right" for my kids at the moment. It was a crazy day of visiting home daycares and more calling on the phone to various people.  Emotionally draining in way that I can't figure out how to put into words.  Mariel enjoyed the visits, which made it easier on all of us.
It was also a strangely warm day- highs in the 50s.  Mariel and I took some time (while Noella was napping in between our "visits") to go outside and play.

 After a little while, she kicked off her boots, took off her tights, spread out the towel we brought out to dry things off from melting snow, and said she was sunbathing on the beach. 

Supposed to snow tomorrow.

You have to laugh at yourself, 'cause you'd cry your eyes out if you didn't (one of the many important lessons of life learned from the Indigo Girls)

Tough day.  No sleep.  Brooke told me last night that she does not want to watch the girls anymore, that it is not what she expected.  It was certainly wonderful to have them with her, and I know that my kids were in a good place.  I also know that I would probably not be so happy watching four kids, myself.  So I respect and understand her decision, or I at least I will, when I get over the state of intense despair/ panic/ worry that I am in at the moment.  Wondering how to decide where my girls should go and how to get them in a place that won't put us all back in this same position in another few months (not really trusting my own instincts at this point).  There is a center that I like, but they don't expect openings until the summer.  So do I find a temporary place and go through multiple transitions?  Or try to find a different center (if there even is a better fit for us out there)?  Nanny? In home?  What will this do to my kids?   You know, all of that good stuff (Actually, if you're reading this, I hope you don't know.  It sucks.)
Crummy day at work, including finding out in very long meeting that a visiting scholar is coming next year who will be teaching Indigenous Politics.  Two courses.  In the Spring.  Which is when I am scheduled to teach... Indigenous Politics.  So, how does this work?  Um, isn't this actually what I was hired to do?  Confused.  Things got interesting, too, when the power went out on campus for the 2nd time in 8 days.  Did you know that my office is in the basement?!!!  Not such a productive or positive day at work.
So when the kids went to bed, I went to the gym.  I take a class my Aunt recommended, Zumba, which is a sort of choreographed dance/ aerobic thing.  It was my third class, so I am relatively unskilled compared to all of the regulars. (Side note: I have never felt plainer than in this class- I have no idea where all of these middle aged curvy, voluptuous women come from, but they can WORK IT in ways I definately can't).  I met a dance teacher once who used to say that "a bad dance won't harm the earth" and I try to abide by that- might as well make a fool of myself.  I do a good job of this.  And I laugh at myself.  The teacher this time put a new spin on the class, and she was hoping we would dance a little, well, sexier than I ever could.    My favorite instruction of the night was when the teacher told us to dance up to the mirror and "love all over our sexy selves."  I am not sure what this means, and I am pretty darn sure that I did not do this, but it definately made me smile.  And I needed that.