A Teacher's Life for Me

Before I begin, let's get one thing straight: I am so glad that I get to stay home every day with my baby boy.  I wouldn't have it any other way.

But I left a really awesome job to stay home with Jack.  One that I like to think I was pretty good at.  And out of the 180 school days in a year, I miss being a teacher on exactly 176 of them.

Of the four days that I don't miss being a teacher, two of them are happening this week.  On these days all the good little girls and boys that teach elementary school in Alpine School District are participating in Parent Teacher Conferences.

The reason I dislike Parent Teacher Conferences Day is not because I disliked communicating with my students' parents.  On the contrary, I felt like I had a pretty good rapport with my students' parents and our conferences were largely positive.  I loved telling them about all the awesome things their kids were doing in school.  Plus the PTA provided phenomenal dinners on those nights, complete with bouquets of fruit.  FRUIT!

No, I didn't like Parent Teacher Conferences Day because it didn't end until eight o'clock.  At night!  And it's a two-day ordeal.  You finally get some rest and you have to do it all again the next day.  Plus teach all day both days too.  It's exhausting!

But because one of us has to bring home some bacon, Lewis is making his way through his Parent Teacher Conferences as I type.  Poor dear.  I brought him some cupcakes to help him get through the night, cause I'm a good wife.

And I get it.

I'll Never Be a Model

If there is anything that having a baby has taught me, it's this: I suck at walking.

I sort of already knew that, in so much that I am really clumsy.  One need only look at the bruises that currently adorn both my shins to understand that.  I've been fortunate that I haven't maimed or otherwise injured my child due to my penchant for the klutz.  Yet.

But it goes beyond that.  Overall, I'm just bad at walking.  Maybe I missed a lesson in my toddler years or something.

I realized this last night when I was trying to put Jack to bed.  We are still working on the whole self-soothe-fall-asleep-on-your-own deal.  It's not going well.  So most nights he falls asleep while I'm feeding him or holding him and then I will ever so carefully gather him into my arms, creep over to his room, and deposit him in his crib.  Sometimes we only have to do this once.  Sometimes this process repeats itself.  Several times.

Last night as I was carrying him to bed, I noticed that every time I stepped with my right foot, it jiggled him.  I totally step on it weird and it jostles whatever cargo is on my person.  This is super awesome at two in the morning when I'm trying to put my little pip into his bed.  Not.

Lewis has mentioned before that I have a somewhat heavy gait.  I wasn't sure what to think of that.  All I knew was that it didn't seem very feminine or wifely.  But it's true!  I walk like I weigh 300 pounds!  And Jack's sleep (and mine, for that matter) has suffered the consequences.

I never thought that was something I needed to fix.  But here we are.  No wonder Jack never seems to get enough sleep.

What's the Big Deal?

Last night Lewis came bursting in the house with a look of excitement on his face.  It was January 18th and it was finally snowing.  Jack HAD to come and see.  I had thought Jack's first snow would be when he was much younger, so it was actually pretty great that it waited this long to snow.  Jack is old enough to notice the flakes falling and he might even think it's cool.

So everyone got bundled up and we trooped outside with our camera, ready to document this momentous occasion.  It was beautiful.  Fat, fluffy flakes were falling gently.  They were the kind that would catch in your hair and stay there without melting immediately.  The snow was accompanied by that gentle silence that blankets the world as it gracefully accumulates.  Lewis and I both turned to look at Jack, confident we would see the look of wonder and amazement that was sure to be on his precious face:

He was unimpressed.

It was like he knew that the promise of four inches was bunk and that this would only produce a slight dusting and that my worry about Lewis making it to school safely this morning was all for naught cause the roads weren't slick in the least.

Clever boy.

This is Just a Tribute

I don't know if you know this, but I've got a seriously amazing husband.  Seriously.  I don't think I express to him enough how so very awesome he is, so here goes - mommy-blog style.

The Top Whatever Number I Get to Before I Stop Reasons My Husband is Cooler than Yours


1.  He teaches fourth grade.

I think Lewis is the merriest every month.

Not only does he teach it, but he kicks bums (mommy blog, 'member?) at teaching it.  Right now his class is studying puns.  Puns!  Did you ever study puns in fourth grade?  Nope, cause you didn't have Lewis as your teacher.

2. He provides nighttime entertainment by talking in his sleep.

Since I have such difficulty in falling asleep, Lewis nearly always goes to sleep before me.  And he will often express very real concerns to me in his sleep.  Like how we could go about building a bomb (his solution was to ask his sister for help since she teaches science.  The science she teaches is biology, but still...).  Or if I can feel his arm, since he couldn't (he had fallen asleep on top of it) (this happened last night).  I just wish he talked more often in his sleep when I am up feeding Jack.  That would be lots of fun.

3. He goes along with my crazy ideas.

Jack in a cloth diaper.  He's skinny.

Like putting our baby in cloth diapers.  Or making my own taco seasoning.  It helps that most of these ideas have turned out good.

4.  He has perfected the homemade pizza.

I want some right now.

We got a pizza stone for our wedding and have been trying to make pizza on it ever since.  The crust was always too puffy or too caky or too soggy.  The sauce was always too runny or too bland or too gross.  We finally found one crust recipe we liked, but it took forever to make.  Not to be deterred, Lewis kept working until he found a quick, but delicious crust recipe.  Then he located a suitable sauce recipe that he tweaked to perfection.  Now all we need is to make our own mozzarella cheese!  (No we don't.)

5. He singled-handedly brings home the bacon so I can stay home with Jack.

His new school.

6. Speaking of bacon, he likes his cooked the same way I do (extra-extra crispy) so that's never a brunchtime conflict.

We usually eat bacon when we go to Park City.

At least he says he does.

7. We can get excited about things together and not think the other is too dorky.

Lewis at Disneyland is like Lewis in a candy shop.

Like Disneyland and Christmas and camping and Jack pooping.

8. He loves his son so much.

I love watching the two of them play.  Lewis adores Jack and Jack... well, he used to just tolerate him, but he's warming up to him.  In a few months, I know Jack will be following him around wherever he goes and Dad coming home from work will be the best part of his day.

9. He always puts Jack in his car seat so I don't have to.

I don't have one of Jack in his car seat, so here's just a picture I love of the two of them.

Jack HATES his car seat, in spite of our efforts to make him like it by saying, "Yay!" very enthusiastically whenever we talk about it.  And I hate putting him in.  Lewis is always willing to bite the bullet and put him in when we go places together.

10. He likes me.  He really likes me.

I know most married couples love each other, but I'm not sure that all of them LIKE each other.  But I know that Lewis likes me, and I like him.  Saturday night comes around, and we are just fine sitting at home, catching up on all the movies we missed seeing in theaters the past few months cause we had Jack and cause they are all at the Redbox now.  And we love it.

Ten is a nice round number, so I'm going to stop there.  Plus Jack keeps trying to hit the keys and he's a crafty one, so it's getting harder and harder to stop him.  I'll just end with this: I love Lewis.