My Toddler Hates my Computer

Every time I sit down and pick up my laptop my daughter gives me a look that says "don't do it mommy". I smile and give her a toy to play with, which distracts her for awhile, then she turns around and that's when it happens. She sees me sitting on the couch in her room typing away on my computer.

As soon as my daughter sees me on the computer she gets angry. I actually think she is jealous. I wish she could understand that I love her more than my computer. But there is work to be done and on days I work from home I have to use my computer. I'm not sure when her animosity towards my computer started or why. All I know is that when I pick the computer up she screams and as soon as I put it away she is happy as can be.

So now I must hide my computer use from my toddler to please her. I give her some snacks and toys and then sneak away into the other room so I can secretly check my email and use the Internet. I hope that one day she will understand I do love her more than my computer but until she does I will continue to hide my secret computer affair.

Great Read for Moms

I was poking around the book section at Target when I came across a book that made me laugh. On the shelf next to the expectant mother books was a book titled "I Was A Really Good Mom Before I had Kids".

The book portrays the challenges and struggles real life moms face in a humorous and empathetic manner. At the time I read the book I was feeling guilty about needing space from my daughter. I love her to pieces but sometimes I just feel like I needed a break to get back to my old self. I realized this for the first time when she was just two days old. My husband and I needed to take her to the hospital for a quick blood test. My husband took her to the back to get her blood work done and I found myself enjoying my alone time in the waiting room. That is when I realized that every moment of down time, no matter where you are at, is enjoyable when your a busy mom.

I had envisioned motherhood as a blissful experience filled with love, joy, and happiness. I thought I would bring my newborn baby girl home and I would snuggle her to sleep at night and then have time to read a book before bed. No one had ever told me how hard the first few weeks would be. When we brought our daughter home for the first time I was filled with joy and excitement to finally have her home. I couldn't wait to tuck her into her new bassinet that I had bought her. She was going to sleep in it right next to my bed so that I could be there when she needed me. We would wake a few times during the night and I would feed her and then she would quickly fall asleep till morning.

If you are reading this and you have children you realize that is not what happened. The first night home from the hospital I thought for sure something was wrong with my baby. She cried all night and refused to sleep in her bassinet. As soon as we set her down in it she would wake up screaming. My husband and I tried everything. We walked her, sang to her, rocked her, fed her, but nothing would calm her down. This went on every night for two weeks. I thought surly there was something wrong. This was not what I had ordered, but there was no return policy at St. Lukes.

Now I have a darling one year old who sleeps through the night and allows me to read a book before a bed. That is when I finally read this book. I wish I would have read these stories before my daughter was born so that I could understand that I was not the only one who thought their baby was a lemon. Motherhood is a challenge everyday and the adjustment is very difficult. To any expectant mothers my advice is to read this book and to brace yourself. It is a difficult challenge but it is worth every minute of it.

Working at Home

I have the opportunity to spend part of my days working at home. This allows me to spend time with my daughter and to avoid the cost of daycare. But the older she gets the harder it is to get anything accomplished.

You see as soon as I start working on something and I get into a grove she is standing at my feet crying or grabbing my computer cord to get my attention. So I stop and give her some love, milk, food, or a diaper change and then once she is settled I go back to work.

I start working again and I get lost in my work and after fifteen or twenty minutes I notice that she has not been bothering me so I look up and there she is. She is sitting on the floor taking all of my husbands DVDs out of the stand next to the TV or she is sitting on the floor taking apart the picture frame that was on the shelf in the kitchen, and I wonder how she got her paws on that. So I stop again and clean up her mess. Give her some toys to play with and I go back to work.

Another half and hour passes and there she is running into the living room with a roll of toilet paper and make-up out of my make-up bag.

I am starting to think I am going to need to get a babysitter to watch her so I can work at home. I have to wonder how moms with multiple children manage to get an hour of work in during the day. I love that I have the opportunity to stay home and work for a few hours a day with my beautiful, mischievous girl but I can't help but to wonder how moms get anything accomplished when their kids are awake.

I make sure I savor every minute I get to spend with my little peanut because I know in the blink of an eye she will be off to kindergarten and the house will be quiet again. But until then I am going to have to continue working at night and during nap times so that I can accomplish the things that need to be done.

A Twenty Something Girl in a Thirty Somethings World

Chicago is a place full of twenty somethings chasing their dreams and thirty somethings that have achieve professional success and have entered into marriage and motherhood.

So this leaves me wondering where do I fit in?? At 27 I am still working to meet my career goals. I completed graduate school at 25 and was married soon after. I then became pregnant with my daughter during my first year as a full-time working professional. I find myself somewhere in between the twenty somethings chasing their dreams and the thirty somethings that are married with children.

It is a challenge to fit in completely with both groups of friends. My twenty somethings friends are out living the single life. They are dealing with the drama in their work and personal life that revolves around dating and gossip. My thirty something friends are dealing with the drama in their life that revolves around daycare, the color of their babies poop, temper tantrums, and marriage.

I often find myself indulging in the excitement of the dating/nightlife my twenty something friends have. I enjoy hearing the stories of the awkward first night with a new guy, the concerns about whether or not he is into her, and then the drama of how the relationship ends. I love going out with the twenty something friends when I need a reminder of who I used to be. They keep me young and hip and in the loop with whats going on in the world of a single girl.
And when I need a break and to tune into reality I find myself turning to my thirty something friends who help to keep me grounded. We chat about parenting and marriage and how to be successful at both.

You see you can't vent about marriage to your single twenty something friends because they will always respond with "at least you have someone." And you can't vent about needed a night out on the town to your fellow mommies because they will always say "who will babysit, what about your husband, is it worth feeling so bad when your baby wakes you up early after a long night out?" So I keep myself in with both crowds and vent to the appropriate group. I find the best thing you can do is chat about whats going on in your life with the friends who can relate regardless of where they are in our life. The best girlfriend to vent to is the one who understands and can agree with you.

The City Life....We Thought We Would Have

After my husband and I learned we were expecting our first baby we decided to move closer to our family and friends. At the time we were living in Boise, ID and our families were in the mid-west. We knew we wanted to live somewhere exciting, but we just weren't sure where. And then we decided Chicago was the place for us.

Who wouldn't want to live in Chicago? It is a bustling city with so much to do. Festivals, concerts, sporting events, great restaurants, and an exciting night life. And who could forget the museums and famous landmarks our daughter would see. The anticipation to move to the big city was high and we were ready to go.

I was offered and accepted a job in Evanston, IL on the north side of the city. When we first moved we were extremely busy getting settled into our new home and into our jobs. A month or two had past and we still had not gone into the city. In fact, several months had past and before we knew it we have lived in Evanston for 5 months and had still not made a trip into the city.

So we pack up our daughter and shipped her down to Nanas for the weekend so my husband and I could go to dinner in the city. It was great to walk around downtown in the snow and under the Christmas lights. It was that night we decided we would make a trip to the city at least once a month.

Well that was in December and now it is August and we have only been downtown for a social night outing a handful of time. My husband works right off of Michigan Avenue and we still have trouble finding the time and energy to meet for dinner after work.

I had to laugh yesterday when I met up with a girlfriend who was in town from Ohio. She was telling me all about her weekend. She had visited Millennium Park, Shedds, and the John Hancock building. All places I said we would go, but I was embarrassed to admit that we have lived here for a year and have never been to any of those locations.

It is hard to find the time to take advantage of the city life when you live here. I suspect it is that way for most people living in a tourist town. It is so easy to say you do not have the time to see the sights when you can do it anytime. I guess when you travel and know you only have a few days to experience the city you make an effort to take full advantage of it.

So today I make another promise to myself. To take advantage of all Chicago has to offer and to start living like a tourist.