Today was Micah’s first day at child care at The Children in the Shoe, and I cried my eyes out! He is now officially a Little Star (I had it wrong before . . . I thought he was going into the Lambs classroom). I always knew he was a superstar!
Our day was crazy (as usual). We went to our playgroup this morning, and we brought a kosher for Passover birthday cake we baked for one of the other moms. Nothing fancy, but it wasn’t bad for a Passover cake.
Micah had a great time at playgroup! He played on the playmat, and his friend Juliet couldn’t stop running her fingers through his hair (okay, more like grabbing a chunk, but at that age, same thing!!) They were even holding hands for a while. I think some of the other women took some photos – I will try and update those later.
We stayed a little too long at playgroup, and I needed to race out of there and get gas for Elliot’s car. We finally made it to the daycare center at 2:00 – about 1/2 hour later than I’d planned. I brought him back to the room, and left him there. As I walked out . . . I started to bawl. I was just so sad to leave him. I was worried he would be afraid with all the strangers, and I didn’t want him to be sad or lonely. I kept thinking they wouldn’t talk to him enough and that he would not get enough stimulation. Crazy, right? It also worries me that many of them speak with an accent, and I worry that hearing poor English will affect his language development. I went to the office and filled out all the paperwork, and then I went back and checked on him. He was sitting in a bouncy seat, playing with a blue stuffed elephant. He wasn’t smiling and chatting like he does at home, but he looked like he was fine, so I ran out of there in a mad race to get to my meeting on time!
My meeting went well – I won’t bore you with the details, but it looks like I have a chance at another contract. After my meeting, I checked in with Elliot, and he was about to pick Micah up from daycare. I raced home and waited for them. When Elliot walked through the door with Micah, he was clearly happy to see me. He couldn’t stop beaming and laughing, and he was just so happy to be with me. I can assure you, the feeling was mutual!
Micah did just fine . . . he enjoyed playing with the blue stuffed elephant while he sat in a bouncy seat, and he took his bottle. They said he was happy and easy the whole time – he even got a wonderful report card to prove it!
All in all, he did really well, but I was a bit frustrated with his caretaker, Aneta. When we arrived, Micah was asleep. We decided to place his car seat in the crib so we did not wake him up (I told her he desperately needed to nap for an hour or two). So, after we placed him in the crib . . . she woke him up to put in his paci “so he would sleep better.” HELLO – how does WAKING A BABY UP help them sleep better? I did my best to bite my frustration back, and I went to the front office. I came back to check on Micah before I left, and he was quietly playing. DH picked him up at 4:30, and he was napping – but he had JUST fallen asleep. According to Aneta, Micah took 5 ounces. I told her he probably shouldn’t need more than 4 – I have a feeling she force-fed him the last ounce instead of taking the bottle away when he was just comfort-sucking. I’ll have to have a discussion with her about not over-feeding him. Needless to say, his belly hurt a bit when we brought him home, and he had a meltdown around 7:30 because he had not gotten enough sleep during the day. We’ll have to work that out.
I had to run out after nursing Micah to attend a viewing – the father of our family friend, Pat, died last week. I made it back a little after 8, and Micah was still in melt-down mode. Elliot managed to get him to sleep for a few minutes, but I needed to nurse him again before he finally drifted off. I guess my little guy just needed a bit more mommy time. He was SOOO over-tired today.
Update. . . . 1:02 am. It has been a rough night. Micah was hysterical at bed time, then woke up again at 8:45 and needed to nurse. He went back to sleep, but Elliot and I have needed to run upstairs MANY times to reinsert the paci. I was getting ready to pump when the fussing started again. I reinserted the paci, but he didn’t seem satisfied, so I picked him up and decided to nurse him again. While I was nursing him, he was making this horrible rattling noise – he was extremely congested. We used that blue nasal squeegey to clear things out (he did NOT like that) and I finished nursing him. He is currently asleep, on his side, but it is a very restless sleep. I think we’re in for a long night and an early morning! Maybe daycare did really throw him off more than we thought.