Nanny Diaries: Routines & Monkey Sounds

So today began last night.

I took my sleeping meds, Jonathan kissed me goodnight, and I was asleep within seconds.  I woke up completely wide awake probably around 1-something.  I made myself stay in bed hoping I'd doze off, but nope.  I read my blogs, went a little too crazy downloading new iPhone apps, worked on cleaning out my inbox, you know... things you can do mindlessly while you're exhausted but cannot sleep.  I laid in bed until my alarm went off at 5:30am when I took a shower, got prettied up, loaded up my nanny bag, and set out at 6:30am for work.  The sun wasn't out yet, but it wasn't dark either.  Kind of grey and yucky.  Then I thought of how hard this schedule is going to be in winter when the sun doesn't come up until much later.  I'm a sunshine person - if the sun's out, I focus better.  I can get more things done.  On rainy days, I could just take a nap and hang out in my pajamas all day.

So anyways, I get to L Bug's house and she comes running up to me: "UPPP pweeeease!!"  (Baby #2 is due on Wednesday and I don't know what we're going to do about the whiney "UPPP pweeease!" habit...)  So I pick her up, we say bye to Mommy and Daddy, and then we go out onto the porch like every other Wednesday and wait for Mommy's SUV and Daddy's truck to pull out of the driveway and do "beep beep."  So Mom and Dad honk their horns several times (it's still only 7am, mind you) and L Bug yells "Bye bye!" and "Beep beep!" as she waves until both cars are out of sight.  Then it's playtime.

I try to plan an event each morning for her because you just cannot keep a 23-month-old busy in the house from 7a-5p.  We aim for walks, strolls around the park, meeting my friend Kim at the wading pools at the other park... things like that.  I'm excited to incorporate Kindermusik, Storytime at the library, and maybe even art lessons when summer is over.  She's at such a fun age.

But for today, it was our planned zoo day, so we trekked up to Cleveland and met my mom and sister.  Then we walked all around the zoo.  L Bug would get so excited about certain animals, and others, she'd scream at the top of her lungs, try to stand up in the stroller, and reach high in the air while desperately saying, "UPPP pweeeease!!"  Weird, I know.  The highlight of her day though, I believe was the monkeys.  She calls monkeys "hee hoo ha has" since that's the sound they make.  At each and every monkey exhibit, she would wave hello to the monkeys and say, "HI!" She would giggle and giggle as they swung on ropes, ran around, and did random monkey-ish things.  And when we were done with one group of monkeys and moved on to another, she would wave and scream "Bye bye hee hoo has!!" or rarely, a complete, English "Bye bye monkeys!!"  It was very cute.

After 2 hours or so, L Bug was exhausted and I wanted to get her home for naptime (we are big into routines right now because of Baby #2) so we ate our picnic lunch and then I took L Bug home, tucked her into her bed, turned on her classical music, switched on her fan, sang"Jesus Loves Me" twice (she begs "More Jesus, more Jesus!" until I sing it a second time), gave her a kiss, and closed her door. Fast asleep.  And that right there is the only reason I am blogging right now.  I finally have a spare moment!

Life has been out of hand lately - crazily wild and stressful and overwhelming!  I have finals for my three summer courses beginning tomorrow, and I'm getting ready for fall semester starting August 31st.  I'm busy ordering my textbooks, Nikki's textbooks, parking passes, etc., and I have Little M on Mondays, L Bug on Wednesdays, and Baby L on Saturday nights.  (She is finally outgrowing her colic... you have no idea how wonderful it is!)  I'm still juggling appointments and medical stuff plus a lawsuit now from my car wreck 2 years ago.  I just got involved with my region's organ donation group, too, and I'm up to big things there.  (Stay tuned!)  I'm re-starting physical therapy, too, and I decided to contact all of my I-miss-you friends and schedule them in.  You have to make time for things like that no matter how busy you are.  I've learned that.  Life is short, remember?

Anyways, tonight we're going to Grandma's (Jonathan's grandma) for dinner like we have been doing every Wednesday for awhile now.  She makes the best pasta ever - it's spaghetti with covatel noodles.  I could eat it all day long, mmmm!  I like it, too, because Jonathan and I drive around 40 minutes to get there, and it's nice to just have "chat" time.  :)   We hold hands and discuss whatever strikes our fancy, and yes, sometimes we kiss at red lights.  ;-)

Oh yes, and it is time for our church's annual yard sale so my mom and I have been going nuts in the basement getting rid of all of the stuff we can find.  It's actually kind of fun.  I like getting rid of stuff and reorganizing.  It's in the air right now... probably because fall is coming.  I love fall.  The colors are just gorgeous and the leaves inspire all kinds of change.  Good change.  Then comes the holidays.  I hate the holidays because it's all so cliche, but I absolutely adore the holidays because of all of the friends and family you get to be with.  The memories are precious.

So I'm going to eat a snack before L Bug wakes up because otherwise, I will be sharing my snack.  lol  Then Mom will come home, we will discuss the new baby schedule, and I'll go home where Jonathan will pick me up and go out to Grandma's!  Yay!  Oh and tomorrow I will be starting midterms . So studying might be a wise idea, too?

Thanks, friends, for hanging in there with me - I promise to try harder to make time to share.  Life is so amazing, but it's just happening way too fast right now.  I can't keep up with it as hard as I may try!

Oh and did I mention I'm completely and utterly exhausted?  Thank goodness I can sleep in tomorrow!

xoxo