IrishOboe

Some days everything seems to go wrong and other days everything seems to line up.  Most days are a bit in between, but here is an account of one day to give you (and my future self) a glimpse into daily life here in our new home in Emmen.

6am Stephan’s alarm goes off. I’m already awake because Joseph needed a snack.  He just want back to sleep so I do too.

6:15am get up and follow my morning routine:

Get dressed. Do a quick sweep of the floors. Process my physical inbox for five minutes. Water the plants.  See the chives, marjoram and tomato grow!!!

10 minutes of “nesting” or making the house a bit nicer than it was the day before, today I wiped the coffee table, de-cluttered the window sill and arranged the candles there, found a home for some oversized sheet music that had been sitting around since the move, etc.

6:45am Joseph wakes up.  I drop what I’m doing (nesting) and greet him.  He pees on the potty.  We dump it in the toilet together and play a little.  I get us breakfast.  Today he ate two little slices of bread and three scoops of yogurt.  I had toast.  I wipe up the high chair and table and notice Joseph grunting so I put him on the pot.  Success!  For some reason he also grunts before having to pee.  We take care of the pee, say goodbye to Daddy as he goes off to work, I do the dishes and we play a little together and nurse (I don’t remember how often we play and nurse but it’s here and there and whenever).  I finish my morning routine:

Open all windows to air out apartment (so humidity doesn’t get high enough for mold to continue to grow)

“Swish and Swipe” bathroom (wipe surfaces and toilet, brush toilet bowl) – 4min

8:30ish I start to work on my “important daily cards” where I alternate 10 or so minutes on a task with 10 or so minutes of focused play with Joseph.  This morning practice was first up so I got out my harp and worked on adjusting the bray pins until Joseph crawled over to me and I gave him a little harp lesson.  He loves the harp.  I’m trying to teach him to be gentle.  He actually seems to have learned a bit how to be gentle and has a better plucking technique than he did before.  It used to be the “grab five strings and pull with all your might never releasing the fingers” and now it’s “grab one to three strings and pull sometimes releasing the fingers and making a nice sound.”  I call the improvement, especially since he’s only had three lessons.  What a smart kid!  I tell him he can’t bother me while I’m practicing (it’s only 10 minutes!) and he listens until I’m almost done then when he comes to grab the strings while I’m doing a run-through of a piece I tell him “no” while I’m playing (that takes brain power!) and he starts crying.  Fortunately I’m at the end of my practice session and we can make up.  Total time the harp is out: 15 minutes.  Not up to conservatory standards but I’ve learned how to make the most of the minutes I have.

 (More)

The day after I blogged about how great ECing with Joseph is I missed nearly every one of his pees for two days.  Things have been improving ever since, however and now we’re back to a pretty good average.

Joseph loves clapping his hands, especially with people.

He is increasingly aware and coordinated.  He crawls around obstacles to get to his desired destination.  I first observed this April 20^th when he saw me open the balcony doors and he crawled as fast as he could around his toys to get outside.  If I close the doors before he gets there he throws a fit.  I’m learning how to balance real needs with fits.  It’s not always easy to tell when he’s hurt and when he’s just made he can’t have something.

And speaking of crawling, he goes FAST!  We need to get a video of it someday.  He’s still not interested in standing or walking without support.

He pushes buttons.  When Daddy helps Joseph brush his teeth Joseph gets to turn the bathroom light on and off (it’s a button).

Joseph likes being on the balcony and crawling outside of the house.  When he’s on a surface he doesn’t like he’ll lift his right knee up so that only the foot touches and then gingerly crawl using his right foot and his left knee/foot.  It’s terribly cute.

I’ve been enjoying working on our garden.  I have no clue about gardens and all the instruction books confuse me more and fail to give the basic instructions I think I need.  Despite not knowing what to do and taking too long researching and getting nowhere, I’ve finally just started trying things and whether it’s right or not I’m having fun with it.  I’ve worked the ground to our 170 sq. ft. garden entirely by hand (and with hand tools).  It’s starting to look tamed and I’m proud of how I can grab 15 minutes or so of time when Joseph can entertain himself to work on it.  I’m also trying to grow parsley, chives, marjoram, and cherry tomatoes from seeds indoors.  We don’t get that much sun, so we’ll see how it goes.  The chives and marjoram are sprouting already after just a few days!  It’s so much fun to grow stuff!  It’s almost doesn’t matter if I get a good harvest.

I should write about our Ireland trip, but I don’t want to think that hard, so I’ll use the captive audience to talk about what’s been on my mind and heart for the last year or so.  I find nobody much wants to hear me talk about how I’m working on organizing house and home as much as I have need to talk about it, so with baby in bed and husband out and about, I’ll have some quality time with the keyboard.

I’d love to write about all the things that I’ve discovered and am tweaking to serve my family, like GTD (Getting Things Done), the Tickler, Swish and Swipe (thanks to the Fly Lady) and more, but that would take too much energy, too.  I had a somewhat “blah” day.  You know, one of those days where you don’t feel like doing much of anything and things only get done that are automatic or unavoidable and you end up spending a good deal of time in quadrant four (unimportant and non-urgent) activities.  A few years ago a day like that would have meant candy wrappers and dishes scattered on my desk, stuff spread all over my room, me stuck to the computer doing random things procrastinating going to bed because that would mean facing the consequences of wasting the day away: seeing the next day’s list of engagements and realizing that I’m unprepared for them all.  Whether or not it would have been possible to prepare for all of them if I’d used the time well is irrelevant to the guilty conscience.  I’m unprepared and IT’S ALL MY FAULT!

Thankfully, it’d not like that tonight.  Amazingly, it’s not like that tonight.  Praise the Lord it’s not like that tonight!  The floors are swept, the dishes are done, the bathroom is clean, things are picked up and put away (okay, my desk is a little messy . . .), tomorrow is planned and I’m writing a blog post because I have a little card that lets me know I didn’t write on this week yet.  All that happened on automatic pilot even though I had a “blah” day.  I hardly had days like that a few years ago even when I was in a good mood!

But before this gets to be a long boring post, the most amazing part about today is that I made two phone calls and ran an errand that I’d been procrastinating on for one week, two months, and several months respectively.  That would be impressive on a good day, but on a “blah” day?  It only happened thanks to a tip about gambling.  I’ve started keeping a die on my desk and a slip of paper labeled one through six.  I write three things I’ve been procrastinating on and three things I like to do.  Each day, or several times a day I commit to spending 15 minutes on whatever the die tells me to do.  Not only have I started reading for pleasure again, but when the one finally came up today, I picked up the phone without letting myself think.  Two phone calls and less than 15 minutes later (including interruptions from Joseph) my “Calls” list was empty!  That’s quite a picker-upper for a “blah” day.

The errand got done thanks to a more old-fashioned reminder system: a kick in the pants from my husband.  “Take Joseph, go for a walk, and visit the glasses shop.”  I did.  I walked in and they gave me an exam right then.  That’s good because tonight my glasses finally buckled under Joseph’s loving (okay, so I sat on them a few times, too).  Normally that would have been the frustrating kick-in-the-pants to finally get new glasses and it would have become an emergency, but this time it made me laugh.  I’d already planned to go pick out frames with Stephan tomorrow!

Fine. It wasn’t short.  That’s why I normally set the timer and don’t let myself go longer than 15 minutes!!!!  And no, my taxes aren’t done yet, but we have an extra two months as overseas citizens . . .

You’ve been warned.

Despite a rather long break from ECing with Joseph because of preparing for the move, moving and traveling in Ireland, Joseph hasn’t forgotten how to use the potty.  In fact, he quickly surpassed his previous skills and it still amazes me what he can do.  I marvel at it, really.  Our nine-month-old baby crawls to me saying “mamama” in a fussy tone when he needs to pee.  Then he waits until Mommy gets it and puts him on the potty where he does his business.  I might add that his favorite position is holding his hose, which I’m not sure is a good thing or not.  Mostly he keeps it pointed downwards, only once he got a surprise . . .

He doesn’t go #2 as often as before, which means that I can tell when it’s about to come and usually it’s in the morning so we catch it right after he wakes up.  But sometimes he can wait for me if I’m lazy getting out of bed.  Amazing.  It’s still amazing to me because sometimes it doesn’t work.  Sometimes he happily poo on the floor smiling up at me or he’ll refuse to use the potty even though it’s been two hours.  At those times no sooner do I take him off the potty than he goes on the floor!  It’s times like those that I realize he’s just nine months and that would be considered normal, but I get frustrated because I know he has control at least sometimes.  Now I’d say he has control and is willing to communicate most of the time.  That’s incredible!  I’ve gotten bold.  The other day we only missed one pee from wake-up to 2pm.  Yesterday I went shopping with Joseph in the sling on my back wearing no diaper.  We were gone an hour and toward the end he got fussy and I felt something warm and wet at the small of my back.  As soon as we got home I took him out and realized it was just my sweat.  I put him on the potty and he went!  I’m really enjoying that he can communicate rather clearly about his need to go.  It’s no longer just a feeling (though that plays a part, too).  If I’m not sure I show him the potty and ask if he wants to go and if he smiles and reaches for it then he goes but if he doesn’t putting him on it is futile!  I’ve started signing more with him, but not as much as I should.  If I’d be signing from the beginning I’m sure he’d be starting to sigh by now.  But there’s no better time to start than now!

I think I’ve failed to mention elsewhere that he is very stable on his feet now.  He shows no interested in standing without a hand grip, but he is very able to lower himself down to a comfortable position.  He can catch himself when he falls and he knows where the edge of the bed is and how to slide off sideways.  Being a Mom is an amazing job!

Things have been plenty busy around here with several trips to Basel for rehearsals and other commitments but it’s been a week since my last post so here’s a little more for you.

Stephan has been coming home for lunch, which we’ve made the made meal of the day.  It’s lovely to share every meal with him, though it takes quite a bit of time to prepare and to clean up on my own with Joseph.  In general, I’ve been pleased with my progress of figuring out how to keep house without taking too much time so I can be there for my family.  Joseph is enjoying the extra space and can crawl quite fast now.  He loves people and will happily go to and play with anyone who smiles at him.  This is quite a hit on the trains.  If someone doesn’t look at him, he coos and smiles at them until they do.  He expects the attention and loves it.  Of course, Mommy has to be near by and when he wants me nobody else will do, but it is nice that he doesn’t need me all the time.  He’s spent a number of hours with Grossmutti away from me and has done just fine, so maybe we’re coming up to the time when I can have an evening off and go out somewhere.  Who knows!

March 27^th Joseph surprised us by moving from the seated position on the train to scooting backwards onto the floor.  It was very smooth and deliberate, but it still must have been half luck because he’s not usually that intentional about getting down off sofas and beds, though he’s getting better!

What’s also surprising to me is Joseph’s third word (after “Mama” and “Bappe”).  When he’s unhappy about something he whines “nei nei nei nei nei” which is pronounced like the German word “nein” meaning no.  His mother tongue is English, but so far all three words he speaks are more Swiss German than English!

We’re enjoying beautiful spring weather here.  I hung some laundry up outside yesterday and wild flowers and blooming and birds are singing.  It’s easy to be in a good mood!  (Disclaimer: That doesn’t stop me from getting frustrated when Joseph is too much, but I’m learning to be more and more patient.)