Hi sweetie-pie-love-of-my-life!
No, we haven't forgotten about you it's just that life has been super busy since we came back from our trip out West which I still have to tell you about. Your Daddy and I made a little (umm...45 minutes) video blog about our marriage shenanigans and at some point I'll post that.
So a little mini update for you, Mister O.
Mama is working!
Yes, sweetie pie, I started working outside of the home, last Wednesday, April 1st. I feel so lucky and honored to have been able to be a stay at home mama for so long...basically from the time you were 6 months until 22 months but Mama wanted to go back to work! When I first resigned from my position when you were 6 months old I had no idea when I would go back to work...in a year...in 2 years...when you started school...after I was done having bambinos...so I just played it by ear.
The last few months though I felt that it was time, not just for me but also for you. I was feeling isolated and a bit crazy and I thought it would be good for you to make other little friends your age so here we are. One night a few weeks ago I looked through the classifieds and found an amazing job. I hadn't quite made the decision to return back to work at the time but I thought to myself, I'll apply to this one job and if I get an offer it's a sign I'm meant to back to work and if not, then it's a sign that it's not the right time right now.
So I sent in my resume on a Friday, the closing date for the position. Then that Monday I received a call from their Human Resources Director for a phone interview. Then they called me two days later for an interview with the 4 directors of the organization and at the end of that interview they asked me to come in the next day to interview with their Chief Operating Officer. Whew! It went by so quickly and the next day, I got a call from the COO offering me the position and he wanted to know if I could start on Monday (this was Wednesday and we were leaving for Colorado the next day). Crazyness!
Luckily I had already started to look at preschools when I got the call for the phone interview. Daddy & I were only comfortable with you being in a child care center and not in a family day care. So I called all the child care centers in the area that accept 22 month olds and there weren't many openings available with some providers only accepting places on the waitlist for the 2010-2011 school year. West Hartford crazyness! Oh, and also you weren't up to date on your vaccines so we had to rush over to Northampton to your pediatrician to get you all your shots so you could enroll in child care.
Anyhoo, luckily the YWCA in the area had just gotten a full time spot opened up the week I had called. Daddy and I had looked into the YWCA child care a long time ago when I had thought about returning back to work but we couldn't afford at the time unless I was going to work full time and I didn't want to work full time back then. So anyhoo, you and I went to check out some child care places and we really liked the YWCA, It's about 5 minutes from our home, or a 15-20 minute walk and is housed at the Elmwood Community Center that we've gone to a lot. Daddy and I really liked it when they gave us a tour. It's super diverse as far as ethnicity and class and they have two separate classrooms. One for 15-36 months old and one for 3 & 4 years old.
You go outside every day, unless it's raining and they play music and do science projects and art projects and who knows what else. What I liked the best is that it seems real. On Fridays, for example, is pizza day and all the kiddies get to eat pizza for lunch. Last week they had a pajama day where everyone, including the teachers dressed up in pjs and read stories. While I loved your preschool before, it was a bit too perfect, if that makes sense. Like they would never have pizza day, and even if they did, it would be organic multi grain pizza dough that you had made yourself with organical locally grown cheese and on and on...
Here's what your old school has been up to, by the way:
Volcanoes
Following the children’s lead, we have been engaged in an ongoing exploration of volcanoes. What began as a table independently discussing volcanoes and molding them from play dough, soon led to a collaborative survey of images of volcanoes on the internet, which led to brilliant paintings, engaging drawings, and then a sculptural recreation of a volcano, using a hollow log, with pink wool for the flowing lava. Harnessing the immense force of this natural phenomenon in paint and pencil, as well as re-enacting explosions in the sensory table with pyramidal-shaped cones, has given these preschool artists a sense of empowerment and understanding.
Good thing I went back to work because I don't know if I would have been able to make volcanos with flowing lava for you! Anyhoo, all to say that I really like it and I hope you do too.
Speaking of which, you cry so much when we drop you off. It's so sad, sweetie. They say you've been getting better though but you ask for backa backa when you go to take your nap. :( My poor munchkin.
Anyhoo, I miss you like crazy but I'm really enjoying my job so far. I'm a youth intake specialist and organizational monitor at a non-profit in Hartford that works on workforce development and I'm the Future Workforce division, which deals specifically with providing opportunities for low income youth to enter the job force or receive education and training. With the federal Economic Stimulus Plan, my organization received $3 million for a summer youth employment program where youth between the ages of 14-24 will get to work at an organization for 6-12 weeks during the summer and get paid for it. However, there are strict federal guidelines on who can participate in the program since it is designed for low income youth only. Since there are strict eligibility guidelines to apply to the program I have to collect a bunch of documentation from them and their families to prove that they're both income eligible for the program (you can't make more that 180% of the poverty level for your family size) and also document that they have a "serious barrier to employment" which can be a lot of things from your family's first language not being English, to being a foster child, to your parents not graduating from high schoool, to being homeless, and on and on.
So I go to these intake sessions where youth and their parents/legal guardians come to sign up for the summer job program. Once we have all the youth signed up, sometime in late May we'll decide which youth to accept into the program and place them at jobs for the summer. Once that's done, I'll be monitoring the different organizations that are have some of the youth from the summer program to make sure they are compliant and will gather information for them for reports and funding purposes.
Anyhoo, I love it and and I get to talk to people all day which I really like. My other coworkers (there are 3 of us on the team) are hilarious so we have a really good time. The only issue is that for the next month or so I have to work 2 nights a week to attend sign up sessions that take place from 3pm-8pm so not seeing you all day on those days is hard but once all the youth are signed up I'll go back to my regular hours (8:30-5:00pm).
On Friday I'm going to flex my time and take a half day so you're going to stay with Lela Carmen in the morning since it's Good Friday and then I'll get to pick you up at 12:30pm and spend the rest of the day with you...yay! I'm looking forward to taking you to the library and our other usual haunts.
This is getting too long so I'll stop here. Oh, and your Daddy has really stepped up to the plate. I don't know what we'd do without him little O. Another benefit of my job is that it's also in downtown Hartford close to Daddy's job so we ride in together and I park in a parking lot across from my job (which my organization pays for...yay!) and then Daddy walks me to work and then walks to his job so we get to spend a little alone time together in the morning. Today we even had lunch together at a restaurant nearby...it's like a little date for us!
Anyhoo, I love you little snookie pie. You are the best little O a Mama could have.
Mama
