Who am I kidding?

So I thought that I was handling this whole "going back to work" thing pretty well. I wasn't feeling too anxious about it, but I think that's only because I was so stressed out about finding childcare and getting Z to take a bottle that I didn't have the time or energy to be anxious about anything else. Now that we found our super nanny and she was successful in giving Z a bottle, I have ALL THIS ROOM in my brain to freak out about going to work, leaving Zachary with someone else, maybe even missing a minute or two of his babyhood! I feel like I'm back on the roller coaster of emotions I was riding after Zachary was born (hello, baby blues!). I keep trying to tell myself to "just breathe", but then my mind jumps to "breathe like we do in yoga" and then to "I can't go to mom & baby yoga anymore because I'll be AT WORK!" and then I'm right back where I started. And all of this anxiety is simply over the idea of leaving my baby for a few hours a day...I haven't even begun to ponder the idea of having to be productive at work again.

It's all good now

So everything seems to be working out again! We found a great nanny, and she came over this morning to help me watch Zachary so that she can get an idea of his routine. She was also able to give him a bottle, and he drank the whole thing! I'm so relieved, even though my emotions are still all over the board regarding my return to work on Monday....

Not a good day

Childcare? Nope. Bottle? Nope.

Stressed to the nines? Absolutely.

Good day

We may have found childcare! And after trying 3 different types of bottles with 7 different types of nipples, Zachary actually drank 1-1/2 oz! It's not a lot, but it's a start.

It's been a good day!

The real world

The real world is creeping back in and I must say, I don't like it one bit.

My maternity leave is due to end next week. This is enough to give me a fair amount of stress (I don't get to spend all day with my baby? Someone else is going to be with him??). To add to it, the childcare that I was sort of counting on fell through yesterday. And Zachary is refusing to take a bottle. So now we have a baby without childcare who refuses to eat from a bottle, and I'm supposed to go back to work in a week. Hmph.

I can't help but think that all of these issues would cease to exist if I didn't go back to work.

I'm going to call it "Fido"

My favorite line (so far) in Anne Lamott's "Operating Instructions" (she's talking about her post-baby belly):

"When I lie on my side in bed, my stomach lies politely beside me, like a puppy."

Photo-frenzy and blog-a-rama

I'm still trying to figure out the best way to manage my pictures. I'm posting in three different places right now (see below for descriptions) and it's getting confusing.

It was much easier when I only had one blog and I organized all of my pictures by event. But since Zachary was born, I take a lot more pictures (believe it or not) and the vast majority are event-less, unless you consider things like "drooling" and "sitting in his rocker" to be events. So for Zachary's pictures, I've been organizing the sets by date and posting them to his blog. I post the rest of my event-based or non-Zachary-centric pictures here on this blog.

The problem is when I have pictures of events (such as the baby class reunion) that include pictures of Zachary. Do I post them here or on Zachary's blog? And regardless of where I post them, will people be able to find them if they are scattered across two blogs? And I haven't even factored in the third blog yet.

Hmmmm...gotta think on this one a bit longer.

Here's a run-down of the three blogs, if you're curious:

wenmei

My blog. I started it in 2005, though I did maintain a couple of other sites prior to that (our wedding site in 2005 and my photos from 1999-2004, both of which can be accessed from wenmei). This is my catch-all blog, covering everything from events to pictures to my random thoughts. (By the way, if you click on the links to "wenmei" you won't go anywhere...you're already on that page.)

babyhill

Zachary's blog. This started off as my pregnancy blog, which I spun off from my main blog in order to spare people the details of my transformation into mommy-hood (unless they were interested). It then became my baby blog once Zachary was born. In January, however, Zachary took over the blog so that he could speak for himself. This is where he posts about his activities and where I post his weekly picture sets.

mamarazza

Picture blog. This is my newest blog, and it doesn't contain any text. I wanted a place to post pictures that I like without having to include a description. Right now it only has pictures of Zachary, but it will likely expand to include more. I may use this as the central repository for all of my pictures (and move them off of wenmei and babyhill), but I haven't figured out an elegant way to do that without over-complicating mamarazza.

Oh yeah, speaking of pictures, I've posted a new set to flickr: Misc February pictures

Should I be worried?

Yesterday afternoon, I took Cowboy and Zachary for a walk around the neighborhood after a long day filled with the soothing sounds of a screaming baby. It was my last resort -- I'd tried everything to get Zachary to take a nap (poor guy was exhausted but refused to sleep) so I finally decided that a rainy walk in the Babyhawk was going to have to work. Even if Zachary didn't stop crying, at least Cowboy and I would get some fresh air.

I made it down the street and halfway around the block when I realized that I felt a lot of air on my legs, so I looked down to make sure I was wearing pants. I was -- they were just baggy and made of a really light material so the wind was cutting through them pretty easily.

Should I be concerned about the fact that it took me over a block to check if I was wearing pants? Or should I be more concerned that this is even an issue?

Le gourmand

I listen to Sirius satellite radio in the car, and I often hear a commercial for Rosetta Stone language software. A man describes a visit to a French restaurant, where he impresses his friends by ordering in French. He says something along the lines of, "When the waiter came, I said, 'Je voudrais le poulet et le riz'."

Every time I hear that, I can't help but think, "You go to a French restaurant and you order chicken and rice??"

mamarazza

I'm making some changes in my blogging efforts, but I haven't quite nailed down what I want to do yet. I don't like having two separate streams of photos because it's too hard to figure out where to post which pictures (should the one of Zachary and Cowboy be on this blog or baby-hill...?). Plus I want to have a place where I can just post pictures for the sake of posting pictures.

So I started yet ANOTHER blog (it seems ironic that, in order to simplify my blogs, I'm adding another one to the list):

m a m a r a z z a

It's where I am posting my favorite pictures as I take them. I may move all of my pictures over there eventually.

"Mamarazza" (pronounced "ma-ma-rat'za") is a word that I thought I invented, but it turns out that I'm not as clever as I think I am. I came up with it because so many of my friends call me the "paparazzi" due to my picture-taking addiction. Since I am now a mama and I am female (those two tend to go hand-in-hand), I figured "mamarazza" would be a good twist on "paparazzi".

Quick Italian lesson: "Paparazzi" is the plural form of "paparazzo". "Paparazzo" is masculine, as it ends in an "o". The female form would end in an "a", as in "paparazza". But I'm a mama, not a papa...so "mamarazza" is born.

However, "mamarazza" has already been coined by Marianne Fürstin zu Sayn-Wittgenstein-Sayn. As she is an Austrian princess, accomplished photographer, and already has an impressively long name of her own, I hope she doesn't mind if I use "mamarazza" as well.