Lessons in Motherhood

Hailey can feed herself now. Yup, it’s true. She can pick up tiny objects like Cheerios and Veggie Crackers and shove them in her own mouth. I guess my job here is done!! Actually, since we”ve started this eating on our own thing, we’ve lost all interest in eating any baby food. We’ve also stopped sleeping through the night. It’s always one step forward, two steps back!

I have driven in Atlanta for exactly one day, but here are some things that I know to be true:

1) Whoever named the streets was either incredibly uncreative or really stupid, probably both. All of the streets are named the same thing, and I’m not just talking about the infamous Peachtree. No, it includes lots of other streets that bear the same name, and are only delineated as Drive, Street, Circle, or Avenue. It’s craziness.

2) They certainly don’t skimp on the syllables when it comes to street names. Here are a few that I ran across today…Ponce de Leon Ave, Ralph David Abernathy Freeway, Joseph E Lowery Blvd, and let’s not forget Ralph McGill Blvd, where we currently live! When they name a street after me, I’m going to call it Alisa Catherine Palmisano Hamilton Blvd Circle.

3) Whenever the street namers came up with a new fantastic street name, they must have just picked any random street and given it that name, regardless of whether it already had a name. That’s the only explanation for why all of the streets suddenly change names at completely random intersections.

4) There’s absolutely no need for street signs to help someone like me make sense of any of this!!!

Here we are in beautiful Atlanta. We arrived yesterday to find that during the 3.5 hour drive, Hailey had left us with a gigantic present in her pants. So, the first order of business was an immediate bath and depooping of her outfit. Fun. Then, we carried all of our stuff up 4 flights of stairs. Double fun. Luckily, all of our furniture is still in Nashville, but we did have several large items. We had to tag team the unloading and carrying so that someone was in the apartment with Hailey at all times. See, we’re already feeling the effect of having left all of our free family babysitters in Nashville! Our apartment is very small. Well, let’s say cozy. However, it is very convenient for both of our jobs and is directly across the street from a huge park with lots of walking trails. So, I think that it will suit us perfectly. More later…

I don’t know if you can see it, but it’s just to the right of her first tooth. I can only hope that she gets my teeth. I can just picture the dental bills now. Yikes!

Hey, how do you work this thing?

Oh, this part goes in your mouth!

Now I got it!!!

Look what I can do. Today I held the bottle all by myself for the first time. I’m such a big girl!!! There are a few more pictures up on the Flickr site. http://www.flickr.com/photos/lukehamilton/

Now that we are getting to the point where we actually have to go live in Atlanta, I’m getting a little nervous. I know that it’s going to be fine, but it is so unfamiliar. We are leaving all of our furniture and most of our worldly belongings in Nashville to help “stage” our house. Josie, our loving border collie, is going to live with my Mom and Step Dad for a little while, and we’ve already given away one of our cats. Thank goodness the other cat is coming with us. So much change in such a small period of time. I just can’t imagine living in a place with rented furniture. I’m going to miss my bed and Hailey’s rocker and my house. Of course, I can’t even really express how much we are going to miss all of the people in Nashville. We are so thankful to our friends and family here for being so wonderful and kind, not to mention helpful in this transition. Well, I’m getting a little teary now so it must be time to start thinking again about all of the stuff I need to do before we leave!

Some wise Mom once told me that whatever age your child is will seem like the best age. Well, so far that wisdom has held true. Never more so than during this 6-7 month old stage. Hailey is absolutely perfect right now. She’s alert and happy most of the time. She can sit up on her own and play with toys, but she can’t crawl yet. She babbles incoherently, but doesn’t talk back. She snuggles, but doesn’t need to be held all the time. It’s just great! Here is her 6 month picture. I’ve also included one from last weekend where you can see her tooth!

Well, I’m a bit of a slacker because we’ve known for almost a week now that we would be packing our bags for Atlanta. Luke received a job offer last week and officially accepted it on Friday. It’s a very exciting offer with one of the largest, if not the largest, interactive agency in the country. They are providing us with relocation assistance including a temporary apartment until we can sell our house. It’s really a wonderful package. So, we’re off to Atlanta. He starts his job on March 5th. Yes, in less than 2 weeks!!!! I’ll post more details as soon as I have them!

Last Monday, Hailey had her 6 month checkup, including shots. Her stats are now: Weight: 16.63 lbs, 56th percentile and Height: 26.5″ 70th percentile. She’s a long one! No wonder she’s already too long for her 6 month clothes. Well, I think it’s a combination of the height and her gigantic thighs. Really, they’re huge!

Three days after the shots, Hailey started running a fever. On Saturday, Grandma Scott and I took her to the doctor where they promptly made me feel like a bad mother by declaring that her fever was 103 and rushing out of the room to get Tylenol. Helllloooo…I had been giving her Tylenol the whole time, I just didn’t give her the last dose in case they prescribed something else. I didn’t know her fever would spike up. Plus, our stupid thermometer at home is completely inaccurate. Anyway, they diagnosed her with an ear infection.

Now, we’ve begun the battle of the medicine. It’s not just that she doesn’t want to take the medicine. It’s that she flat out refuses. You get any dropper full of anything near her mouth and she clenches her little lips so tight that it takes a tire jack to pull them apart. It’s ridiculous, but twice a day we continue to fight the good fight. Each time we get about half down her throat and half on her shirt, on my shirt, on the chair, etc. If anyone has any suggestions for making this easier, I’m all ears. I just don’t want her to hate medicine for the rest of her life. I can just see me chasing her around the house with the dropper when she’s 3. Yikes.

I don’t write about the work/family topic as much as I should. If I wrote about it in proportion to the amount that I think about it, I would have a blog on the subject every day. These are the questions that I most often grapple with:

• Will my children be better or worse off for me having worked during their childhood?
• Will I look back at my life and regret spending all my working hours away from them?
• Do I even have it in me to stay home with them every day?
• Can a teacher at a daycare or preschool teach them more than I can?
• Am I going to have discipline problems with them because their parents aren’t around enough to offer that steady hand?
• Am I a better mother for trying to do it all even if I’m not always successful?
• Will my daughter(s) look up to me and respect me more for working?
• Can I even afford to stay home?
• Am I being selfish for wanting to work?
• Would I become Bree Hodge (formerly Bree Van de Camp) if I stayed home?

I ask myself these questions every single day. Usually multiple times a day. There are times when I think that I’ve absolutely made the right choice, and others when I think that I’m ruining everything, mostly my child. I guess that the most frustrating part is that I’ll never know what the answers are. All I can do is try to achieve the best balance that I can and be flexible in case my family needs me to make a change one way or the other.

I hope that one day Hailey and her yet unborn sibling(s) will read this and understand how difficult the decision is. Well, one day they’ll understand because they’ll probably go through it themselves. That’s a scary thought.

PS: I’m not pregnant again, people. Get with the program. I’m just asking hypothetical questions!