a group journal like the SAHM/WAHM have?

What is it? I seen it but didn't venture into it..

definitely!

Sure:)

Sure.

:bullhorn: What is it??????????????????????????????????????????? :)

:lol: Melissa! Basically a journal for working moms and dads where we can vent, get to know each other, discuss stuff, and support each other :)

Thank you!!! Count me in!!! ;)

I'm in . I need all the support I can get! :)

Sure :)

I'm in . I need all the support I can get! :)

Ditto!!!

I'm in! :supergrin

Much needed!!! :nod:
How about happily working parents! :lol: Is there such a thing?

Count me in!!!

D~ I am not sure about the happily part!! :lol:

Would anyone mind if I put together some introduction questions for us to answer. There are a few here that I "know" but don't really "know" alot about them.

Sure Amy! Ask away! I would love support from other working moms. :)

Is this our "journal"?

1. What is your name, age, and names and ages of DH and child/ren.

2. What do you and your DH do? How many hours a week do you both work. Are you FT or PT?

3. What is your day like after work and on your days off? How are the household matters [chores, bill paying, etc] divided?

4. Share anything else you would like us to know about you.

5. What do you hope to get out of this journal?

Is this our "journal"?

I can PM Wendy to rename it "Working Parents Group Journal"

1. What is your name, age, and names and ages of DH and child/ren.
Me: Nocona, 32
DH: Paul, 34
Kids: Matthew - turned 3 yesterday; Sara - due in 10 days!

2. What do you and your DH do? How many hours a week do you both work. Are you FT or PT?
Paul quit working a little over a month ago. Prior to that he worked a couple nights a week and weekends doing tech support for DSL.

I work FT+ (7am-5pm M-F, plus anything I need to take home or stay late or come in on Saturday for) at a general contractor. I am the director of a specialized insurance program for our subcontractors.

3. What is your day like after work and on your days off? How are the household matters [chores, bill paying, etc] divided?
I generally get home around 5:30. Then we do the dinner thing and hang with Matthew, then his bath and I try to watch something I've TiVOd before I try to go to sleep. Weekends are spent running errands and hanging out. I pay all the bills/balance the checkbook, etc. He is mainly responsible for cleaning, but that doesn't usually happen unless I point stuff out :rolleyes: He's generally fairly good about doing dishes, laundry and taking out the trash.

4. Share anything else you would like us to know about you.
I'm cool ;)

5. What do you hope to get out of this journal?
Working parents seem to be a minority on OUAL, so hopefully we can provide a little support and/or commiserate with one another :)

I just realized this is in my moderating group, so I changed the title :)

I just realized this is in my moderating group, so I changed the title :)

TY....I didn't get to PM Wendy....I had to get Alexis. Today is a day where I cannot get both girls to nap at the same time. :rolleyes:

1. What is your name, age, and names and ages of DH and child/ren.
Me: Amy, turning 34 in July
DH: Don - turning 38 on Sunday
Kids: Ashton Elizabeth 6/22/02 and Alexis Victoria 10/14/04

2. What do you and your DH do? How many hours a week do you both work. Are you FT or PT? I am a casino dealer, with a 40hr. work week. Off Tues/Wed. I work 11-7pm, and Monday it is 12-8. Don is a Sound/Lighting Supervisor and his schedule changes week to week, but is mainly off Sun/Mon, works 9-5 on Tues & Wed, works 9-7 on Thursday, and 9-2am Fri/Sat. But all those times are flexible, somedays earlier, some later, depending on what events/concerts, etc. he is working. Split days off suck, but it cuts back on child care costs.

3. What is your day like after work and on your days off? How are the household matters [chores, bill paying, etc] divided?Don takes out the trash to the curb 2x a week, and will do dishes here and there, and will sometimes cook dinner on the days I work that he is home. Sometimes I cook on my days off for when he comes home or we go out. He will hit the grocery store for a few things if asked, and does his laundry. I do just about everything else.....grocery, girls laundry, bill paying/banking, etc. Don gets the girls dressed on the days we both work. Bedtime for Alexis is about 9:30 and Ashton's is 10. With working a later shift, we need a later bedtime for the girls to sleep in later! :silly: I am not getting up at 6am when I don't start work for 5 hours.

4. Share anything else you would like us to know about you.I would eventually love to be a SAHM, or at least go down to PT, but since we want a bigger house, I want to find a better paying dealing job.

5. What do you hope to get out of this journal? The same as what Nocona said!!

Well, this is right up my alley!!! Hi ladies!!!

1. What is your name, age, and names and ages of DH and child/ren.

Tracey: 29
Josh: 27
Jackson: 2 (January 18, 2003)

2. What do you and your DH do? How many hours a week do you both work. Are you FT or PT?

I am a full-time paralegal at a very small medical malpractice law firm. We do strictly defense litigation work. Well, I'm not *actually* full-time, I have Wednesdays off, so I really only work 32 hours, but get paid for 40.

Josh works for the railroad and is on the road 100% of the time. To date, we havent' seen him in 11 days. He's expected back home for ONE day, but we still have 10 more days to go. Right now he's working on a traveling gang and has been "gone" for 14 months. He's really only home now 2-3 days a month because he's getting further and further away as the gang is traveling east.

3. What is your day like after work and on your days off? How are the household matters [chores, bill paying, etc] divided?

After work....well, I pick up Jackson from school, we drive the 55 minutes home, make dinner, eat dinner, unpack and re-pack our stuff for the next day, tubby time, and bed time. Not much time for anything else since I like us to be in bed by about 8:30 p.m We co-sleep, so we both just go to bed at the same time.

Household matters divided...ummm, they aren't :lol:! It's just me 100% of the time, so I do everything, you name it, I do it! Of course, in Josh's defense, he's 1200 miles away, and living out of a hotel room, so there's really not much he can do.

4. Share anything else you would like us to know about you.

Other than the fact that I'm starting to loose my mind... nope :lol:!

5. What do you hope to get out of this journal?

Friendship and support! I sort of feel out numbered sometimes when it comes to working, so this is just awesome to see us all here!

Can I join in too?

1. What is your name, age, and names and ages of DH and child/ren.

I'm Lil, 29
DH is Karl, 31
DS, Nick and Belly Baby comming in a few weeks.

2. What do you and your DH do? How many hours a week do you both work. Are you FT or PT?

Right now I'm FT but will be PT after my matternity leave is over :)

I'm a software test specialist. I test high availability/diaster recovery software my company makes. DH works at the same place he was hired to test the Linux project which is shelved for a while so in the mean time he has become the ap note tester and solution creater.

3. What is your day like after work and on your days off? How are the household matters [chores, bill paying, etc] divided?
Well DH does most of the cooking in our family. I do most of the cleaning, all the bill paying and we split baby care about 50/50. We commute together so we get home at around 6 pm or so. We try to have dinner prepped and stuff in the morning and do a lot of crockpot meals... Nick goes to bed between 8 and 9.

4. Share anything else you would like us to know about you.
Well I'm actually ready for a career change. I'd love to go to nursing school or teach childbirth classes (Bradley method) I want to be a doula, birthing has become a real passion for me.

5. What do you hope to get out of this journal?

A chance to connect with other parents in similiar situations as me. Being a working parent has its own set of challenges and its nice to chat with those going through it.

1. What is your name, age, and names and ages of DH and child/ren.
I am Melissa - 32
DH - Dave - 35
DS - David 3

2. What do you and your DH do? I am an insides sales rep; DH is a tech
How many hours a week do you both work. We both put in 40 hours a piece Are you FT or PT? We are both FT

3. What is your day like after work and on your days off? Busy. After work it's really crazy. Between dinner, bath time, some family time and bed time. I usually don't get to "relax" until 9pm. The weekends are great. Saturday is family fun day and Sunday we do house and yard work.
How are the household matters [chores, bill paying, etc] divided? We share it 50/50. It's pretty even....Most of the time ;)

4. Share anything else you would like us to know about you. I am pretty crazy and out there sometimes. I love to read and hang with my wonderful family. We are currently TTC #2 and have been since October 2003. I had a m/c last Apri. I am a fun loving person. What else would you like to know? I am pretty much an open book.

5. What do you hope to get out of this journal? I hope to meet new friends that I may otherwise not meet. I hope to gain some insite to my crazy 3 year old. Mainly just looking to get support from other working moms!!

Amy: I just noticed that your birthday is in July. What day? Mine is July 15th!

:bee: joining in!

1. What is your name, age, and names and ages of DH and child/ren.

I'm Denise~going to be 29 on the 21st
DH is Vinnie~30
DS is Nicholas who is 28 months now.

2. What do you and your DH do? How many hours a week do you both work. Are you FT or PT?

We are probably one of the only ones on the board that work together. :lol: Most days we arent "together" but work out of the same office. My dad is our regional director. We are supplemental sales coordinators. (We work for AFLAC, the "duck" commercials?) All offices are independently owned by agents and my brother and myself own our office space. Yes, my brother also works with us. :crazy: We work crazy hours most weeks, definitely FT since we are a pretty large office with many agents under us and we need to get in early and often leave late at night. It helps that our office is in the town I live in! Im out of the door earlier so I drop Nick off at my mom's or my FIL's for the day. They are our daycare! :lol:

3. What is your day like after work and on your days off? How are the household matters [chores, bill paying, etc] divided?

After we meet back at the office at the end of the day, we will either eat at FIL's or my moms, most days we just pick him up and grab something on the way home! Vin does 100% of the cooking, taking the garbage/recycling out and does all of the bills. I do the cleaning, laundry, etc...We split taking care of Nick right down the middle. He is so awesome with doing the diapers, waking up early, baths, getting dressed etc...After Nick goes to bed is when I get most of my chores done. I dont get too many days off unless its a holiday but even then, Im always running to the office for something or another. TG I own it and can bring Nick with me! :lol: Grocery shopping/mall trips are always done as a family. :)

4. Share anything else you would like us to know about you.
Its very stressful working with family, especially your husband and father! I dont know who is worse anymore!! I am very happy where I am in life right now...minus a m/c...I am fortunate to be making good money, have a new house, new cars and a healthy happy child. My life is almost complete.

5. What do you hope to get out of this journal?

I often feel guilty for being so happy working and being out all day. I couldnt imagine myself being a SAHM. And its not even money issues since money isnt an issue. I enjoy my time with Nick and never feel like I am less of a mother for deciding to build my career and work my way into a corporate world. I would hate to see my education go to waste. I am more successful than many men in my office and I think it bothers them. (sometimes DH) I would love a place to just get out my frustrations and have the support of other working mom's/dad's.
Denise

1. What is your name, age, and names and ages of DH and child/ren.

Me: Stefanie, age 33
DH: Anish, age 35
Kids: Emma, 2.75; Krishan, 1


2. What do you and your DH do? How many hours a week do you both work. Are you FT or PT?

I am an investment banker. I am working PT most of the time- generally I go in M,T and TH. If need be, I work Wednesdays, and when it's necessary, I'll work a Friday, but that's rare. DH is a CTO at an internet strategy firm, working FT.


3. What is your day like after work and on your days off? How are the household matters [chores, bill paying, etc] divided?
We try to get home by 6 when the nanny leaves, but often only one of us makes it home in time. We scramble together some dinner, every other night is bath night, and then the kids get ready for bed. Krishan goes down by 7, Emma by 8. I'm lucky that on Wednesdays, my nanny is working, so I use that day to get a lot of errands done. On Fridays, we try to do playgroup in the morning, then do stuff around the house in the afternoon.

We share the childcare 50/50. DH usually gets the kids dressed in the morning b/c I take longer to get ready, and bathtime is almost always his job. I probably do most of the household chores, but I'm home more and more anal. :) He walks the dog, and we split the cooking. I pay all of the bills, do the taxes, etc.

4. Share anything else you would like us to know about you.
For supposedly such a high powered executive :rolleyes: , I'm on OUAL way too much.

5. What do you hope to get out of this journal?
Definitely people to commiserate with! And to get ideas on how to streamline/organize better. Plus, Emma will be going to preschool in the fall, and I'll need help with all of the stuff related to sending your kid "out" to daycare/school.

:lol: Im like Stefanie! In a suit, heels and 'hose sitting there typing away! :lol: If someone comes into my office, my screen turns to work-related in a second! Im so quick too! :lol: How embarassing! :lol: I try not to "type" too much during the day but once I get home I can relax and unwind on here. Im supposed to be doing laundry now though! :lol:

:biggrin: Denise, glad I'm not the only one!

At least I try to be professional and not open OUAL out at an account! :lol:

I totally forgot about those taxes! Ugh! Stresses me out since we make 100% commission! :crazy: You cant imagine how much we have to give back! :(

I have been thinking of having Nick in preschool this fall too! :) I think it would be good for him. (them) Children interaction I think is lacking since Nick is with my mom 50% of the week and my FIL the other.

I am here!

What a good idea.

1. What is your name, age, and names and ages of DH and child/ren.
Me: Silke, 35
DH: David, 33
Kids: Natascha, 10, and Kyle turning 2 in May

2. What do you and your DH do? How many hours a week do you both work. Are you FT or PT?
I am chemist working on a new high performance fiber. Think Kevlar, but hopefully ours will be better soon. Basically I am analytical and mechanical testing support for R&D and the Pilot Plant. I work FT and plus some. :tongue2:
David works as a mechanic for one of the counties and has been studying for a mechanical engineering degree. He works FT, 40 hours, plus National Guard.

3. What is your day like after work and on your days off? How are the household matters [chores, bill paying, etc] divided?
David gets the kids ready in the morning and I help if I am not gone already. He shuttles them to babystitter/school. I do the pick-up routine: Natascha first, then Kyle. So I am ususally home around 5pm since I get off at 4pm. I kind of miss getting off at 3pm. I could get soooo much more done. Well, then starts the homework, cooking dinner and taking-care-of-a toddler battle all at the same time. :lol:
In regards to the bills..... I have no clue since David does that......I know my money does keep vanishing to somewhere every month. :lol:
On the chores, David gets the kids ready for bed most of the time while I clean up. I guess, I do most of the household chores, but David does pitch in. Before I forget, I don't do trash. :lol:

4. Share anything else you would like us to know about you.
Geesh, what to put here? :scratch: I have been debating heavily wether to go back for my PhD or not. Other than that they are trying to kill me workload-wise at work right now, I guess, I have no more to share. :lol:

5. What do you hope to get out of this journal?
Getting to know some working parents on OUAL.

1. What is your name, age, and names and ages of DH and child/ren.
Hi!
I am Alysia. Age 26
DH is Brad. Age 27
DD is Genavieve 15 months

2. What do you and your DH do? How many hours a week do you both work. Are you FT or PT?
I work for an insurance company 40 hours a week sometimes more.
DH is currently working a temporary job 40 hours a week and is waiting for his start date for his new full time job.

We both basically do Customer Service

3. What is your day like after work and on your days off? How are the household matters [chores, bill paying, etc] divided?
After work, we make dinner (or go get something), play with G for a little while, get her ready for bed, and then watch tv for an hour or so and go to bed.

On the weekends, we try to do laundry etc.
I do all the bill paying. And we split most everything else.

4. Share anything else you would like us to know about you.
I am going to school full time right now and should be doing homework as I type. I promise to go do it as soon as I am done with this post... :bolt:

I have also been home from work all this week because Genavieve is sick. I am so tired I would almost rather be back at work! But, my baby needs me!

5. What do you hope to get out of this journal?
Maybe some of my sanity back?... Or just people who understand my insanity would work too!

1. What is your name, age, and names and ages of DH and child/ren.

Me: Wendy, age 31
DH: Roger, age 33 (if I have to claim him :lol: )
Kids: Abby, age 3


2. What do you and your DH do? How many hours a week do you both work. Are you FT or PT?

I am a litigation paralegal. I work full time...I am usually in the office by at least 8:30...earlier if I have to be in court, mediation or a deposition and try to be out of the office by 5:00 but sometimes that depends on if I have been in court and am trying to get back to the office once we have gotten out. My responsibilities at this point are just about everything. We just recently downsized and fired my assistant so all I have now is someone that answers the phone. I am in court everytime by boss is in court, responsible for any and all paperwork that comes in and out of the office, preparing for trial and then all of the office managment duties as well. Needless to say I am usually running around like a chicken with my head cut off. The only thing I dont do is answer phones and the filing :lol:

Roger is a CPA and his hours all depend on what time of the year it is. Right now because it is tax season he is in the office until usually 8:30 or 9:00 and in the office early as well. He also teaches at one of the business schools here and on the one or two nights he does that he doesnt get home until close to 10:00.


3. What is your day like after work and on your days off? How are the household matters [chores, bill paying, etc] divided?
Now that we have moved the office I am usually to Abby by 5:45. She goes to school from 8:30 to 12:30 and then my MIL picks her up and she spends the afternoon with them. After I get her we usually come home, eat dinner, get a bath and then play a little bit. She is usually in bed by 9:00 and at that point I get a little down time. There are some evenings that I have a few errands to run, but I really try to do that on the weekends. Saturday she has gymnastics and we usually spend that afternoon getting our stuff done. Sunday we usually try to make church and then come home and spend the afternoon hanging out.

As for the household....I am very lucky in that I have had a cleaning service for the past 5 years. I dont know what I would do without that. Recently my MIL has taken over the cleaning duties (for some extra money) and she has insisted on doing our laundry as well. I really didnt want to let her do that because I felt really strange about it but since she has been doing it for the past month it has taken a lot off of me trying to get it done! We also have a lawn service so that makes things easier on DH. I pay most of the bills (we have seperate money so the bills DH pays are the big ones..meaning less 4 payments vs all the other misc ones) When he is home he will do the bath if I ask, and also will put her to bed when he is home. He usually take her to school becasue I cant drop her off and be to work on time, I do however always have her dressed, fed and ready to go before I walk out the door..but like I said, I pick up. Everything else is my responsibility though....meals, grocery, doctors, clothes shopping, dressing, finding activities for her to do, birthday presents for friends, lunches for school and all the other stuff that comes along with having a 3 year old.

4. Share anything else you would like us to know about you.
I love to read...and I really woudl like to take the time to travel more. I love the beach.....I am going to get away all by myself hopefully in June! I cant wait :)

5. What do you hope to get out of this journal?
I would like to feel like I am not alone....I know that sounds silly, but sometimes I feel as if I am the only one dealing with trying to juggle being a full time professional with motherhood. I would like to know that I am not the only one that feel guilty...and that the guilt is not necessarily from not being a SAHM...but from wanting to spend more time with my child but knowing that I couldnt/wouldnt be happy at home with her all day long. I would also like to know that I am not the only one that feels overwhelmed on a daily basis. I think I do a good job of balancing...but still feel like I am drowing most of the time....I would also like to learn how to take more time to take care of me without feeling guilty about it..... WOW! That was a book huh???

1. What is your name, age, and names and ages of DH and child/ren.
Me: Dennis, 34
DW: Mary, 37
Kids: Joe 3, Frances 22 months

2. What do you and your DH do? How many hours a week do you both work. Are you FT or PT?
We both work FT. I'm a software developer for an agricultural bank. Mary is a systems engineer/project manager for a telecom company.

3. What is your day like after work and on your days off? How are the household matters [chores, bill paying, etc] divided?
We both usually leave work around 4. I pick up the kids and we're all home around 4:30. Then it's a rush to get dinner ready, eat, take baths, play and watch a little TV and get the kids in bed. We usually start the bedtime routine between 6 and 6:15 and they are in bed around 6:30. (They get up around 6:30-6:45.) Then we have some "couple time" and talk and watch a little TV. Then Mary usually reads for a while and I play around on the computer for a bit or do other things, and we head to bed around 9-9:30.

We have cleaning people come every other week. We both do the laundry and the other chores. Mary usually plans dinners and I usually end up doing the cooking because J & F are both in a Mommy phase. I pay the bills on the weekends.

4. Share anything else you would like us to know about you.
I'd like to change careers, but it's hard to do when you need to pay the mortgage and feed the kids.

5. What do you hope to get out of this journal?
To see that we're not the only ones who go through this every week :)

I'd like to change careers, but it's hard to do when you need to pay the mortgage and feed the kids.


Same here, Dennis! I completely agree!

1. What is your name, age, and names and ages of DH and child/ren.

Me: Alyssa, age 31
DH: Joe, age 31
Kids: Aidan, age 3 Colin, age 2 "Jax" 17w baked


2. What do you and your DH do? How many hours a week do you both work. Are you FT or PT?

I am a marketing programs manager for an enterprise software company. Basically, I try to get more people to know about and buy our solution by coming up with new and different ways to appeal to how we can solve their business challenges. I do this FT. Right now, very FT. :updown:


We decided when Aidan was born to have Joe stay home. But on top of SAHD duties, he's a hockey ref . This means from about Sept-May he has upwards of 5 games a week, usually 2-3. He also does camps/tournaments which have left me alone for as long as 2 weeks. He's also a call firefighter/EMT in our podunk town - we don't have many FT firefighters so if the alarm sounds, you go if you can...and yes, you get paid. :aok:


3. What is your day like after work and on your days off? How are the household matters [chores, bill paying, etc] divided?
Right now, it's a mess. I'm working until 10-11pm each night, usually after the kids are in bed though. So between workload and pregnancy, there is little structure.

Normally though and esp. if Joe's home that night, I get home by 6:30pm and have a little time with the kids before dinner. We'll all eat (Joe cooks) and then if it's bath night, I take the kids for a bath while Joe cleans up and then we play around until bedtime, which we aim to have be by 9pm. A dance party tends to sneak its way in most nights. :lol:

Luckily I'm a night owl so I get cleaning done at night. Joe helps as much as he can during the days and does get a lot done, but there are things that are mine/that I do better. Like laundry. :dead: I'll usually pick 1-3 things each night to attack. Same with the weekends. I try not to save everything up for the weekend, because that just stinks to spend the whole day doing chores.

I'll try to do some things like bills during the work day too.

4. Share anything else you would like us to know about you.
Like Wendy, I love to read. Somehow I try to fit that in around working and spending QT with the kids. I also listen to books on tape to make my commute better, but I also try and use my 40 minute each way commuting time to make or return calls and de-stress. Exercise is what I don't get around to as much as I'd like.

5. What do you hope to get out of this journal?
I hope it's another way to interact more with different people. And I'm always up for hearing different tips on time management and organization! :aok:

What is your name, age, and names and ages of DH and child/ren.
I'm Becky, I'll be 38 in two weeks.
Dh-Chris, turns 37 on Sunday.
Dylan - DD, 10 years old
Alex - DS, 2.5 years old

What do you and your DH do? How many hours a week do you both work. Are you FT or PT?
I am an account manager for an audio and web conferencing company. I work 40 hrs/week but I have lots of flexibility. I work full time.
DH is a Service Advisor for BMW. He works about 60 hrs/week. No flexibility and he works more than full time.

What is your day like after work and on your days off? How are the household matters [chores, bill paying, etc] divided?.
I get home, get the kids a snack, oversee homework and playtime and get dinner ready and we wait for daddy to get home around 6:30. We hang out together on the weekends. We get our chores done as a family on Saturday mornings since I fired the housekeeper. I pay the bills, if I didn't we wouldn't have anything. My DH isn't good at bill paying. I make dinner and he cleans up. We both work on the house together on Saturdays. Chris is great about doing laundry and putting it away. Otherwise I do everything else. :lol:

Share anything else you would like us to know about you.
I am adopting my stepdaughter in 12 days. She has been my daughter for 6 years and I have raised her as my own since she was 4. I don't get enough time to myself. I help care for my mom who recently had knee replacement surgery and it stresses me out. I love to host parties. We have a hot tub and it's the best thing we ever bought. Chris and I play on an adult co-ed kickball team on Friday nights. Also, I'm a journal slacker! :lol:

What do you hope to get out of this journal?
Empathy, sympathy, laughter and getting to know others more.

1. What is your name, age, and names and ages of DH and child/ren.
I'm Robyn (25) and I'm a single working mom. Dh and I separated at Christmas time (whole 'nother story!) Jacob is 3 1/2, Connor just turned 2 in March and Ty is 10 months.

2. What do you and your DH do? How many hours a week do you both work. Are you FT or PT? I am an executive assistant at a health research foundation and work 40-45 hours per week

3. What is your day like after work and on your days off? How are the household matters [chores, bill paying, etc] divided? I guess my situation is pretty unique...dh and I are separated and I have the kids 90% of the time (he has them every second weekend) but I also live with my sister and her boyfriend. So we all share the chores, cooking, bill paying etc...Days after work are crazy and hectic! I don't get home until 5:30-6:00 and then we have dinner (usually something my sister has started, and if not something simple like Kraft dinner and frozen veggies!) and then it's baths and bed for the kids. Once they are in bed, I'm doing laundry and tidying up and *trying* to get to bed at a decent hour. Days off, I tend to try and spend as much quality time with the boys as possible since our weekdays are so crazy busy. We tend to take it easy, hang out, and now that the weather is nicer we are outside tons.

4. Share anything else you would like us to know about you. Guess I've pretty much already done that! Honestly, as much as I doubted it...I'm really enjoying working. I LOVE what I do and the people I work with are great!

5. What do you hope to get out of this journal? It would be great to see how others deal with the 'day to day' stuff while working outside the home and raising kids.

4. Share anything else you would like us to know about you.
For supposedly such a high powered executive :rolleyes: , I'm on OUAL way too much.



:lol: Sorry, but I find this funny! I always feel guilty for being on here when I am (and trust me, I'm far from a high powered executive! :lol: ), so it's great to read this! Stef, I'm looking forward to getting to know you (and everyone else!) a bit better!

This is a great thread...I'm going to come back and post...since I'm new to this working thing, I think it's a great idea! :nod:

Thought this might be interesting to post here...

Study: Working moms' babies do just as well

FRIDAY, March 25, (HealthDay News) — Working mothers with infants at home, take a breath or a sigh of relief. According to a new study, it's quality of time spent with baby — not quantity — that helps guide a toddler's social and intellectual development.

Researchers from the University of Texas at Austin compared women who didn't work outside the home and spent a lot of time with their infants to women who were employed outside the home and spent less time with their infants. They found no differences in the children's development up to three years of age.

"I would say the big news here is the amount of time that mothers spend with their children does not seem to be that important; it is the quality of the interaction, not just the amount of time," said Aletha Huston, the lead author and a professor of human development at the University of Texas at Austin.

The results appear in the March-April 2005 issue of the journal Child Development.

Huston and her co-author, Stacey Rosenkrantz Aronson, looked at 24-hour diaries detailing the daily schedules of 1,053 mothers of infants, collected as part of the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development's study of early child care. A total of 580 of the moms in the study were employed and 473 were not.

The researchers watched videotaped observations of the mothers' interaction with their babies during the babies' first year of life, to see how sensitive the mothers were to the children's needs. They also visited the family at home to evaluate the quality of the home environment.

Overall, Huston and Aronson found that the amount of time the moms spent with their babies was not a critical determinant of strong mom-child relationships.

They then assessed the children's intellectual and social development at ages 15 months, 2 years and 3 years.

The amount of time spent with the infant, and whether the mother worked or not, had no effect on the child's social and intellectual development during the three years, the researchers found.

One finding that might surprise some: Employed moms spent more time with their babies than expected, given their busy schedules. There also weren't great differences in time spent with infants, especially on the weekend, between working- and nonworking moms.

For instance, nonemployed mothers spent an average of 146 minutes in social interaction with their babies on a given weekday, whereas working mothers spent almost 90. On the weekend, working mothers actually spent more time in social interaction with their babies than nonworking mothers — 157 minutes compared to almost 129 for nonworking moms.

The working women tend to compensate on the weekends for time away from babies during the week, Huston said. And they find the time to interact with their child — often by cutting down on leisure-time activities for themselves, or in sleep or household activities.

The study fills in a gap in research, Huston said, about the effect of maternal employment and time spent with young children.

"Years ago we argued whether child care and working had a bad effect on young kids three and four years old," she said. "Now we all take for granted that it is OK."

"Where the controversy still exists is the first year of life," she said. "Some argue that fulltime maternal employment is not good for babies under one year. We are saying it is not the amount of time that mothers spend with their children that seems to matter for babies. It is more the characteristics of the mothers."

Another expert, Dr. Sarah L. Friedman, praised the research. Friedman, project scientist and scientific coordinator for the NICHD's Study of Early Child Care, was not involved in this particular analysis but is familiar with the findings. "The findings provide support for the prediction that mothers who spend more time with their infants, particularly time devoted to social interaction, are more sensitive and provide higher quality home environments during the child's early years," she said.

Based on the study findings, she added, it appears that employed women compensate for lost time with their children during the week by increasing the time with their infants on the weekends.

But she added a caveat: "One reason that maternal time may fail to predict children's development is that the authors have insufficient information about the content and quality of the interactions between mother and child.

-- Kathleen Doheny, HealthDayNews


Source: Sarah L. Friedman, Ph.D., project scientist, National Institute of Child Health and Human Development, Bethesda, Md.; Aletha Huston, Ph.D., professor of human development, University of Texas at Austin; March-April, 2005, Child Development

1. What is your name, age, and names and ages of DH and child/ren.
Trish - 33
Chad - 33
Aden - 2 - will be 3 in June
Evan - 13 months

2. What do you and your DH do? How many hours a week do you both work. Are you FT or PT?
We both work FT. I work 8am-4:30pm, M-F as a secretary in the Student Life office of a University and DH works 40+ hours as a VP at the insurance restoration company owned by him and his father.


3. What is your day like after work and on your days off? How are the household matters [chores, bill paying, etc] divided?
I do the drop off and pick of the boys from daycare the 3 days they go, the other 2 days of the week DH's stepmom comes to our house and watches the boys for us and I wish it was like that everyday, because the most stressful part of my day is probably getting me and the boys up, fed and dressed for daycare. DH helps a some, but only becauase I nagged him into it and I hate doing that! After work we attempt to get dinner ready, which is usually done by DH because I do not like to cook, then it's bath time (every other night or if they really need it), then play time and Evan is in bed by 8pm and Aden goes to bed around 8:30pm. After the boys go to bed is when I start doing cleaning and laundry, which is all done by me. I will usually get on OUAL for a little while, then go to bed around 11pm or so. I do all the bills, as well. The weekends are spent with me and the boys during the day and we will usually run some errands or go and visit my parents. We own 3 rental, right now, so DH has been spending his weekends getting them fixed up, but they are all rented now, so he can come back to working on our house, since we need to put it up for sale in a month or so because we just bought a new house and we take possession of that house in June. SO, things are going to be a little crazy at our house for the next few months.

4. Share anything else you would like us to know about you.
I also love to read and as doing really good about getting myself a book from the library every time we took Aden, but I've been slacking and I want to get back into it. I didn't do it for so many years, because I didn't think I had the time, but now I am making the time.
Also, DH and I are planning on TTC baby #3 this year and there are still times that I go back and forth on this, while I don't feel like our family is complete with two, there are also times that I feel I just don't have the patience for more children, so it's something that I struggle with every once in a while.

5. What do you hope to get out of this journal?
Support from other working parents. As has been said, I sometimes feel that we are in the minority here and I sometimes feel bad for working, but it can't be helped, right now. And, I also spend way too much time on here and I'm also not a high-powered executive, but I just do not know what I would do without this place. I have gotten so many parenting and just general life questions answered here and it has been a God send!

Denise -- Your post had me laughing since we both work with our DH's and our lives outside of work sound somewhat similiar and hectic and we both name our sons Nicholas :)

We are probably one of the only ones on the board that work together. :lol: Most days we arent "together" but work out of the same office.

My husband and I work for the same company! Does that count? :lol:
We used to both work in the office together years ago, but now he works out of our home as an account manager.

Thanks for posting Robyn. Very interesting. I feel that David and I have a great relationship. I have given him the room to grow and become his own person. I think with my personality if I were a SAHM I would have smothered him and he would be a clingy whiney butt child who wouldn't want anything to do with anyone. I am glad I went back to work. It was the best thing for me and my family and I don't regret one bit of it. That study said something that rings true for me. On the weekends I do try to overcompensate for time missed during the week. We generally have a great time and enjoy playing around being silly. You can tell by the status of my house :blush:

My husband and I work for the same company! Does that count? :lol:
We used to both work in the office together years ago, but now he works out of our home as an account manager.

Cool theres 3 of us :)


Robyn -- Thanks for posting that article. Actually we are doing some cleaning and the other day we found DH"s old child psych book from college and pulled it out and there was a stody about how if Infants spent time in daycare they had less of an attachment to their moms than those who don't... As I'm reading it outloud to DH, Nick came running from across the room gave me a huge hug and screamed "Mama" demanding some serious cuddles... DH just looked at me and said, "I don't think you have to worry about that" and we laughed.

But its nice seeing something more recent to the contrary as well.

1. What is your name, age, and names and ages of DH and child/ren.
Me: Colette ~ 37 .. ouch!
DH: Jim ~ 39
Kids: Alexis ~ 3 years 3 months & Benjamin ~ 18 months

2. What do you and your DH do? How many hours a week do you both work. Are you FT or PT?
I work for LNP Engineering plastics which was bought by GE in 2002. :rolleyes: I'm a FT Plastics Engineer in the Technical Service department. 7:30 - 4:30 . I troubleshoot, make material recommendations and investigate quality material complaints :dead: , along with a whole bunch of other stuff. I work at the office which is about a 35 to 40 minute commute from home .... and growing as the areas keep getting more industrialized with more traffic lights. :rolleyes:
Jim is an account manager for the same company, but he gets to work out of our house. He travels to customers in Eastern PA, NJ, DE, MD and Long Island.
I work 40 hours and it's hard to say what Jim works because sometimes he ends up at his laptop at night.. but he does get to run errands and take the kids to their doctors appointments during the day. Very flexible. :up:


3. What is your day like after work and on your days off?
After work I'll pick up the kids by 5:05 PM on M,W,F or come straight home on T,R since IL's come to babysit then. I'll make dinner and Jim cleans up. ( He's VERY helpful around the house and HE dresses and takes the kids to daycare!! :) ) Then we play with the kids and do small tasks ( ie wash, etc). Now with the time change, we take the kids outside a LOT. :sunny: My kids' bedtime is 9PM so we'll head upstairs for a bath anywhere between 8 and 8:30. After that I finish up getting things ready for the next day and we sit down to watch some TV. I usually end up falling asleep on the couch. :rolleyes:
On days off it varies. Sometimes we take the kids on errands or to the park. In the summer we go to the shore every weekend. I can't wait! :sunny:
How are the household matters [chores, bill paying, etc] divided?
I'd say pretty evenly. Again, Jim helps out quite a bit and I'm grateful to have him. He helps cook, clean up, etc and he handles all of the bills and investments. I wash the clothes and get the kids stuff ready.

We have someone come and clean for us every 3 weeks. (our neighbor's sister has a side business) and we also have someone do our lawn. I've always hated cleaning (thanks to my mom) and it frees up my time to play with my kids. We both work hard, so we don't mind spending the $ on it.

4. Share anything else you would like us to know about you.
I'm not as motivated at work as I used to be. :( I'm on OUAL waaay too much. I would optimally love to work 3 days a week. Jim is getting into a new business venture this June and maybe in two years I'll be able to be a SAHM. I'm not entirely sure I'd like to be home all the time though. I need people interaction and I actually LIKE going to the office. :blush: We shall see what happens in the future.


5. What do you hope to get out of this journal?
Laughter, support, friendship

Amy: I just noticed that your birthday is in July. What day? Mine is July 15th!

July 28!!

Cool theres 3 of us :)

make it 4. up until monday, my dh and i worked at the same company (he just left) at one point we worked in the same call center. :errr:



1. What is your name, age, and names and ages of DH and child/ren.

kim - 38
marc - 31
tony - he'll be 3 on april 22
gianna - 6 months

2. What do you and your DH do? How many hours a week do you both work. Are you FT or PT?
right now i have no title, but i work in the global services at a major enterprise data storage company. my dept is 'e-services/knowledge management' and currently i'm involved in the testing phase for the rollout of a new web portal for our customers.
marc was a customer engineer here for 7 yrs. he just got a new job as a storage admin in the IT dept of major bank in boston.

3. What is your day like after work and on your days off? How are the household matters [chores, bill paying, etc] divided?
i drop and pick up the kids. i work 7:30-3:30 so i have them by 4pm. when we get home gianna needs to nap. she does not nap well at daycare so she'll sleep a few hours when we get home. i let tony do whatever he wants within reason while i do same :lol:. i rarely clean after work, i will throw laundry in though.

lately marc has been doing a lot of cooking. which is nice. we are split pretty much on everything, and no chores are particularly mine or his. we have a lawn service (mainly because marc tried to do all the fertilizing etc. on his own last year and it didn't exactly work out great :lol: ) but no cleaning lady :(.

eta: i forgot marc does all the bills. not because i can't, but because i'd rather not! i have a rough idea of our expenses, whereas he can tell you exactly what the car payment is.

4. Share anything else you would like us to know about you.
we have talked about downsizing our house so i can stay home. since having gianna i hate going to work even more than i did before. problem is housing is so ridiculous here it's hard to find something livable for under 300k.
previously i had convinced myself i could never be a sahm, i'm just not the type. well i think i was just saying that because i knew it would never happen. ...now that it possibly could happen, i'm all for it :lol:. ya know, it sounds cliche but i'm an older mom and i'm just sick of working.



5. What do you hope to get out of this journal?
a bigger pity party to attend? :lol:

:rahrah: :rahrah: WOOOO Hooo! KIM is BACK! :rahrah: :rahrah:

1. What is your name, age, and names and ages of DH and child/ren.
Me - Alicia (30)
DH - Joe (30)
DD - Genevieve (Genna) (15 months)
BBU - Baby Boy U. (due July 25th)

2. What do you and your DH do? How many hours a week do you both work. Are you FT or PT?
Me - Legal Counsel (work in politics)
DH - Engineer

We both work FT. Mine is 36 hrs a week, and his is 40+ hours a week.


3. What is your day like after work and on your days off? How are the household matters [chores, bill paying, etc] divided?
DH picks up Genna from daycare around 5 PM, they go home, start dinner, and I come home around 5:30 - 6 PM. We have dinner, clean up, and play with Genna for while. DH does Genna's bedtime routine since I get her up in the morning. She goes to bed around 8 PM, and then we try to get a little bit done around the house. DH does the cooking and dishes, I do the laundry, we both pick up the house, but I usually do most of the inside cleaning while he does the outside work.


4. Share anything else you would like us to know about you.
#2 is on the way, and I am not sure how the heck will get everything done with even less time. Thankfully my job is WONDERFUL and fairly flexible, so I am sure we will make it happen.

5. What do you hope to get out of this journal?
Enjoyment out of seeing other happy, working, moms/dads :)

This is going to be a fun group! ;)

Thought this story was appropriate for this thread - interesting example of the balance challenges. :updown:

Yesterday, one of our cars was in the shop. Therefore, Joe had to pick me up at work. From there, I had to then drop Joe off at hockey. The problem was I was on a con call gone way late - it was a 5pm call and I dropped Joe at 6pm and my part had just started. :disbelief TG the kids were asleep. UNTIL...Aidan woke up crying that he had to pee. So not only am I leading this call, but I'm in the middle of a parking lot in a fairly big city and Colin's asleep and child crying he has to pee NOW. What did I do? I finally parked the car as furtively as I could and let him out to pee, with me shielding him...all while talking as cheerfully as possible as I was getting a little heat about a program we're running. Even if I wasn't on the phone, I don't know how else I would have handled it given where we were and where I could have possibly stopped. Egad though. Not a great moment.

That is a good story, Alyssa! :lol: Gotta love being a working mom :aok:

:lol: Sometimes ya gotta do what ya gotta do! Thanks for sharing.

Here is another recent article that made the rounds, but I thought was applicable to post again. Probably easier to read at http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/6959880/site/newsweek/ (http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/6959880/site/newsweek/)

http://c.msn.com/c.gif?NC=1255&NA=1154&PS=73838&PI=7329&DI=305&TP=http%3a%2f%2fmsnbc.msn.com%2f
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/images/MSNBC/msnbc_ban.gif MSNBC.com
Mommy Madness
What happened when the Girls Who Had It All became mothers? A new book explores why this generation feels so insane

By Judith Warner
Newsweek

Feb. 21 issue - Back in the days when I was a Good Mommy, I tried to do everything right. I breast-fed and co-slept, and responded to each and every cry with anxious alacrity. I awoke with my daughter at 6:30 AM and, eschewing TV, curled up on the couch with a stack of books that I could recite in my sleep. I did this, in fact, many times, jerking myself back awake as the clock rounded 6:45 and the words of Curious George started to merge with my dreams.

Was I crazy? No—I was a committed mother, eager to do right by my child and well-versed in the child care teachings of the day. I was proud of the fact that I could get in three full hours of high-intensity parenting before I left for work; prouder still that, when I came home in the evening, I could count on at least three more similarly intense hours to follow. It didn't matter that, in my day job as a stringer for this magazine, I was often falling asleep at my desk. Nor that I'd lost the ability to write a coherent sentence. My brain might have been fried, but my baby's was thriving. I'd seen the proof of that everywhere—in the newsweeklies and the New York Times, on TV, even in the official statements that issued forth from the White House, where First Lady Hillary Clinton herself had endorsed "singing, playing games, reading, storytelling, just talking and listening" as the best ways to enhance a child's development.

All around me, the expert advice on baby care, whether it came from the What to Expect books or the legions of "specialists" hawking videos, computer software, smart baby toys or audiotapes to advance brain development, was unanimous: Read! Talk! Sing! And so I talked and I read and I sang and made up stories and did funny voices and narrated car rides ... until one day, when my daughter was about four, I realized that I had turned into a human television set, so filled with 24-hour children's programming that I had no thoughts left of my own.

And when I started listening to the sounds of the Mommy chatter all around me in the playgrounds and playgroups of Washington, D.C.—the shouts of "Good job!," the interventions and facilitations ("What that lady is saying is, she would really prefer you not empty your bucket of sand over her little boy's head. Is that okay with you, honey?")—I realized that I was hardly alone.

Once my daughters began school, I was surrounded, it seemed, by women who had surrendered their better selves—and their sanity—to motherhood. Women who pulled all-nighters hand-painting paper plates for a class party. Who obsessed over the most minute details of playground politics. Who—like myself—appeared to be sleep-walking through life in a state of quiet panic.





Some of the mothers appeared to have lost nearly all sense of themselves as adult women. They dressed in kids' clothes—overall shorts and go-anywhere sandals. They ate kids' foods. They were so depleted by the affection and care they lavished upon their small children that they had no energy left, not just for sex, but for feeling like a sexual being. "That part of my life is completely dead," a working mother of two told me. "I don't even miss it. It feels like it belongs to another life. Like I was another person."

It all reminded me a lot of Betty Friedan's 1963 classic, The Feminine Mystique. The diffuse dissatisfaction. The angst, hidden behind all the obsession with trivia, and the push to be perfect. The way so many women constantly looked over their shoulders to make sure that no one was outdoing them in the performance of good Mommyhood. And the tendency—every bit as pronounced among my peers as it had been for the women Friedan interviewed—to blame themselves for their problems. There was something new, too: the tendency many women had to feel threatened by other women and to judge them harshly—nowhere more evident than on Urbanbaby and other, similarly "supportive" web sites. Can I take my 17-month-old to the Winnie the Pooh movie?, one mom queried recently. "WAY tooooo young," came one response.

I read that 70 percent of American moms say they find motherhood today "incredibly stressful." Thirty percent of mothers of young children reportedly suffer from depression. Nine hundred and nine women in Texas recently told researchers they find taking care of their kids about as much fun as cleaning their house, slightly less pleasurable than cooking, and a whole lot less enjoyable than watching TV.

And I wondered: Why do so many otherwise competent and self-aware women lose themselves when they become mothers? Why do so many of us feel so out of control? And—the biggest question of all—why has this generation of mothers, arguably the most liberated and privileged group of women America has ever seen, driven themselves crazy in the quest for perfect mommy-dom?

I started speaking with women from all over the country, about 150 in all. And I found that the craziness I saw in my own city was nothing less than a nationwide epidemic. Women from Idaho to Oklahoma City to the suburbs of Boston—in middle and upper middle class enclaves where there was time and money to spend—told me of lives spent shuttling back and forth to more and more absurd-seeming, high-pressured, time-demanding, utterly exhausting kids' activities. I heard of whole towns turning out for a spot in the right ballet class; of communities where the competition for the best camps, the best coaches and the best piano teachers rivaled that for admission to the best private schools and colleges. Women told me of their exhaustion and depression, and of their frustrations with the "uselessness" of their husbands. They said they wished their lives could change. But they had no idea of how to make that happen. I began to record their impressions and reflections, and wove them into a book, which I named, in honor of the sentiment that seemed to animate so many of us, Perfect Madness.





I think of "us" as the first post-baby boom generation, girls born between 1958 and the early 1970s, who came of age politically in the Carter, Reagan and Bush I years. We are, in many ways, a blessed group. Most of the major battles of the women's movement were fought—and won—in our early childhood. Unlike the baby boomers before us, who protested and marched and shouted their way from college into adulthood, we were a strikingly apolitical group, way more caught up in our own self-perfection as we came of age, than in working to create a more perfect world. Good daughters of the Reagan Revolution, we disdained social activism and cultivated our own gardens with a kind of muscle-bound, tightly wound, über-achieving, all-encompassing, never-failing self-control that passed, in the 1980s, for female empowerment.

We saw ourselves as winners. We'd been bred, from the earliest age, for competition. Our schools had given us co-ed gym and wood-working shop, and had told us never to let the boys drown out our voices in class. Often enough, we'd done better than they had in school. Even in science and math. And our passage into adulthood was marked by growing numbers of women in the professions. We believed that we could climb as high as we wanted to go, and would grow into the adults we dreamed we could be. Other outcomes—like the chance that children wouldn't quite fit into this picture—never even entered our minds.

Why should they have? Back then, when our sense of our potential as women was being formed, there was a general feeling of optimism. Even the most traditional women's magazines throughout the 1980s taught that the future for up-and-coming mothers was bright: The new generation of fathers would help. Good babysitting could be found. Work and motherhood could be balanced. It was all a question of intelligent "juggling." And of not falling prey to the trap of self-sacrifice and perfectionism that had driven so many mothers crazy in the past.

But something happened then, as the 1990s advanced, and the Girls Who Could Have Done Anything grew up into women who found, as the millennium turned, that they couldn't quite ... get it together, or get beyond the stuck feeling that had somehow lodged in their minds.

Life happened. We became mothers. And found, when we set out to "balance" our lives—and in particular to balance some semblance of the girls and women we had been against the mothers we'd become—that there was no way to make this most basic of "balancing acts" work. Life was hard. It was stressful. It was expensive. Jobs—and children—were demanding. And the ambitious form of motherhood most of us wanted to practice was utterly incompatible with any kind of outside work, or friendship, or life, generally.





One woman I interviewed was literally struck dumb as she tried to articulate the quandary she was in. She wasn't a woman who normally lacked for words. She was a newspaper editor, with a husband whose steady income allowed her many choices. In the hope of finding "balance," she'd chosen to work part-time and at night in order to spend as much time as possible with her nine-year-old daughter. But somehow, nothing had worked out as planned. Working nights meant that she was tired all the time, and cranky, and stressed. And forever annoyed with her husband. And now her daughter was after her to get a day job. It seemed that having Mom around most of the time wasn't all it was cracked up to be, particularly if Mom was forever on the edge.

The woman waved her hands in circles, helplessly. "What I'm trying to figure out—" she paused. "What I'm trying to remember ... Is how I ended up raising this princess ... How I got into ... How to get out of ... this, this, this, this mess."

Most of us in this generation grew up believing that we had fantastic, unlimited, freedom of choice. Yet as mothers many women face "choices" on the order of: You can continue to pursue your professional dreams at the cost of abandoning your children to long hours of inadequate child care. Or: You can stay at home with your baby and live in a state of virtual, crazy-making isolation because you can't afford a nanny, because there is no such thing as part-time day care, and because your husband doesn't come home until 8:30 at night.

These are choices that don't feel like choices at all. They are the harsh realities of family life in a culture that has no structures in place to allow women—and men—to balance work and child-rearing. But most women in our generation don't think to look beyond themselves at the constraints that keep them from being able to make real choices as mothers. It almost never occurs to them that they can use the muscle of their superb education or their collective voice to change or rearrange their social support system. They simply don't have the political reflex—or the vocabulary—to think of things in this way.

They've been bred to be independent and self-sufficient. To rely on their own initiative and "personal responsibility." To privatize their problems. And so, they don't get fired up about our country's lack of affordable, top-quality child care. (In many parts of the country, decent child care costs more than state college tuition, and the quality of the care that most families can afford is abysmal.) Nor about the fact that middle class life is now so damn expensive that in most families both parents must work gruelingly long hours just to make ends meet. (With fathers averaging 51 hours per week and mothers clocking in at an average of 41, the U.S. workweek is now the longest in the world.) Nor about the fact that in many districts the public schools are so bad that you can't, if you want your child to be reasonably well-educated, sit back and simply let the teachers do their jobs, and must instead supplement the school day with a panoply of expensive and inconvenient "activities" so that your kid will have some exposure to music, art and sports.





Instead of blaming society, moms today tend to blame themselves. They say they've chosen poorly. And so they take on the Herculean task of being absolutely everything to their children, simply because no one else is doing anything at all to help them. Because if they don't perform magical acts of perfect Mommy ministrations, their kids might fall through the cracks and end up as losers in our hard-driving winner-take-all society.

This has to change.

We now have a situation where well-off women can choose how to live their lives—either outsourcing child care at a sufficiently high level of quality to permit them to work with relative peace of mind or staying at home. But no one else, really, has anything. Many, many women would like to stay home with their children and can't afford to do so. Many, many others would like to be able to work part-time but can't afford or find the way to do so. Many others would like to be able to maintain their full-time careers without either being devoured by their jobs or losing ground, and they can't do that. And there is no hope at all for any of these women on the horizon.

Some of us may feel empowered by the challenge of taking it all on, being the best, as Tea Leoni's "Spanglish" character did on her uphill morning run, but really, this perfectionism is not empowerment. It's more like what some psychologists call "learned helplessness"—an instinctive giving-up in the face of difficulty that people do when they think they have no real power. At base, it's a kind of despair. A lack of faith that change can come to the outside world. A lack of belief in our political culture or our institutions.

It really needs to change.

For while many women can and do manage to accept (or at least adjust to) this situation for themselves, there's a twinge of real sadness that comes out when they talk about their daughters. As a forty-something mother living and working part-time in Washington, D.C. (and spending a disproportionate amount of her time managing the details of her daughter's—and her husband's—life), mused one evening to me, "I look at my daughter and I just want to know: what happened? Because look at us: it's 2002 and nothing's changed. My mother expected my life to be very different from hers, but now it's a lot more like hers than I expected, and from here I don't see where it will be different for my daughter. I don't want her to carry this crushing burden that's in our heads ... [But] what can make things different?"





For real change to happen, we don't need more politicians sounding off about "family values." Neither do we need to pat the backs of working mothers, or "reward" moms who stay at home, or "valorize" motherhood, generally, by acknowledging that it's "the toughest job in the world." We need solutions—politically palatable, economically feasible, home-grown American solutions—that can, collectively, give mothers and families a break.

<LI>We need incentives like tax subsidies to encourage corporations to adopt family-friendly policies.
<LI>We need government-mandated child care standards and quality controls that can remove the fear and dread many working mothers feel when they leave their children with others.
<LI>We need flexible, affordable, locally available, high-quality part-time day care so that stay-at-home moms can get a life of their own. This shouldn't, these days, be such a pipe dream. After all, in his State of the Union message, President Bush reaffirmed his support of (which, one assumes, includes support of funding for) "faith-based and community groups." I lived in France before moving to Washington, and there, my elder daughter attended two wonderful, affordable, top-quality part-time pre-schools, which were essentially meant to give stay-at-home moms a helping hand. One was run by a neighborhood co-op and the other by a Catholic organization. Government subsidies kept tuition rates low. A sliding scale of fees brought some diversity. Government standards meant that the staffers were all trained in the proper care of young children. My then 18-month-old daughter painted and heard stories and ate cookies for the sum total in fees of about $150 a month. (This solution may be French—but do we have to bash it?)
<LI>We need new initiatives to make it possible for mothers to work part-time (something most mothers say they want to do) by creating vouchers or bigger tax credits to make child care more affordable, by making health insurance available and affordable for part-time workers and by generally making life less expensive and stressful for middle-class families so that mothers (and fathers) could work less without risking their children's financial future. Or even, if they felt the need, could stay home with their children for a while.
<LI>In general, we need to alleviate the economic pressures that currently make so many families' lives so high-pressured, through progressive tax policies that would transfer our nation's wealth back to the middle class. So that mothers and fathers could stop running like lunatics, and start spending real quality—and quantity—time with their children. And so that motherhood could stop being the awful burden it is for so many women today and instead become something more like a joy.

Women today mother in the excessive, control-freakish way that they do in part because they are psychologically conditioned to do so. But they also do it because, to a large extent, they have to. Because they are unsupported, because their children are not taken care of, in any meaningful way, by society at large. Because there is right now no widespread feeling of social responsibility—for children, for families, for anyone, really—and so they must take everything onto themselves. And because they can't, humanly, take everything onto themselves, they simply go nuts.

I see this all the time. It never seems to stop. So that, as I write this, I have an image fresh in my mind: the face of a friend, the mother of a first-grader, who I ran into one morning right before Christmas.

She was in the midst of organizing a class party. This meant shopping. Color-coordinating paper goods. Piecework, pre-gluing of arts-and-crafts projects. Uniformity of felt textures. Of buttons and beads. There were the phone calls, too. From other parents. With criticism and "constructive" comments that had her up at night, playing over conversations in her mind. "I can't take it anymore," she said to me. "I hate everyone and everything. I am going insane."

I looked at her face, saw her eyes fill with tears, and in that instant saw the faces of dozens of women I'd met—and, of course, I saw myself.

And I was reminded of the words of a French doctor I'd once seen. I'd come to him about headaches. They were violent. They were constant. And they would prove, over the next few years, to be chronic. He wrote me a prescription for a painkiller. But he looked skeptical as to whether it would really do me much good. "If you keep banging your head against the wall," he said, "you're going to have headaches."

I have thought of these words so many times since then. I have seen so many mothers banging their heads against a wall. And treating their pain—the chronic headache of their lives—with sleeping pills and antidepressants and anxiety meds and a more and more potent, more and more vicious self-and-other-attacking form of anxious perfectionism.

And I hope that somehow we will all find a way to stop. Because we are not doing ourselves any good. We are not doing our children—particularly our daughters—any good. We're not doing our marriages any good. And we're doing nothing at all for our society.

We are simply beating ourselves black and blue. So let's take a breather. Throw out the schedules, turn off the cell phone, cancel the tutors (fire the OT!). Let's spend some real quality time with our families, just talking, hanging out, not doing anything for once. And let ourselves be.

From PERFECT MADNESS by Judith Warner. To be published by Riverhead books, a division of Penguin Group (USA) Inc. © 2005 by Judith Warner.


© 2005 Newsweek, Inc.
© 2005 MSNBC.com

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1. What is your name, age, and names and ages of DH and child/ren.
Jen - 29
Russ - 30
Sierra - 3
Sean - 2

2. What do you and your DH do? How many hours a week do you both work. Are you FT or PT?
I'm a software engineer and DH works in a bakery. I work full time, about 40 hrs a week (+ about 1-1/2 to 2 hrs of commute time) and Dh works 2 days a week for about 6 hrs.

3. What is your day like after work and on your days off? How are the household matters [chores, bill paying, etc] divided?
Things are hectic when I get home from work at 4:30. Dh usually gets dinner ready while I play with the kids. Although sometimes I like to do dinner. I do all the bills and all the shopping since DH is really bad with money. DH takes care of most of the household chores since he's home more. I usually do stuff like folding laundry in the evenings.

4. Share anything else you would like us to know about you.
This whole working full time while having kids is pretty new to me. I started this job about a month ago. It's good because we were struggling financially for a long time, but it's really hard to not be doing the SAHM thing anymore after doing it for almost 4 years. Sometimes I really miss my kids. :(

5. What do you hope to get out of this journal?
Support from other people in my shoes. A good pity party when I need it :lol:

1. What is your name, age, and names and ages of DH and child/ren.
Darren, 35
Me (Brooke). 29, will be 30 in June
Rebekah, 3
Baby #2 due October 15

2. What do you and your DH do? How many hours a week do you both work. Are you FT or PT?
I'm a fire protection engineer. I work full time, 40 hrs a week. I might ask to go down to 3 days a week after Baby#2 comes but I'm not sure my company will let me.
Darren is an estimator and service manager for a commercial roofing company. He's full time, too. He works more than 40 hrs a week.

3. What is your day like after work and on your days off? How are the household matters [chores, bill paying, etc] divided?
Ugh! So busy! I get home, make dinner, clean up dinner, we run whatever errands we have to run (we're trying to stay home more, though), and then bath, TV time, then bed. Rebekah doesn't go to bed until 9:30-10pm every night. DH and I don't go to bed until close to 11:30pm every night.

I do most of the chores. Darren takes care of the trash, yard work, and poop detail. Sometimes Darren helps with cleaning and laundry. He's been doing more lately. I do most of the rest. I am totally responsible for our meals and our bills.

4. Share anything else you would like us to know about you.
I struggle alot because I don't work for a very mommy-friendly company.
I like to read, scrapbook (no time, though), and sew.

5. What do you hope to get out of this journal?
I'd love to feel less alone and less of a minority.

Jenn, I just have to say that you and Robyn are an absolute inspiration. I don't know how you guys do it! You both should be really proud of yourselves, that you're taking such good care of your kids all on your own. :)

I often feel guilty for being so happy working and being out all day. I couldnt imagine myself being a SAHM. And its not even money issues since money isnt an issue. I enjoy my time with Nick and never feel like I am less of a mother for deciding to build my career and work my way into a corporate world. I would hate to see my education go to waste. I am more successful than many men in my office and I think it bothers them. (sometimes DH) I would love a place to just get out my frustrations and have the support of other working mom's/dad's.
Denise

Very well said D! I am a pretty happily working mama too! I'm thankful that I get to "balance" my week out with having Wednesdays off, but I honestly don't think I could be home 7 days a week. The other thing I'm extremely thankful for is Jackson LOVES LOVES LOVES school! He has done beyond wonderfully since we put him in the school last July! It was definately one of the best decisions we have ever made!

I'm so glad to see everyone joining in!!!

I was laughing at Steph's and D's comments about being on OUAL during the day...that's pretty much the ONLY time I am on OUAL! I'm lucky because in my office, my computer doesn't face out, so it looks like I'm just typing away on some brief :lol:! The good thing is, I can prioritize very well, so my work is always done :nod:!

I'm not as motivated at work as I used to be. :( I'm on OUAL waaay too much. I would optimally love to work 3 days a week.

I'm the same way.

I just don't care about my job anymore. I don't WANT to climb the corporate ladder or take on more responsibility because that means longer hours and more stress. Darren can easily leave the house at 5am and get home at 6-7pm in the summer and still have work to do. I can't have a job that demands the same from me because I HAVE to be available to take care of the kids.

I'm the same way.

I just don't care about my job anymore. I don't WANT to climb the corporate ladder or take on more responsibility because that means longer hours and more stress. Darren can easily leave the house at 5am and get home at 6-7pm in the summer and still have work to do. I can't have a job that demands the same from me because I HAVE to be available to take care of the kids.

I also feel the same way. I'm happy, but that's because I have made sure I do NOT have tons and tons of responsibility...it's a relatively easy job...some stressful moments (like before trial and during trial), but in all reality, it's just right. My husband has been trying to convince me to go to law school for years now and I'm just not interested...I like being able to leave the office at 4:40 and not think about it until I go back the next morning.

Tracey~ I totally understand that too. Brad keeps pushing me to apply for supervisor/management positions when they come open at work but I am just not interested... of course I don't really like my current job that much anyway. But, I think I would hate a supervisor/management position even more

1. What is your name, age, and names and ages of DH and child/ren.
Erin, 32
Chris, 31
Livia, 2

2. What do you and your DH do? How many hours a week do you both work. Are you FT or PT?
Officially - my title is Director of Public Relations for a small import company. But, I tackle it all. Our company buys/manufactures product in China and sells it to retail stores/catalogs/etc. I handle PR, marketing and I also do a lot of product development/communicating with the Orient. I work full time from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. I have a bad commute - about one hour as we live in the burbs and I work in downtown Dallas.

Summing up DH's workload is insane. He works as an outside sales rep for a custom cabinet company - selling only to new construction (homebuilders) On top of this, he started his own homebuilding company in late 2003. He currently is in the middle of building 12-15 homes this year. Hopefully, he will be able to leave his sales job soon b/c Livi and I don't see too much of daddy. He typically leaves the home at 7 a.m. and gets home shortly before 8 p.m. He works 7 days a week w/the hours being slightly less on the weekends.

3. What is your day like after work and on your days off? How are the household matters [chores, bill paying, etc] divided?

I pick Livi up at daycare at 6 p.m. or shortly before...depending on traffic. We run home. I either cook or grab something (more often than I should). We eat and try to hit the bathtub by 7 p.m. I get Livi all ready for bed and typically DH plays w/her and rocks her ... depending on when he makes it home. We unwind and watch some TV/read once she is in bed. DH works on the computer at home for his own business every night from about 9 p.m. to midnight. Yes...his workload is nuts!!!!

I handle all of the house stuff - cleaning, laundry, bills and such. We do have a cleaning service every three weeks that helps a lot! I am primarily responsible for Livi. DH always helps out when he is home, though. DH is in charge of trash/outdoor/yard responsibilities.

4. Share anything else you would like us to know about you.
I often struggle with my role as a working mom. I question whether I want to be a SAHM when it is possible and I am never sure. I enjoy interacting with adults and being stimulated at work. I enjoy reading (currently addicted to THE LAST JUROR) and I have a terrible TV addiction (mostly reality shows) that has been fueled by getting a DVR (best invention ever).

5. What do you hope to get out of this journal?
Sharing stories w/one another makes me feel human....just knowing there are others out there with similar crazy schedules!!

I wanted to be a SAHM when I first had David. I returned to work when he was 3 months old and I thought I was going to die. After about 3 months I realized that me being a working mom was the best thing for both of us. I needed to be out in the world and speaking with adults. While I loved the 3 months with my son, I was going a bit stir crazy. I couldn't handle being in the house all the time and we didn't really have the money for me to join "mom clubs". The hospital had a free gathering thing and I went a couple times but the ladies there were so snotty and cliquey not to mention that it was during David's nap time so either he was sleeping or really cranky. I love being a working mom. I have more patience with David and I feel like Melissa. I don't know how to explain that last sentence. Hopefully y'all will understand.

Robyn and Jenn: My hats off to you ladies. I know how hard it must be for you. My parents divorced when I was 7 and I remember my mom having to go back to work. Only she had no skills and had to go to school in order to get a decent paying job. I remember "studying" with her at night. Your children will look up to you as wonderful strong role models! I applaud you both!!!

I wanted to be a SAHM when I first had David. I returned to work when he was 3 months old and I thought I was going to die. After about 3 months I realized that me being a working mom was the best thing for both of us. I needed to be out in the world and speaking with adults. While I loved the 3 months with my son, I was going a bit stir crazy. I couldn't handle being in the house all the time and we didn't really have the money for me to join "mom clubs". The hospital had a free gathering thing and I went a couple times but the ladies there were so snotty and cliquey not to mention that it was during David's nap time so either he was sleeping or really cranky. I love being a working mom. I have more patience with David and I feel like Melissa. I don't know how to explain that last sentence. Hopefully y'all will understand.

Robyn and Jenn: My hats off to you ladies. I know how hard it must be for you. My parents divorced when I was 7 and I remember my mom having to go back to work. Only she had no skills and had to go to school in order to get a decent paying job. I remember "studying" with her at night. Your children will look up to you as wonderful strong role models! I applaud you both!!!

Ditto! I went back to work after 3 months of maternity leave and was miserable. It took me about 9 more months to realize that we were making the best decision. I needed to work, but I needed to be HAPPY with that...it took me a while, but I finally got to that place. What has REALLY helped me realize that is Jackson being so happy at his school! My IL's were watching Jackson for the first 14 months and it nearly killed me, but making the switch to daycare has done wonders for everyone involved (well, not for the IL's, but it was their own fault).

I applaud you single mommy's too! I'm pretty much a single mommy (only I have a wedding ring) and it's TOUGH!!! There's no breaks! I'm glad we are all here to support each other!

Robyn and Jenn: My hats off to you ladies. I know how hard it must be for you. My parents divorced when I was 7 and I remember my mom having to go back to work. Only she had no skills and had to go to school in order to get a decent paying job. I remember "studying" with her at night. Your children will look up to you as wonderful strong role models! I applaud you both!!!

:hug99: Thank you Melissa! Some days I still feel guilty for going back to work but I also know that right now it's what is best for all of us. Financial stuff aside of course! Working gives me the time away to interact with adults and so when I am with the boys I'm fresh and ready to deal with all the 'kid problems' that tend to frequently happen in our house!

It's hard but so worth the effort!! You are a great mom and a very strong woman!!

Tracey, I didn't mean to leave you out! :doh: I don't know how you do it, either! I couldn't handle DH having a job that took him away that much.

I singled out Robyn and Jenn because they had their worlds turned on their heads recently, and are coping (and coping WELL) with their new lives.

But any of you that work and do the lion's share of the childcare when you are not working, deserve a big HUGE medal. (Or at least a massage or something....) :awink:

Tracey, I didn't mean to leave you out! :doh: I don't know how you do it, either! I couldn't handle DH having a job that took him away that much.

I singled out Robyn and Jenn because they had their worlds turned on their heads recently, and are coping (and coping WELL) with their new lives.

But any of you that work and do the lion's share of the childcare when you are not working, deserve a big HUGE medal. (Or at least a massage or something....) :awink:

Don't worry, I wasn't left out! I can only imagine how Robyn and Jenn feel! :hug99: Oh, and I do have a massage therapist on my payroll :lol:! It's a godsend! Now, if I can only figure out how to get a cleaning lady back on my payroll...I would be smokin' happy!!!

Alyssa, I can totally relate to your adventure of conf calls with kids. I had one last night myself. Thankfully I was on with internal people instead of customers. My 2 year old was being a chatterbox in the car and I asked him to be quiet since I was on the phone. He yelled at me "Get off the phone mommy"! :blush: I frequently do audio and web conferences from home in the early morning which isn't easy with two kids at home. That's when the TV serves as a babysitter. :lol:

When Alex was born, I was able to stay home for 4 months. 3 months were maternity leave and 1 month working from home part time. When I came back to the office, I was able to work 4 days a week. That one extra day was a godsend. I received a promotion when Alex was one and had to come back full time. I would like to go back to 4 days/week, however it won't be happening anytime soon. I'm ok with that. I love my job, I'm thriving in my job, but have no aspirations to move up the corporate ladder. I make good money and can provide excellent benefits for my family.

My biggest chore is getting the kids off to school/daycare and picking them up. I'm the only one who does this. My DH works such long hours he misses the timeframe for daycare on both ends. This is the one area I really would like a break on once in awhile, but know that others deal with this as well.

Hats off to Jenn and Robyn! I hope we can support you well here. Also Tracey, my DH works long hours but at least he does come home at night. I don't know how you do it. :hug99:

Well, that was a lot of :blahblah: for nothing huh? :lol:

Honestly, I don't know any different. We were lucky though to have Josh home during Jackson's first year, but before and after that, he's always been gone. Although, now if the first time we are dealing with the lengthy "being gone" time frame. He has always been close enough to come home every weekend, but not it's just not feasible. I'm just going with the flow and loosing my mind all at the same time :lol:!

Hopefully we can bring back some of your sanity Tracey. If nothing else we can all go insane together!!

I love my job, I'm thriving in my job, but have no aspirations to move up the corporate ladder. I make good money and can provide excellent benefits for my family.

:nod: I agree with this. There used to be a time when I was more driven and more interested to make it up the corporate ladder. Especially since my industry is still very male-dominated. But after having kids and moving to a part-time schedule, I'm just not willing to work all hours anymore. My kids come first. I'm already trying to figure out how I can adjust my schedule so I can attend my kids' sporting events! :lol:

I know that because I'm only part-time, I've probably taken myself off the career track for a while. There's a woman who was promoted to VP (my level) a few years after me, and I suspect that at some point, she's going to get promoted above me. I have to come to terms with that. Some days, I'm totally o.k with that, and others, it bothers the hell out of me. Especially since I've proven that I can do my job and do it well, while still working a flex schedule.

Add me to the list of not wanting to climb the corporate ladder. I actually just discussed this with my manager earlier this week. I am happy where I am. I want to do my job the best I can but have no aspirations to move up. She completely understood.

I agree I tototally admire all you single moms out there or those with DH's that travel we barely get by from day to day and theres two of us (and right now only one child)

I also agree about losing motivation, I really have big time. To the point that my performance at work was called into question. I got back on track but still strugle.

So here's a question for the mom's who said they wanted to be SAHMs but couldn't than eventually reached a peace with it. HOw did you get to that point. I've been trying since I went back to work when Nick was 4 and 1/2 months old and I am no where near that point. I know he does okay with his daycare provider Heck Nick, DH and I all adore her... Actually of all the parents I've ever met she is the closest to my parenting views out there so he is getting very similiar care but I still have yet to reach that inner peace about working, I still cry when I leave him nearly daily. Even though I know he's in great hands. I've really been trying to come to terms with it and just can't. Its not about Nick, its about me not wanting to lose that time with him.

It just happened. I don't know how to explain it. One day when David was 6 months old and was having a cranky day I realized that I don't really have the patience to be with him all day. I am the type of person that has to do something for myself. Working is my outlet. At work, I get to be me. Not mom or wife..just Melissa. I was losing myself being at home. Now don't get me wrong. If we had enough money and could afford me to be home and be able to be part of Mom and child groups that require paying I would maybe do it...I really don't know. I really like the adult interaction.

Every one is different. I felt guilty when I first left David at my aunt's house (she was the first one to watch when I went back to work). Then my SIL was watching him and I felt pretty good about it until I had a really bad experience and I really second guessed my decision to come back to work. Then we found this really awesome lady and I felt good about my decision. Now that he's in school I wouldn't have it any other way. I devote a lot of time to David when I am home. I never feel that he is a burden or an inconvience to my life.

So to answer your question..It just comes to you one day. Can you tell that I am bored at work and would really like to go pick up David and take him to the park and play on the slides!!! :lol:

Ooh, I'm here! That's what I get for not being at work yesterday (Riley had pinkeye) and then the nerve of me to actually do work this morning! :rolleyes:

What is your name, age, and names and ages of DH and child/ren.
Darcy, just turned 29 on Saturday
Phil, 30
Riley, 16 months

What do you and your DH do? How many hours a week do you both work. Are you FT or PT?
I'm an associate editor for a publishing company. Since we all have kids (most I'm sure have "noisy" books), those are the books we publish. I don't work on them, per se--that's for the children's department. I work on general books, from sports to gardening, scenic drives to homework helpers, you name it, we've probably done it. Up until this week I worked in the office Tuesday-Friday with Mondays as my "work-at-home" day. I can't remember the last time I actually "worked," though, so it was nice to get paid for 5 days. I was supposed to have this benefit taken away in February, but I slipped through the cracks (you get the benefit for a year once you return from maternity leave). I switched departments in January, and nobody said anything, so I just kept taking Mondays off. But another coworker just found out her time is up and she's not getting an extension (she had her baby 6 weeks after I did), so I'm afraid my Mondays will be up momentarily. Enough about that!

Phil is a human resource generalist who works way too much. He's at the office probably 9-10 hours a day, which stinks, especially because on days I work, Riley is at daycare at his work. So that just makes it longer that I don't see her. :( He has an interview on Tuesday, so we're hoping something good comes out of that.

What is your day like after work and on your days off? How are the household matters [chores, bill paying, etc] divided?
My day after work is pretty much the same. An hour commute then when Phil and Riley get home he makes dinner while I entertain her. We usually all try to eat at the same time, then I clean up the kitchen, and he puts her in her jammies or gives her a bath. Then we have playtime, which usually consists of a book or two and playing. I'm sure this will all change with the weather getting nicer. I still am nursing her in the morning and evening, so I'll nurse her and he'll put her to bed around 7:15-7:30. Then we get up at 6 and do it all over again.

As for bills, I've always been the one to do them. Phil takes care of phone calls and appointments, and I pay the bills. Works for me!

Share anything else you would like us to know about you. We just put our place up for sale this weekend, so that's been stressful. We're in a townhome now and looking for a house with a backyard. Right now we back up to a pond, which is nice--if you don't have kids you need to keep an eye on! Plus the time is just right.

I'm also hoping that once we have our second kid I'm able to stay at home. I feel racked with guilt either way--for working or for staying home--especially because on some Mondays, or even yesterday, I snap at Riley and get so mad at her. I yelled at her yesterday and then we both started crying, and I wonder if I can actually stay at home with her every day. And I feel guilty, too, because what did I go to school for?! To stay at home?! Or to find a PT job at a grocery store just to make ends meet if I can stay home? But I can't see myself at this job either for the rest of my life, so who knows?

What do you hope to get out of this journal? I hope to learn that others are going through what I'm going through, and that I'm not the only one feeling this way. I have some coworker moms here who I can talk to about certain things, but there are other things I feel that I can't tell them (like about wanting to quit someday). I'm just glad there's a place I can "talk" about this stuff.

Phew! :)

See I'm jealous of the being you at work thing and maybe thats part of my issue. The place I'm least able to be Lil is at work. My co-workers just live vastly different lives than we do. And I find that I have to be quiet during most conversations and can't really speak my mind. Its not that I don't like my co-workers I do, and switching teams has helped a lot but at the same time, I still don't feel I get to be me because I'm often holding back and on edge. I'm much more me when I'm with my other mommy friends in the area. I mean even right as I type this there is a conversation going on about how vegetarianism is unhealthy for pregnant women... Its being said knowing I'm sitting two cubes away and can probobally hear everything and that I'm pregnant vegetarian as they say it... I should speak up and show them all my research on how its healthy and in most settings I would but not in this one.

See that's were our personalities are completely different. If I heard people talking about me or some of my beliefs as if I couldn't hear I would speak up. That's just how I am though. At work I don't care what people think of me. They can like me or hate me; either way my job will be done. I have ruffled quite a few feathers at work. I am a very blunt person and often have been referred to as not having a "filter" on my mouth. My reponse...so. I am not a quiet or shy type person. I have always been very opinionated and outspoken. You can always speak your mind here. I will always support your choices!! :hug99:

Are those people pregnant or vegetarians? If not, I'd speak up and tell them they have no idea what they are talking about!

Happy Belated Birthday, Darcy! You are living my dream right now- we too live in a townhouse, and I'm forever bugging DH that I want to move somewhere with a backyard!

1. What is your name, age, and names and ages of DH and child/ren. Eleanor 33, Andreww 33, Isabelle 3 1/2, Rebecca 13 months

2. What do you and your DH do? How many hours a week do you both work. Are you FT or PT? I'm a family practice physician; DH is a chiropractor/naturopath. He's in the process of starting up his own office, so he doesn't have set hours yet. I'm in the office about 35 hours a week, which will increase, probably, when I get busier, and have more paperwork. I also do hospital work, which takes up a variable amount of time.

3. What is your day like after work and on your days off? How are the household matters [chores, bill paying, etc] divided? I usually pick the girls up from daycare/DH drops them off- sometimes we switch. One of us makes dinner, and the other plays with the kids. DH does baths, and we both do bedtime stories- he sits with the kids after bedtime until Isabelle falls asleep- it varies which of us puts Rebecca to bed. Weekends...really depends on whether one of us is working. We do swim lessons every Saturday, and often go to the coffee shop for a snack, or to the bookstore for storytime. DH does the bill paying- the chores we usually divide up, depending on who has the time for them...I'm doing more now, because DH is getting saddled with bedtime all the time.

4. Share anything else you would like us to know about you. This is the most I've worked since the kids were born...I did temp work filling in for Dr's who were out on leave before, and would often have stretches of time where I didn't work, and stayed home with the kids. I know I'm not great as a stay at home mom...but it's pretty hard being a working mom, too. I get frustrated with Isabelle more often than I'd like (she's a "spirited child"), and I get frustrated by not enough "me" time...

5. What do you hope to get out of this journal? People to share experiences and commiseration with!

Happy Belated Birthday, Darcy! You are living my dream right now- we too live in a townhouse, and I'm forever bugging DH that I want to move somewhere with a backyard!

Thanks. I don't think anyone's ever told me I'm living their dream. I'm flattered. :) Honestly if we don't move now, we'll go crazy. We're both so ready for our "own" place, even if we do "own" the townhome now. Know what I mean? It's just rough because right now I feel sometimes we're having a hard time making ends meet. I cannot imagine what a higher mortgage payment will do to us. *sigh* Guess we'l cross that bridge when we get there.

I am the type of person that has to do something for myself. Working is my outlet. At work, I get to be me. Not mom or wife..just Melissa. I was losing myself being at home. Now don't get me wrong. If we had enough money and could afford me to be home and be able to be part of Mom and child groups that require paying I would maybe do it...I really don't know. I really like the adult interaction.


:nod: Well said Melissa! That is EXACTLY how I feel! It's nice to just be 'Robyn' for a change...I am 100% happier now than I was 3 months ago...although other circumstances also play a role. But I mean myself as a person.

And thank you to all of you for your support...it means so much to me:hug99: Honestly I'm doing what I'm doing because I have to, to survive. It's in a mothers instinct to protect herself and her children, and I suppose that is what I have done. But it really helps that even though I HAAVE to work I enjoy it as well!

1. What is your name, age, and names and ages of DH and child/ren.

Me - Shanna - 31, almost 32
DH - Ray - 47 :blush:
Leah - 3
Francesca - 9 almost 10 months

2. What do you and your DH do? How many hours a week do you both work. Are you FT or PT?

I'm in charge of the compliance and ethics program for a health insurance company. I'm very full-time. I get to work at about 7:30 and always try to leave by 5, but I work at night after the kids go to bed a few nights a week. Ray is mostly a SAHD, but he's a part-time adjunct professor and teaches 1 -3 classes each semester.

3. What is your day like after work and on your days off? How are the household matters [chores, bill paying, etc] divided?

I'm lucky that Ray stays home, because it makes our mornings easier than most of you have it. I get up with the kids, spend some time with them in the morning and then leave them with him. :) Evenings are crazy. If it's a day that he teaches, they're even crazier. :lol: Both kids clamor for my attention, I'm trying to cook dinner, you all know the story. :rolleyes: I do all the cooking, but Ray does all the laundry and day-to-day picking up. We have a cleaning lady every other week, which has been a godsend. He's in charge of bills.

We try to kick back more on weekends. Ray always wants some time away from the kids after being with them all week, so I try to give him that without being resentful about working two jobs. :lol:

4. Share anything else you would like us to know about you.

I also love to read and miss having more time to do it. :(

5. What do you hope to get out of this journal?

See that people are going through the same crazy things and be around others who don't judge mothers for working (not an OUAL gripe, but more of an IRL gripe).

See I'm jealous of the being you at work thing and maybe thats part of my issue. The place I'm least able to be Lil is at work. My co-workers just live vastly different lives than we do.

This is me, too, but not for the same reasons as you, Lil. My coworkers are (almost) all men...either single men without kids or men with kids and SAH wives. They can work 60+ hrs a week and they don't have to worry about what's for dinner, who's picking the kids up, or if the laundry is getting done. Someone does that all for them.

It's so hard working in this environment. Not a single person here is excited about someone being pregnant. (well....except for the secretaries but I'm an engineer and I can't really spend time talking to them because their boss is very strict). So I feel like I have to hide it and downplay it. They don't understand "I have to pick my kid up" or "Daycare doesn't open until 6:45am so I can't be 1.5 hrs from the office at 7am likeyou want me to". They just don't care.

Oh...and the real kick in the pants - the company recently decided to pay for a plan that pays for your care when you get old and need a nurse or a nursing home. But they don't have ANY maternity leave or short term disability. :rolleyes: And the crazy rules! I can't use my sick time to care for a sick family member. Only if I'm sick.

It's just a very not-family-friendly place to work.

Can you tell I hate it?

Oh man Brooke that just sounds awful... I thought I had it bad where I was but I can't imagine no matternity leave thats horrible, do you get the time off unpaid? Its tough being a woman in a technical field and my company is one of the better ones for that but there is still an underlying prejuidice by many old timers... I'm lucky in most people in my company are very young.

See I should speak up... but I've learned not to bother, everything turns into a battle with me being the bad guy with this group of people. If I said you know being pregnant and a vegetarian is actually quite healthy if you do x,y,z and don't worry about me, I'm very educated on nutrition than it would somehow be turned around that I'm telling the pregnant woman in the original conversation she's being unhealthy by not being a vegetarian, even though nothing I'd say or think would imply that... I just kind of got defeated with this group and stopped bothering, I know they do this to get a rise out of me I just have no idea why.

Brooke~ I can't imagine being one of the few women at work! I can understand how unhappy that would make you! We don't have paid mat. leave either. Just the FMLA time period since that's the option now for employers. We have to save up to make sure we are okay for my next mat. leave. As for your sick time, do you have to tell them WHY you aren't coming in? I don't see why it matters if you have, say 6 sick days, who cares how YOU spend YOUR sick days?

Brooke ~ I know how you feel. Now I work with a great group of engineers, but I'm the only woman too. And I was in the same situation when I was pregnant with Sierra. Nobody at work was interested in my pregnancy at all.

But I'm excited for you! :)

I feel finding the right daycare before going back to work was key for me. I would hate my job, if my kids weren't happy. They are very happy and are doing great. My DD who's 10 is a latchkey kid for the first time this year and she loves it. My DS who's 2 is in a GREAT in-home daycare. I'm very happy with our situation and that makes coming to work even better. I don't feel quilty one bit and my kids are thriving!

I am so excited that everyone is so interested in doing this!!

After being home with a sick baby for 3 days, I am thrilled to be back in the office for a few hours today! :lol:

I dream about being a SAHM but I just don't think I could do it! I love spending time with Genavieve but sometimes I just need the adult interaction so I don't go crazy!

What I would really like to do, is work part-time once she is school-aged so I can be home when she gets home from school. My ILs have been her daycare since I returned to work up until last Friday. So, that certainly made it easier for me to go back to work and not worry about who was watching her. But, now she is going to daycare 2 days a week and spending 3 days with the ILs...

Ok, I need to get back to work! I have one more hour to go tonight!

Brooke, I completely understand. Every one of my bosses have SAHM wives, so they completely don't understand it when you can't be there at all hours of the night, etc. It frustrates me to no end!

As for your sick time, do you have to tell them WHY you aren't coming in? I don't see why it matters if you have, say 6 sick days, who cares how YOU spend YOUR sick days?

I don't have to tell them, for the most part. I don't even have to tell my boss, really. I just have to call in to the secretary so they know where I am. Just in the past 1.5 years they've actually said that the amount of sick time you use will be considered in your review. AND they said that we should be saving at least 1/2 of our sick time every year and carrying it over! So, I get 10 days of sick time a year, and I've been there for 7 years, so I should have 7 weeks (35 work days) of sick time saved up. HA!

Alot of the secretaries/word processors have kids and families. So most of these new rules are focussed towards them. It really feels like they are punishing the women and mothers in the company.

*sigh* I sooooo want another job. There's just no way I can change now, not with being pregnant. Maybe I'll spend my maternity leave looking for something else.

Oh - yes, we get up to 12 weeks of FMLA time, but it's all unpaid unless you used saved sick or vacation time.

I'm so glad to hear that I'm not the only one! :hug99:

WOW! I cant remember what page I posted on! :lol:
So glad to see so many of us out there! :)
As for maternity leave with me-I had a week. :lol: Well, Nick was born 6 weeks early during our crunch time and I think I delivered on a Fri and by the following Wedn I was back in the office but not out on accounts until the following week. When Nick came home 2 weeks later I took 3 weeks. :lol: And since I work for basically myself I didnt get any FMLA/disability etc....Your basically 100% commission so what you make you keep. Could be good and bad.
I also work in a man's company and I am the highest paid out of the agents who work there. Helps that its my office and my accounts but still....I have a secretary that talks too much about nothing but at least I have someone to talk to. :lol:
Glad there are so many working moms who want to actually WORK. :lol: Vin makes enough money for me to stay home and we do have residuals coming in, but I feel like I am doing something with my life besides raising my son. I can do that too and I feel more complete. It also helps to have your own checking account BTW. :awink:
Denise

Holy cow!!! I actually had to work yesterday and I missed so much! You ladies are chatty! :lol:

I also admire Jenn, Robyn and Tracey for doing the working single mom thing. When DH goes out of town it's so hard and I'm so glad when he comes back - I'm not sure I could do it all the time. You ladies ROCK! :aok:

And, I also have no desire to climb the ladder at work. I had the opportunity last year, as my director and Asst. director left and everyone kept asking me if I was going to apply for either and I was like "now way!" First of all, I get paid more than the asst. director and both of those positions work nights and weekends occasionaly and being home with my kids is much more important to me :nod:

I do think I'd like to be able to work 3 or 4 days a week, some day, though. A friend of mine is a director of another office on campus and she is working on a 3 day a week position in her office and she wants me for the job! If it goes through, it will probably start in Fall 2006. It seems like forever, from now, but I'll try and hang on.

Brooke: :hug99: That would totally suck!!! I am happy about your pg and you can talk to me about it anytime you want!! ;)

Brooke: :hug99: That would totally suck!!! I am happy about your pg and you can talk to me about it anytime you want!! ;)

Thanks. :hug1:
I almost wore a maternity shirt today to work. I have on maternity pants, since the only regular pants that fit me are dirty right now. And I had the maternity shirt on but then I changed it because it made it pretty obvious that I'm pregnant. Feeling like you need to hide something that you should be excited about is a horrible feeling.

Screw them... wear the shirt. You should get a shirt that says "Bun in Oven" and has an arrow pointing down!! :lol:

Screw them... wear the shirt. You should get a shirt that says "Bun in Oven" and has an arrow pointing down!! :lol:

Definitely!!

Screw them... wear the shirt. You should get a shirt that says "Bun in Oven" and has an arrow pointing down!! :lol:

:lol: I think it's horrible that you've been made to feel like to have to hide (and not be excited) about being pregnant. But I can also understand, when I was pg and working I felt that I couldn't be as excited as I wanted to be about it. I also worked in an office with 90% men, and single to boot, who really didn't care how crappy or :puke: I felt.:hug99: I'm VERY excited for you Brooke! I'd love to hear all about your pregnancy!

I feel finding the right daycare before going back to work was key for me. I would hate my job, if my kids weren't happy. They are very happy and are doing great. My DD who's 10 is a latchkey kid for the first time this year and she loves it. My DS who's 2 is in a GREAT in-home daycare. I'm very happy with our situation and that makes coming to work even better. I don't feel quilty one bit and my kids are thriving!

ITA. Our daycare is awesome and the kids just love it!

I'm fortunate that my company is very family friendly. They specifically say that sick days can be used for sick dependents. My direct boss has a 3 year old and his wife is due in June with their second, and my manager has 2 year old twins and he was a SAHD for 6 months when they were born, so they totally understand.

Dennis

Brooke ~ I know how you feel. Now I work with a great group of engineers, but I'm the only woman too. And I was in the same situation when I was pregnant with Sierra. Nobody at work was interested in my pregnancy at all.

In their defense, it's hard for a man to "show interest" in a co-worker's pregnancy without seeming creepy. So we play it safe. One of my co-workers is due next month and I wouldn't be comfortable talking to her about it the same way that other women do.

Dennis

In their defense, it's hard for a man to "show interest" in a co-worker's pregnancy without seeming creepy. So we play it safe. One of my co-workers is due next month and I'm wouldn't be comfortable talking to her about it the same way that other women do.

Dennis

I never thought of it that way. You poor men just can't win! :lol:

Good point Dennis.

Brooke -- Its true wear the shirt. We're all happy for you here!!

Dennis that is a valid point that I didn't think of. Maybe I see things differently since my department is so tight nit... which has its advantages and disadvantages but we all talk babies and stuff here I may not always like what I hear but no one would think strangly of a man being excited about a pregnancy... heck my last pregnancy one of my guy co-workers told me all about his wife's pumping experience when I mentioned I was going to nurse :lol: But with it being so tight nit that leads to the other problems such as everyone knowing how I parent and since its so different than most people that work here its caused a lot of animosity towards DH and I... and than everyone found out we were vegetarians and the majority of people grew up on farms and its been down hill ever since with our relationship with co-workers.

Although my team really is great which makes it better.

Very good point, Dennis! I wouldnt have thought about that either!

Some of the guys here are ok. When I was pregnant with Rebekah, one engineer told me about how they just used breastfeeding to space out their 5 kids. Of course, he went on and on about how great breastfeeding was and I never bothered to tell him I wasn't planning on breastfeeding.

Another one, whose wife is pregnant with # 3 right now, was really happy for me this time and asked me if it was planned. I don't know why he cared. :dunno:

Oh - I emailed my supervisor on Wednesday and told him I was pregnant and he still hasn't responded. :dunno: He lives in Minnesota and he was supposed to come into town on Wednesday and I was planning on telling him then. But he cancelled because of rain here (they needed to do work outside) so I just sent an email.

I hate when people don't respond to important emails... maybe he is waiting to talk to you in person but thats strange.

Oh - I emailed my supervisor on Wednesday and told him I was pregnant and he still hasn't responded. :dunno: He lives in Minnesota and he was supposed to come into town on Wednesday and I was planning on telling him then. But he cancelled because of rain here (they needed to do work outside) so I just sent an email.

That's pretty odd.

Dennis: Would that be a "man" thing?

I'm fortunate that my company is very family friendly. They specifically say that sick days can be used for sick dependents. My direct boss has a 3 year old and his wife is due in June with their second, and my manager has 2 year old twins and he was a SAHD for 6 months when they were born, so they totally understand.

Dennis

Where I work (Fed. Gov't, so that likely explains a lot! :lol: ), we have days specifically designated for this...they're called Family Day's, and you either 5/child, or 5/year (I should look into that, shouldn't I?!). I feel lucky to have them, that's for sure.

Dennis, you also made a good point about guys showing an interest in a co-workers pregnancy...makes sense.

And thanks for the kind words everyone. :bighug: They are *more* than welcome! :lol: :awink:

In their defense, it's hard for a man to "show interest" in a co-worker's pregnancy without seeming creepy. So we play it safe. One of my co-workers is due next month and I wouldn't be comfortable talking to her about it the same way that other women do.

Dennis

Boy is this true. Good point Dennis. I was lucky. Two of my co-worker's wives were due within a week of me, so I was lucky to have them to talk to, both were also expecting their 2nd child. The women in my office were the ones not too interested. :rolleyes:

Brooke, wear your maternity clothes and be proud of your "bun in the oven"! Do not allow them to make you feel inferior. Pregnant women are very powerful, use it to your advantage! :victory:

Thanks everyone.

Is everyone having an easy Friday today?

I am back at home again today after my 5 hour stint at work yesterday... I will probably go into work for a few hours tonight after DH gets home from his job. Will probably be taking Genavieve back to the doctor this afternoon. :blue:

Ok, small work gripe. I was recently promoted at work (amzing since I've only been here for a month!) I was an assistant for a director, now I'm an executive assistant for 2 senior directors. Before my promotion I had my little corral (cubicle) with quite a bit of space...now with the promotion I'm sharing a tiny office (no windows) with another assistant. I just moved in today and I have NO space!:blue: It sucks! This girl that I share an office with is very nice and all that...but it just sucks not having my own space. My boss tried to argue it for me but with no luck, and I really don't want to kick up too much of a fuss being the 'new girl' Just wanted to complain to someone and I fugred you all would understand!

Dennis: Would that be a "man" thing?

No, I think it's just a particular person thing.

Robyn, that stinks! But congrats on the promotion!

I'm having an icky day. I'm still congested and hacking up all kinds of wonderful stuff. DD is home with Dad today since she had a fever yesterday (no fever for 24 hours per daycare). I was home with her Wednesday when she had pink eye. But then I find out today that I have to work full weeks now. :( I'm so sad. I'd been working 4-day weeks since I came back to work from maternity leave. I admit that I did get away with it longer than I was supposed to (it's a 12-month benefit), but I'm bummed that I won't get that day with Riley anymore. :( What a week.

I work with a lot of men and they tend to ask me more about "when's that baby coming" than some of the women. I even had one of our subcontractors ask me if I was having a c-section or not :lol: People will ask anything :disbelief

That sucks, Robyn. I hope you figure out a way to arrange things so you have a little more room.

Friday going ok here for me. I am finally caught up after a very busy week. We have a big trial going out on Monday so between that and everything else that has come up this week it has been nuts. We are leaving tonight to fly to NC for a wedding...Abby is so excited to be flying on an airplane. This is her first flight that she will remember so she can hardly sleep she is so excited!

Question for you: How do I get out of court at 5:00 on Monday....drive 30 minutes back to my office....drive 30 minutes to pick up Abby and then turn around and drive another 30 mintues back to bring her to swimming lessons?? :lol: Somehow I think I am going to have to enlist the IL's help...

Things are pretty low key here today :)

One of my co-workers wife is pregnant, and he has been asking me a lot of pg related questions. It was funny because the guys around here generally don't want to hear anything about it.

An odd thing is going on here. I see a perinatalogist out of Ann Arbor, but work in Lansing (live in the middle). They are an hour and 15 min. a way from each other. I walked into the office last month, and my deputy director was there :jawdrop: She was there for her 20 week u/s, and no one at work knows about it!! I have kept my mouth shut, so far, but it is killing me!!! Then the guy at work who's wife is pg tells us the minute she pees on the stick! I deserve a medal for being able to keep this quiet!

More bitching...got all my stuff moved in only to find out that this woman has pretty much taken over the ENTIRE office! She even has stuff on my desk!!! What am I supposed to do?!?!?!? She has gone to lunch and so I discretely moved her things back onto her desk...this should be interesting!

Oh man how annoying, sounds like sharing an office with her will be quite "interesting"

Things are going okay today, I'm just ready to tear my hair out because I've been trouble shooting the same problem for 2 days and have no idea, neither does my test lead or my boss and I've even rebuilt the machine from scratch and still having it... sometimes I hate computers!! Okay I feel better venting.

Oh Robyn that really sucks!! She shouldnt be able to keep her stuff on your desk. I would tell her to move it or lose it as tactfully as possible!! :lol:

Darcy~ Sorry to hear you have been dealing with Pink Eye too. My DD hasnt been to daycare all week.

Holy crap. Robyn: I feel for ya. I would just move her crap back onto her desk and move my stuff in. Sorry you have to share an office. That really sucks. But congrats on the promotion!! :aok:

Wendy: I think I would inlist IL help with that one!

Darcy: I hope the sick germs leave your house soon!!

i have my own cube but for the past week i've been in a 'war room' environment. meaning it's me and various others on our laptops in a conference room. the postive is i'm meeting new people the negative is i almost always have someone up my butt!

right now i'm alone though. sweet.

oh, and the one girl who is here the most with me brings cookies. oh and coffee. i think i might ask her out :rotflmao:

I bet she would be a great date Kim..

You just need the coffeecake lady in there with you and you'll be set!

You just need the coffeecake lady in there with you and you'll be set!

:lol:

anyone else have a cakelady in their bldg? i have the infamous coffeecake lady. she makes homemade coffeecakes that are TDF! she sits about 3 rows over from me so they are hard to avoid. :lick:

No. We don't get any good goodies around here. :(

No, can you send her over to us? I have a manager who brings in hot fresh Krispy Kremes on Friday.. Does that count?

:lol:

anyone else have a cakelady in their bldg? i have the infamous coffeecake lady. she makes homemade coffeecakes that are TDF! she sits about 3 rows over from me so they are hard to avoid. :lick:

One of the VPs here brings Portugese sweet bread to everyone every Friday. However, cofeecake sounds way better. :lol:

We don't have anyone like that (though our accounting department brings in food all the time... we just try to stay away from them in general :lol: ). My company does provide breakfast every Friday though. It's always the same stuff. EVERY week. :dead: Bagles, muffins, fruit, breakfast bread and cookies.

Yum!
I guess I can't complain, though. We have one whole refrigerator stocked with about 12 different kinds of soda - Coke, Diet Coke, Pepsi, orange, sprite, diet sprite, ginger ale, diet ginger ale, iced tea...you get the picture. All free, as many as you want during the day.

What other perks do your companies offer? Anything?

My company doesn't even offer free coffee.. They are stingy buttheads.

:omg: How did I miss everything here.

:hug99: to all the single mommies. :hug99:

:hug99: to Brooke.

I'm still catching up.

Around the holidays, things were bad here in terms of FOOD. :rolleyes: Does NOT help with the diet!

You are obviously the good girl of the group and were actually working..:lol:

What other perks do your companies offer? Anything?


Well, BEFORE we were bought by GE and some blackbelt came in and did a study on our Coke machine...

... we used to pay 25 cents for a can of soda. Cost I believe.

Then someone probably did a study on making $ from the vending machines :rolleyes: and all the prices went up to 60 cents! :woa: Talk about inflation!

People went so far as to boycott the vending machines by bringing in a case of soda for everyone. We bought out the machine the day before the prices went up and stopped buying the day after. Every once in a while I choke when I need a Diet Coke.

Otherwise, we do still have FREE coffee and teas. .... for now. :disbeleif

My company gives us free breakfast on Mondays similar to what Nocona mentioned.

Every once in a blue moon we will get free lunch

I get free water :lol:

You are obviously the good girl of the group and were actually working..:lol:

:lol: who ME??? :lol: Unless I have a deadline, I'm SO unfocused. :(

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I guess another perk is that we have a small workout room and locker rooms with showers. We get 1 hour for lunch, so you can get a quick workout in. I've used it for years! :up:

We have 2 stairmasters, 2 bikes, 2 treadmills, a rower and a weight gym thingy.

Thats cool, Lette!! I would love it if I had that available at work! :thumbsup:

I'd like to join :)

1. What is your name, age, and names and ages of DH and child/ren.

My name is Emily, Dh is Greg; we are 29 & 35 respectively. Jada and Justin (twins)
are 2.5 years old

2. What do you and your DH do? How many hours a week do you both work. Are you FT or PT?

Dh and I both work FT; I am a Benefits Mgr and DH is an Underwriting Sup for an insurance company.

3. What is your day like after work and on your days off? How are the household matters [chores, bill paying, etc] divided?

DH drops the kids off in the a.m. and I pick them up; usually I get home first so I cook dinner while the kids play. After we eat, we'll play/read with J&J for an hour or so, give them a bath and put them to bed around 8:30-9:00 p.m. I ususally am the bath-giver except for Wed nights when Models comes on :lol: and DH bathes them. DH is usually doing the dishes while I have them in the tub; after they go to bed we both try to tidy up the family room so we aren't stepping on toys. Then we have our adult/TV watching time, etc. On the weekends, DH gets up with them and lets me sleep in late, when I get up, he'll take a nap. During that time I play with them, let them watch a movie if they ask, etc. Once they take their naps Dh and I start cleaning; I do the main floor and laundry, he does the basement and the outside (in the summer). I do all of the bill-paying online at work, DH isn't involved at all, TG :awink:

4. Share anything else you would like us to know about you.

Ask away...

5. What do you hope to get out of this journal?

Support from others who know what the working mom's daily grind is like. :)

blackbelt came in and did a study on our Coke machine...

:rotflmao:

i have to run but off the top of my head:


gyms in every building, even a giant pool in the bldg across the street.
free coffee/tea/hot cocoa (some stations have espresso machines) and filtered water
free tampons and pads (i love this perk)

Man, sometimes it sucks working in a 15 person firm. We do have free sodas, juices, teas, etc., but that's our only perk. Our receptionist keeps a small bowl of candy up at the front of her office, which is VERY bad for my waistline!

Man, I wish we had a coffeecake lady. Damn, Kim, with all your talk today about cake and coffeecake, I'm DYING for some bakery items!!

Brooke, wear your mat. shirt with pride. But I know how you feel- I was the first woman in the firm to get pg in over 10 years! Then I had to be the one to bring all 12 men in my office into the 20th century and deal with comments, questions, and the insane awkwardness of pumping. Oh yeah, that was a fun day, the first time I pumped in my office. I have a thin window that runs alongside my office door that I would cover up with construction paper. Nothing like advertising it to the boys!! :rolleyes: My biggest fear (both times) was that my water would break while I was at work. OMG, I don't think any of us would have recovered from that! :lol:

Lette: I am so jealous. I want a gym here!!

Free coffee and tea here, lots of people bringing goodies in though. We also have what our CEO calls 'tea time' (he's english) where we all get together in the lunch room to mingle and have treats. Usually that happens about every two weeks or so. We also do monthly pizza lunches and once a month we celebrate everyone's birthday that month.

Our other perks:

*Office lunch about once a month
*Free coffee/tea/fru-fru coffee crap, bottled water, ice ;) , hot chocolate, popcorn, I think cup-o-soup too, or at least we used to :scratch:
*Free tampons :lol:
*There's a container by the sinks in the restrooms with toiletries - mouthwash, hairspray, floss, Shout wipes, etc.
*Workout room with 2 showers. There's all kinds of different equipment in there and a TV.
*Lots of "go home early because it's nice on a Friday" days. These were must more prevalent before our architectural firm moved in with us. They don't like to close early :rolleyes: Of course they have a meeting on Thursday afternoons where they haul in kegs and/or coolers of beer, etc. that we don't/can't participate in :rolleyes:
*Unlimited internet access :lol:

:lol: at the free pads and tampons! Why? is my only question....and who's in charge of buying them? :lol:

We're not SUPPOSED to have unlimited internet access. We have it but the company manual says "for business use only". On MOnday I came in and turned on my computer and my screen resolution was all screwed up so now I'm thinking that someone was on my computer over the weekend. I don't know why anyone would get on here and mess with the screen resolution and not put it back unless they wanted me to know. So now I'm suspicious and I've started clearing my cookies and my temp. internet files and history at the end of every day.

Its not uncommon for someone to use someone else's computer if that person isn't here. I've actually used 2 other computers and gone to look up something online (work-related) and found porn sites bookmarked. :eek:

We don't have much in the way of perks. Free coffee/tea/hot chocolate is about it. We have a department lunch meeting every other month. No gym. Apparently they did seriously look into having one before I started but they decided the cost wasn't justified.

I do have a company cell phone and a kickass laptop, but I have to be on call every other month and get woken up in the middle of the night, so it's a tradeoff. And they pay for our home internet service because of this.

Dennis

Boy, I've missed this thread!! Glad to see it though, so here goes:

1. What is your name, age, and names and ages of DH and child/ren.
I'm Bonnie, I'm 36 (37 in July)
DH is Lee, he's 35 (36 in June)
Caroline will be 3 on June 24
Courtney turned 1 on Jan. 21
#3 our big surprise is due Sept. 25

2. What do you and your DH do? How many hours a week do you both work. Are you FT or PT?
We are both attorneys. He is in private practice, litigation defense with a mid sized firm and I work for the state. We are both full time, but my full time is more 9-5 than his full time, since he has to bill his time and I don't.

3. What is your day like after work and on your days off? How are the household matters [chores, bill paying, etc] divided?
We have a nanny, so luckily we don't have to take the kids out in the a.m. I do not think I could get it together enough to do that! Caroline and I are very pokey. I almost always get home by 5:30 when our nanny goes home. Occasionally, I'll ask Lee to, but he works further away and has to work more than I do, so it is just easier for me to be home. I try VERY hard to work out 2 days a week, and I'd love to do 3, but for now, if 2 happens, I'm happy. I do the grocery shopping and bill paying, laundry, house cleaning. He does maintenance type stuff around the house, garbage, etc. If I ask him to do things that fall more into cleaning, etc. he will, but it does not come naturally for him at all! Child care is pretty much 50-50, but I end up doing more sometimes if they just want to be with mommy.

We have no family here, so any time we are not working is pretty much family time...

4. Share anything else you would like us to know about you.
Anyone who knows me on this site knows this already, but my 1 year old was born with some medical problems... she had a cleft palate, but had surgery to repair that in December... she has one ear that is kind of funky... it is small and has no opening, but her hearing is fine, and she also has a condition called microcephaly, which means her head is tiny... below the growth curve, so while she is really doing very well, she may end up with developmental delays, but we just have no way of knowing to what extent she'll be delayed and how. An added element to our lives is more doctors appts and therapies for her that we have to work in... I tend to have at least 1 appt. for her a week, but that is down from her first year of life. We also thought we were done having children after Courtney, but surprise... we are expecting our third, and that is kind of freaking me out for several reasons... #1 I'm afraid of having another baby with problems, because it is just that much harder... #2 I am afraid of how on earth I am going to manage working and having 3 children, the oldest of whom will only be 3!!! I can barely keep it all together now, and I have a pretty flexible job and only an 8 mile commute!!!


5. What do you hope to get out of this journal? Support, get to know more people.

Since I work for the state, we have NO perks... when I was in private, we had coffee, sodas, juices and alternate bagel/doughnut Wednesdays, plus a once a month birthday celebration with pies and cakes. Here, we don't even have water!

I don't know why, but one of the admin assistants has to buy all the stuff :lol:

Our says "for business purposes only" on the internet stuff too, but they don't care as long as you aren't surfing porn and you do your job.

:duh: I have a cell phone (Nextel) and a laptop. I'm never technically "on call" but I have gotten calls at home before.

Oh and I can work from home during my maternity leave (no paid ST leave here so it's just use your vacation days - no sick days, it's all bank days - or don't get paid) and they set all that up for me :aok: Last time they even paid for my cable modem to be installed. I have DSL now so they didn't have to do that again.

I do have a cell phone and laptop, but I don't consider those perks, I pretty much need them to do my job... plus, we aren't allowed to use the cells for personal, tax payer money and all.... so I have to have a personal one anyway!

:rotflmao:

free tampons and pads (i love this perk)


We have this one too. They just line 'em up in the stalls. :crazy:

I forgot about my free cell phone, laptop and internet service. :duh:

I also want to thank GE for our free high speed cable internet at HOME. :biggrin: DH has to have it since he works out of the house and we have a wireless router too. :)

There is some kind of gym with a shower here, but it only has a bike I think, and I am a stair master kind of a girl, so I've never used it. Other state offices have childcare, but for some reason not in San Diego, which is lame... we also don't get any paid maternity leave. You can take up to a year off, but the only way you can get paid for any of it is if you opt for a particular vacation/sick plan that gives you less hours each month in exchange for a short term disability plan... then you can get 50% of your pay for the disability period... for me that is 8 weeks with a scheduled C-section, which I have supplemented every time with my own vacation time... pretty lame.

Wait!! I just thought of one. We have company paid Short Term Dis. :aok: I get to use it as maternity leave!! :woo:

One thing I like a lot about my job is that if I need to work from home, I usually can... we don't have official telecommute hours, but our supervisor does it all the time, so he is fine with us doing it too... yesterday, I had 2 appts. for Courtney, and ended up working at home the rest of the day, which was great.

Wait!! I just thought of one. We have company paid Short Term Dis. :aok: I get to use it as maternity leave!! :woo:

I just posted about our non-maternity leave which also is really just disability... I think this is pretty lame these days, esp. when everyone likes to talk about how "family friendly" they are... and to make things worse, here in California, if you work in the private sector, your employer now has to give you a paid maternity leave, but if you work for the govt., you don't get one!!!

I'm jealous of those of you with gyms at work. That would be so cool!! And free tampons. :lol: That's a new one to me.

We get free bottled water and coffee and tea. We get donuts every Friday. I get to set my own hours which is nice. We are located right near a lake with a nice walking trail, so that's where I spend a lot of my lunch hours getting my exercise.

Oh yeah. My laptop and the ability to work from home if needed.

I just posted about our non-maternity leave which also is really just disability... I think this is pretty lame these days, esp. when everyone likes to talk about how "family friendly" they are... and to make things worse, here in California, if you work in the private sector, your employer now has to give you a paid maternity leave, but if you work for the govt., you don't get one!!!

That's just :crazy:

Here is a perk for me... we have free parking!!! That may sound lame, but when our offices were downtown, you had to find your own parking and pay for it yourself... that was 3 years ago, and back then parking was over $100 a month... now, there are a lot fewer lots b/c of all the building, so it is really $$$, and the state does not pay for it! There is a state lot somewhere, but you pretty much have to have worked here for 20 years before you can get into it!!

Another, non-official perk for me is that my office is in a part of town that is full of malls and shopping centers, including the very practical, 2 story Target, so it is very easy for me to do my own fun shopping, but also shop for household stuff on lunch or on my way home :)

Perks here include coffee/tea/cocoa and an ice machine. We also have a fridge to store lunches. We used to have free tampons/pad but that was from the mgmt company of our old building. Now we have to put in a quarter. My cell phone bill is reimbursed. I have a great manager so I have the opportunity to work from home on occassion.

Biggest perk, I still have a job even though our stock is at $.87/share. :eek:

Here is a perk for me... we have free parking!!! That may sound lame, but when our offices were downtown, you had to find your own parking and pay for it yourself... that was 3 years ago, and back then parking was over $100 a month... now, there are a lot fewer lots b/c of all the building, so it is really $$$, and the state does not pay for it! There is a state lot somewhere, but you pretty much have to have worked here for 20 years before you can get into it!!

Parking in San Diego downtown is NUTS! It cost us like $25 just to park so we could go to dinner (The Spaghetti Factory, for those who live there). And that was almost 2 years ago, before the new stadium was done.

Oh, I forgot they also pay half the cost of a bus pass if we want to take the bus to work and also pay half for education as long as it somehow relates to the job.

Parking in San Diego downtown is NUTS! It cost us like $25 just to park so we could go to dinner (The Spaghetti Factory, for those who live there). And that was almost 2 years ago, before the new stadium was done.

Yes, and it is so much worse now b/c they have built all of these luxury condos everywhere there used to be parking lots... so, it was great when they moved us out here (Mission Valley) and our lease includes our parking! Another "perk" that I don't take advantage of since I live pretty close and there isn't any public transportation to the beach from work is that the state subsidizes a good portion of people's train or trolley passes, so some people do get that.

Another perk I get is they give me $115 a month to decline health insurance (we get it through Mary).

So, does anyone do any kind of outside activities with their kids and if so, how do you do it?

Caroline has a music class every Friday morning that we have done since she was 1, and I used to have every other Friday off... now, I take her and go in to work after or else I have reluctantly had to send her with Rachel our nanny... I hate to do that... we also just started My Gym, and Lee or I will try to leave work early if we can to take her or again, she goes with Rachel, but I know how much she enjoys one on one time with me or with Lee, so it kind of sucks. These are the things that make me wish I could work part time.

Right now I have the kids enrolled in swimming lessons on Saturday mornings. That's their only activity right now and they love it. I don't know if I would want one during the week. Some days I'm so tired and out of energy by the time I get home.

Yum!
What other perks do your companies offer? Anything?

Well...great benefits (no medical bills other than co-pay, as long as we see someone in our clinic system.

Otherwise...I get a lot of perks for being a Dr :) I get free pens, and note pads up the you-know-what, periodic free meals, occasionally free books (got a free flash drive, once- felt guilty about taking it, but it came with some really good patient education materials, so... :blush: )



So, does anyone do any kind of outside activities with their kids and if so, how do you do it?

Both of the girls have swim lessons on Saturday mornings- Rebecca has parent/child, and Isabelle individual. DH and I take turns swimming with Rebecca. And Isabelle has gymnastics on Tuesday evenings. That one is a little tricky sometimes, if work runs over...and we have to eat dinner late on those evenings.

Paul is home so they do a lot of stuff - visiting the zoo, museums, etc. during the week. He also goes to preschool MWF from 9-1

Rachel takes them to Sea World, story time, the aquarium, etc. but I never get to do those things! Occasionally, I'll take them to the zoo.

Right now, the only activity we do is music therapy twice a month on Saturday mornings. We tried Joe in basketball last fall and he wasn't ready yet. We do want to do swim lessons at some point.

My feeling is fulltime daycare/preschool is a lot of activity and they need to have down time.

Dennis

Man this thread rocks!!!!


1. What is your name, age, and names and ages of DH and child/ren.
Brook, age 28
Brett, age 28
Lindsey, age 2

2. What do you and your DH do? How many hours a week do you both work. Are you FT or PT?
I work full time as a juvenile probation officer. I am a county employee and put in 40-50 hours a week.
Brett works at millwork company. He put in 40 hours a week and some over time when they are busy.

3. What is your day like after work and on your days off? How are the household matters [chores, bill paying, etc] divided?
I bring Lindsey to daycare and Brett picks her up since he gets done with work by 4 p.m and I work until 5 p.m. Sometimes Brett has Lindsey fed by the time I get home. I usually give Lindsey a bath and Brett does bedtime. Brett also has a part time job every other weekend, so I get to spend a lot of time with Lindsey on those weekends. Brett is mostly in charge of the outside chores and I do most of the inside, however, Brett helps out quite a bit. I do all the grocery shopping and handle the bills.

4. Share anything else you would like us to know about you.
I enjoying reading and have just started working out at the YMCA regularly.

5. What do you hope to get out of this journal?
To get support from others...and to give support to others

My feeling is fulltime daycare/preschool is a lot of activity and they need to have down time.




we feel the exact same way dennis. i don't do any organized activities with tony. this is also why i leave tony alone after work, i let him decide if he wants me to interact with him. usually he blows me off :lol:

So, does anyone do any kind of outside activities with their kids and if so, how do you do it?

Nope, although we will be enrolling in swimming lessons again this summer. I agree that they get lots of activities during the day at school, we just usually play it by ear at home and lay low without adding tons and tons of stuff. Every now and then, we will hit the playground, zoo, etc. with my mommy friends, but usually it's just the 2 of us on our own.

I'm kind of late, but I'd like to join:

1. What is your name, age, and names and ages of DH and child/ren.
Barb, age 35 (almost 36)
Greg, age 31 (almost 32)
Liam, aged 3 and Norah, 2 1/2 months

2. What do you and your DH do? How many hours a week do you both work. Are you FT or PT?
We both work full-time at local (competing :lol: ) TV stations. I'm in the production department and Greg is the Design Director. Right now he works on the morning show, so his shift is 4am to 1pm. That's just temporary though, in a few weeks he'll go back to working a normal dayside shift. I work 1pm to 10pm. We both work Mon - Fri.

3. What is your day like after work and on your days off? How are the household matters [chores, bill paying, etc] divided?
Right now our days are pretty hectic. I'm alone with the kids in the morning and he has them in the afternoon and evening. We only see each other on weekends and that's the only chance to get chores done. We just do what's needed as we see it.

4. Share anything else you would like us to know about you.
Um, I like watching movies and reading but rarely have the time for that anymore.

5. What do you hope to get out of this journal?
What most everyone else has said, to get (and give) support.

So, does anyone do any kind of outside activities with their kids and if so, how do you do it?



Natascha has piano lessons and Indian Princesses. I have to take her directly from school's extended day program to piano lessons. Then I get Kyle and go home ot prepare dinner. David then picks Natascha up on his way home. It's a little bit of a hassle but it's doable. She also does Indian Princesses. Luckily, they are only on Friday evenings and on the weekend. Her gymnastics classes we had to discontinue. They were twice a week since she was a team and it was juts geting too much for me and her. I might sign her up again for a regular weekend class and maybe they still offer the toddler tumble class. This would be great for Kyle.

I can't believe it took me so long to get here!

1. What is your name, age, and names and ages of DH and child/ren.
Amanda, 33
Tom, 36
Nathaniel, 14 months

2. What do you and your DH do? How many hours a week do you both work. Are you FT or PT?
I'm a chief resident in urology. I'm graduating residency in mid-June. I then become a single, married mom as my job is taking me to Baltimore for 2 years while my DH has to stay in NY. I will be doing a fellowship in pediatric urology at Johns Hopkins (it's a huge honor!). Right now I work about 60-80 hours per week. Starting July 1st I'll be in a research lab for a year so my hours will be better. The following year my hours become INSANE.
Tom is a urologist in private practice. He probably works 50-60 hours per week. He works about 2 miles from home so he can frequently stop home for lunch.
With 2 surgeons in the family, our schedules are VERY unpredictable. Ya never know when an emergency is going to occur. Right now I work 2 weekends a month and Tom works 1 weekend a month. We try to schedule our weekends so we're not both working the same weekend.

3. What is your day like after work and on your days off? How are the household matters [chores, bill paying, etc] divided?
Days off??? What's that??? In the evenings Tom or I cook dinner and then Tom usually does dishes while I put Nathaniel to sleep. Nathaniel is usually still sleeping in the morning when I leave for work (I leave at 6am) but if he gets up, I usually get him. Tom then takes him so I can go to work.
We try to share the chores and we also have a great cleaning lady who comes every week (a necessity!). Needless to say our house is a war zone but we do the best we can!
On Sundays we have special family time. We go to Gymboree together at 10am and then go to the diner for brunch. It's fun!

4. Share anything else you would like us to know about you.
I'm very nervous about having Nathaniel by myself in Baltimore!

5. What do you hope to get out of this journal?
I agree with what's already been said about feeling like a minority. I'm very dedicated to my career but I'm also very dedicated to my family. It's a difficult balance! I also sometimes feel left out on the boards b/c I'm not able to get here as much as most people.

Amanda

I get free water :lol:
That's me, too. :lol: I envy all of those with free tampons etc. Us women are definitely outnumbered in my job. There is only 4 of us against 20 men. :lol:

Free tampons???? Now that is a perk. We have a water foutain. :lol:

Welcome to all the ladies joining us! Wow, didn't realize there were so many of working parents around here! :up:

I think if my boss bought all of us tampons he would fall over dead :lol:!

Regarding perks, I was thinking about this on my way to the Diamondback's game last night where I acquired 4 tickets that my boss couldn't use...you know right behind the dugout...he's a season ticket holder. That's one of the perks, but the tickets are few and far between since he gives everyone a chance. We get an unlimited supply of water, soda, coffee, popcorn, granola bars, oatmeal...you know, the bulk stuff you buy at Cosco. My boss is in LOVE with Cosco and makes several trips during the month.

That's really about it, nothing major.

4. Share anything else you would like us to know about you.
I'm very nervous about having Nathaniel by myself in Baltimore!


My biggest piece of advice when it's just going to be you and Nathaniel is have a routine! Having a routine SAVES MY LIFE! I do a lot of prep on Sundays for the coming week (lunches, pick out clothes, decide what we are having for dinner). It's the little stuff that makes all the difference in the world!

Thanks! I appreciate the advice.

My perks at work include free meals (we can get breakfast, lunch, and dinner at the hospital cafeteria) and free medication if we get them at the hospital pharmacy (this was GREAT when I was doing IVF). The flip side is that we're woefully underpaid for the amount of training we have and the number of hours we work!

Amanda

4. Share anything else you would like us to know about you.
I'm very nervous about having Nathaniel by myself in Baltimore!

If you ever need anything, let me know! I'm only 10 minutes south of downtown, in Linthicum (right near BWI airport).

Do you know where you will be living yet?

Regarding perks, I was thinking about this on my way to the Diamondback's game last night where I acquired 4 tickets that my boss couldn't use...you know right behind the dugout...he's a season ticket holder.

Our company has season passes to every home Oriole and Ravens game. Any time a client doesn't want the tickets, they are up for grabs. Someone sends out an email and the first to respond (who hasn't had them yet that season) gets them. They are nice seats, club level. We usually go once a year to an Oriole game. We can also request certain tickets if there's a game we want to see (I'm going to try to get one of the fireworks nights) and if it's available, you get them.

That's how our tickets are too, Brooke. E-mails - first come, first served. Cardinals, Rams, Blues. We have a couple sets... some behind home plate, some club level. Then once a year they take us all to one of the fancy rooms at Busch Stadium for one of the Cardinals last games.

That's cool about the games! Every once and awhile we can "win" tickets to Mariner's games but its not exactly easy to win 2 tickets out of over 100 people in our department!

My biggest piece of advice when it's just going to be you and Nathaniel is have a routine! Having a routine SAVES MY LIFE! It's the little stuff that makes all the difference in the world!

This is *so* true! I was talking to someone this weekend about this, and, really, our routine has been *so* key in making all of this work as well as it has. The girls barely make a peep when they get up in the morning (they're still half-asleep, as it's still so darn early :blue: ), so I can get them dressed and into the car in 15 minutes. It sounds awful, but they have adjusted so well, and really do love their caregiver and the other kids there. And at night, routine as well...we're ALL benefitting from it! :nod:

As far as perks, well...water? Coffee too, I guess. Being in the Fed. Gov't, really, there isn't a whole lot of 'free' stuff. But, I get a discount at a gym down the street, and stuff like that. And, we get a great maternity leave...in Canada in general, it's a year off, at 55% of your salary, but the gov't will top up their employees to 97%, which is awesome. Also, you can choose to extend your leave by up to 5 years, and still have *a* job to return to (not necessarily your job, but a job at the same pay rate). This is what I did after my maternity leave with Teagan was up, and it was great. And, I still have 4 more years! :lol:

There is also a pension plan, and great medical/dental benefits. So, really, I can't complain. And, once you're indeterminate (permanent), well...you're pretty much good for life, if you choose to stay in the government. And theres lots of opportunity to move around. So, it could be much worse!

I need some help. David is wanting to wear "big boy" underwear at night. The problem is he has accidents. I can't get him to understand that he needs to get up and go to the bathroom at night. Just last night he peed 3 different times. I have stopped putting sheets on his bed as I don't want to have to have a butt load of sheets to wash. KWIM? Should I keep him in pull ups a bit longer? I don't want to discourage him but at the same time I have to get my sleep as does he!!
Are any of your children night potty trained? If so, how did you do it? :help2:

sorry melissa, we are not even day trained. my big success so far is getting him to tell me when he has a load in his pants :dead:

Melissa - I'm not much help either. Rebekah one day decided that she didn't want pull-ups anymore at night and refused to wear them. She had a couple of accidents but for the most part has been trained since then.

Coule you let him wear the underwear either under or over his pull-up? Do you think he'd go for that?

Or - go get a different brand of pull-up so they look different and make a big deal about them being "big boy nighttime pants".

We call pull ups "rest underwear" and Matthew's goal is to wake up with the stars/balloons/whatever still on them in the morning. He wakes up dry most of the time. Luckily he hasn't refused them yet (he wears them for nap too).

Honestly, at this point I will try anything. I know that the night time is the hardest to train so when he said he didn't want to wear his pull up I was fine with it. :dunno: I will try the underwear under/over the pull up.

Wow this thread moved so fast over the weekend :lol:

Perks -- not many really. We used to have free medical but they took that away and we have to pay for it now :rolleyes:

They do bagels and doughnuts every Friday here.

And we're very family friendly atleast my department is, so if Nick ever needs me I just have to tell my boss and I can leave no questions asked (DH works with me, and he tells his boss too and its no big deal) The last one is most important for us.

Boy, this really got moving!

Perks for me used to be 4-day work weeks after Riley was born. That ended this week. :( I'm still kinda upset about it. This week will be very long. I used to have a great boss who let me leave for doctor appointments without taking time off or to pick up Riley from daycare early, but now that I have a new boss, she's not so understanding. We have free coffee (don't drink it), water, and an ice machine. And in the summer we have summer hours in that Fridays are 1/2 days (you make up the time during the week). What's nice about that is if you don't want to come into work on Friday, you only are charged .5 day.

Activities--we don't really do much of anything. We might get more involved once we move, but right now she gets all kinds of activities at daycare so we don't feel too guilty about not doing anything else.

Anybody else in a Monday slump? I just can't seem to get my motor going this morning. :crazy:

i haven't done jack yet :lol: and i've been here since 7:30am. i have a headcold, and my project partner just left for a dr. appt. so i don't see things moving too quickly around here for me anytime soon :lol:

Melissa ~ I don't have any experienced advice to give you as Sierra was strange and actually was potty trained at night before she ever went a day without an accident. :disbelief What about setting an alarm sometime during the night and taking him to go pee? That might make you too tired though.

I am completely in a Monday morning slump. AF showed up yesterday and I am about to break in two. I think I may go home and dope myself up and lay on a heating pad for the rest of the day..

Sorry you're feeling crappy, Melissa. You too, Kim.

I have a headache but it's because my head is sunburnt from being outside all day yesterday. I'm already thinking about lunch! I'm thinking cheesesteak sub.... Yum! (I didn't have time to pack anything this morning)

Anybody else in a Monday slump? I just can't seem to get my motor going this morning. :crazy:

Ah, is that what this is?! :lol: I've done lots of (personal) stuff though...does that count?! :awink:

Sorry you're feeling crappy, Melissa. :bighug:

Anybody else in a Monday slump? I just can't seem to get my motor going this morning. :crazy:

Yes, here it is 11 AM and I haven't done more than 30 minutes of work so far. :blush:

I'll have to kick it in this afternoon. :bolt:

I felt crappy all day yesterday... I got the quadruple whammy:

stomach bug, but no barfing
too much sun and I got the chills in the afternoon
head cold and sore throat of some sort going on
AND AF decided to show!!
:faint: :faint: :faint:

Isn't that the way it always goes, Lette?

Seems so Brooke! The only bonus I got was a 2 pound weight loss. :lol: I'll TAKE IT!

Anybody else in a Monday slump? I just can't seem to get my motor going this morning. :crazy:

Somewhat... Ironically I'm in too good of a mood today. Its hard to focus on work related stuff at all.

Geez, I can't keep up! :awink:

I'm over my cold thankfully, but AF is due today, so I'm looking forward to that. :rolleyes:

I *wish* I could be in a Monday slump, but I'm swamped! I've got about 8 screens open at once right now. :lol: I even had to turn down a chance to go with DH to the Red Sox OPENING DAY game against the Yankees b/c I have too much work! DANG IT!

As for activities, no, not really. Our nanny takes the kids to a playgroup on T/TH, but that's it, really. I want to get Emma back in swimming lessons, but they are always on days when I'm working, and my schedule keeps moving all over the place. I take the kids to a weekly Friday playgroup, too.

It took me until 10:15 to start getting things done this morning, and I am taking a break already :lol:

Ah, is that what this is?! :lol: I've done lots of (personal) stuff though...does that count?! :awink:



Of course it does! :awink: I had about 4 cups of coffee...strong German coffee. Now I am all wired up. :lol:

What an awesome thread! And DUH! How long did it take me to find it.....
Needless to say I am joining in..

1. What is your name, age, and names and ages of DH and child/ren.
Me: Nadine, almost 32
DH: Yehuda, 33
DS: Benjamin (AKA Yumi), 6.5
DD: Shoham, 2.5

2. What do you and your DH do? How many hours a week do you both work. Are you FT or PT?
I am a FT technical writer or documentation communicator (ie I write user guides and online helps for software programs). I am supposed to work 45 hrs a week Sunday-Thursday but I work less than that. I usually work from 8:15-3:15 and on Mondays from 8:15-8 pm. TG I work close to home.
DH is a much more than FT comptroller (learned CPA who is responsible for all the financial records/reports of a huge investment firm). He usually works from 8am-7pm Sun-Thurs. During the crazy months when the reports are due he works until the wee hours of the morning (coming home at 2,3,4,5 or even 6 am is not an unusual occurrence) and then he also works Fridays. TG Saturdays are off limit thanks to Shabbat.

3. What is your day like after work and on your days off? How are the household matters [chores, bill paying, etc] divided?
After work I pick up the kids, go home with them (or to afternoon activities 3 times a week), let Shoham play on her own while I do HW with and exercises with Yumi (more on that later). Then we play some, watch TV, go to the yard or so (usually there isn't a lot of time left) until it is time for dinner, long sitting on the toilet (Yumi), baths, story time, prayer and bed.
I do the vast majority of the household matters. The problem is that we have to readjust to new schedules every time the peak period starts and when it is over. When it starts I have to get used to being a "single mom" on weekdays and when it is over it is SO hard for me to delegate chores back to him, KWIM? He is also EXHAUSTED after working so hard for weeks in a row. So - I do most of the things (bringing kids to and from school/DC, taking them to afternoon activities, groceries, cooking, dishes, baths, garbage, bills... you name it) but leave financial issues (talking to the bank or such) to him.
4. Share anything else you would like us to know about you.
Yumi has ADHD. That is why he is on meds (Ritalin) and has to do daily exercises (trampoline, sommersaults....) that last around 30-40 minutes. He also has 1 gym lesson, 1 horsback riding lesson and a private lesson a week to help him. We also took him off the school bus because it was too dangerous. It is often less than easy to deal with things and I don't always know what to do. I decided to stop spanking since I read and participated in the spanking thread- and so far so good. Almost 2 weeks without spanking. I was diagnosed with the Meniere disease and therefore I am on a very strict low-salt/sodium, no caffeine (ie also no chocolate) diet. I am very tired all the time and I yell much more than I'd like to. I am often stressed. I rediscovered reading again and love it.
I am about to switch jobs... I think. The present place of work hired me as technical writer but I mostly do translations which I hate. They also fired my boss and the present boss is ... :scratch: I have a great job offer and hope to sign a contract tomorrow. The only downside is that is farther away from home.
Oh- I live in Israel and speak English to my kids - so they are growing up bilingual.
There is much more... but I'll leave it at that. :blush:
5. What do you hope to get out of this journal?
Support, commiserating, fun to chat with people who deal with the same crazy issues particular to a working parent like me.

Perks at work
Here there aren't alot of perks. Free parking, a limited amount of soda.
Afternoon activities
Yes, as I mentioned above Yumi has 1 gym lesson, 1 horsback riding lesson and a private lesson a week to help him. We also go to the English library once every other week so Shoham can go to Story Hour and we take out books for the kids and me.

Enough, right? :blush:

Anybody else in a Monday slump? I just can't seem to get my motor going this morning. :crazy:
I have that problem on Sundays - as this is our 1st working day in the week.:updown:

My Monday slump so far is just not being able to wake up...I've had tea (I don' drink coffee) and am now onto coke with the hopes it will help wake me up. It's only 12:45 and I still have like 5 hours of work!

Perks for me used to be 4-day work weeks after Riley was born. That ended this week. :( I'm still kinda upset about it. This week will be very long.

That really sucks! I have a 4-day week (Wednesdays off) and I couldn't imagine working a full 5-day week anymore. I hope you and Riley both are able to adjust to the change :hug99:

Until a few minutes ago I was worrying myself sick. There was a chance I was PG since AF is very late (I have an IUD). I was afraid of possibly losing the baby IF I was PG when the IUD would be taken out. AND I have this job offer and worried about signing it while withholding that I was PG or losing the opportunity if I told them I was PG.
TG things are much less complicated now and I can be less stressed. In a way it is sad how such things affect a working mom. I mean - working men are "lucky" they don't have this additional stress. KWIM?

Also - totally unrelated: Passover is coming up. It is next Friday. Well - there are tons of preparations involved and I DON'T have the TIME or the ENERGY to do anything. We have a HUGE due date at work - scheduled for April 29 (the last day of Passover). You'd think that a company in Israel would look at the Jewish calendar before setting due dates ... but NO! UGH....
OK vent over.
That is one of the many reasons I want to get out of here - and I started here 6 months ago.

Ugh, I go off and have Oral surgery, and you're all at 11 pages :eek:

There you are Jeni!!!

1. What is your name, age, and names and ages of DH and child/ren.
Jeni~26
Mike~23
Jayden~3
Michael III~6mths

2. What do you and your DH do? How many hours a week do you both work. Are you FT or PT?
I'm an "office manager" I work 40+ hrs a week
He works construction, and can do pretty much anything and works ALL kinds of hours.

3. What is your day like after work and on your days off? How are the household matters [chores, bill paying, etc] divided?
CRAZY. I don't get home with the boys until at least 6pm and sometimes he has dinner ready, sometimes we make it together. I do *most* of the house work, and pay the bills. We take care of the kids together.

4. Share anything else you would like us to know about you.
I'm also here WAY too much during work:lol:

5. What do you hope to get out of this journal?
Meet other working parents:)

I'm here :biggrin:

I hate mondays, and I have to take Michael to the Dr. for his 6mth check at 3pm.

I'm just getting ready to go to work.

We had a big snowstorm yesterday so they decided to close all the schools and such without waiting to see how the roads were this morning. They were fine. So this morning we watched the news and our daycare wasn't listed. I tried calling and they still have the message that says they are closed for Good Friday. The roads really weren't bad so we got the kids up and I took them to daycare. Of course it was closed. Mary later found out they notified a different channel. So we came home and had breakfast.

I called Joe's friend Peter's parents to see if they wanted to do something, and his mother agreed to meet at the Children's Museum. We came home and had lunch and as I was putting them down for nap Mary came home to take the afternoon shift. So as soon as I finish eating my lunch I'm going to go to work.

Dennis

My feeling is fulltime daycare/preschool is a lot of activity and they need to have down time.

Dennis

I agree with this... I'm starting Caroline in preschool in Sept. but only part time, so I may cut down on some stuff. And when they all go to daycare/preschool/kindergarten in a few years, we'll probably stick to one activity for a LONG time!!

I'm hoping to find a preschool for Jayden for this fall. WHat do I ask? I'm thinking MOST of them around here are in churches. I have NO idea what to look for, or when to even call.

Are any of your children night potty trained? If so, how did you do it? :help2:

Caroline is night potty trained... I kept her in pull ups until she stayed dry for about a week and then just said, OK... It has been several months, and she has only had 1 accident since... I really didn't do anything, it was all her, but she did show me she could do it, so I decided since she had the ability we'd go for it... she does wake up when she has to go potty, but since her one accident, I do keep the water down to a minimum before sleep, ask her right before bed if she needs to go, and if it seems like it has been an hour or 2 since she last went, I stick her on the potty just in case.

I'm hoping to find a preschool for Jayden for this fall. WHat do I ask? I'm thinking MOST of them around here are in churches. I have NO idea what to look for, or when to even call.

Jeni, I didn't know what to ask until I had been to see one or two of them. Basically I wanted to know what their day was like, to get a sense of how structured or unstructured it was. Did they have to be potty trained? How much time did they spend outdoors? How many days/week is the program? What is the admission process? That kind of stuff. The answers to that, plus my general feeling after having gone to visit the place, helped me choose.

I'm hoping to find a preschool for Jayden for this fall. WHat do I ask? I'm thinking MOST of them around here are in churches. I have NO idea what to look for, or when to even call.

Call soon! Rebekah's preschool morning session is already full and the afternoon session only had a couple more spots left 3 weeks ago. And they don't staart until mid-September.

Definitely call before June.

I'm hoping to find a preschool for Jayden for this fall. WHat do I ask? I'm thinking MOST of them around here are in churches. I have NO idea what to look for, or when to even call.

Do you know other moms with kids in preschool or who are even a little older? I found out about the school where I am sending Caroline through a mom of an older child who really liked it.

I also agree that daycare is a lot of activity for them, so we don't do any outside activites, either.

Jeni - we just went to our 1st preschool open house last week and we didn't bring Aden, but other kids were there and they expected the kids to come, so that is my 1st bit of advice - if you go to an open house, take Jayden :lol: The only thing we asked was what their day was like and then we just walked around the room and checked everything out :dunno: We felt like dorks, but I didn't know what else to ask :lol: Good luck finding one!

Also on pre-school, for me, I really wanted it to be very much a playing type atmosphere as opposed to academic. That was important to me, so if you have things you think you'd like for your child, different programs emphasize different types of things.

Holy busy Monday, Batman!! This is my first chance to log on today! I will have to go back and catch up!

Abby goes to gymnastics on Saturdays. She is in shcool from 8:30 -12:30 and doesnt have the opportunity to have any activities there...next year she might be able to take dance there is she stays all day.

We are starting swimming lessons tonight. I hated scheduling something for the evenings, but we are going to be gone so much the next few months that it didnt make sense to do them on Saturdays and it also conflicted with her gymnastics. I didnt want to do gymnastics and swimming at the same time...gymnastics is over for the summer at the end of May. But, I didnt want to wait until May to start swimming lessons becasue our pool opens in May. She was so close to swimming on her own last summer that I really just wanted to give her that extra push this year so that she can be off and running for the whole summer! So we are overlapping for 6 weeks or so with the gymnastics and the swimming.

I gave notice today.
I will be employed here until May 1. I will be going on my Pessach vacation as scheduled (20.3. - 30.3.) and I will start at the new place on May 2. On May 1 I will basically come in to say my goodbyes.
Phew ! I am glad that's behind me.

so i'll assume you got that new job nadine! congrats! :woo:

Congrats Nadine!

Congrats, Nadine!

Ladies, I'd appreciate any of your opinions on a thread I started here...
http://www.onceuponalife.com/forums/showthread.php?p=454944#post454944

Jenn: Not sure if you wanted a reponse here or not..so I did it both places:
I say stop bringing pull ups. Bring extra panties and clothes for her to wear. Don't give pull ups as an option. Rory is going thru a rough transition. She's going to start doing things that she wasn't. It's normal. I would explain this to your caregiver and ask her to be a little "nicer" when Rory has accidents. Have Rory go potty before leaving and have her ask every hour if she needs to go. Don't put all the responsibility on Rory. She has a lot on her little mind. Good luck! Work with her on this. I am sure she will snap out of it and continue on her merry little way. :hug99:

Congrats Nadine!

Congrats Nadine!

Jenn~good luck. Jayden just turned 3, and wants NOTHING to do with the potty:(

Congratulations, Nadine!

Congrats, Nadine!

Congratulations Nadine!:jump:

Congratulations Nadine!

Congradulations Nadine!! :yippee:

Congrats Nadine!! I thought I posted this earlier:scratch:.

Thanks to all of you!
I am excited about the new job. But it was also important to me to be fair towards my present employer since they were fair towards me. I was sick for 2 weeks one month after I was hired and got fully paid.

Congrats Nadine!! What new job will you be taking on?

Congrats Nadine!! What new job will you be taking on?
Thanks, Alysia.
Basically the same I had for the past 5 years. I am a technical writer (AKA documentation communicator - I write user manuals and online help for software).
The difference is that when I got hired for the present job I was asked to also do tranlations for 20% of my time. The 20% turned into 90% plus. I don't like translating to say the least. I told them several times and it didn't change a thing. That's why I am changing jobs. This time I made sure I would be doing NO translations. :nod:

Ugh...it's just a bad bad bad day here.

I've been working on a project off and on since Nov 2003. We've gone through several rounds of changes and comments, and I hate the whole project.

We just submitted the final yesterday that was (supposedly) due on April 1. I was given the work on Feb 28 and the project manager and I went over all of it. I took several pages of notes. Nowhere did I write down a deadline. I think we discussed it but I don't remember getting one. And I would have definitely written it down. I know I need to write everything down.

The PM went to autocad the same day (or later that week) and told all 3 guys there that I would be giving them some work "in the next few weeks". He never told them a deadline. But they didn't ask, either.

The PM knew I was on vacation for 10 days last month. He said it was ok and to get some of the work to autocad before I left. I tried - part of it was done and ready for autocad but the cad guy was sick the day before I left and we couldn't go over it. So I was plugging along with the work (it was lot of prep work for me before autocad could actually do the work), getting it ready for our autocad department but they were swamped.

On Mar 28, the PM calls me (I hadn't seen nor talked to him since Feb 28 - he's working outside of our office) and asked me if we'd be ready for the Apr 1 deadline. I said "what deadline?" and it's just been a mess since then. Autocad is pissed at the PM for springing the work on them. This PM always does this. He always leaves out important details of projects or twists facts. He has a selective memory. So we had to kick this up into high gear, autocad has had to work lots of overtime to get it done in the past 2 weeks. And we finally submitted it yesterday.

Today the PM sends a nasty email about the printing company's staples not being folded over and he cut his hands on them. :rolleyes: Of course, autocad was pissed. That was the last straw - the manager couldn't just let it go and sent back a nasty comment about the unrealistic due date.

Of course, the PM responds again, stating that we had 30 days notice and that we (me and autocad) dropped the ball on this one, not telling him that nothing was getting done while I was on vacation, etc.

Then autocad has to respond about how the PM is twisting facts and making up information to turn the blame onto us. All of this has been cc'd to a company partner, the PM's boss.

Granted, I probably did mess up because I didn't confirm a deadline sooner. I'll admit that I learned my lesson with that. But the PM didn't do his job, either. He just left it with me and didn't even check on the status of the project for 4 WEEKS!!!

So now we just wait and see what the partner says and what the PM says. And, of course, this happens 2 months before review time. *sigh* I hate my job.

Anyway, I'm seriously considering riding out my time here until the baby comes (if I don't get fired first) and then looking for another job during my maternity leave.

Brooke, I am so sorry!
How mean of that boss!
I hope it won't affect your review too much!
Take it easy - you shouldn't stress over things now.

Nadine~ Sounds like the new job is a change for the better then!!

Brooke~ Sorry about the rough day! :hug99:

This is such an active thread....aren't we supposed to be working moms? :lol:

Sorry you have a jerk boss Brooke. That makes a job you don't like all that much worse. Hang in there. You'll find the right time to jump ship.

Congrats on the new job Nadine! Good for you.

Jenn, I agree with everyone else in your thread. Your daycare provider should be asking every hour if she needs to go and should be consistant. What was she thinking about being out for 2 hours? I wish I could offer advice but we are no where near potty training. Alex has lost interest completely.

Thankfully work is quiet today. I don't feel like doing anything anyway.

Congrats, Nadine :)

Sorry, Brooke :bighug:

Thankfully work is quiet today. I don't feel like doing anything anyway.

Same here!! :lol: Today will be a short day for me anyway. Genavieve has a doctor's appointment this afternoon!

:bighug: I'm so sorry Brooke, hopefully you can find it in you to stick it out until the baby gets here and then find something better.

Congratulations Nadine! :)
Brooke, sorry you're having a tough time while being pregnant. Hopefully while out on mat leave you can find something more family-friendly.

I am jealous of you all who gets free meals. Our biggest gripe at my job is that they don't have refrigerators/microwave/kitchen so they try to force you into buying from the cafeteria which has good food but is over-priced. Meanwhile, the execs who can afford to pay the high price cafeteria gets to have a kitchen with free coffee, tea, cocoa, etc. How unfair is that?

The one big/only perk I have is that we are owned by Ford and so we get all cars made by them at cost which includes, Lincoln, Mercury, Volvo, Mazda, Range Rover and Jaguar. We also get to extend it to family and friends so that is pretty cool :cool:

WHOA! Didn't know that this thread was here!

1. What is your name, age, and names and ages of DH and child/ren.
Aimee: 34
Jim: 39
Hanna: 3

2. What do you and your DH do? How many hours a week do you both work. Are you FT or PT?
I work for a printing company in the office. I work 3 days in my office and 2 days offsite at a clients office. M-F; 8:30 - 5pm.
Jim is self-employed and works out of his home office. He works everyday, as needed on whatever is happening at the time so he's pretty flexible with his schedule (I'm sure that everyone will start to hear me complaining about this soon enough).

3. What is your day like after work and on your days off? How are the household matters [chores, bill paying, etc] divided?
We are very laid back people which I love. Typically Hanna eats some dinner food at the sitters and by the time I pick her up, she's not interested in a sit down meal. Jim & I will make whatever we feel like (and use whatever leftovers we have in the fridge) and sit at the island chatting about our day while Hanna hangs out playing. Weekends are equally unstressful. As far as *cleaning* goes, we both do it. He typically washes the floor though because we have one of those industrial mops & it's too heavy for me :lol: or at least that's what I tell him :awink:

4. Share anything else you would like us to know about you.
I wish that I weren't a FT working mother but that's another post isn't it :lol: but all in all, things are good now .. I've had my issues with my work place but I'm finished stressing about it ... life is too short!

5. What do you hope to get out of this journal?
Being able to hear how other people handle working FT & having a family ... cause sometimes it can be a bit crazy right?!

Congrats Nadine!!

I hate when there is a mix up with a project like that and there always seems to be someone like PM dropping the blame on you.

I hate when there is a mix up with a project like that and there always seems to be someone like PM dropping the blame on you.

I know. And all I can think is that if Donald Trump were the boss, the PM would get fired. But in real life it's not always like that.

Brooke: Sounds like the PM screwed up and knows it which is why he is blaming everyone else. :hug99:

I'm so sorry Brooke! :hug99: It does sound like the PM is to fault and is just trying to pass off the blame.

Brooke, so sorry that you had to go through that.

Jenn, I agree that you should definitely just get rid of the pull ups. Rory knows how to use the potty, so she should be in underpants. If she has an accident, she just gets clean underpants. The sitter should not be frustrated or annoyed that a 3 1/2 year old has accidents. That's just part of being 3 1/2 and the sitter needs to ask Rory if she needs to use the potty and also needs to tune into the signals that she has to go. We all recognize that little potty dance even if the child is saying, no I don't have to go. If I know I am going to be out for a long time, I either make sure we are near a bathroom during part of the trip, or I have a little Baby Bjorn potty in my car. We have had to use that car potty and for $10 it may just be worth getting one and having the sitter keep it for Rory. Good luck, and I'm sure it is just a temporary thing.

Brooke~ that just sucks! I think looking for a new job during your mat leave is a really good idea :nod:.

I'll start a new question:

How long is your commute to and from work?
Who brings the kids to DC/KG/school?

Brooke~ that just sucks! I think looking for a new job during your mat leave is a really good idea :nod:.
ITA. You shouldn't be miserable at work.

How long is your commute to and from work?
20 minutes, most of it is highway.
Who brings the kids to DC/KG/school?
DH does

How long is your commute to and from work?
Right now - 10 minutes.
New job - 30 minutes.

Who brings the kids to DC/KG/school?

I do. That is why the commute actually takes longer because it includes bringing Shoham to DC and Yumi to school.
The new place of work is only 20 minutes from Yumi's school. The present company moves offices. Even though the new place will be 10 minutes from my home as well, it is in the opposite direction. So getting there from Yumi's school would also take 30 minutes. That's why the difference in commute isn't actually a difference.

Thanks for all of the replies, I do appreciate all of them, and agree, it was just nice to hear others opinions.

How long is your commute to and from work?
Well, it's really about 20-40 minutes, depending on traffic, and if I drive in, or take the bus, but because I have to go about 20 minutes out of my way to take the girls to the babysitter, well...I leave an hour and a half :eek: before I have to be at work. I *hate* being late.

I'm trying to get them somewhere closer (read, more on my way), but so far, no luck.

Who brings the kids to DC/KG/school?
Me.

How long is your commute to and from work?
To work it's about 20 minutes. I'm here by 7am so that helps :aok:
To home it's about 25-30 minutes. I try to leave a couple minutes before 5. That usually helps a lot.

Who brings the kids to DC/KG/school?
Paul takes Matthew to preschool on the days he has school (MWF).

How long is your commute to and from work?

It would normally take me about 15 mintues to and from work. Since I take David to school it takes about 30-45 minutes. It depends on when I leave and how the traffic is.


Who brings the kids to DC/KG/school?

Yeah, tha would be me! :)

How long is your commute to and from work?

10-15 mins. - both ways

Who brings the kids to DC/KG/school?

I pick up and drop off - even though the DC is closer to DH's work, but DH takes one of our dogs to work, so he can't fit the carseats in there with the dog :rolleyes:

How long is your commute to and from work?

I have about a 20-25 minute commute depending on when I leave out.

Who brings the kids to DC/KG/school?

DH drops off in the morning and I pick up on the way home. :)

How long is your commute to and from work?

TO work = 30 minutes
From work = 35 to 40 minutes.... or on bad nights up to an hour. :rolleyes:

Who brings the kids to DC/KG/school?

Jim gets them ready and drops them off on M, W, F. I don't even see the kids since I leave at 7 am and they're still sleeping. I count my blessings here that Jim works from home is such a help. :)

I pick the kids up on my way home. They're only 5 minutes from home and on the way.

How long is your commute to and from work?

5 minutes if I can come directly here. On MWF, it's about 15 minutes.

Who brings the kids to DC/KG/school?

I take her to my mom's house and pick her up on MWF.
Darren takes her to school and picks her up on Tues and Thurs.

How long is your commute to and from work? About a half hour including stopping at daycare. If I go straight to or from work it's about 10 minutes.

Who brings the kids to DC/KG/school? I usually do because it's 5 minutes from my office, but occasionally Mary drops them off or picks them up.

How long is your commute to and from work?
About an hour :(

Who brings the kids to DC/KG/school?
I drop Genna off in the morning and Joe picks her up in the evening.

How long is your commute to and from work? On a good day, an hour. Today was about an hour 15 minutes.

Who brings the kids to DC/KG/school? Daycare is at Phil's office site, so he takes her every morning unless he won't be at work. It's only for his company's employees, but it's a chain--Bright Horizons. It stinks when I have to take her because it adds another 45 minutes to my already-dreadful commute. Yesterday I left work at 4 and got home about 5:45. :( Keep your fingers crossed that Phil gets the job he intereviewed for yesterday.

How long is your commute to and from work?

Depends totally on traffic. If there is no traffic then I can get there in 20 minutes, but if there's traffic it can take as long as 45 minutes.

Who brings the kids to DC/KG/school?

Just me!

it's raise time here and although i really thought i would get the shaft, yesterday i suprisingly got not only a raise but a promotion! :lol2: and here i am trying to figure ways to downsize so i can stay home :lol:. oh well, mo' money mo' money.

How long is your commute to and from work?
about 30 mins which includes dropping off the kids. i am here around 7:20am generally.

Who brings the kids to DC/KG/school?
me. occasionally marc would pick up but he has a new job now and it's not possible anymore.

How long is your commute to and from work?
Would be 5 min if I didn't have to take both kids to diff. places, so it end up being an hour. :rolleyes:
Who brings the kids to DC/KG/school?
I do

How long is your commute to and from work? 10 minutes, if I'm just going to work, and don't get stopped by a train. (It was 45-60 min. when I worked in Seattle)
Who brings the kids to DC/KG/school? DH usually takes them in the morning, and I pick them up at night. Sometimes we switch, depending on our schedules, and other days, one of us does both times...

How long is your commute to and from work?

45 minutes in the morning, and about an hour in the afternoon. It would be even worse, but I carpool which really helps around here. I leave the house at 6:15 and get home around 4:30.

Who brings the kids to DC/KG/school?

Dh brings the kids to FIL's house on his work days since it's 2 blocks from his job.

How long is your commute to and from work?
It's only about a 10 minute drive, but I drop Alex off at DC in the morning, so it runs 25-30 minutes. When Dylan is off track from school, I drop her off at the rec center, so then it's about 45 minutes to drop off both and get to work. Thankfully, both are on my way.

Who brings the kids to DC/KG/school?
me and only me. My Dh is gone by 6:10am and isn't home until at least 6:30pm. DC is open 7am-5:30pm The only time I don't get the kids is if I'm out of town on business and then DH has to struggle to make it.

I'm so jealous of those who have help doing this, it's very tedious day after day after day.............

I'm so jealous of those who have help doing this, it's very tedious day after day after day.............

Oh, believe me, I know! Up until November, I was doing it all myself, every day, for 2.5 years! Darren usually leaves by 5am. his boss decided he didn't want him driving to the office every morning (it's 70 miles away!) so he decided to take Rebekah to school for me. It's been a HUGE relief for me. Him picking her up helps, too. The extra 20 minutes I have at home at dinnertime makes a world of difference.

I'm so jealous of those who have help doing this, it's very tedious day after day after day.............

ME TOO!!!!!

How long is your commute to and from work?
Anywhere from 30 minutes to 1 hour, depending on my mode of transportation (car v. train), if I walk to the train or drive and park, etc. (And might I point out that I live 9 miles from my office? :rolleyes: )

Who brings the kids to DC/KG/school?
Neither- we have a nanny that comes to us. We generally both try to wait until she arrives at 8:30 before we leave for work, but if one of us has to go in early, the other will stay home and wait until she gets there.

I'm jealous of those of you with short commutes!! Oh I miss those days...

How long is your commute to and from work?

Depends on traffic, but 45 minutes to an hour.
It is 23 miles one way

Who brings the kids to DC/KG/school?

I drop Genavieve off at daycare on Monday and Friday. Tuesday through Thursday I meet FIL 1/2 way between work and home and he takes Genavieve back to their house.

Kim~ Congrats on your raise on promotion.

:errr: I have my annual review today. I won't get a raise though because I got one back in December.

:errr: I have my annual review today. I won't get a raise though because I got one back in December.

good luck! i am always so nervous at my review.

Kim - congratulations!


Alysia - good luck!

How long is your commute to and from work?

Its 30 minutes to work but 45 minutes to the babysitters. Than another 15 back to work so we drive for an hour.

Who brings the kids to DC/KG/school?
Since DH and I work together it winds up being both of us. Sometimes if I need to finish something up or vice versa than one of us will slip out get Nick and pick the other one up with the baby.

I love taking/picking David up. It's our "special" time to talk and laugh about stuff. I wouldn't trade it for the world!!

ok guys, i need help wording an email. i was helping, as a favor, my old group set up a web enabled database (not my area of expertise but i did what i could). i can't do it now, i'm too swamped as we have a huge go-live coming up monday that imo, is going to bonk :lol: (thanks to marketing) anyway..... i need to beg off without coming off like an a-hole. (btw i have full support of my boss on this).

so here's what i've got so far:

Michelle,

I am heavily involved with new ****** project, I'm not sure when I'll be able to get back to the database. As this database was never a formal project for me with a project plan and/or deadlines etc., I cannot devote myself to it at this time. Regretfully, I am removing myself from the project. I would suggest finding someone with more database experience than I to help you with this project.

The basic database and forms are already set up, along with the graphics and html pages, they are located on the backup server ( \\*****\ (file://%5C%5Cpselab176%5C/)). M**** can give access rights to whomever takes over the project.


that's all i have...i'm stumped. no matter what i say it still looks crappy.

I love taking/picking David up. It's our "special" time to talk and laugh about stuff. I wouldn't trade it for the world!!

I love picking up :) The few times that DH is out of town and I have to drop off, I don't like it because I'm not used to being the one 'leaving' them I guess. Plus it's more stressful for me because they are strict with out arrival time here whereas in the evening there is no real rush and they are always happy and come running up to me. I love that :nod:

Kim, you just need to pass the buck. Say something like "You need to talk to [kim's boss] to work out my availability for this project."

Michelle,




I am heavily involved with new ****** project, I'm not sure when I'll be able to get back to the database. As this database was never a formal project for me with a project plan and/or deadlines etc., I cannot devote myself to it at this time. Regretfully, I am removing myself from the project. I would suggest finding someone with more database experience than I to help you with this project.





The basic database and forms are already set up, along with the graphics and html pages, they are located on the backup server ( \\*****\ (file://%5C%5Cpselab176%5C/)). M**** can give access rights to whomever takes over the project.



I would say:

Michelle,

Regretfully I am removing myself from the database project. I am heavily involved with the new **** project and I'm not sure when I would be able to get back to the database as it was never a formal project for me and I cannot devote myself to it at this time.

Then the last paragraph.

hmm...i could do that dennis but i want to make it clear i'm NOT available :lol: nor am i ever going to be. :lol: .

nocona, good thinking. i'll stick a line at the end saying to speak to my boss if they have any issues.

ya know, they should be happy i even attempted it. the damn thing is practically done (with one issue i could never resolve since hey, i don't know much about databases)!


you guys rock. i love this thread. notice i have plenty of availibility to post here :rotflmao:

Hi everyone!!! Finally catching up from page 5! Sorry I can't personalize comments on what some of you posted, but I did read it all. It was tough this past week with Don working so much, and I was sick on top of it all.

Tomorrow is back to work for me and another hectic week it is going to be. Don again has special events to work this weekend, so he has long days Thursday - Sunday [and he is normally off Sunday :rolleyes:] This means again I have to do all the am routine and the pm routine by myself :faint: I just did this last weekend! I hate, hate HATE when Don has things like this. So another week of being the single mom w/a wedding ring :rolleyes: It sucks! I give soooo much credit to you single moms! :clap:

Don is going to barbeque some steaks tonight after he gets home from work. I am on my 3rd load of laundry with 2 more still to go. It is getting nice outside.......I will sneak in a quick shower if I get both girls to nap at the same time after lunch, I hope to go outside with them for some fresh air.

How long is your commute to and from work?
Who brings the kids to DC/KG/school?

My commute is only about 7 miles but it takes about 20 minutes. My kids stay home for now since they are so little. Next year, Caroline is going to preschool 3 1/2 days a week, but will go to the pm session and most likely our nanny will drive her there and pick her up most days. Once she goes to kindergarten, I am pretty sure, I'll be driving her, but that is still a bit more than 2 years away.

:wavey: Ugh, what a day! Emma has been puking nonstop since 11:30 PM last night, so nobody got any sleep and my laundry load tripled in size. Thankfully today is an "off" day for me, though I have/had two meetings for a Board I'm on, and I was supposed to work on a presentation for a meeting on Friday (my REAL day off). BUT, the Friday meeting was moved, so I didn't have to work on the presentation. :woo: So instead I took my poor baby to the dr. She'll be fine, hopefully, but is already very dehydrated so we've got to get liquid into her in tiny portions.

Anyway, it made me very happy that today was already scheduled for me to be out of the office. I hate having to take any time off because a child is sick. I feel like I get penalized for it, especially since all of my superiors had SAHM wives.

Kim, you've probably already sent the email, but I was going to suggest something like what Nocona suggested. :thumbsup:

How long is your commute to and from work?
It takes me about 15-30 minutes.

Who brings the kids to DC/KG/school?
Our nanny comes to our house. I leave for work earlier than Tom so he watches Nathaniel in the morning until the nanny gets there.

Sorry about Emma's illness!

Amanda

Sorry about Emma, Stef

How long is your commute to and from work?
After Hanna was born, I purposely changed jobs so that my commute was shorter so now, when I go to our regular office, it takes me about 10 minutes from home (not including dropping Hanna off at daycare) and going downtown via transit about 45 minutes but at that point, I don't watch the clock ... which is a nice relaxing time. :biggrin:

Who brings the kids to DC/KG/school?
I usually do both but lately, since the weather is a little better, Hanna wants to walk over to the babysitters in the morning so dh takes her. And he's also been a little better about picking her up at the end of the day if I need him to.

The one thing that I can honestly say I stress most about is the pickup at the end of the day. I *know* that Hanna needs to be picked up by 5:30 and if I'm one minute late, I stress to no end!!!

Sorry to hear Emma is sick, Stef. I hope she gets better ASAP!
I hear you about children sick days. TG here it is the law to have 8 paid kid sick days a year. I had that even at the place that gave me near to no sick days for myself.


That brings me to another question:

How many paid vacation days to you have per year? Are you allowed to take more than what you have (ie be in a minus of vacation days)?

How many paid sick days do you have? What happens if you use more than that amount?

To answer my own questions:

How many paid vacation days to you have per year? Are you allowed to take more than what you have (ie be in a minus of vacation days)?
I have 17 paid vacation days right now and will have 18 at the new job. Usually people are allowed to take more than the days they accumulated but I usually try not to.

How many paid sick days do you have? What happens if you use more than that amount?
The law here is 18 paid sick days a year and the 8 kid sick days are part of those 18 days (ie it is not 18+8). I have taken more sick days here than that and I don't think they'll charge me for it. But I guess I will know on my last day of work here. My previous employer hardly gave any sick days and there I would have not been allowed to take even a single day more.

How many paid vacation days to you have per year?
I have just over 4 weeks ( 22 days ) paid vacation days per year. I've been here over 15 years! :owow:

We also get 11 paid holidays off. :sunny:

Are you allowed to take more than what you have (ie be in a minus of vacation days)? Hmm I have no idea. I've never had to do that.

How many paid sick days do you have? Not sure of this answer either. I think we get 10 personal rolling days to use for sickness, doctors appointments and other things that need to be done during the day. I'm off to check....

" If you are a full-time employee, subject to management approval, you may take up to five paid days in a rolling 12-month period for important personal business that cannot be attended to outside normal work hours, such as a house closing, a conference with your child's teacher or days of deep personal or religious significance. These days are known as "personal business days."

stilll trying to find out sick days... Is it terrible that I don't know. I almost never take more than 1 or 2 sick days per year.

What happens if you use more than that amount? No idea.

~~~~~~~~

PS. I hope Emma is feeling better. We went through the stomach bug last week. :dead:

How many paid vacation days to you have per year? Are you allowed to take more than what you have (ie be in a minus of vacation days)?

How many paid sick days do you have? What happens if you use more than that amount?

I have 15 paid days off a year. They are "bank days" so it's vacation and sick all rolled into one. I really like this plan as where I used to work we had 10 vacation days and 5 sick days. If you didn't use the sick days you just lost them. The way we have it here you use them either way and you can rollover up to 5 days to the next year.

If you use more than your # of accumulated days you don't get paid.

How many paid vacation days to you have per year? Are you allowed to take more than what you have (ie be in a minus of vacation days)?
I have 15 vacation days, plus any stat holidays and a week at Christmas. If we go over our vacation days we don't get paid. But we are able to roll over our vacation days to the next year if we don't use them all.

How many paid sick days do you have? What happens if you use more than that amount?
10 sick days, and same as holidays, if you go over you don't get paid. I also have 5 personal/family days and 3 mental health days. My company is pretty good with time off.

Oh - we also have holidays off (Passover, New Year's Eve etc but only Jewish holidays of course) - the # of days I don't know. It also varies each year. I f a holiday falls on Friday or Saturday there is no additional day off.
I think the maximum # of holidays off is 8. But I might be mistaken.

How many paid vacation days to you have per year? Are you allowed to take more than what you have (ie be in a minus of vacation days)?
We earn 4 hours of vacation time with every pay check (every 2 wks) so it comes down to about 2 wks a year. We also get a good humber of holidays off and about 1 1/2 wks at Christmas.

How many paid sick days do you have? What happens if you use more than that amount?
Same as vacation, we earn 4 hrs every 2 wks so it comes down to about 2 wks a year.

If we go over either amount, we do not get paid.

We only get major holidays (New Year's Day, Memorial Day, 4th of July, Labor Day, Thanksgiving and Christmas). If the holiday falls on Sunday we get Monday. If it falls on Saturday, we technically don't get it (though they usually close the office... it's not a technical holiday).

How many paid vacation days to you have per year? Are you allowed to take more than what you have (ie be in a minus of vacation days)?

I get 15 right now (it's based on years of service). I don't think we can take more than we have, but the company allows leave without pay with management approval.

How many paid sick days do you have? What happens if you use more than that amount?

I think we get 6 sick days. If you use more than that, you ahve to use vacation time or leave without pay. Ours rolls over and you can use it to get paid while out on maternity leave. RI has temporary disability insurance, so if you take extended sick leave, you get paid by the company (assuming you've accumulated long term sick time) and paid by the state at the same time, so you can make more money than while you're working. :lol:

How many paid vacation days to you have per year? Are you allowed to take more than what you have (ie be in a minus of vacation days)?

i have 4 wks vacation (been here 10yrs)
9 paid holidays
3 floating holidays

we can roll one week of vacation.

How many paid sick days do you have? What happens if you use more than that amount?

5 combined sick/personal. after that you have to dig into your vacation time.

How many paid vacation days to you have per year? Are you allowed to take more than what you have (ie be in a minus of vacation days)?
I get 10 days vacation (will be 15 next year once I have my 5 year anniv.), 2 personal days, and 2 floating holidays, so it's a total of 14. If your mgr permits any additional days, they will be unpaid. Also, we aren't allowed to carry over unused days.

How many paid sick days do you have? What happens if you use more than that amount?
Exempt employees have an unlimited # of sick days, however after 5 consecutive days out you will be put on STD and need a drs. note. Non-exempt employees I believe get 5 sick days, any more than that are unpaid.

We also get 9 holidays per year.

How many paid vacation days to you have per year? Are you allowed to take more than what you have (ie be in a minus of vacation days)? Once you're here 5 years, you get 20 days--before then it's 15. So I have 20 (been here 6 years). You can take more days off than you have--they're just unpaid days pending your director's approval.

How many paid sick days do you have? What happens if you use more than that amount? We don't have any separate sick days, but we are able to use what we call 1-3. Basically you can leave early up to 3 hours before you're supposed to without having to use any paid time off. We have 8 of these per year. It's nice to use when you work 7:30-4 because you can leave at 1 and that's the end of your day.

The really crappy thing, though, is that last year when I returned from maternity leave, I was forced to use my paid time off as part of my maternity leave. So when I returned in February, I had 2 days left for the rest of the year. When I asked the HR director about it, she seemed shocked that I would have a problem with that, and basically said that children usually only get sick on the weekends. :rolleyes:

How many paid vacation days to you have per year? Are you allowed to take more than what you have (ie be in a minus of vacation days)?

Because I have been here for more than 3 years, I get 15 days of paid vacation a year. It accumulates over the year, though, so I start out with whatever I carried over from last year and add an additionally 4.x hrs to that total every 2 weeks. We can carry up to 2 yrs of vacation time over into the next year.


They don't like us to take more than we have. If we do, it takes our total to a negative # and then it just adds teh 4.x hrs to it each pay until it's a positive # again. I hope that makes sense.

How many paid sick days do you have? What happens if you use more than that amount?

I get 10 a year. They accumulate just like the vacation (3.x hrs per pay). If I need more than I have saved up, I have to take time off without pay.

Oh - we cannot use sick days if our children or family members are sick. AND they want us to save at least 1/2 of our sick days each year for emergencies and short term disability situations, since we don't have that. They actually look at how much sick time we take each year when they do our annual reviews now. That's new over the past 2 years.


So, Steph, I TOTALLY understand how you feel penalized when your kids are sick. I do too.

Did you laugh at her, Darcy? :lol:

UGH!!! I HATE MY SUPERVISOR!!!

He just stopped into the office next to mine to talk to the guy there, I could see the back half of him through my door, and he just walked away. Didn't even say hi or anything. I haven't seen him or talked to him in about 3 months, since before I found out I was pregnant! I sent him an email last Wednesday (he was supposed to come into the office and cancelled his trip) telling him I was pregnant and he never responded.

So typical of the men here.

That's nice:rolleyes:
How many paid vacation days to you have per year? Are you allowed to take more than what you have (ie be in a minus of vacation days)? 2 weeks, and one floating "birthday" day

How many paid sick days do you have? What happens if you use more than that amount? 3 days :rolleyes:

Brooke, that is just RUDE of him! How could you not acknowledge your employee's pregnancy announcement :mad: He sounds like a AssHole!

Brooke, that is just RUDE of him! How could you not acknowledge your employee's pregnancy announcement :mad: He sounds like a AssHole!
I agree!! :complain:

How many paid vacation days to you have per year? Are you allowed to take more than what you have (ie be in a minus of vacation days)?

We get one day per pay period, which amounts to about 4 weeks a year. It accumulates if you don't use up to 600 hours of leave. We just get leave time, not vacation or sick. It is all the same.

We also get 12 paid holidays, and we have a pretty liberal flex-time policy.

How many paid sick days do you have? What happens if you use more than that amount? See above.

Brooke, that sucks!

How many paid vacation days to you have per year? Are you allowed to take more than what you have (ie be in a minus of vacation days)?
I have 15 paid vacation days, any stat holidays (and, in the Gov't, it works out to be something like almost 10 extra days, with Easter, Christmas, New Years...), and we have other 'odd' days. Like a volunteering day. So, you say this is where you volunteered, and all is good. There's another odd day as well, but I can't think of what it's called right now. So, essentially, a lot of paid time off.

How many paid sick days do you have? What happens if you use more than that amount?
I *believe* that we accumulate one/month. That's not to say that you can't use them if they're not there. Essentially, once you've worked the first 10 days in the month, you get your sick day. It's weird, I know. We also get 5 family days.

And, there's always leave without pay. I swear, two of the ladies I work with are off more than they're in (mind you, they've been here forever, and have 7 weeks vacation!)! The Gov't is good with paid time off, that's for sure.

I have 4 weeks vacation now b/c I've been here over 10 years. Except for the year I got married, I'm pretty sure I've never taken 4 weeks worth' of vacation!

I don't even know how many sick/personal days we get. Our company is small (15 people) and pretty laid back, so I don't think they even keep track. They'd notice if you were perpetually out, but I've never known anyone to abuse the system. Still, I feel guilty when I take a sick day (for me or for the kids), b/c it seems like I'm not "tough enough" to go in anyway. :rolleyes:

Our holiday schedule is the same as the stock market. If they're open, we're open. I think it works out to about 7 holidays a year. It's one of the reasons why I picked Monday as one of my working days- there's lots of Monday holidays! :lol:

Emma is hanging in there, thanks. I almost stayed home with her today, but I'm only working a 1/2 day anyway. So far she hasn't puked today, but then again she's been asleep for most of it.

Did you laugh at her, Darcy? :lol:

I think I was more in shock that she said that. And she said it at my review! (HR sits in on all our reviews.) Afterward I made sure to tell as many people as I could about her insensitive remarks.

And Brooke, I'm so sorry you work with such jerks. :(

How many paid vacation days to you have per year? Are you allowed to take more than what you have (ie be in a minus of vacation days)? At my casino, you earn 5 days vacation [same as one week, but they classify it as days] after 2000 hours of work, after your 2nd 2000 hour work period, you get 10 days. After completing your 6th 2000 hours, you get 3 weeks. That is the max. Youcan submit a formal request for an extra day off [not paid] and that is subject to the casino manager's approval.

How many paid sick days do you have? What happens if you use more than that amount?[/QUOTE] We have no sick days, but some casinos do. You call in sick and lose the days pay.

If your company doesn't have family sick days and your child is sick, do you call out sick for yourself or do you use a personal/vacation day?

If I'm strapped for vacation days, I usually call out sick for myself since we have unlimited sick days :blush:

If your company doesn't have family sick days and your child is sick, do you call out sick for yourself or do you use a personal/vacation day?

If I'm strapped for vacation days, I usually call out sick for myself since we have unlimited sick days :blush:

I usually call out sick for myself. They'll never know because I only have to tell the secretary, not even my boss.

I'm lucky, though, that my mom will watch Rebekah when she's sick. So I don't usually have to take a sick day unless I have to take her to the dr.

Quick fly by post:
I have 15 vacation days. The standard holidays and unlimited sick time. I also have 3 or 5 personal days. It's great!!

Paul's home now so it's not a problem. If he was sick AND Matthew was sick, I'd just take off. I'd either take a vacation day or do a work from home type thing.

When we were both working FT and Matthew was in DC, I was the one that usually stayed home. Sometimes my mom would come stay with him too.

DH only works part time, so he's often home if the kids get sick anyway. Most of the time so far he's been the one to take time off if one of us needs to. I haven't accrued much paid time off yet.

We switch off who stays home with Riley when she's sick. Both our employers are fine with us staying home if she's sick--we even tell them why we're at home. Phil has the software at home, too, to actually work, but that's so hard to do with a toddler anyway.

I feel more guilty about taking time off for "me" than I do when I'm home with Riley. It's almost like I can't justify taking time off for me to get better, but when it comes to my child I'll do anything to make her feel better.

How many paid vacation days to you have per year? Are you allowed to take more than what you have (ie be in a minus of vacation days)? I have 3 weeks of paid vacation days, but will hopefully be adding another week this summer since I am coming up to finishing up my 7th year here at this firm. Taking more than we have...well, since *I'm* the only who takes note of how many days I take, I'm sure I could get away with it. There's no office manager here, it's just a very small law firm with a boss who can't handle personal confrontation issues.

How many paid sick days do you have? What happens if you use more than that amount? I have 6 sick days and 6 personal days. Again, I don't think anyone would have the "balls" to question time off/do something about it. I wouldn't have a problem if it was regulated for EVERYONE, but since it's not, then I really don't care.

With that being said, I have a pretty strong work ethic and wouldn't go over my paid days off unless it was downright necessary.

Since I'm the only parent for Jackson, I'm the one who stays home with him/takes him to the doctor, etc. I do have my IL's right down the street, but I feel that since *I'm* the parent and most likely was up all night with a sick child, *I'm* going to be the one to take care of him.

The really crappy thing, though, is that last year when I returned from maternity leave, I was forced to use my paid time off as part of my maternity leave. So when I returned in February, I had 2 days left for the rest of the year. When I asked the HR director about it, she seemed shocked that I would have a problem with that, and basically said that children usually only get sick on the weekends. :rolleyes:

That's were our maternity leave comes from as well. Our sick/vacation/personal days first, then everything else is unpaid...then when you come back, you have NOTHING left!

Wow, you all have a lot of "personal" and "sick" time. I wish

I have a question,
Do you find yourselves going out to eat a lot more because your too tired to make dinner after work?

We go out to eat WAY too much

I have a question,
Do you find yourselves going out to eat a lot more because your too tired to make dinner after work?

We go out to eat WAY too much
So do we :blush1: but, we have gotten a little better. I also eat lunch out way too much and I usually stop and get a pop or coffee on the way into work in the morning. See, if I was a SAHM we would save a ton of money, right there :lol:

Me too!

We eat out way too much, too. I TRY to cook at least 4 times during the week and sometimes I do ok and other times I don't. I like to eat dinner by 6pm and since I get home at 5:30pm (and DH is incapable of starting anything :rolleyes: ), my options are pretty limited. I run out of ideas alot.

Now that it's nicer here, we're cooking on our grill alot more so we will be eating at home more often.

Oh - boss just stopped in to say congratulations.

Now that it's nicer here, we're cooking on our grill alot more so we will be eating at home more often.

Oh - boss just stopped in to say congratulations.
We will also grill out a lot more now that it is nice out :nod:

AND...it's about freakin time!!!

I finally have a chance to answer this. Have been so freaking busy. :crazy:
How many paid vacation days to you have per year? Are you allowed to take more than what you have (ie be in a minus of vacation days)?
I have two weeks paid vacation. We are allowed to take an advance.

How many paid sick days do you have? What happens if you use more than that amount?
I have five sick days, but since they are considered PTO days, I can also use them in lieu of vacation days. If I use more than that...I means trouble eventually.
I am at a point, where I am afraid to take time off at all. Kyle was sick very often this last winter/fall season. So basically, I am frantically looking ofr somebody who could come into my house to watch just a sick kid. I can't afford to take off, not even for myself. I made most of my time up, but that doesn't seem to count at all.

Do you find yourselves going out to eat a lot more because your too tired to make dinner after work?
We try not to go out and eat. If we do, it's like Arbys, Wendys....I try to avoid it at all cost, but sometimes it does happen. It just adds up so quickly.

I get 4 weeks of vacation. I think I technically get some sick days but no one uses them.
We eat out all the time.

Amanda

How many paid vacation days to you have per year? Are you allowed to take more than what you have (ie be in a minus of vacation days)?

How many paid sick days do you have? What happens if you use more than that amount?

We have a pool of days off... since I've been here almost 5 years I've reached the maximum of 25 days. All of our sick tmes comes out of the same pool. If we run out of time we are allowed to borrow from the following year.

Do you find yourselves going out to eat a lot more because your too tired to make dinner after work?

We had to change this because we couldn't afford to eat out as often as we did. We started using the crockpot and prepping things in the morning so litterally all we had to do was turn on the stove or oven when we got home and its helped a lot.

How long is your commute to and from work?
I am fortunate to live and work in the same town.

Who brings the kids to DC/KG/school?
I drop Nick off at my moms (same town) or my FIL's (5 minutes away!)

Do you find yourselves going out to eat a lot more because your too tired to make dinner after work?
Yes, way too much!!! Usually we order takeout and bring it home or have it delivered. :)

How long is your commute to and from work?
I have about a 45-55 minute commute each way (27 miles).

Who brings the kids to DC/KG/school?
It's just me! Jackson's school is about 5 minutes from my office, so we ride in together now, which is fantastic!

That's were our maternity leave comes from as well. Our sick/vacation/personal days first, then everything else is unpaid...then when you come back, you have NOTHING left!

My maternity leave was the same way!

good luck! i am always so nervous at my review.

Thanks, Kim! It went well!

Do you find yourselves going out to eat a lot more because your too tired to make dinner after work?

Some. Since Dh is home a lot of days, he cooks about half the nights and I cook about half the nights just because I like to cook. I also set up a crockpot meal every once in a while so it's all done by dinnertime.

But there's definitely those days where neither of us wants to deal with it. Then we usually order in pizza or chinese or something.

How many paid vacation days to you have per year? Are you allowed to take more than what you have (ie be in a minus of vacation days)?
We get 10 vacation days and 5 personal days

How many paid sick days do you have? What happens if you use more than that amount?

We get 5 or 10 sick days. I dont remember which.

Once its gone you just take everything unpaid

I have 15 vacation days and 10 sick days. We can go negative up to 5 days and we can carry them over. If we use up our sick days we have to take vacation. We also have the option to get an "angel day" - if we donate 12 hours of pay or more to the United Way over the year we get an extra paid day off. I hate the whole United Way thing, but basically it's just buying an extra day off, and I can direct the United Way donations to our daycare.

We hardly ever got out to eat, especially during the week. We have the kids that are in bed by 6:30, so they'd just be totally crabby if we tried to go out. Plus it would take too long.

Dennis

And speaking of... I only have 1/2 an hour of sick time left for the year since Genavieve was sick all last week and I had already missed some time!

If your company doesn't have family sick days and your child is sick, do you call out sick for yourself or do you use a personal/vacation day?

If I'm strapped for vacation days, I usually call out sick for myself since we have unlimited sick days :blush:

We dont have specific family sick days, BUT they don't count an absence as an "occurence" if it is for your child. So, if I have too many occurrences I say G is sick....

We are only supposed to have like 5 occurrences a year but 3 days in a row counts as one occurrence....

How did I miss this thread for so long! :)

Quick intro -- I'm Missy, mom for Maggie (who's almost 2!). I am a neurologist in my first year of practice. Maggie goes to daycare 5 days/week and DH usually takes her, unless I am going to the hospital that morning then I do (daycare is right down the street).

To catch up with the questions...

I get 20days of vacation/year, and I'm not sure how many sick days. I have no paid maternity leave (it's a small group) so I am saving some vacation time so I can get paid when #2 comes along.

We get a LOT of takeout -- I don't get home most days until 5:30 and then Maggie is usually in bed by 6:45 -- doesn't leave much time for cooking!

Do you find yourselves going out to eat a lot more because your too tired to make dinner after work?

YES. We eat out way too much and would have so much extra money if we stopped!! My DH is starting a new job today and will be working from 12-9, so since he wont be home for dinner, I am just planning on doing a microwave meal for myself and then making a little something for Genavieve. I am hoping this will cut down on our dining out expenses IMMENSELY!!

See, if I was a SAHM we would save a ton of money, right there :lol:

Same here!!

Brooke~ I am glad your boss finally acknowledged your email!! :rolleyes:

Stef~ I hope Emma is doing better!

Missy~ Welcome to the thread!!

We eat out way too much, too. Or throw a pizza in the oven way too often. It's just so much easier, but we need to eat better--especially now that Riley's eating table food.

OK...here is the breakdown for me...

Commute - Anywhere from 40 minutes to an hour. :rolleyes:

Daycare pickup/drop-off - I do it :). I enjoy doing it!

Vacation - Three weeks paid per year. (I've been here 5 years and worked here 2 years a long time ago). It is a small company and very flexible, though. I could go over w/out a problem :awink:. I was also given a 5 1/2 month maternity leave...nice!

Sick days - Unlimited...but, I never abuse them!

Eating out - Yes...all the time. My DH works insane hours, so, it is easy. Typically I grab something and bring it home. So bad for us, though!

:biggrin:- Erin

Alysia, then you can spend the money you save on Gymboree:lol:

Alysia, then you can spend the money you save on Gymboree:lol:

Jeni, I like the way you think my friend!!! :lol:

Do you find yourselves going out to eat a lot more because your too tired to make dinner after work?

actually no. once every two weeks or so i have marc pick up sushi on the way home, but generally we cook, or forage in the fridge :lol: or have a bowl of cereal or whatever.

We're trying to do better about ordering takeout, but we still do it at least once or twice a week. If we (I) don't plan out meals ahead of time and shop at the beginning of the week so that all of the ingredients are in the house, we get stuck and wind up ordering. It's a bad habit we're trying to break.

I have 15 vacation days and 10 sick days. We can go negative up to 5 days and we can carry them over. If we use up our sick days we have to take vacation. We also have the option to get an "angel day" - if we donate 12 hours of pay or more to the United Way over the year we get an extra paid day off. I hate the whole United Way thing, but basically it's just buying an extra day off, and I can direct the United Way donations to our daycare.

We hardly ever got out to eat, especially during the week. We have the kids that are in bed by 6:30, so they'd just be totally crabby if we tried to go out. Plus it would take too long.

Dennis
6:30? I envy you. Mine aren't in bed until 8 pm. Do you get up really early?

We dont have specific family sick days, BUT they don't count an absence as an "occurence" if it is for your child. So, if I have too many occurrences I say G is sick....

We are only supposed to have like 5 occurrences a year but 3 days in a row counts as one occurrence....
That would be nice. At my job, they seem to count every day against you wether I am sick or my kids.

actually no. once every two weeks or so i have marc pick up sushi on the way home, but generally we cook, or forage in the fridge :lol: or have a bowl of cereal or whatever.

Hmmmmm...Sushi :lick:

6:30? I envy you. Mine aren't in bed until 8 pm. Do you get up really early?

Yes - we get the kids up at 6:30 during the week. They sleep til about 7:30 on the weekends usually.

Dennis

I get 2 weeks paid vacation and I don't even know how many sick days ... I've never really had to know nor have I had the thought to ask ... we're a small company with flexibility.

Dinner? We hardly ever eat out ... dh dislikes chain restaurant food and he's a really good cook so we're lucky there. We *might* eat out once a month for dinner ... more so in the summer I think and the same with breakfast as a treat.

My maternity leave worked that way, too. Vacation days first and then sick days. I didn't take a day off for over a year!

Amanda

New questions...

What time do you get home from work?

What time do your kids go to bed?

Did you set their bed time, or your kids? :lol:

Do you feel you have enough time at night with your kids?

What time do you get home from work?
4pm

What time do your kids go to bed?
i like to get tony in bed by 8:30pm at the latest. occasionally i let him stay up until 9pm.

gianna varies. she often takes a nap when we get home from work. then i need to wake her, feed her, keep her up for an hour, hour and half and then back to bed. if she doesn't sleep after work she will crash by 7:30 or so.

Did you set their bed time, or your kids? :lol:
what do you think? :lol: me of course! we get up very early and tony is junk if he stays up later than 8:30. i really like him to be in bed by 8pm.


Do you feel you have enough time at night with your kids?
not really but what ya gonna do?

What time do you get home from work?
If I don't stay late I get home around 5:30.

What time do your kids go to bed?
His bed time is 9pm.

Did you set their bed time, or your kids?
He did :rolleyes: Up until about 17 months he was going to sleep by 6:30. Then one day we kept him up a little later for a b-day party and I think he though that happened every night :lol: . His bed time went to 8:30 then and it's now at 9. I'm not going any later :nono: That also coincided with Paul starting to stay at home with him and they don't get up until 7:45 or 8 (I call to wake them up every morning).

Do you feel you have enough time at night with your kids?
Pretty much. He gets up from his nap about the time I get home so he's raring to go. I get his bath ready for him at 8 and I sit in there with him about 1/2 the time (the rest of the time I'm getting his clothes ready for the next day, getting jammies out, etc.). Then we watch a show and he's off to bed.

What time do you get home from work?
That really depends on when I can leave, but I try to leave at 4pm that puts me at home at 5pm.

What time do your kids go to bed?
The little one goes to bed at 8pm, my big girl around 8:30pm.

Did you set their bed time, or your kids? :lol:
I did. If it was up to them , they'd stay up until they just crash where ever they are. :lol: Wether I actually get to them bed at their time every night....now that's another question. :lol:

Do you feel you have enough time at night with your kids?
Right now, not really. I have been working 40 plus hours and that's just a killer. I am worn out, and it has happened that I went to bed before the kids. :blush1:

Here's another question.
Do you have a bedtime routine? What is your routine?

What time do you get home from work?
Usually around 5pm

What time do your kids go to bed?
Evan goes to bed anytime between 7:30 and 8pm. Aden usually goes to bed around 8:30pm, but on the weekends I will let him stay up until 9pm.

Did you set their bed time, or your kids?
We set it, but Evan was kind of the one who set his bedtime, because Aden never went to bed that early at his age, but we could tell Evan was tired, so off her went.

Do you feel you have enough time at night with your kids?
Yes and no. Sometimes I can hardly believe that bedtime is here and other nights it can't come soon enough :lol: The weekends we will sometimes let them stay up later, in hopes of getting them to sleep in a little and because we want to spend more time playing with them.

What time do you get home from work?
Usually around 5:30 PM


What time do your kids go to bed?
Between 7:30 and 8 PM


Did you set their bed time, or your kids? :lol:
Genna pretty much set her own bed time in the beginning because she would start to lay down and cuddle next to us around 8 PM, so we just started to say 8 PM was her bedtime, and she is very consistent about getting sleepy at that time and heading to bed.


Do you feel you have enough time at night with your kids?
I feel like I have adequate time, and when I don't, I try to sneak out of work early. Of course, I would always loves more time.

What time do you get home from work?
It varies since Im not 9-5...in at 8 or 9 and usually done by 5 or 6.


What time do your kids go to bed?
Around 8-830...depending on the night and his mood. :lol:

Did you set their bed time, or your kids? :lol:
See above post!

Do you feel you have enough time at night with your kids?
I think we do since we always eat together as a family and that is very important to me. We have enough time to play and take a bath and just be with each other. I get up with Nick at 630-7 am so we have an hour of mommy and me time as well.

Here's another question.
Do you have a bedtime routine? What is your routine?

Bedtime routine for Nick? Its a bath usually and cuddle time/downtime and then bed. He's really easy to get to sleep! Once he's in bed, he is out in about 5 minutes!
My routine is never the same. I am usually working at home and doing various household stuff at the same time! :lol: I usually end up going to bed around 11-1130 and washing my makeup off and brush my teeth. Often that is the time I get some action as well! :awink:

Do you have a bedtime routine? What is your routine?

Yes. She gets in her PJs around 7:30, has a snack and milk, and then DH takes her upstairs to brush her teeth, they do prayers, and she goes to bed :) Sometimes she even takes DH's hand and walks him upstairs :lol:

What time do you get home from work? I get home at 5. Phil and Riley usually get home around 5:30.

What time do your kids go to bed? 7:15. She rarely puts up a fight, too. She gets up at 6 with us, so this works out fine.

Did you set their bed time, or your kids? I think in the beginning she set the bedtime, but now we just keep it at that time for everyone's sanity. :lol:

Do you feel you have enough time at night with your kids? Not at all. By the time we're finished with dinner, I feel like I only get about 45 minutes with her before it's off to bed.

Do you have a bedtime routine? What is your routine? Yes. If it's bath night, she gets a bath after dinner and then into jammies. If it's not bath night, we just put her in her jammies after dinner. We usually read a book or two, I nurse her, and then Dad settles her down and puts her in the crib.

What time do you get home from work? 5:30pm

What time do your kids go to bed? 9:30-10pm

Did you set their bed time, or your kids? She does :rolleyes: It's horrible. I'd love for her to go to bed at 8:30 so I could get a little time to myself. I've tried making it earlier but if I put her to bed that early she's awake until 11pm and she gets up early.

Do you feel you have enough time at night with your kids? Yes.

Do you have a bedtime routine? What is your routine?
No, but not for my lack of trying. I have tried and tried to enforce a routine but DH just sabotages it every time. I have even written it down, made checklists, etc, but he cannot (or will not) stick to it. And I can't do the routine AND the dishes and the laundry and feed the dogs and water the plants and plan the next day's clothes and lunches and dinner all by myself.

So, no, we don't have one.

Oooops, of course I meant a bedtime routine for the kids. :lol: Good point, Denise.


Do you have a bedtime routine? What is your routine?
Yes. Kyle usually gets a bath...not every time because sometimes time is short. Lots of cuddling and a story. Before he goes off to night night, he has to give hugs to everyone. :lol:
The big kiddo takes a shower or bath, lays out clothes for tomorrow, packs the book bag for school and then it's story time...depending on time 15 to 30 minutes. For some reason, I am the designated story reader in the house. :scratch:

Do you have a bedtime routine? What is your routine?
I guess we do, but I never thought of it as a routine. We usually do dinner, then baths (usually every other night), then watch some TV (my kids love Jeopardy and Wheel of Fortune :lol: ), then Evan heads to bed and we play some more with Aden before he goes to bed 1/2 an hour later.

What time do you get home from work?
5:30-6pm

What time do your kids go to bed?
He's supposed to be in bed at 8pm, but it's usually 8:30, and he sometimes just lays there and sings until 10pm :rolleyes:

Did you set their bed time, or your kids? :lol:
We did, he would stay up until he passed out

Do you feel you have enough time at night with your kids?
No, because I don't have one on one time with either of them.

Routine?
Not really

What time do you get home from work? About 5:15 PM

What time do your kids go to bed? 9 to 9:30 PM ... they get to sleep in because DH takes care of them in the morning. I'm outta there by 7AM. They get up after 8.

Did you set their bed time, or your kids? I guess we did. When Alexis was first born, I didn't feel I had much time with her at all after work. Then when she went to daycare she'd be tired & cranky so I'd give her a little dinnertime catnap. Then we'd let her stay up till 9. The same thing happened with my son.

Do you feel you have enough time at night with your kids? I think it's a good amount of time. Although after I put them down, THEN I get the next days stuff ready. I need to work on that while they're awake, so I can have some *me* time.
Do you have a bedtime routine? We don't have much of a routine..never did. I'm fortunate my kids are flexible and don't rely on one. Every other day we do go up for a bath around 8-8:30 pm. So that's kind of a routine... I guess.

What time do you get home from work?
About 4:15 or so.


What time do your kids go to bed?
By 8pm. Sometimes a little earlier if they need it.

Did you set their bed time, or your kids? :lol:
Kind of both. I'd let them stay up later, but they get so crazy when they're tired that they get really unmanagable. So they really need their bedtime when it is.

Do you feel you have enough time at night with your kids?
Yes. I'm usually so beat by the end of the day that I wouldn't have the energy to play with them much later than that anyway. I need to wake up at 5am, and I like having a few hours to straighten up and relax and maybe spend some one on one time with DH before I have to get to sleep too.

Do you have a bedtime routine? What is your routine?Definitely!! We've had a bedtime routine since the kids were tiny. If it's a bath night, we do that. Then we all brush our teeth. Then the kids get their pajamas on and pick out whatever stories they want to read. Then the three of us get into either Sean or Sierra's bed (we alternate) and I read 2-3 books to them. Then they each get in their own bed, I give them hugs and kisses and that's it. I turn out the light and close the door and except for the very rare occasion, they both go right to sleep. Sitting and reading their bedtime stories is my favorite part of the day.

What time do you get home from work?
Depending on what time I manage to leave, and then what bus I get, anywhere from 4:45 to 5:15.

What time do your kids go to bed?
The girls are in bed early…T is almost always out by 7:15, and Rory is generally in bed by 7:30 (they’re up by 5:30 though).

Did you set their bed time, or your kids?
Oh, I definetly did that. Rory wasn't going to bed until 9-10pm, and it was awful! She wouldn't even go to bed, she'd fall asleep in front of the TV. Now, evenings are *much* better!

Do you feel you have enough time at night with your kids?
I'm kind of like Trish and Lette here…some days it's great, and other days… :lol: But, for the most part, it's good. I have time with the girls from the time I pick them up until they go to bed. Then I get stuff ready for the next day, and all of that fun stuff.

Do you have a bedtime routine?
Sort of, maybe…dinner and bath, or sometimes bath and dinner. Then playtime/quiet time, or, now that it's nice out, we'll go for a walk. Then a bit of TV, and bedtime.

I'm *so* glad it's Friday. This week has been just kind of crappy. :blue: I just got great news from my Mom though, so that's good. Work is busy, we're preparing for a panel in town in just over a week, so it keeps me busy, but still...it's Friday!

:hug99: Sorry about the bad week, Jenn and the not so good news from your mom. I hope your weekend is better.

What time do you get home from work?
Usually around 5:30pm


What time do your kids go to bed?
Maggie goes to bed at 6:30pm most nights.


Did you set their bed time, or your kids? :lol:

We kind of fell into this pattern, although I think we're going to start keeping her up until 7pm because she's started getting up really early!

Do you feel you have enough time at night with your kids?
Yes and no... I come home from work exhausted so I don't have a lot of patience for Maggie, and then when she's in bed I feel bad that she's gone to bed already!

:bighug: Jenn

What time do you get home from work?

We both usually get home around 4:30.

What time do your kids go to bed?

We start bedtime around 6-6:15 and they are in bed by 6:30.

Did you set their bed time, or your kids? :lol:

They do - they are usually totally wiped out by the end of the day.

Do you feel you have enough time at night with your kids?

No. The evenings are a mad rush of dinner, bath, play and bedtime. It would be nice to have an extra half hour or hour so the evenings could be a bit more relaxed.

Dennis

Do you have a bedtime routine? What is your routine?

We go up to the bathroom and Joe goes potty and we brush Frances' teeth. Then Joe gets a jellybean and we all go and read stories together. When we finish, one of us takes Frances to her room and rocks her for a few minutes and puts her to bed. The other takes Joe to brush his teeth, although now he insists on doing it by himself. Then we take a turn brushing him. Then we go back to his room and say prayers and rock for a few minutes and put him down.

Dennis

Well I guess I can joint this group. I have just finally gone back to work after a few months off. I don't work full time because..well there isn't a full time job available to me right now but I am now working and so is DH and it is nice. I don't think I could be a SAHM for very long. I actually get further behind with everything when I stay at home.

My name is Jayne and DH is Dan. We have two children. Tylor almost 10 and Alyssa age 3.

I work about 20 hrs a week for Parks Floral. I deliver flowers and Work in the shop. I LOVE IT. It is so great and I have never had a more rewarding/non stress job. The smiles on people's faces when you take them flowers is priceless! DH runs the computers/servers at Solartec. I know he has a job title but I forget it :lol: He works anywhere from 40-50 hrs a week and also does a lot of side jobs with computers.

We are lucky..no daycare. My IL's watch the kids for FREE!! and Tylor is in school while I work. I work 9-2 when I do work!

What time do you get home from work?
I get home at 2pm


What time do your kids go to bed?
Tylor and Alyssa both go up at 8pm. They get 1/2 of TV time and then they go to sleep!

Did you set their bed time, or your kids? :lol:
Well they set it really but it was great so we enforced it!

Do you feel you have enough time at night with your kids?
yes. We have plenty of time for homework, playing, dinner, baths and bed. It is a great balance!

Jayne

Do you have a bedtime routine? What is your routine?
I guess it is sort of a routine. We send the kids upstairs at about 10 till 8. They brush their teeth and go to the bathroom. We tuck them in, set the TV for 1/2 on their favorite show and then the TV shuts off. Alyssa runs to her room and goes to bed (on her own I might add which is so cute) We do baths every other night do to dry skin and when those happen we go up at 7:30.

Jayne

I work about 20 hrs a week for Parks Floral. I deliver flowers and Work in the shop. I LOVE IT.

Ahhhh...my dream job! I would love to work in a flower shop!

And that brings up another question -
What is your "Dream Job"? If you could do any job, what would it be?

Ahhhh...my dream job! I would love to work in a flower shop!

And that brings up another question -
What is your "Dream Job"? If you could do any job, what would it be?

Brooke..that flower shop literally is right out my front door too! No commute..I walk out my front door, cross the street and I am there!


My dream job would be to be teaching choir/show choir to high school students. If I would ever finish my degree I could full fill this..although the further away from it I get I wonder if that is really really what I want. I think I want the end product but I don't want the hassle of getting to that.

Jayne

Do you have a bedtime routine? Yes we do
What is your routine? About 7:30 or quarter to 8 David takes a bath. After some playing and a gallon of water on my floor he gets out and gets dressed. We brush his hair and teeth. He gives daddy night kisses and hugs and some tickles. Then it is story time. Depending on how long the Daddy routine takes he will get 1-3 stories read. After we read stories we say our prayers. I kiss and hug him goodnight and turn off the light. About 10 minutes later he calls me into his room to get a drink of water. He doesn't want it before then.

Bedtime? 8:30pm

I missed so much because I've been working. AGGHH!!!

How many paid vacation days to you have per year? Are you allowed to take more than what you have (ie be in a minus of vacation days)?
I have 4.5 weeks of vacation. My company offers a great vacation policy. However, that includes sick days as well. I have worked here for 4 years. After 8 years, I will get another week. All employees receive 3.5 weeks their first year.

How many paid sick days do you have? What happens if you use more than that amount? See above, if I go over that time, I don't get paid for it. But if my kids are sick, my manager usually lets me work from home without burning all my days.

What time do you get home from work? I get home at 5-5:30 with the kids. Chris is home around 6:30pm.

What time do your kids go to bed? 8pm without fail. My 10 year old too, she does her dailiy reading then. She is usually asleep by 8:30pm.

Did you set their bed time, or your kids? Yes, we set it. They have never known anything different. We tried to put Alex down earlier but it was a struggle, so we moved it back by 30 minutes.

Do you feel you have enough time at night with your kids? Depends on the day. :lol: The more tired I am, the more I look forward to them going to sleep. In general, no I don't get enough time to just relax with them.

Do you have a bedtime routine? What is your routine?
Yes. We tell the kids at 7:45 that bedtime is coming and we go upstairs to get in pjs and brush teeth. One of us reads to Alex. We both tuck in the kids and kiss them goodnight. Baths/showers are taken every other day so I don't consider this part of the bedtime routine.

What is your "Dream Job"? If you could do any job, what would it be?
An executive party planner.

What time do you get home from work?
It varies widely and is totally unpredictable! Some days I'm home by 5pm and others not until 10pm


What time do your kids go to bed?
Between 7:30 and 8:30 PM


Did you set their bed time, or your kids?
Nathaniel's usually very tired in the evening so we put him to bed. He would stay up all night and fight sleep if we let him!

Do you feel you have enough time at night with your kids?
Some nights yes and some nights no. It really depends when I get home. I have days when I leave for work before he gets up and get home after he's sleeping. That's very hard!

Bedtime routine?
Sort of. He still gets a bottle at night and we brush his teeth and snuggle a bit. The he goes into his crib and (eventually) goes to sleep.

Amanda

What time do you get home from work?

Between 545 and 615 depending on where I am picking G up from. Sometimes not till 630.

What time do your kids go to bed?
She used to go to bed between 8 and 830 but lately its been more like 730.

Did you set their bed time, or your kids? :lol:
I guess you could say both. When she starts to get real fussy or falling over.. its time for her to go to bed!


Do you feel you have enough time at night with your kids?
No. But, there isnt much I can do about that right now!

Do you have a bedtime routine? What is your routine?

Yes. Right now bedtime routine includes, diaper change and putting on PJs, a bottle, brushing teeth, reading one or two books, rocking for 10-15 minutes, kiss goodnight, and laying her down for the night.

Working on getting rid of that bottle though. But, I won't start trying again until she is all better. We still have the sickies here.

What is your "Dream Job"? If you could do any job, what would it be?

I don't even know anymore. I would be satisfied with something that was part time hours but still full time pay. :lol: Especially once G is school age, I really want to be able to work part time by then so that I can do school activities with her and be home when she is done with school in the afternoons.

How many paid vacation days to you have per year? Are you allowed to take more than what you have (ie be in a minus of vacation days)?
I get 14 hours a month, total, so 21 days a year (4.5 weeks) I opted for this thing called Annual Leave where you just get a total # of hours for whatever per month, instead of getting what would be more hours of vacation and sick, but with Annual Leave, you get a mini-disability plan where you get 50% of your pay for up to 6 months of disability. It lets me get 8 weeks paid 50% that I can combine with time on the books to get a paid maternity leave. The crappy thing is that that is the ONLY paid maternity leave available, so I've been here 4.5 years but can never accumulate any time because I keep having babies!!!

If you go over your time on the books, you have your pay reduced, or docked, by that number of days.

We also get 13 holidays and one personal holiday a year to use whenever we want. Typically, at the holidays, the governor gives us 4 hours of time and the attorney general gives us 4 hours so we get another day off.

If the holiday falls on Sunday we get Monday. If it falls on Saturday, we technically don't get it (though they usually close the office... it's not a technical holiday).

Ours is the same for Sunday holidays, but for Saturday, we get 8 hours of holiday credit that we can use whenever we want.

And all our time except the personal holiday roll over and can either be paid out or used to retire early and get extra service credit, so if I accumulated 6 months of time, I could retire 6 months early and it would be counted as service time for my retirement formula. We have a pretty good pension here, which is one of the main reasons I came to work for the government.

I have a question,
Do you find yourselves going out to eat a lot more because your too tired to make dinner after work?

We go out to eat WAY too much

We never go out to eat during the week... but we do tend to eat a lot of convenience type foods.

What time do you get home from work?
I get home by 5:30, Lee gets home between 6:30 and 7 usually.

What time do your kids go to bed?
Courtney goes to bed at 8, Caroline can stay up as late as 10 b/c she still takes a 2 hour nap and we are in bad habits with her bed issues... as in she sleeps with me, oh well.

Did you set their bed time, or your kids? :lol:
I definitely set Courtney's. Caroline's is not fixed, so while I decide each night, I am not 100% in charge
Do you feel you have enough time at night with your kids?

Yes. Though some nights I keep Court up a little later b/c by the time she has eaten and had a bath, it's sometimes nice to play a bit longer with her. Plus since my kids stay home, they can sleep as long as they want and nap when they need to.

I have a bedtime routine for Courtney... but she is so easy to go to sleep that we don't even use it much anymore. I used to always play her the Rainbow Connection while holding her and then put her in her crib and leave the room... now, I put the song on and put her down, don't even play the whole thing and leave... she just goes right to sleep. Caroline is just a lot tougher and has been from day one.... our routine is after brushing teeth, we go lie down in my bed, watch a Scooby Doo or other show, I turn it off and she goes to sleep. I usually read a book in bed with a little book light and usually pass out with her.

Do you find yourselves going out to eat a lot more because your too tired to make dinner after work?

Not at all.
Our main meal here is at lunch so we basically all eat "out" - DH and I at work (although I bring in my own food) and the kids at school/DC.
Dinner for us is bread with something (usually cheese), egg, veggies, sometimes tuna and so on. You get the picture. Since Yumi can't have yellow cheese (he suffers from migraines) we hardly ever have pizza.
I used to take them out more often but since Yumi is in 1st grade and we are so busy with HW and his exercises, it just gets too late.
I think eating out takes much more of my energy than preparing a meal at home these days.

What time do you get home from work?

I usually get home around 4. That is, I leave work at 3 and pick up Yumi and Shoham. If we go home directly we manage to be home by 3:45-4 pm. But Sundays, Tuesdays and Thursdays Yumi has lessons so we don't go home directly.
What time do your kids go to bed?
They are in bed between 8-9. But Yumi NEVER falls asleep before 9:30-10 pm. (Because of his meds he has trouble falling asleep.)
Did you set their bed time, or your kids?
Both in a way. Since I have so much to do with them we never manage to finish it all before 7:30 and then dinner and baths can drag out like crazy. But 9 pm is lights out and end of story.
Do you feel you have enough time at night with your kids?

Yes and no. I feel I don't have enough time for Shoham. I am so busy with Yumi and his HW and exercises that she often has to "look after herself", play alone. :blush: Or she has to wait with me while Yumi is in a lesson (then we have some alone time but we are usually stuck somewhere with 45 minutes to pass). That makes me sad. And in a way I also don't have a lot of time for Yumi - except the necessities.
But I am lucky- I used to get home between 5-6 every day. Now I am home at 4 except on Mondays. So I have more time. But it seems like it is never enough.

Do you have a bedtime routine? What is your routine?
Yes, we do.
We have dinner, baths, story time, prayer, lullabies.

So today is Sunday ... and it seems I am the ONLY working parent right now... :lol:
OK, OK, so I didn't work Friday and Saturday. But sometimes I wish we had Sundays off here as well.

Which brings me to a new question:

How do you spend the weekends?
Do you manage to rest/nap?
Do you go to sleep late on Sunday night (ie the night before the working week starts)?

How do you spend the weekends?
Unfortunately, a lot of our weekends are spent cleaning (laundry, catching up on cleaning what I couldn't get done during the week), yard work, or doing little home improvement jobs (a neverending story :supergrin). We do try to do something together as a family. We go for walks, to the playground, to the park, or take out the canoe. If there is anything interesting in town...some festival or activity...we are off and out of the house. With the current gas prices, I rather stay close to home. I also try to squeeze some time in for my friends.

Do you manage to rest/nap?
DH usually lets me sleep in.....if you consider 8 or 9AM sleeping in. :lol: Since I get up before 6AM for work, it is for me. :lol: DH takes a nap then lots ot times in the afternoon. But lots of times we kill ourselves with cleaning or projects...so rest.....I guess, NO.

Do you go to sleep late on Sunday night (ie the night before the working week starts)?
Me, lots of times. (I am still up posting late right now. :blush:) I know better, but I enjoy the peace. DH goes to bed early, and I am having a date with my laptop. :lol:

How do you spend the weekends? DH works on Saturdays now. And I work on Sundays 1-2 times a month. When we are home, we do laundry and clean up around the house. I am also usually scrambling to finish my homework on Saturdays before my weekly deadline.
Do you manage to rest/nap? I try to take a least one nap when Genavieve naps on the weekends but it doesn't happen most of the time
Do you go to sleep late on Sunday night (ie the night before the working week starts)? I have for the past few weeks because Sunday night is one of the only nights I really like to watch TV and the shows I watch are on from 9-11. But, I plan on going to bed early tonight

So, I said I was going to bed early... and here I sit and its 10:00... :lol:

How do you spend the weekends?
Our weekends are from Thursday afternoon-Sunday. (Sunday is a work day.)
On Thursday afternoon I am busy grocery shopping. Thursday nights I usually cook the meals for Shabbat (since we don't cook on Shabbat, amongst other things). Friday the CL comes and I have to organize the house. I do laundry and sometimes get to rest a bit/watch TV if DH is at work and the kids are in school/DC. Now that the sun goes down later and we have DLS time, Shabbat starts around 6:30 pm. That gives us time to do things around noon. I even manage to take a nap sometimes. Then Shabbat starts and we have our routine of synagogue/prayer, meals, playing with the kids, resting. When Shabbat is over I have to put things back in place and then we usually vegetate in front of the TV.
Do you manage to rest/nap? Now that Shabbat starts later and ends later, yes. I take at least one 2 hour nap on Saturday.
Do you go to sleep late on Sunday night (ie the night before the working week starts)? Otherwise I wouldn't have asked that question :crazy:. Yes, we usually watch TV until late. This week we outdid ourselves and watched TV until 2 am. :down: It was hell getting up on Sunday to go to work.

How do you spend the weekends?
We both do some chores here and there on the weekend. We usually end up going out somewhere as a family most weekends. I try to plan it so we are out for a few hours each day if possible. Yesterday, we went shopping and today we went out to the San Diego Yacht Club for opening day on a friend's boat.

Do you manage to rest/nap? Not much if at all. Though, today, both girls were napping at the exact same time, so I got to read the paper for the first time in months.

Do you go to sleep late on Sunday night (ie the night before the working week starts)? Sometimes last, sometimes not... tonight looks like it will be late, but sometimes, I collapse!

Before the holidays many employers hand out gift certificates to their employees. I was sure I was not going to get anything since I resigned. It was a very pleasant surpise to both get a medium-sized bag (good for trips and such) and 100$ in GCs. YAY!

yay nadine! free gc's is always good!

How do you spend the weekends?
marc used to work most weekends so i would generally clean one day, then take the kids out the other, or go visit my mom.
with his new job he should have most weekends off. this weekend we plan to go to the zoo on saturday.
Do you manage to rest/nap?
never. if both kids are napping, we have sex :lol: Do you go to sleep late on Sunday night (ie the night before the working week starts)?
i try to get in bed by 10pm every night. gianna is 7 months and still gets up at least once a night and i have to stick the binky back in her mouth.

How do you spend the weekends?
In the summer we go to the shore every weekend. I have a good amount of vacation, so a lot are extended weekends. :sunny:
We go to the pool or beach and walk the boardwalk and go to the rides, or hang out at night.
Otherwise, we do house projects (moreso Jim than I) and stuff with the kids. We went to the Phillies game with them this past Saturday. Otherwise, play outside when it's nice or go to the zoo, park, etc.
I don't clean, I have someone do it for me. :)

Do you manage to rest/nap? What's that? :lol:
We get up around 7:30 on the weekends and hardly ever take daytime naps. (we sneak in the afternoon quickie as well. :awink: )

Do you go to sleep late on Sunday night (ie the night before the working week starts)?It's not any different than any other night. Kids are in bed by 9 PM and we watch a show or 2 and I usually fall asleep on the couch. :rolleyes: Last night I woke up at 1:30 am on the couch. :disbelief

I need to vent URGENTLY....

I am working on a user manual. Tomorrow is supposed to be my last day here. I wanted/promised to finish to update it. The deadline is next week - but I won't be in. (I will be on vacation starting Wednesday.)
Of course NOW all the mess has to start.
First Word crashed my document and I lost all the changes I made since Thursday (TG for that backup!!!). I will have to try and remember all the tiny changes I made since then.
Then I FINALLY get input from one of the developers. I still need to enter a section but I never had the necessary input until just now. He sent me MY document (a previous version of course) and that is where he added info directly - over 50 pages!!!!! WTH?????????????????? How am I supposed to finish all that by tomorrow????????:tantrum: :cry: :errr:

How do you spend the weekends?
Saturday is the day we all do stuff as a family usually. We call it "family fun day". This month the kids have swimming lessons. We often go to the zoo or the aquarium or the park or something like that.

Sundays DH has to work, so the kids and I usually relax in the mornings and run our errands in the afternoon. Sometimes we go visit my mom or she comes and sees us. I spend some time doing some extra cooking to save time during the week too.

Do you manage to rest/nap?
Not really. I haven't napped in years!! I never get to sleep in, but I don't care that much. Sunday mornings are pretty low key and I usually let the kids watch some tv while I read the paper or a book for a while.

Do you go to sleep late on Sunday night (ie the night before the working week starts)?
I try not to, but it seems like I usually stay up a little too late. I'm usually working on finishing up my homework for the week. I'll be so glad in June when school is over!!

I need to vent URGENTLY....

I am working on a user manual. Tomorrow is supposed to be my last day here. I wanted/promised to finish to update it. The deadline is next week - but I won't be in. (I will be on vacation starting Wednesday.)
Of course NOW all the mess has to start.
First Word crashed my document and I lost all the changes I made since Thursday (TG for that backup!!!). I will have to try and remember all the tiny changes I made since then.
Then I FINALLY get input from one of the developers. I still need to enter a section but I never had the necessary input until just now. He sent me MY document (a previous version of course) and that is where he added info directly - over 50 pages!!!!! WTH?????????????????? How am I supposed to finish all that by tomorrow????????:tantrum: :cry: :errr:

Yikes!!! I'm sorry you have to deal with all that.

we sneak in the afternoon quickie as well. :awink:
With a 10 year old in our house....not a chance for :brow: .

I usually fall asleep on the couch. :rolleyes: Last night I woke up at 1:30 am on the couch. :disbelief
OMG. That is my second bed as well. :lol:


Nadine, I am so sorry about your yucky last day. :justahug:

How do you spend the weekends?
Saturday we usually do something fun as a family. We either go to the park, beach, Disney or Universal. Sunday we generally clean and do laundry and the "house" crap.

Do you manage to rest/nap?
DH and I take turns getting up with David so we both get to sleep in one day during the weekend. Usually on Sunday I take a nap while watching the race.

Do you go to sleep late on Sunday night (ie the night before the working week starts)?
I usually go to bed on time on Sunday nights. Saturday and Friday I try to stay up. It's hard because I am so tired. Late for me is 11:30. :blush1:

Sorry to hear of your crappy day Nadine! :justahug:

How do you spend the weekends? Cleaning, doing yard work, running errands, grocery shopping, doing all the stuff we can't get done during the week.
Do you manage to rest/nap? No. I'm not a napper at all. So I don't even try. Darren would occasionally take a nap when the weather was too cold to be outside but now that it's nicer, he won't even come in the house until after dinner time.
Do you go to sleep late on Sunday night (ie the night before the working week starts)? We go to sleep at 11-11:30pm every night.

How do you spend the weekends?
Generally bumming around the house, either doing chores if the weather stinks, or spending it outside if it's nice. From April-July and again from Sep-Nov, DH coaches a men's soccer team on Saturdays. Other than that, we're having family time, walking into Harvard Square or some such thing.

Do you manage to rest/nap?
Rarely, though I've been trying to sneak in naps lately. On occassion we'll take advantage of both kids sleeping at the same time. :awink:

Do you go to sleep late on Sunday night (ie the night before the working week starts)?
Not later than any other night. Most days we're in bed by 11 PM. I should do more things at night to get ready for the next day, as often we're scrambling in the morning.

Sorry about your day Nadine :(

How do you spend the weekends?
Lately, DH has been busy every weekend renevating our lastest rental house and now that that is done, we have to get our house ready to sell, so he is usually doing that stuff and I'm running errands, visiting my parents or just trying to keep the boys busy and spend some quality time with them.

Do you manage to rest/nap?
I've never been a big napper, but every once in a great while, I will nap while they are and on the rare occasion that DH is home and they are both napping we have also been known to take advantage of that time :brow:

Do you go to sleep late on Sunday night (ie the night before the working week starts)?
I usually try to be in bed by 11pm, just like during the week, as my boys will still get up just as early :rolleyes: and I'm usually the one who gets up with them while DH sleeps in :complain: No, I'm not bitter :lol:

How do you spend the weekends?
Riley doesn't sleep in at all, so one of us is up by 7. It's usually DH since I'm such not a morning person. :lol: Saturday mornings consist of cleaning and doing laundry. But these last few weeks have consisted of trying to find a house since our place sold. Guess we kinda need a place to live! We're usually done with errands early afternoon, although DH might run a few errands by himself. Sunday we really don't do much, although we do head to the grocery store every other Sunday to stock up.

Do you manage to rest/nap?
DH usually naps more than I do. Unless I"m exhausted, I won't nap. I might lie in bed for an hour or two while he watches Riley just to give me a break. And hopefully our new house will have a soaker bathtub where I'll be able to relax in just as easily. :)

Do you go to sleep late on Sunday night (ie the night before the working week starts)?
Yesterday was an exception when I couldn't fall asleep until after midnight, but I'm usually asleep by 10:30 every night. Some nights I don't even make it to 9:30, though.

What time do you get home from work? Usually between 5 and 5:30


What time do your kids go to bed? Bedtime is 8- 8:30 (what time Isabelle actually gets in bed and falls asleep is debatable)

Did you set their bed time, or your kids? We did- Isabelle is always challenging it though.

Do you feel you have enough time at night with your kids? Usually, if I don't have an evening meeting


Do you have a bedtime routine? Yes- bathtime if it's a bath night, followed by pajama time, toothbrush time and story time (2 stories that Isabelle gets to pic)


How do you spend the weekends? The girls have swim lessons on Saturday mornings. Now that it's getting nice, we tend to spend a lot of time outside. We're getting a swing set soon, and will be spending even more time outside when that happens. Other than swim lessons, no set routine on the weekends, really.

Do you manage to rest/nap? No, not usually- kids naptime is when we get things done around the house.

Do you go to sleep late on Sunday night (ie the night before the working week starts)? Depends on how much I still have left to do...I try to get to bed at a reasonable hour, though.

1. What is your name, age, and names and ages of DH and child/ren.
Stella (37), DH-Benjamin (36), DD-Brooke (2), One on the way (9/05)

2. What do you and your DH do? How many hours a week do you both work. Are you FT or PT?
I am a Marketing Manger for an Architectural firm. I work 40 hours a week.
DH is a VP/Sales Manager for a manufacturing firm and he also works 40 hours a week, plus some travel within US and Canada.

3. What is your day like after work and on your days off? How are the household matters [chores, bill paying, etc] divided?
I usually pick up my DD from my mothers around 6:15pm and then spend as much time with her as I can. I am lucky, DH does the cooking and I do the cleaning. DH pays all the household bills and I pay for my own CC, car payment, etc. We have a joint checking account that we put our budgeted monthly money into that pays for all bills, groceries, any household expenses, and then whatever is left from my budget, is my own to spend on me or DD.

4. Share anything else you would like us to know about you.
No, I am happily married and don't really mind working, since my DD is able to be watched my my mother and grandmother. That is the next best thing to my DH or me. If I didn't enjoy my semi-nonstressful job as much as I do and enjoy the people I work with, I wouldn't work. If things change in the future, with management, I will consider staying home or going part-time, but if it isn't broke, don't fix it.

5. What do you hope to get out of this journal?

I hate Mondays!!! I don't feel like doing anything!!!! I just want to go home!!

I hate Mondays!!! I don't feel like doing anything!!!! I just want to go home!!
I hear ya! It is sooo nice outside and I am couped up in here.

I know! The Weatherbug thing in my toolbar says it's 74F outside!
Plus, I'm so congested from my cold when I'm inside but when I'm outside I feel fine. Just I just want to go outside!

I haven't been productive today at all!

I've spend the majority of my afternoon on OUAL because I'm all caught up and I'm dying to get outside into the sunshine! :sunny: Only 15 more minutes!!! :woo:

Thermometer said 85 when I went out for lunch (that one is always a few degrees higher than normal- but still- it's warm!). I wanna go home and start digging in the yard again!

How do you spend the weekends?
We do stuff with the kids. We usually do some kind of "activity" Saturday and Sunday mornings. Then after nap we just play.

Do you manage to rest/nap?
I don't nap, but I rest during the kids' nap or after they go to bed. Mary sometimes naps when they do.

Do you go to sleep late on Sunday night (ie the night before the working week starts)?

No, we usually go to bed at our regular time - 9-9:30.

Dennis

Wow, no posts for today? Where is everybody? :scan: Are you all major busy?

I'm in a bad mood:( I hate my job!

How do you spend the weekends?
Doing chores, hanging out with the kids. Once in a while the kids will go to g'ma/g'pa's house so we can go out as adults.
Do you manage to rest/nap?
My DH manages to get more naps in then I do, but I occassionally do. I like to nap while Alex is napping.

Do you go to sleep late on Sunday night (ie the night before the working week starts)?
Depends, sometimes I just don't want the weekend to end so I stay up. Usually, I'm so tired that I don't last past 9:30pm.

Wow, no posts for today? Where is everybody? :scan: Are you all major busy?

up until just now i was swamped. however our major launch went bust as i predicted so we're frozen until we get direction. we're in war room mode still but at least there's a lull.

I have been in meetings and acting silly with my coworkers. Today isn't to bad. Some people have been getting on my freaking nerves and I am about to punch them in the face. I hate 2 faced people.

Do you have people that you work with that you thought were your friends just to find out that they are selfish buttheads and not so much your friends?

I do. Specifically two people that used to be on my team before my promotion last October. When we all split up they got the big head and started acting stuck up. I have tried for 6 months to let it go. Well I am done. I don't need friends like that. They aren't my friends..so they can go fall in a hole!!

Do you have people that you work with that you thought were your friends just to find out that they are selfish buttheads and not so much your friends?

Not so much here but I've had that problem at past jobs, specifically when I worked in a Hallmark store when I was in college. At that point, I decided that I could work with anyone but I didn't have to get along with them or be their friends. And I haven't had the same issue since then.

My bigger problem is that I don't like alot of my male co-workers! I can work with them but I don't like them.

Do you have people that you work with that you thought were your friends just to find out that they are selfish buttheads and not so much your friends?

i try not to make 'friends'..i have coworkers that i hang with, but i wouldn't say they are friends. this place is very back- stabby so i always watch myself.

i try not to make 'friends'..i have coworkers that i hang with, but i wouldn't say they are friends. this place is very back- stabby so i always watch myself.
My point exactely. I find my friends outside the work place. I had the pleasure of working with two bit..... that tried to get me fired. Well, one of them got herself fired last year and the other one just left a month ago. But their crap still lingers. :rolleyes: I know all about backstabbing. Sigh.

That brings up another question. I have worked in an all male and an all female environement. I actually prefer working with a higher male percentage because there seems to be less gossip, backstabbing. What are your experiences? Just curious. :biggrin:

I have worked in both and prefer males!! You don't have to deal with the bitchiness and back stabbing. I thought we were out of highschool. I guess you can take the girl out of highschool but not the highschool out of the girl. :rolleyes:

I have worked in both and prefer males!! You don't have to deal with the bitchiness and back stabbing. I thought we were out of highschool. I guess you can take the girl out of highschool but not the highschool out of the girl. :rolleyes:
That's a way to look at it? :lol:

Melissa, I am trying really hard to make sense of your profile line. :scratch: Can you smell the smoke? :lol:

i try not to make 'friends'..i have coworkers that i hang with, but i wouldn't say they are friends. this place is very back- stabby so i always watch myself.

That's me too.. not so much the back stabby part, b/c it is not a competitive environment, but EVERYONE here talks about everyone else behind their backs. My unit is a small one and quite dysfunctional, so while I am friendly with everyone, I really don't trust anyone. And, all the other attorneys in my unit are men except this one woman who I don't like at all... she is very dumb and annoying, so I don't talk to her at all.

As for male vs. female, as an attorney, I've worked a lot more with men than women, b/c sadly many of the women drop out when they have kids... when I worked in private with a large group of women in my age range, I loved it. We were all very friendly, had similar interests, etc. But, before I left that firm, almost all of them left the full time practice of law b/c of starting families. I've never really worked with any "mentoring" type women b/c the places I've worked there just haven't been any. I like working with men just fine, but I miss the cameraderie I had when I worked with a big group of women. The firm I worked at was not a competitive environment though, there was nothing to be gained by backstabbing. In fact, if you were competitive in that way, you were looked down on, so I feel I have been fortunate in the kinds of places I've worked.

I'm in a male dominated field. It has it's advantages and disadvantages. There's less backstabbing but the guys gossip as much as women! I also find that I have to really stand up for myself or I get treated differently.

Amanda

I used to work in the sports field (obviously a male-dominated field) and found that most men didn't take me seriously. They thought I was trying to break down barriers, so they tended to give me crappy peon jobs. And I felt like I had to prove to them I could do it, so that was tough. It made me realize that there were a lot of men in that field, though, that were bitter about life--or maybe just at our job. So I decided to switch fields and go into publishing instead.

Melissa, I am trying really hard to make sense of your profile line. :scratch: Can you smell the smoke? :lol:

:lol2: It's a commercial that they play the crap out of here. It's a Lance cracker commercial. The gimmick is Lance crackers are small enough to fit into your pants for an anytime snack. Hense, "I've got Lance in my pants". I was really in a silly mood Monday morning had a caffeine buzz and I had heard that freaking commercial so many times I sang it all day long. So when I was trying to come up with something for my profile line that was what was stuck in my head. Sorry for making you think so hard. :lol: You are actually the 2nd person to ask me about it. I am just a bit :crazy: .

:lol2: It's a commercial that they play the crap out of here. It's a Lance cracker commercial. The gimmick is Lance crackers are small enough to fit into your pants for an anytime snack. Hense, "I've got Lance in my pants". I was really in a silly mood Monday morning had a caffeine buzz and I had heard that freaking commercial so many times I sang it all day long. So when I was trying to come up with something for my profile line that was what was stuck in my head. Sorry for making you think so hard. :lol: You are actually the 2nd person to ask me about it. I am just a bit :crazy: .

:rotflmao: Man, I was pondering so hard what that is in your pants.

That brings up another question. I have worked in an all male and an all female environement. I actually prefer working with a higher male percentage because there seems to be less gossip, backstabbing. What are your experiences? Just curious

I've been stuck with mostly males ever since I took up engineering in college. Frankly, I like it.

I got a job in plastics and it definitely has it's advantages being a woman. I'll admit, when I worked in the Automotive Region, things were tough and I'd get calls from customers asking "to please connect them to an engineer" or "OH, you're the engineer! I'm sorry!" :rolleyes:

I also was the only woman in the Technical Service group out of 13 people!!! Aside from the secretary that is. :lol:

There was 1 guy in my group that was worse than a woman though. :disbelief You'd tell him something and it'd be out before you know it!

:rotflmao: Man, I was pondering so hard what that is in your pants.

Just crackers :lol2:

Just crackers :lol2:
I can just see them...all crumbly with melted cheese. Yummy. :lol:

I don't know what's wrong with me. I just don't feel like working today. So far I managed to have one coffee, make a phone call and tons of OUAL. :blush1:
I can't believe it's going to be in the 90s today. Where's the pool?

That brings up another question. I have worked in an all male and an all female environement. I actually prefer working with a higher male percentage because there seems to be less gossip, backstabbing. What are your experiences? Just curious

Well, also being an engineer, I work with all men now. I actually like it better this way. Mostly because there's so much less of the catty dramatic stuff going on. Also because I get the whole bathroom to myself! :lol: I'm just used to it. All my college classes were the same way. I just generally have always been a tomboy and so I have always gotten along better with men.

The guys I work with are all pretty good guys. I don't feel like they treat me any different than anyone else. I guess I'm lucky.

I can just see them...all crumbly with melted cheese. Yummy. :lol: I never thought about them being crumbly. :lol: I figured they would be protected by the wrapper! :lol2: I have serioulsy lost it!!!

I don't know what's wrong with me. I just don't feel like working today. So far I managed to have one coffee, make a phone call and tons of OUAL. :blush1:
I can't believe it's going to be in the 90s today. Where's the pool?

We have the same sickness. I have had coffee, yogurt, and found 1 cusotmer's maintenance information and emailed it and spent almost 2 hours on OUAL. Am I an addict? :blush1:

things were tough and I'd get calls from customers asking "to please connect them to an engineer" or "OH, you're the engineer! I'm sorry!" :rolleyes:

At least you have a female first name. Most people get REALLY confused when Brooke the Engineer is female. :rolleyes: I get alot of mail for Mr. Brooke Lastname.

Who in the hell would think that Brooke is a male name? These people are on crack!!!

I only had that happen once Brooke. A secretary of one of my collegues from Japan sent me a thank you and addressed it Mr. Colette Lastname. :lol:


New Question..
How many people work for your company in the building where you're located?

Am I an addict? :blush1:
Hey, I know I am. Terrible. Hi, my name is Silke and I am OUAL addict.

For the :crazy:ness...it's the heat. :biggrin:

I only had that happen once Brooke. A secretary of one of my collegues from Japan sent me a thank you and addressed it Mr. Colette Lastname. :lol:
Those crazy foreigners. :lol: I had that happend before, too, but in the States. Who in the heck knows what sex refers to the name "Silke"?:lol:

How many people work for your company in the building where you're located?
Hmmm...I think 19, but with our partners it may be 26 or so.

Who in the hell would think that Brooke is a male name? These people are on crack!!!

ALOT! I always get mail for Mr. Brooke. A professor in college said I should have been male, people at work. it happens ALOT!

And I get people who can't understand "Brooke". Some call me Brookie :rolleyes:. Yesterday I ordered lunch at Baja Fresh and the girl wanted my name for my order and I said "Brooke, B-R-O-O-K-E" and she said "what?" and I spelled it again for her. And when I got my receipt, it said "ROK" on it as my name. :disbelief

How many people work for your company in the building where you're located?
I just counted on my phone list. :lol: We currently have 96 people here and we have a manufacturing facility 10 miles down the road with maybe 50 or so... I'm not sure on that count..

How many people work for your company in the building where you're located?

hmm...in this building i think there are maybe hmm....1,000?
hard to tell. maybe more. we have 7,000 employees in this state (the majority of them here in this town scattered around a bunch of bldgs) and about 24k worldwide.

New Question..
How many people work for your company in the building where you're located?

About 85. We're split between 2 buildings in the same industrial complex because we outgrew the first building (where I am).
Total throughout the US and the world, we have 152 current employees. We have people in Spain, Italy, Singapore, Thailand.... I think that might be it.

New Question..
How many people work for your company in the building where you're located?

I think there's about 50 people in this building. Then we have another building right across the street for manufacturing. There's probably another 100 people over there.

How many people work for your company in the building where you're located?

I work in the corporate headquarters bldg so there is about 2,500 of us here. Worldwide it is about 19K.

THere are only about 15 people here :lol: and I'm the only woman.

New Question..
How many people work for your company in the building where you're located?

11. On Tuesday's another doc and his nurse come over for the morning, but otherwise- we're just a small satellite clinic :)

ALOT! I always get mail for Mr. Brooke. A professor in college said I should have been male, people at work. it happens ALOT!

And I get people who can't understand "Brooke". Some call me Brookie :rolleyes:. Yesterday I ordered lunch at Baja Fresh and the girl wanted my name for my order and I said "Brooke, B-R-O-O-K-E" and she said "what?" and I spelled it again for her. And when I got my receipt, it said "ROK" on it as my name. :disbelief
That is just crazy!!!

New Question..
How many people work for your company in the building where you're located?
We have about 200 people in our building.

How do you spend the weekends?
Unfortunately I work one weekend in 6 so that weekend is shot... Otherwise, DH usually goes to yoga one morning and I hang out with Maggie and clean the house or we'll go to the park. The other day we either run errands or do something fun (this weekend will probably be the children's museum).

Do you manage to rest/nap?
No! I am usually the one to get up with Maggie in the morning because I am the lighter sleeper. Sometimes I will relax on the couch while she naps, but usually I am off to the grocery store or cleaning.

Do you go to sleep late on Sunday night (ie the night before the working week starts)?
Nah. I'm usually in bed by 10pm every night regardless. I can't manage to stay awake much later!

Regarding "Mr. Brooke" -- as a female physician I get "oh are you the nurse" a lot. Grr!! I don't mind working with the younger guys, but the older male docs have been slow to warm up to me and take my advice as the specialist.

We have about 25 people total who work here.

Missy - I get that all the time, too. "Nurse?" It's like, no, woman can be doctors now. It drives me crazy!

Amanda

I do too, Missy. And I'm in a high-female physician specialty too...I think people just don't expect young female doctors?

New Question..
How many people work for your company in the building where you're located?

We have about 200 here in this location. Most are in customer service or help desk. About 50 of us are sales.

Eleanor - Especially when they're as attractive as we all are!;)

Amanda

How many people work for your company in the building where you're located?

I work for the Attorney General's office, and almost all the units in our office are in downtown San Diego except us. My unit is in a different part of town because we are 75% federally funded and we have a ton of people, so we have our own $$ to find office space. Within my unit probably 90% is criminal and only 10% or less is my unit, civil. There are about 12 people on the civil side and probably 40 on the criminal.

As for the "are you the nurse" comment, when I was in private practice and took a lot of depositions, I always got the "are you the court reporter" question... I say, if you don't know, don't ask! Or, assume that the woman IS the doctor or lawyer so you don't offend her.

As for the "are you the nurse" comment, when I was in private practice and took a lot of depositions, I always got the "are you the court reporter" question... I say, if you don't know, don't ask! Or, assume that the woman IS the doctor or lawyer so you don't offend her.

People always think I am the client....happend to day going into a pre-trial conf. Some day I will say..."hell no, do you think I would marry that POS?" :lol:

As for the number of people in my office....there are only three of us.....someone to answer the phones....me, and my boss (who really isnt here much anyway though :lol: )

How many people work for your company in the building where you're located?
5! My boss, his wife, The designer, a greenhouse keeper and myself!!! there was another girl ..well..I have a funny work story!!!



On Saturday at work was rather busy. It was the boss, our designer, myself and the other shop girl. She is 17 and about to graduate in a few weeks. She was not feeling well. Thought she was coming down with a sinus infection or something but she worked like a trooper that day. She is a little girl..I am guessing 125 lbs and cute! She had on Jeans and a sweatshirt and it was 70 so we figured that maybe she was getting sick as she was cold all day.

Anyhow we get this call on monday from her mom saying "Melissa will not be able to come back to work, EVER" we were shocked..we thought she had really really gotten sick so we asked if she was ok. Her mom says "she was really sick Saturday night and it got much worse sunday. Sunday afternoon we rushed her to the emergency room and she was so sick they rushed her right to a room...and there..about 20 minutes later she delivered a 7 1/2 lb. baby boy :eek:

SHE HAD NO IDEA SHE WAS PG. I started to cry I was her 10 years ago and it just really sent me back. (although I knew I was pg) They are all doing fine but it was a real work shocker.

Jayne

:eek: I always wondered how people DON't know they are PG!

Hi ladies. Sadly, I am unsubing from this thread. :blue: It has so many posts each day, and by the time I am able to read it all on my weekend- there are about 10 pages to read, not to mention answering all the questions. Being in a casino, I obviously don't have computer access while I work.

Best wishes to you all as we deal with this crazy thing called life!

AmyLynn we will miss you!! :hug99:

How in the hell do people not know they are pregnant? That's just crazy!!

Amy, it does move fast, stop in sometime though:)

jayne, that is madness! and you saw her all the time and never suspected?

How in the hell do people not know they are pregnant? That's just crazy!!
:nod: and she was only 125lbs. How do you cover a pg there?

What a crazy story!

Amanda

I've heard of those stories and always wondered, too :scratch:

We'll miss you Amy! :(

How many people work for your company in the building where you're located?

I think we have about 450 in our building. We have about 650 nationwide.

Dennis

I work with her ...I had absolutly NO CLUE. I have only been there 6 weeks but she didn't look like she was pg at all. I mean I never saw a pouch..she worked like a trooper. I just had no clue at all.

Jayne

Melissa,
look what your crackers started http://www.onceuponalife.com/forums/showthread.php?t=17204 :lol:

I have no idea how many people are in our building... I would guess 750-1000.

Melissa,
look what your crackers started http://www.onceuponalife.com/forums/showthread.php?t=17204 :lol:

:lol2: How funny!!! I need to go check it out!!

question for moms with kids in half day pre-school/kindergarten:

how the hell do you get them there/back?


i want to send tony when he's 4 to preschool. right now he's in home daycare. how would i get him to the daycare after preschool? :scratch: there is a chance my dcp will pick him up but i can't bank on that.

what do you do?

I'm going to have to switch Aden to a preschool that has daycare, so he can go there all day. My first choice for preschool wouldn't take Evan, so Aden is actually going to my 2nd choice, but it's still good.

Jayne - that is crazy. My guess is that she knew and didn't tell her parents or anybody else :eek: Wow!

This thread does move very fast for us to be 'working' :lol:

question for moms with kids in half day pre-school/kindergarten:

This is why half-day pre-school couldn't work for me. My kids will go to pre-care and after-care. It sucks :(

This thread does move very fast for us to be 'working' :lol:
Work? What's that? :lol::blush1:

My job is posting on OUAL. :lol: And confusing all of you guys with my profile line! :lol2:

And confusing all of you guys with my profile line! :lol2:
You did a heck of a good job on that one, even got your own thread. :lol:

I agree that this thread moves fast but I just try to pick up whenever I can.

I'm a bit worried about the preschool problem. I have no idea what we'll do!

Amanda

question for moms with kids in half day pre-school/kindergarten:

how the hell do you get them there/back?

We don't. Kyle has to go full-time. Right now, he is in a home daycare situation and I am not sure yet what we'll do when he is ready for pre-school.

You did a heck of a good job on that one, even got your own thread. :lol:
That just kills me. I don't understand why people just didn't ask me! :silly:

question for moms with kids in half day pre-school/kindergarten:

how the hell do you get them there/back?

Thankfully our daycare provider is on the school bus route. When Alex starts kindergarten, he will take the bus to and from her house on school days. She has one little girl doing this now. God forbid if something happens and she is no longer working or such, we will be SCREWED!!!

Happy Birthday Becky!!

question for moms with kids in half day pre-school/kindergarten:

how the hell do you get them there/back?


i want to send tony when he's 4 to preschool. right now he's in home daycare. how would i get him to the daycare after preschool? :scratch: there is a chance my dcp will pick him up but i can't bank on that.

what do you do?

I am lucky in that I have my IL's who pick Abby up at 12:30. If I didnt then I would be in the same boat.

I am lucky as well, My exIL's watch Jayden, so they will pick him up:)

Happy Birthday, Becky! :balloons:

Happy Birthday Becky!!


Happy Birthday, Becky! :balloons:

Thanks ladies! My co-workers decorated my cubical in a Mexican Fiesta :chilipepp theme complete with a pinata hanging over my head. :lol: It makes turning 29 for the 9th time a bit easier!

Thanks ladies! My co-workers decorated my cubical in a Mexican Fiesta :chilipepp theme complete with a pinata hanging over my head. :lol: It makes turning 29 for the 9th time a bit easier!


:lol: That sounds great Becky! :bday: Did they take you out to lunch?

I'm going to have to switch Aden to a preschool that has daycare, so he can go there all day. My first choice for preschool wouldn't take Evan, so Aden is actually going to my 2nd choice, but it's still good.

Rebekah's daycare goes all the way up to Kindergarten. So, technically, she could stay in there and get preschool and kindergarten until she is ready for full-time 1st grade.

We will be pulling her out, though, in August. My mom will pick her up from preschool and keep her in the afternoons and the rest of the week.

Rebekah's daycare goes all the way up to Kindergarten. So, technically, she could stay in there and get preschool and kindergarten until she is ready for full-time 1st grade.

We will be pulling her out, though, in August. My mom will pick her up from preschool and keep her in the afternoons and the rest of the week.
The one he is going to be going to has Kindergarten, too, so that is always on option. :nod:

:lol: That sounds great Becky! :bday: Did they take you out to lunch?

Thanks Lette! Tomorrow I'm going out with my close work friends. I've been stuck on conference calls for most of the day. In fact I'm stuck on one right now. :boring: Is it beer-thirty yet? :drink:

Oh I certainly hope so Becky. I am stuck on a con call myself!!! Pass the bottle!!

The one he is going to be going to has Kindergarten, too, so that is always on option. :nod:

Yeah, right now we only have 1/2 day kindergarten in our public schools so alot of working parents leave their kids in the daycare center for that year because they can't find 1/2 day care.

Boy, have I been busy. I missed the beer. Darn.:lol: Happy Birthday, Becky! :cake:

:drink: :drink: :drink: :drink: :drink:

Have a beer on me, I'm buying the first round! :lol:

Happy Birthday Becky!

Amanda

question for moms with kids in half day pre-school/kindergarten:

how the hell do you get them there/back?

Thankfully our daycare provider is on the school bus route. When Alex starts kindergarten, he will take the bus to and from her house on school days. She has one little girl doing this now. God forbid if something happens and she is no longer working or such, we will be SCREWED!!!

my dcp will do this for kindergarten and grade school as well. but i'm still screwed for pre-school. damn. maybe i'll be a sahm by then :lol2: ahhhh i can dream.


happy birthday becky! :bday:

Thanks Kim! It was a good day.


My Friday has started out crappy. My division VP called to rip me apart in his very condescending tone this morning. I was close to tears but I controlled it and decided I'm not going to let this fooking a$$ make me cry. He is so not worth it. You can't ask that man a question without it becoming some huge ordeal. I'm so glad it's Friday and I'm going to lunch with friends.

that sucks becky. give him one of these :catfight:

pretty quiet here. after spending all morning running scans, antivirus programs, anti spyware progams, etc.....i have just solved my pc issue by changing out my mouse :lol2: . drove me nuts all morning, my laptop was possessed!

also had 3 con calls before 10am :sleepy:

Asshole!!!!! :fryingpan

I'm sorry, Becky!

Ugh, I have been gone for 4 days, and even though I checked my e-mail and voicemail while I was gone, I am totally swamped!! I got calls 5 minutes after I walked in today asking me the status of things too! Give me a break.

Sorry, just needed to vent a little :)

Becky, sorry for the rough morning. At least you know that he's just an ass and it's not you.

Happy belated birthday Becky! I'm sorry about the crap this morning! Good for you keeping your cool though!

Question for moms with kids in half day pre-school/kindergarten:

I don't know who can do 1/2 day if they work. Jackson's school goes up to 5th grade, but the AZ governor is really pushing for full day kindergarter, which will be AWESOME if it works, then we will just have to do aftercare.

Sorry for the rough morning Becky :( Happy Belated Birthday! :cake:

question for moms with kids in half day pre-school/kindergarten:

how the hell do you get them there/back?

When Caroline goes, Rachel (our nanny) is going to have to drive her there and most days pick her up. She'll be going in the afternoons from 1-4, sometimes from 12-4 if we do lunch bunch. Occasionally, Lee or I will be able to get her if we go home early, but most days, she'll have to load the other two in the car and get her. I usually have a home visit for Courtney on Thursday and pre-school will be M, T and Thurs., so I will likely be able to get her Thursdays. We'll see. If I didn't have a nanny and my kids went to daycare, I think I'd end up finding a full day program when she was 4 and just keep her in the daycare if I liked it while she was still 3.

Ali~ I feel your pain... I had 12 voicemails and about 30 something emails to wade through when I got back to work today... and I was only gone for 2 days!

It sounds like it was a rough Friday for a lot of us. :wtf:

I just thought of a question. Many of us have posted how our schools only have 1/2 day kindie or two full days, etc. Does your school (public or private) have any sort of enrichment program for other times even if part time? Ours does but I have no clue what it encompasses. I have called the lady several time for more info and just keep getting voicemail. :rolleyes:

Also, if you have school age children with early release or minmum days, what do they do after school? Do you pick them up? Does daycare pick them up? Are they latch key kids?

Also, if you have school age children with early release or minmum days, what do they do after school? Do you pick them up? Does daycare pick them up? Are they latch key kids?

I am not in this situation yet, but I think when I am, I am either going to have to make mine a minimum day too or have them in after-care. I am hoping by the time they are in school to be working part time, so I can be off when they are, but we'll see what happens.

Sorry I've been MIA in here, it's been a rough couple of weeks with illnesses! Now my nanny is very sick, so DH and I are having to cover- she could be out all week! It's one of the biggest drawbacks to a nanny- when she gets sick, we're screwed.

question for moms with kids in half day pre-school/kindergarten:

how the hell do you get them there/back?

This was one of the biggest considerations when choosing Emma's preschool. The one we chose is walking distance from our house, because Tracey (our nanny) will have to be the one to pick her up. Tracey doesn't drive, so we had to limit our preschool choices to something that was within reasonable walking distance.

DH is using this very fact to prevent me from moving. :)

I just thought of a question. Many of us have posted how our schools only have 1/2 day kindie or two full days, etc. Does your school (public or private) have any sort of enrichment program for other times even if part time?

Rebekah's school goes all the way up through kindergarten. It's technically a daycare center but they do preschool and kindergarten during the day. The rest of the day is spent doing nature walks, playing outside, napping (I don't think the kindergarteners nap), doing crafts, having free play time, that sort of thing.

Where she will go next year is strictly part time preschool. They also have an before and after school program for the kids in the elementary school (kindie through 6th grade) across the street but that's separate from the preschool and the preschoolers can't go to that.

The busy of day of a working mom....this has been an VERY busy day for me and I am feeling it right now and it is far from over.

What has been one of the busiest days you can remember??

6:30 Up and running (although running late) 7:00 get Abby up, dressed, hair done and ready to eat breakfast. Thankfully I had packed her bag last night or I would have been screwed since I woke up so late.

7:30 Out the door on my way to the office.

8:00 Get a call from my boss that the computers are still down so we make the decision that I wont be going to court with him so I can stay behind and get the computers fixed.

8:30-10:00 God bless Stagg for fixing the computers..

12:45 Dh brings Abby by my office so I can take her to her 1:30 doctors appointment.

1:00 We make record time so I have an extra 30 mintues....I swing by Off Broadway to see if I can grab a pair of shoes to wear to a wedding this weekend.

1:30 Abby's first dentist appointment

2:15 On way back from Dentist and stop to grab me some lunch and see if I can get Abby to eat some more since I know she didnt eat much lunch.

2:40 Back at office to catch up on everything I need to do (with Abby in tow of course)

6:00 Head off to Abby's swimming lessons right up the street from my office

7:00 Meet Dh and hand off Abby so that I can go get my nails done. (have to be done before our flight leaves friday afternoon)

9:00 Treadmill (or bike if I dont feel like the treadmill) for 40 mintues

10:00 If I have an ouce of strength I would like to read a couple of chapters in my book....but I am thinking I should just put my head down and crash!! :lol:

The busy of day of a working mom....this has been an VERY busy day for me and I am feeling it right now and it is far from over.

What has been one of the busiest days you can remember??

6:30 Up and running (although running late) 7:00 get Abby up, dressed, hair done and ready to eat breakfast. Thankfully I had packed her bag last night or I would have been screwed since I woke up so late.

7:30 Out the door on my way to the office.

8:00 Get a call from my boss that the computers are still down so we make the decision that I wont be going to court with him so I can stay behind and get the computers fixed.

8:30-10:00 God bless Stagg for fixing the computers..

12:45 Dh brings Abby by my office so I can take her to her 1:30 doctors appointment.

1:00 We make record time so I have an extra 30 mintues....I swing by Off Broadway to see if I can grab a pair of shoes to wear to a wedding this weekend.

1:30 Abby's first dentist appointment

2:15 On way back from Dentist and stop to grab me some lunch and see if I can get Abby to eat some more since I know she didnt eat much lunch.

2:40 Back at office to catch up on everything I need to do (with Abby in tow of course)

6:00 Head off to Abby's swimming lessons right up the street from my office

7:00 Meet Dh and hand off Abby so that I can go get my nails done. (have to be done before our flight leaves friday afternoon)

9:00 Treadmill (or bike if I dont feel like the treadmill) for 40 mintues

10:00 If I have an ouce of strength I would like to read a couple of chapters in my book....but I am thinking I should just put my head down and crash!! :lol:

Wendy, I'm exhausted for you and all I did was read about your day! :lol: Good luck!

I couldn't even read all of it, it made me too tired! :lol:

Also, if you have school age children with early release or minmum days, what do they do after school? Do you pick them up? Does daycare pick them up? Are they latch key kids?

Luckily, Natascha's school offers after school care. On early release, I pick her up ...sorta my lunch in the go. ....and bring her to work with me. I can still do this for now, but I am dreading the thought of it not being able to do it probably next year anymore since we are in the middle of an acquisition. Then I'll probably drop her off at home for the few hours. She's old enough now.

Geesh, Wendy, you wore me out. :faint: :lol:

Subbing! Did I not see this thread before?

I'm Lyndee. :wavey:

DD's preschool closes at 6:30 but luckily she's located in the same building at my office. My officemate also has her 3-month old in the same learning center. We had so much work today and couldn't get done by 6:30 so my officemate and I rounded up our kids, put them in our offices and worked for a few more minutes. Good thing I had some toys for Lauryn to keep her occupied.

What has been one of the busiest days you can remember??


some days are busier then ever. however when i'm at work, i'm generally AT work so i'm in my cube and not running around. that helps.

however today i have some things to do so it will go like this:

up at 4am! woo! who wanted that second kid? :scratch: i curse the binky!

give gianna a bottle at 5:45, take shower, get ready, get G dressed, wake tony, dress tony, bring kids downstairs (after much arguing with tony)

out the door at 6:40am

get gas
stop at atm
stop at donut shop to get tony a muffin (getting both kids out of the car due to no drive thru).
stop at post office
stop at other bank drive thru to deposit check.
get to work slightly late at 7:40am due to getting stuck behind freakin school bus.

tony has his 3yr appt today. so i'll leave at 2pm, go to fedex to mail stroller (so totally out of my way), then pick up both kids, take to dr for 3:10pm appt.

marc is working late so i won't see him at all. i am thinking of taking the kids to go exchange something at the mall but i can skip that if i'm too tired.

so not too busy once i get them home. unless i want it to be, kwim.

:faint: Kim, I do not know how you get up and get going so early! You are my hero!

trish - i'm not getting up at 4 because i want to! i bink G and then back in bed but i don't go back to sleep. marc gets up around 4:45am to get ready. when he leaves the house at 5:45am is when i have to get up.

Phew- I am on vacation and miss a zillion pages here... LOL
I don't have time to read them all now. Just coming by to say a quick hello. I am on vacation (Passover) until April 30 and I won't be online much....
(There have been 5700 posts since I was online last!!!!)

Kim - I'm amazed that you get in the shower at 5:45am, though! I set the alarm for 6:50am and then hit the snooze for 20 mins :lol:

I must say, that when I do get up earlier, I do get a lot more done, though!

Kim, you're trusting FedEx with your strollers again? :lol2: Please tell me you're not sending them through Kinko's!

I have a dilema and I need your opinions.

Rebekah had 3 girlfriends in her daycare class - Macey, Nevaeh, and Taryn. She always played with them and talked about them, especially Macey and Nevaeh.

Somehow, over the past month or so, her class has become all boys except for her. She does ok with boys, she plays with them at the playgrounds and at the library. But she's been with these same boys for months and 2 or 3 of the 6 boys are very agressive. They are always pushing and grabbing and getting time outs. I know the teachers discipline the boys as best they can because I've seen them do it. But Rebekah always talks about how Patrick pushed Brandon or someone did something else.

I don't think Rebekah likes being in the class with these boys. She always asks me if Macey or Nevaeh will be there and I don't know anymore. They still have cubbies but I never see them anymore. This morning she was very clingy and hesitant when we got into class and then one of the boys grabbed her and starting pulling her arm and she started crying. The teacher, Miss Tina, ended up taking her aside and playing with her alone. They were talking about princesses when I left. :lol:

The teachers always say Rebekah is very good at school, she never gets into trouble. I think I'm going to call at lunch today and ask Tina where all the girls went and find out how Rebekah did with the boys today. The whole thing just has me so upset because I don't think she's all that happy at school anymore because the girls are gone.

What would you do? She only goes there 2 days a week (Tues and Thurs) but if I take her out, she won't be with any other kids until September other than whoever she and my mom run into at the playground. Maybe, if the girls are there on Monday and Wednesday, I could ask about switching her days.

stef - did you not read they paid my claim? :lol2: they sent me a denial letter about 2 months ago, then last week i got a check! :rotflmao:

so yes, fedex kinkos again! i will not pay the exorbitant amounts those 'shipping' stores try to charge you!

Brooke, I'd do exactly what you are thinking of doing. How odd that none of the girls are there! I'd only pull her if she's really miserable about going.

Kim, yes, I saw they paid your claim, but the agita you experienced when you thought they lost your stroller, do you really want to go through that again?? :)

Brooke, talk to the teachers and ask them what happened to the girls and go from there.

How did I miss this thread? Needless to say, I haven't read the whole thing yet. :lol:

I'm Lisa, working (and soon to be single - Kevin moves out May 6) mom to Julian, who'll be 3 in July. He's in daycare in Midlothian, where we live, and I work in downtown Dallas, about 30 miles away.

A typical day looks something like this:

5:30 - alarm goes off
5:50 - I actually get up :lol:
6:00 - shower, get dressed
6:30 - start trying to get Julian up
6:45-6:50 - actually get Julian up
7:15 - leave for daycare
7:30 - drop off at daycare
8:30 - work (usually late, I'm supposed to be here at 8:00 :blush: )
5:00-5:30 - leave for the day
6:00 - 6:30 - pick Julian up from daycare
7:15 (or whenever I get home and get it fixed) - dinner
8:15 - 8:30 - bath time
8:45 - 10:30 - bedtime (some nights I can get Julian in the bed, but I can't make him sleep! :banghead: )

After he goes to sleep, I'll stay up, try to pick up a little, and have a little time for myself. I'd love to work out, but if he's up until 9:00 or later, it's not going to happen after that. I'm in bed anywhere from 11:00 to as late as 1:30, depending on how much time I take for myself. Ugh! How sad is this - one thing I'm actually looking forward to about Kevin moving out is that every couple of weeks I'll have a little time completely to myself! :lol:

As for the after-school question - Julian's current daycare has a pre-K and kindergarten program, so I'm sure he'll stay there for that. And they offer before- and after-school care, with buses and vans to take the children to school in the mornings and pick them up in the afternoons. I don't know yet what our local school district offers - I think they have a before- and after-school program as well. So we should have a couple of options, which will be nice. Geez, since Julian will be 3 soon, I guess I should start checking out the school district, shouldn't I? :)

Here is another recent article that made the rounds, but I thought was applicable to post again. Probably easier to read at http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/6959880/site/newsweek/ (http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/6959880/site/newsweek/)

http://c.msn.com/c.gif?NC=1255&NA=1154&PS=73838&PI=7329&DI=305&TP=http%3a%2f%2fmsnbc.msn.com%2f
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/images/MSNBC/msnbc_ban.gif MSNBC.com
Mommy Madness
What happened when the Girls Who Had It All became mothers? A new book explores why this generation feels so insane

We are simply beating ourselves black and blue. So let's take a breather. Throw out the schedules, turn off the cell phone, cancel the tutors (fire the OT!). Let's spend some real quality time with our families, just talking, hanging out, not doing anything for once. And let ourselves be.

From PERFECT MADNESS by Judith Warner. To be published by Riverhead books, a division of Penguin Group (USA) Inc. © 2005 by Judith Warner.


© 2005 Newsweek, Inc.
© 2005 MSNBC.com


Well, this makes me feel a bit better! :) I tend not to structure a lot of Julian's time at home. If he wants to play with his trains, I let him play on his own. If he wants me to play with him, he'll come get me. If he wants to read, he'll tell me. And if he says he just wants to stay home instead of going out and doing things, then we stay home. I don't push a bunch of different stuff on him, and sometimes I felt bad about that, I worried if I was somehow neglecting his development by not having activities for him. But maybe I'm doing all right just letting him do his own thing.

And this article talked about daycare concerns. In Texas, all daycares have to be state-licensed, and are subject to regular inspections to make sure they're meeting all the criteria. I'm very, very thankful to have found a daycare for Julian that I'm happy with, where he likes his teachers, and that doesn't completely break the bank (it's actually one of the most affordable in the area). That makes it a lot easier for me to go to work. If I thought he was unhappy or in a place that wasn't helping him learn and grow, I'd be miserable.

Hi Lisa, :wavey: Long time no see, where have you been?

Brooke, I would call the teacher and ask about the other girls. I wouldn't hesitate to switch the days so Rebekah can spend time with her girlfirends.

Holy cow Kim, you need a secretary! That is too much for any working mom! :lol:

I'm in a pissy mood at work today. I'm still waiting for my 2005 quota numbers.....it's only freaking MAY! ARRGGHHH!!! It's going to be a long week.

Rebekah had 3 girlfriends in her daycare class - Macey, Nevaeh, and Taryn. She always played with them and talked about them, especially Macey and Nevaeh.

Uh . . . is that really Heaven backwards? That's . . . interesting. :lol: How do you pronounce that?

Hi Lisa, :wavey: Long time no see, where have you been?

Hey Becky! :wavey: I've been trying to survive the insanity that is my life, between work (which makes me bonkers) and trying to get Kevin the hell out of my house :lol:, and being mother to the busiest boy on two feet. I sneak on at work occasionally, and now I have a faster computer at home, so I should be around a little more. I hope so, anyway! :)

Hey Lisa! :wavey: I'm glad to see you're back, I've been worried about you :)

And I don't know how I have TOTALLY overlooked this thread in the past :dunno:

Uh . . . is that really Heaven backwards? That's . . . interesting. :lol: How do you pronounce that?

Yes, Heaven spelled backwards. It's "nuh-VAY-uh". Rebekah can't say it so she calls her "Rayah".

Hey Lisa! :wavey: I'm glad to see you're back, I've been worried about you :)

Thanks, Shanna! :) I'm fine, just buried under the avalanche that is my life. :lol:

Thanks, Shanna! :) I'm fine, just buried under the avalanche that is my life. :lol:

TOTALLY understand that :lol:

:) I'm fine, just buried under the avalanche that is my life. :lol:

This is good know that there are others. :nod: :lol:

I like your ticker Lisa. Looking forward to your emancipation to an awesome thing!

Ugh! I'm so stressed out! Here's a typical day:

5 am Wake up, take the dog out and feed her, shower, get dressed
6 am Leave for work (I may or may not see Nathaniel before leaving)
6-7 pm Come home; cook dinner, play with Nathaniel, straighten up
8 pm Put Nathaniel to bed
If I'm lucky, I can relax a bit until I go to bed around 9:30.
My DH is a wonderful man but a complete slob. I feel like I spend all evening cleaning up after him (for example, he'll do the dishes but leave the pots and pans). I have to remind him to do the few chores that are actually his. It drives me crazy! And he sees no problem watching 2 hours of tv per night while I'm running around like a maniac.
Furthermore, I'm moving to Baltimore in 6 weeks with my son but without my DH (no, we're not splitting up - I got a fantastic opportunity to train at Hopkins for 2 years). I can't even think of all the things I need to get done before I move. It's too overwhelming!
On top of all of that (yes, there's more), I recently had a chemical pregnancies after doing infertility treatments. My cycles are a mess and I'm a completely hormonal lunatic.

Amanda

Oh, I did I mention that I'm working 4 weekends in a row??? (last weekend was the 1st of 4).

Amanda

On top of all of that (yes, there's more), I recently had a chemical pregnancies after doing infertility treatments. My cycles are a mess and I'm a completely hormonal lunatic.

:hug99:

congrats on the hopkins job! where do you live now? how often will you see dh? (did you post he was a dr. too? i can't remember)

eta: well duh i could look in your profile line to see where you are :lol:

Thanks Kim! Yes, Tom's a dr too. We'll see each other almost every weekend. My 1st year I'll be in a research lab so I'll have weekends off. Thankfully it's only 3.5 hrs from NY to Baltimore.

Amanda

How is everyone doing? Its been quiet in here! Its almost Friday!!

One.....more....day..... :mope:

I don't know why I am getting excited... I am working OT on Sunday so I will only have a one day weekend... :mope:

I'm dragging butt today, and just not happy to be at work. It's bad when the place you spend most of your waking hours at just makes you tired. :dead:

:( I have to be here Saturday.

Ah, Jeni, that sucks. I'm sorry. :hug99:

Jeni~ I am sorry! Just know your not the only one working this weekend!

I'm sorry to all those who have to work this weekend. :(

Tomorrow is a vacation day for me, so I'm pretty excited :lol: I'm having a hard time getting anything done today, though... our office ran out of COPY PAPER this morning and we didn't get any until about 30 minutes ago :jawdrop:

Can Friday please hurry up? I've done nothing but deal with ass clowns all day today! :tearhair: Alysia and Jeni, sorry you have to work on Saturday.

It's only for a few hours, but it still screws up my weekend :rolleyes:

our office ran out of COPY PAPER this morning

How the heck do you run out of copy paper?! :scratch: What, did no one see you were getting down to the last couple of packages in the last box? :lol:

I've done nothing but deal with ass clowns all day today!

:spit: Becky, that's too funny - can I add that phrase to my vocabulary?

I have a meeting with my manager at 3:30, regarding something on one of my accounts that needs to be fixed. Ugh. I'm getting tired of having a job that makes me feel stupid and incompetent at every turn, and that makes very little use of my education and background.

Can Friday please hurry up? I've done nothing but deal with ass clowns all day today! :tearhair: Alysia and Jeni, sorry you have to work on Saturday.

My husband uses this term all the time. No-talent ass clowns. Gotta love the movie Office Space. :)

Yes, Heaven spelled backwards. It's "nuh-VAY-uh". Rebekah can't say it so she calls her "Rayah".
Believe it or not, this was the #150 girls name in 2003. :disbelief

=====

Just checking in. I'm so up to my eyes in work that I tend to just check a few threads each day...and this clearly was not among them. :crazy: I'm working 16 hour days lately...egad. We have our user conference in 10 days, so it's expected/anticipated...but I'm tired!! Not that long on the weekends, but I do have to travel next Saturday. :(

I'm still here too :dead: We've closed out a HUGE case today, so that should help my workload :lol:

Count me in as another who's working this weekend.

Amanda

It's Friday......:woo: This week has been major busy for me. I had to train a few people, instruments breaking down, vendors coming for a visit...sooo much fun. :tongue2: Looks like everybody else was super busy, too. I actually had no problems catching up..what's up with that? :lol:
Sorry, Jeni, Alysia and Amanda, that you work this weekend.:hug99:

I know there may be a better place for this question, but since we are all working, I thought I might start here to see what others had to say.

Do any of you have a combined income that exceeds your parents or your ILs incomes? If so, how do you handle things like going out to dinner, gifts, etc?

Dh alone makes a lot more than my parents combined, and with my income, we are almost double theirs. They make decent wages and are getting buy just fine. We aren't rolling in the money by any means because we have my student loans and a much higher cost of living in our area than they do. It is just a little strange at times because I feel like they think we expect them spend as much on us as we do on them, and we don't. We try to pick up the tab for dinner when we can, and we cook for them when they come to visit so they don't have to pay for meals out. I figure they did a lot for me when I was growing up, and I should try to help them out now.

Anyway, just wondering if anyone else had this experience and how they dealt with it.

:banana: It's Friday!!!!!!!!!! :banana:

AliMarie ~ I haven't really been in that situation, so I can't say.

Ali~I wish :lol: No, I would like to actually "help" Our parents, but I think we all make the same, and we have to costs of children at home to take care of. I would say what you are doing should be enough. Have they ever mentioned the fact that you make more?

Do any of you have a combined income that exceeds your parents or your ILs incomes? If so, how do you handle things like going out to dinner, gifts, etc?


My DH and I make well over what my IL's make. I'm sure my DH makes well over what my FIL makes and my MIL makes barely nothing. Because I'm in sales, many years I have made more than they do combined. My mom is retired and is sitting on a nice nest egg and owns her home free and clear.

Dinner: we don't go out with them too often but we usually split the bill. My IL's are very proud people and will not allow us to pay for them. It makes me feel bad because they babysit for us and we would like to show them how much they are appreciated. My mom usually pays if we go out to dinner even though we fight her on it. It's something that makes her happy.

Gifts: Both our parents feel bad accepting large gifts so we tend to keep it low key. Every Christmas, we get my IL's a large gift certificate to our local performing arts center and they buy tickets to plays or concerts thru out the year. My mom is much harder to buy for. She is disabled and doesn't do much so we don't spend that much. It's usually pictures, books, home items, etc.

We aren't really in a position to help them out but if they needed money, we certainly would do what we could. Both parents have lots of equity in their homes where we do not. Our expenses are much higher because we still have small children.

We make more than my parents. I honestly don't know what my MIL gets from the pension that was left when her husband died but she owns a very expensive house that is paid for in full. We try to treat both sets to dinner when possible. Other times they treat us. Our financial situation isn't stellar (I have TONS of debt from med school) so that plays a big role. We definitely try to do nice things for all parents when possible!

Amanda

What a great start for new week!
No sleep.....our almost 2 year old decided to pull sorta an all-nighter. Boy, am I tired....:sleeping: DH said that it was 6:30...............OK............then DH again............oh crap...........look at your clock, it is 7:30...........darn........fell back asleep.............rushing to get the kids out............getting on the highway and guess what..........they are doing shoulder repairs.........major back-up..........driving an alternative route...............suck:crazy:

How is everybody elses Monday? :biggrin:

Do any of you have a combined income that exceeds your parents or your ILs incomes? If so, how do you handle things like going out to dinner, gifts, etc?


well, my dad is deceased. i alone make more than my mom, but her house is paid off (and worth big bucks), she's a silent partner in her family's business (which is real estate development) and she has my dad's annuity and their savings...so she ain't hurting :lol:. she pretty much works to keep busy...she's 61.

we don't talk to marc's mom and his dad is deceased.

Our combined income is much more than my parents. But we have alot more expenses, a huge house payment, less savings, more debt....so they pay alot of the time. And they are in a much better position to loan us money if we need it.

Our combined income is close to the same as my parents and well more than my husband's parents. That said, my parents also get several thousand a month from my grandmother b/c she would rather see us enjoy our inheritance while she is living rather than after she's dead. And their house and vehicles are owned free and clear. They pay probably 90% of the time. That said, we've only been out once or twice since the twins were born :lol: His parents, on the other hand, his dad is retired from the military and then a government job, their house is owned free and clear and MIL owns an alteration shop, so they're quite comfy :lol: They usually pay, the one or two times a year we see them.

It's Monday, I have tons of work to do, and my attention span is about as long as the life of your average fruit fly. :lol: After a weekend of tons o' tantrums, three head-butts, two falls off the bed (Julian), two rounds of night terrors (Julian), two early wake-up times, and one fall into a big piece of furniture (me), I'm fried. :dead:

And I can't imagine why I can't concentrate on work - it's not like I have anything going on in my personal life. Just the fact that Kevin is moving out on Friday after saying he wanted out over a year and a half ago, his stuff is everywhere, and he can't finish packing because his back has gone out (what good timing, huh?! :crazy: ). Oh, and the fact that motherhood is a contact sport.

Pass the tequila, please!!!

Oh my Lisa!! Sounds like a crazy weekend. I will happily pass the tequila!! :lol:

I had enough tequila this weekend to be able to spare you some :lol:

Our combined income is more than my mom b/c she has been retired for years and has a fairly small pension, but has a lot of investment income from the life insurance $$ from when my dad died and she remarried a man who has a good pension... they own their home and have no where near the expenses we have. My ILS are quite wealthy and do not have the kind of expenses we have, so we are not in a situation where we have more than anyone.

Today, our nanny told us she is moving to Colorado at the end of June to go to school full time... I am happy for her since she is 21 and only has a high school diploma, and I just think college is important for everyone... but I like her and my kids really like her, so I am also bummed... She has only been with us a little more than a year, but she is a very nice, trustworthy girl, and what a pain in the butt to have to find someone new! UGH!

I had enough tequila this weekend to be able to spare you some :lol:

Got a straw to go with that bottle? :lol:

I can't concentrate today to save my life. I might as well be at home for all the good I'm doing today. :crazy:

I am having concentration issues too :lol: I just can't get my butt motivated... its end of the month and I was off Friday.... I JUST CAN'T STAY AWAY!!! :lol:

Yeah, me too. I'm tired and unmotivated and now I have to write an email to someone who's not going to be too happy with what I have to tell them. Yay.

Brooke, I'm right there with ya - I've got a couple of phone calls to make where people aren't going to like what I have to say. I wish I could send e-mails, then at least they could digest what I'd said before they flew off the handle at me!

I am with you here. I am super motivated today........NOT :lol:
Pass that bottle, please. :drink:

And then send the bottle in NY for me.

Amanda

Tequila! Now that sounds good! When can Friday be here??? I have a date on Friday and I want to get going!:lol:

Other than that though...work is going well, crazy busy and only looking like it's going to be busier. Although my boss did ask if I wanted to go to New York City with him at the end of the summer. We are partnering up with a company there and we have to go and meet with them. So, I'm super excited about that!:banana:

A date, Robyn? :woo: sounds like fun! And New York sounds great too!

Lisa - they haven't responded to my email. So I'm waiting.

New Yort and a date.......yeah, sounds like fun.

I am super busy as usual :rolleyes: ..............sneaking some OUAL time here :devil:
Can't wait to get home to put out the presents...........my baby turned two today. :bawl:

That is awesome Robyn!!!

Robyn, that sounds great!

Brooke, I got voice mail, I'm waiting right there with ya.

Work - still no motivation, I look at what's on my desk and think, "you know, I really should take care of that," and then promptly ignore it. Could it be because Kevin is moving out on Friday? Gee, I can't imagine that my personal life could possibly be distracting me from my work. :lol:

A trip to NYC and a date??? Sounds too good to be true!!!
Not too bad a day yet...

Amanda

Our combined income is more than both sets of parents. My IL's are retired...their house is paid for and they have a nice next egg, but they are still on a very fixed limited budget. We usually pay when we go out, and we also send them on at least one trip a year.....last year it was two trips. They keep Abby for us in the afternoon so we feel as if we owe them.

My parents are a bit younger and my dad still has at least 10 years before he retires. My mom has always been a SAHM. My dad makes good money and they are very comfortable, but they also have one still in college and then one that is a junior in HS so they are still dealing with the expenses of that. I guess that is what happens when you basically have two families.......16 years apart..... :lol: You never catch a break :)

I've been slammed and I'm damn sick of it! I didn't get to even visit here yesterday. I'm getting ready to leave work now so I'm goofing off now.

Silke, :bday: to Kyle!

I spoke too soon. I didn't leave work until nearly 7pm.

Amanda

Thanks, Becky. :akiss:

So................does anybody have any special plans for Mother's Day? Is your DH going to pamper you? :biggrin:

David said that I won't need to do a thing......including the cooking. That'll be interesting. :lol:

Edited to add: Guys? Any special pamper plans? :awink:

:bighug: to everyone who worked late and was just overloaded yesterday!

Plans for Mother's Day? Ha. I'm sure it will be a day like any other. It doesn't help that Kevin's back is giving him fits - I can't even expect him to watch Julian for a couple of hours while I take a nap. I'd be surprised if I get a card. (I don't expect anything from Kevin since we are splitting up, but it would at least be nice if he thought to get me a card from Julian.) I think Julian should get his mama a gift certificate for a spa day. :lol: Kevin and I actually did talk about that, so we'll see if he follows through.

Mary's mom is coming in for the weekend, and Sunday is also Mary's birthday. If the weather is nice, we're thinking of having a picnic brunch. And the kids got her some great presents - although Joe gave her the Bob the Builder DVD 2 weeks ago so he could watch it :)

Dennis

No Mother's Day plans here that I know of. I haven't made any and Darren hasn't mentioned it. The most I did was say I wanted a new electric skillet for Mother's Day. We'll see what happens. I'm not expecting anything so I won't be disappointed.

We're celebrating mother's day on Saturday since DH works Sunday. My mom is going to come over and we're either going to Red Lobster for lunch that day or maybe going on an easy hike if it's nice. DH is talking of finding a sitter and having a date night, but we'll see.

I'm on call again this weekend. Bummer. My parents are leaving for London on Friday so we'll celebrate with my mom when they come back (my older brother lives in London).
Tom, Nathaniel, and I are having a nice dinner out on Saturday night. Sunday we're having lunch with my in-laws. I picked out my own gift so I know I'll like it! It's a beautiful bed quilt from Pottery Barn for when I move to Baltimore. It was wildly expensive and I fell in love with it.

Amanda

I think we are hosting my ILs for dinner on Mother's Day. :rolleyes: What fun that will be.......

:flower: Happy Mother's Day to all my fellow working mommas! :flower:

Thanks, Alysia! :bighug:

So how was everyone's Mother's Day?

It was Mother's Day???? :awink:

How was yours?

Oh, nothing special here. Just another day, just another meltdown during grocery shopping. :tearhair: :lol: Julian did get me a spa gift certificate, though - pedicure and massage, here I come! :aok:

Wow! Go Julian!!! :nod: He has good taste :awink:

Mother's Day was very nice. For the first time in years, we didn't do anything with MIL. :updown: My mom is upstate and we visited her last weekend. I also sent her flowers and chocolate. :)

So, I got to do totally what I wanted.

Jim made me breakfast, then we took the kids to the park.
At 1 PM I went for an hour walk with my 2 neighborhood friends. It was a beautiful day! :sunny:

For dinner, Jim made me filet on the grill. I got 2 cards from the kids, 1 from Jim and an audio book on CD. :up:

WELL .... I got to do what every mother wishes they could do on their *day* ...cut the front & back lawns, laundry, dishes, grocery shopping ... AH!!! to be a mother!! :lol:

Just a side note: Sat. night we went out for dinner to my choice of restaurant and then Sunday night I did get some very special favors from dh :awink:

i didn't get any offers for breakfast :(. (granted we went to a sushi buffet the night before and i ate like a drunken shogun warrior). i took tony to the supermarket at 7:30am :lol: we picked up donuts on the way home. the kids gave me 2 yankee candles, which i love. i'm not big on gifts for mother's day, etc. (plus we are going to florida in two wks).

anyway, we went to my mom's for the day. i hadn't seen my family in about 3 wks so that wasn't bad.

Mother's day was great! We went to Sonic for breakfast with the kids and that was lots of fun. We came home and did some yard work, which I didn't mind. It was a beautiful day and nice to be outside with DH and the kids. I got really spoiled as far as gifts go. I received a new set of dishes in a mexican theme along with a matching serving bowl, pitcher and two adorable margarita candles. I was queen for a day! Later, we met my IL's for a late lunch at Country Buffet. I ate horribly yesterday so today I'm in a carb coma! :lol: I haven't seen my ILs in weeks. I got a late bday present from them, $50 GC to Target. :woo:

It's going to be 75 in Denver today. I don't want to work.

DH did a GREAT job for Mother's Day. Let me sleep in late, cooked breakfast, played with the kids so I could sit and read the paper undisturbed, cooked dinner (marinated steak, my request). And he got me a new cell phone, which I had asked for, but desperately needed! It really was a nice day. :)

But now I'm back at work and I have so much to do I can't even see straight. I'm trying to keep a running To Do list, but it's so depressing to look at. I'm going to have to work on Wednesday (my sacred day-off-but-the-nanny-still-watches-the-kids day), because I have jury duty on Thursday. :dead:

Mother's Day was pretty good... I got to sleep in which was fabulous! We had gone out to dinner for our anniversary the night before, so we were out late and I was tired... then DH took the girls to the park for a couple of hours. After that, it was pretty much like every other Sunday... I took Courtney to Target, went to the grocery store... the girls napped at the same time and that was a great gift too.

DH did a GREAT job for Mother's Day. Let me sleep in late, cooked breakfast, played with the kids so I could sit and read the paper undisturbed, cooked dinner (marinated steak, my request). And he got me a new cell phone, which I had asked for, but desperately needed! It really was a nice day. :)


Stef, does he have a single (and equally considerate) brother? :lol: Sounds like a great day! Good luck with jury duty. Is it for a criminal case? If it is, let me know - as a former prosecutor, I can tell you plenty of things to say that should get you struck from the panel. :supergrin

Mother's Day was mediocre. I was on call so it started with a trip to the hospital. We then got to hang out with my in-laws (not my favorite people). Tom pretty much dropped the ball so I didn't really celebrate for myself at all. To add insult to injury, my beeper went off ALL night. Remind me why I do this???

Amanda

Mine was just like any other Sunday. I asked several times to be allowed to sleep in and that didn't happen. :rolleyes: Sure, DH got up and got Rebekah milk when she woke up at 7am but then they both got back in our bed and I ended up getting up by 7:30 to take a shower while DH snored.

Then we went to breakfast at the same place we always go. Then we had to hit the grocery store for dinner at my mom's that night. Then Rebekah and I painted a little while DH worked in the yard. We went to my mom's for dinner. And that was it.

I got one card, a balloon, and a little basket of pink flowers that Rebekah adores.

And Rebekah and I made this while we were painting (I painted her hand and then let her paint mine....

http://im1.shutterfly.com/procserv/47b5db28b3127cce91dd220de3ab00000015109AatWTZi5au (javascript:openSlideWin(1, '67b0de21b350d8fc2566', 24);)

I have a question/topic -

Has anyone ever gone to one of those places where you make up a bunch of dinners, freeze them when you get home, and then they are ready to prepare when you want them?

A place called Let's Dish (http://www.letsdish.net) just opened here and I went with my sister a couple weeks ago. Every month they have a menu and you can choose the meals you want to make when you register online. At first I thought it was kind of expensive - $155 for 8 meals, or $195 for 12 meals. But each meal serves 6 people and we split them into 2 when we made them up (the place let's you split them any way you want as you are making them). So we ended up with 13 meals, I think. We've eaten 3-4 a week for the past 3 weeks and so far I really like them.

The best part is that it saves me a TON of time! I come home and then entire main course is all packaged in one package and labelled with instructions. Most things take 30 minutes or so to make. No more searching for ingredients or cutting up veggies.

Anyway, I'm SO happy that I decided to spend the money and go. It's made my life so much easier! My mom and I are going to go again on June 18th. And I'm definitely going to go a couple times before the baby comes so I can have a bunch of easy meals in the freezer ready to go.

Stef, does he have a single (and equally considerate) brother? :lol: Sounds like a great day! Good luck with jury duty. Is it for a criminal case? If it is, let me know - as a former prosecutor, I can tell you plenty of things to say that should get you struck from the panel. :supergrin

:lol: He has one single one left, but he's just turned 30 and not nearly as considerate. :awink:

I don't know if it's for a criminal case, but I can tell you it's at the Superior courthouse. Does that help you any? Last time I went in for jury duty, they were sitting a panel for a drug case, but they filled it before they got to me. Whew! I'm bringing my copy of the Madeline Albright biography with me, but I was thinking maybe a true crime book would be better? :lol:

Brooke, I want to go to one, but the locations are all pretty far from me. I need more space in my freezer, too! :lol:

Brooke, that sounds wonderful. I will have to look into it :)

Brooke, I want to go to one, but the locations are all pretty far from me. I need more space in my freezer, too! :lol:

There are other companies who do the same thing in different areas. This is the first one close to me.

About the freezer - The day we came back with all the food, I went through my freezer. I found meat that was over a year old! Yuck! I threw alot away that day.

That place sounds neat, do they just have all the ingredients, and you make it?

That place sounds neat, do they just have all the ingredients, and you make it?

Yeah, they have everything set up in stations, like salad bars with bins and measuring spoons. Everything for a particular dish is at the station. The instructions are posted with each one. It tells you exactly what to put it in (freezer bags, aluminum foil, or aluminum containers), and how much of each ingredient. You can leave things out if you don't like them - like black olives or onions or whatever.

Then you take the bag to another area, put a label with cooking instructions on it, then wrap it up in plastic wrap and store it in their refrigerator until you are done each thing you registered for. Then you wash your hands and go on to another station. When you are done, you put everything in the cooler or laundry basket that you brought with you and take it all home.

It takes about 2 hours.

Brooke, I go all the time. I have been to www.dinneranddish.com (http://www.dinneranddish.com/) several times and just last week I tried a new one www.suppersolutionsinc.com (http://www.suppersolutionsinc.com/). It's a god send! I have mexican skillet chicken thawing for tonight.

We make it a girl's night out. A friend meets me, we do our thing and then head to a bar for a drink afterwards. :lol: We are such experts at it now, that we can make 12 meals in just about an hour. It's the best $185 we spend every month.

OK, that sounds really cool. Do places like that give low-carb options for meals?

Wow! That sounds great! Too bad there isn't anything like that around here :rolleyes: Hrmmmm.... maybe I should open one :awink:

OK, that sounds really cool. Do places like that give low-carb options for meals?

The one I just went to does have low-carb meals. They provide all the nutritional information for each meal as well. www.suppersolutionsinc.com (http://www.suppersolutionsinc.com)

Brooke, I want to go to one, but the locations are all pretty far from me. I need more space in my freezer, too! :lol:

There's a place in Milford. www.dreamdinners.com (http://www.dreamdinners.com) I've never been, but Kaari goes to the one in OR and swears by it.

There's a place in Milford. www.dreamdinners.com (http://www.dreamdinners.com) I've never been, but Kaari goes to the one in OR and swears by it.

i work 5 minutes from this place!!! who knew? :lol:


i'm not sure if they still offer it, but there was a company that you could order individual dinners from and they'd bring it to the office :aok: i can't find it on our intranet though.

i work 5 minutes from this place!!! who knew? :lol:


i'm not sure if they still offer it, but there was a company that you could order individual dinners from and they'd bring it to the office :aok: i can't find it on our intranet though.

In that case, would you mind popping over at lunch and whipping us up a few dinners? I always say I'm going to go, but it's "too far" in RI terms. :lol:

Shanna! :rotflmao:

If its 5 minutes from Kim, then it's a haul for me. I'm shocked there aren't any closer to Boston. A woman my DH works with has gone to one, but I think she went to the one in Milford.

So how would I search on Google to find one of these places in my area? :scratch: I'm just curious!

Shanna! :rotflmao:

If its 5 minutes from Kim, then it's a haul for me. I'm shocked there aren't any closer to Boston. A woman my DH works with has gone to one, but I think she went to the one in Milford.

ya, stef had to pack one of the dinners just to get to my house :lol:

So how would I search on Google to find one of these places in my area? :scratch: I'm just curious!

I've been trying to think of some key words to use but I can't. I wonder what these kinds of places are called.

There is one near my ILs house too. But, I think its pretty pricey.

:lol: Kim.

I tried a google search using "prepare dinners freezer" and found some. Here's some in Atlanta, sounds like they did a similar search: http://answers.google.com/answers/threadview?id=496078

I would LOVE one of these places, but I'm pretty sure my little town won't be getting one :rolleyes:

Yup... my town doesn't even have a Wal-Mart, McDonald's, Sonic, ANYTHING! There isn't even a grocery store that isn't a gas station :rolleyes:

There's one just a couple minutes from me but 1) I'm too cheap, 2) Paul stays home so I think he should be making dinner :lol: and 3) he's WAAAAY too picky and wouldn't eat anything they had :rolleyes:

Has anyone ever gone to one of those places where you make up a bunch of dinners, freeze them when you get home, and then they are ready to prepare when you want them?


I have been DYING to do this!! I just found one locally called Dinner Studio. I really want to try it, but need to get myself an extra freezer first. I think it will be particularly helpful once we have 3 kids!!

As for the cost... to me I'd pay a lot b/c we almost never eat "real" meals, because I just do not have the time to prepare them.

1) I'm too cheap,

To me, it's so worth it, given what it saves me in time, energy, and grocery bills.

DH wasn't too enthusiastic about going the first time. He thought it was alot of money. But since I do ALL the meal planning and cooking, I won that argument.

Luckily DH will eat almost anything, as long as it's edible and doesn't contain pickles, vinegar, or jalapenos. We have similar tastes, too.

Aha! You can search for places that do this at this site: http://www.makeandtake.com.

As I thought, only one freaking place in MA. Franchising opportunity, people!!

The one in Maryland isn't even listed yet! We do have to drive about 30 minutes to get there but I don't mind it. We drive that far for dinner some nights. That's what I get for being married to Darren. Nothing in Southern California is "just 5 minutes away" so he's used to driving. Plus, his work is 70 miles from home. An hour each way to some place is still "local" to him! :crazy: We've actually gone to VIRGINIA for dinner before.

1) I'm too cheap

Same with me!

I thought about going to Dream Dinners when I lived in WA- but DH doesn't eat beef or pork, which cuts out a lot of what they make there...

What we're doing now is a weekly recipe mailer (I posted it in Food and Recipes, but I'll post it here too, since it's good for working families :) ). The one we're doing is The Six OClock Scramble (http://www.thescramble.com) and there's another one called Saving Dinner (http://savingdinner.com)(which I think does have a low carb option, as well as a vegetarian option).

They basically e-mail you a weekly recipe plan (for a fee) that has a shopping list (coded by recipe, so you can cross things off if you decide not to make something) with recipes, and suggestions for side dishes, most of which can be on the table in about 30 minutes. We've been using it for about 6 weeks now, and really like it so far :)

Aha! You can search for places that do this at this site: http://www.makeandtake.com (http://www.makeandtake.com/).

As I thought, only one freaking place in MA. Franchising opportunity, people!!

I thought about that a couple of years ago when I first read about Dream Dinners... now they are popping up everywhere along with lots of copy cats... if only I were more of an entrepreneur!!! But, I am lazy, which is why I really need to go to one of these places!!! :lol:

I thought about going to Dream Dinners when I lived in WA- but DH doesn't eat beef or pork, which cuts out a lot of what they make there...

What we're doing now is a weekly recipe mailer (I posted it in Food and Recipes, but I'll post it here too, since it's good for working families :) ). The one we're doing is The Six OClock Scramble (http://www.thescramble.com/) and there's another one called Saving Dinner (http://savingdinner.com/)(which I think does have a low carb option, as well as a vegetarian option).

They basically e-mail you a weekly recipe plan (for a fee) that has a shopping list (coded by recipe, so you can cross things off if you decide not to make something) with recipes, and suggestions for side dishes, most of which can be on the table in about 30 minutes. We've been using it for about 6 weeks now, and really like it so far :)

I am WAY too lazy for this... this requires shopping, meal prep and planning! I'm all about things like Morningstar Farms and some frozen veggies :)

The one near me (well not really near, but near enough) is called Dinner Studio and they also provide a Personal Chef option where you can have the meals prepared and delivered to you for a little more... now, I am not THAT lazy, but it's a nice option! I really want to try their 1/2 session... you make 6 entrees, each with 6 adult servings (which in my house would last a LONG time) and it is $159... or start with the 6 entrees with 3 servings to an entree... $99.

I'm too cheap, 2) Paul stays home so I think he should be making dinner :lol: and 3) he's WAAAAY too picky and wouldn't eat anything they had :rolleyes:

When you think about it, it really is quite economical. To shop and prep for all these meals (think spices or things you don't normally buy, time to cut up ingredients) it really is a good deal. Plus my time is worth a lot more than $14 a meal. :lol: I've become such an expert that I can make 12 meals in about an hour. Also there are plenty of meals that I can split so instead of 12, I can end up with 18-20 meals.

Since Paul does stay home, he should be the one doing the cooking (he would probably expect it from you if you stayed home) or he should be signing up for a session. The nice thing about picky eater is you can add or take away any ingredient and customize each dish.

My Dh thought it was outrageously expensive the first time I went. Now days he asked when I'm going again as the freezer gets low.

Beatnikluv, you should look into a franchise for your area. It sounds like you would make a fortune!

When you think about it, it really is quite economical. To shop and prep for all these meals (think spices or things you don't normally buy, time to cut up ingredients) it really is a good deal. Plus my time is worth a lot more than $14 a meal. .
!

Exactly! This time I picked only things that I can split into at least 2 meals. So I'll come home with 16 meals for $155 - so like $9.70 a meal.

I can't cook at home for that price. When I was there last time I was wondering how they managed to keep their price so low. I guess they can buy in bulk.

There's a Super Suppers in Arlington (there are several of those in the Dallas area) and a Dream Dinners in Grapevine. I'm seriously thinking of trying it. Dream Dinners sounds like it has entrees that could more easily fit my eating plan, and if I get 24 meals out of 12 entrees (when it's just me and Julian, I reckon I can easily get that many, if not more), it will be cheaper than grocery shopping. :lol: So I'm thinking about trying it - how great would it be just to be able to pop a meal out of the freezer when I got home!

I'm seriuosly thinking about looking into a franchise - there is *NOTHING* like this here!

My friend and I just signed up to split a full session at Dinner Studio... you get enough for 72 adult servings, so we each get 36 servings... since we are splitting the session, it will be $119.50 for each of us. They supply EVERYTHING, so to me this is an incredibly cheap deal. I don't have to do any shopping, no planning, no prep work, limited cleanup, and I get to spend 2 hours with my best friend whom I rarely see. We're going on May 20. I am so excited.

and if I get 24 meals out of 12 entrees (when it's just me and Julian, I reckon I can easily get that many, if not more),

I split all of ours in half when i put them together and we still have leftovers. My sister and her DH split everything into 3 portions as they are making it!

I split all of ours in half when i put them together and we still have leftovers. My sister and her DH split everything into 3 portions as they are making it!

If that's the case, as little as I can eat now, with just me and Julian, I might get four meals out of each - that would REALLY be a deal! Twelve entrees at Dream Dinners runs about $200. If I could get four meals out of each entree, that would be about $4.16 each - no way can I grocery shop that cheaply. It's worth that much not to have to wrangle Julian to the grocery store! :lol:

I am thinking about asking my SIL if she wants to go with me sometime. :nod:

We do more take-out that I like to admit but this sounds like a nice alternative.

Amanda

What happened to everybody? Busy? :biggrin:

Any plans for the big day off this month?

Tres! :lol:

My husband is away for the whole week in Huntersville, NC, so I'm a single working mommy of 2 till Friday. :tearhair: I honestly have a great respect for single parents!! :bowdown:

Tonight I have to take my daughter to her swimming lesson AND my son will have to go with me. It will be a nightmare because he'll want to go in the pool. I don't know how I'm going to keep him distracted. UGH.

Plans for Memorial Day are to just head to Ocean City, NJ. :sunny: I hope the weather's nice!

My DH is traveling for a few days this week, and I really don't know how single mom's do it all the time. I am fine for a few days, but I sure respect them for doing it full-time.

I am super busy at work right now. We've got a huge acquisition project going on and its my first project that is 'mine', so I'm beyond busy :(

I wish they had those dream dinners in Jersey! We would def be getting them! They sound so delich!! (esp in the AM!)

Work is busy and I have been on the road this week more hours than I saw my son. :( He has a cough and a runny nose and I wish I could be with him right now. :(

BUT, we do have a four day weekend at the end of the month so I am soooo looking forward to that and going to my parents shore house and going out on the boat and hopefully nice enough to take Nick to the beach!

I'm busy trying to pack since we close on our home next Thursday. Then we're moving in with my parents for a month until we can close on our new house. So it's a bunch of packing, packing, and oh, did I mention packing? :) And calling to cancel utilities, finalizing the closing, and making sure everything's in order. And at night I so wish all the shows on TV were reruns! These season finales are killing me! How am I supposed to get any work done? :lol:

And work isn't any better. I'm creating a book of kids' puzzles--which doesn't sound too bad--but try creating about 220 of them, making sure they're different enough that they're not the same but similar enough that kids will enjoy them. :dead:

So busy. Beyond busy! I'm staffed on several projects, plus we're in major fundraising mode for the charter school I'm involved with (I'm treasurer of the Board). I'm still trying to leave the office by 5ish each day so that I can spend a little time with the kids before bed, but I really should be staying and working late.

Our big Memorial Day plans are to do a naked boot camp potty training with Emma. I'm not feeling good about it, though, since right now she is back to absolutely refusing to sit on the potty. I don't want to force her, but at the same time, she seems like she's going to be content to stay in diapers as long as she possibly can.

Busy here as well! One of my coworkers is out on maternity leave so we've had to pick up her work and juggle everything around.

We don't have any plans for the holiday weekend, just to enjoy some family time.

Busy busy!

We're having a big picnic on the Saturday of Memorial Day. We're going to have food and some games and who knows what else. And steamed crabs! YUM! I've been craving them for weeks now! I can tell that we're going to be having them alot this summer. Seems like the baby really wants them right now. :lol:

Work is actually really slow for me right now (spring/summer is our down time) but we just put our house on the market, so we have been trying to get it ready to show and we have our first showing tonight. :crossfing

No big plans for Memorial Day weekend, but hopefully I'll be packing :)

I've been swamped. Being a working mom is hard!! I don't know that I'll ever get used to this juggling act. At least school will be over in 3 weeks. That will help tons!!!

We're doing Sierra's 4th birthday party on Saturday of the long weekend. That's all we've got planned.

What's up with May? It's not even the end of the quarter? :scratch: I have been swamped myself.
No special plans for Memorial Day yet, but maybe we'll do a picnic and a canoe ride depending on the weather.

Brooke - those crabs sound yummy. I might have to come to Maryland for the holidays. :lol:

Lette - hang in there. :hug99: I don't know how those single working moms do it either. Whenever DH is gone for his national Guard two weeks training, I am so ready for a childless vacation afterwards. :lol:

D - a big hug!
And a big hug for all those movers. I hate moving. :biggrin:

Busy busy here too. The aftermath of our big systems conversion back in March... it just doesn't seem to be getting better, smoother etc etc...

No plans for Memorial Day as of yet but I am looking forward to spending the day with Brad and Genavieve!

Ugh!!!! I am still at work. It's 9:30pm and I have been here since 7:30am.

That stinks Silke! I hope you went home soon after that post!

I've been crazy busy at work this week! Tom and I are going to a medical conference in San Antonio on Friday. We're coming back Wed. Nathaniel will stay with my parents so it will be a mini-vacation for us as well. I feel a little bad b/c work has been SO crazy this week and I've barely seen him. Now I'm leaving him behind for a few days.
Memorial Day plans... Tom and I are both off which is a miracle in itself! I think we're going to spend some time with my parents and try to go sailing.

Amanda

No Memorial Day plans here - just hangin' out, and getting ready for Kevin to move on June 3.

Work makes me crazy. It drains my energy just to walk in the door. Ugh. :coffee:

Lisa, I know you're an attorney, and that you're working for a big bank, what kind of lawyering are you doing nowdays? :lol:

This thread lost some momentum... but I went to Dinner Studio with a friend last Friday... it was AWESOME!! I have a bunch of food in my freezer, had fun with my friend and enjoyed one of the meals tonight. I highly recommend!!

This thread lost some momentum...
Let's get it rolling again. :awink:

Since May apparently was work-overload-month, what exciting work has kept you away from OUAL?

... but I went to Dinner Studio with a friend last Friday... it was AWESOME!! I have a bunch of food in my freezer, had fun with my friend and enjoyed one of the meals tonight. I highly recommend!!
That sounds so good, Bonnie......now I just need a big freezer besides my little top freezer above the fridge. :lol:

Since May apparently was work-overload-month, what exciting work has kept you away from OUAL?

Well.. I'm basically the City Acquisitions Coordinator and we've had a BIG project just come online so I'm majorly hugely unbelievably busy :nod: And I'm tired, too.

Since May apparently was work-overload-month, what exciting work has kept you away from OUAL?

To answer my own question.......well, basically, we are understaffed and I keep getting more and more responsibilities. I am soooo glad that I am getting help soon. Our new employee is starting mid June. :woo:As many hours I have been spending there lately, sleeping over would be so much easier than dragging my tired butt out of bed every morning. :lol: Salary is just suck..........I am my boss' personal slave. :lol: I did manage to negotiate another day off............a 4-day weekend............ah, that'll be nice.

So how many work salary or do get paid OT?

I'm salaried but get comp time, so I guess it evens out. I got 9 hours comp time last week :rolleyes:

I'm salaried but get comp time, so I guess it evens out. I got 9 hours comp time last week :rolleyes:

Your week sounds just as good as mine. :rolleyes: I feel for ya! It's only Monday, and I am already worn out..........still from last week. :lol:

When you have to work extra hours or have to work late, how do you manage to buy groceries, get something to eat on the table, do laundry and on and on........... Mine is a loosing battle. And then I play catch-up on the good work weeks and end up just as worn out from the housework. :rolleyes: So when do we get a break? :lol:

I'm hourly. If I don't work, I have to use a vacation day or I just don't get paid. It sucks, especially since Maya's had rotavirus twice in the past month. Lots of time off there.

The thing is that I have asked to be put on salary but have always been turned down. I am the only person in the office who is hourly. The manufacturing guys in the shop are hourly too, but nobody else in the office is hourly except for me.

When Hurricane Lili hit a couple of years ago, we were off work for three days. We literally couldn't work. It was a %@#$ hurricane. The salary people got paid for the days we had off. The hourly people were told that unless we used our vacation time, we'd have to take those days unpaid. We couldn't have come to work even if we'd wanted to, due to there being a natural disaster going on outside, but we got docked for not working anyway. Classy.

May-August is my slow time, so I've been here, but just in other threads :lol: Work is so slow for me right now and it's driving me insane! :tearhair:

That sounds so good, Bonnie......now I just need a big freezer besides my little top freezer above the fridge. :lol:

Ditto! I've been bugging DH to buy a freezer for the basement, but first we need to clean out some space. :rolleyes:

I'm salaried, but since I work 3-4 days a week, they've translated my salary into a 'per-day' rate, and I submit a time sheet which indicates the number of days (or half-days) I work over a 2 week period. It can suck being salaried, b/c you don't get paid for any overtime (and when I was FT, boy did I do a lot of that!), but there are some benefits to it as well.

I've got a few projects all going on at once, which is keeping me hopping. I've got a client who wants to do a refinancing, a client that wants to sell his company, and a newsletter that we want to put out that somehow falls in my lap. Oh, and today I'm doing all kinds of analysis and charts to prove to a third client that the acquisition they want to do just can't be done. No matter how many times they ask us. :rolleyes:

When I have to work late, thankfully DH usually is there to step in. Sometimes we'll ask our nanny to stay a little later, which is generally not a problem. I've also outsourced as much as we can afford, so we have a housecleaner every other week. I pretty much don't do any housework in between, just b/c I don't have the time!

Ditto! I've been bugging DH to buy a freezer for the basement, but first we need to clean out some space. :rolleyes:

We finally cleaned out our garage last week in prep for the freezer... We just both took an afternoon off work... It still needs a little work, but it is SO much better! I just got the smallest chest freezer, 5.0 cubic feet I think... it is perfect... it doesn't take up too much room, isn't too much $$ and has good enough storage for us.

Since May apparently was work-overload-month, what exciting work has kept you away from OUAL?
No exciting work really, though we did have some meetings on a potentially big case last week... I just cannot get on as much as I'd like and it is nearly impossible to get on at home.


So how many work salary or do get paid OT?
I'm salary.

I've been away on vacation then when I came back I had to finish up a big project. Then DH's grandmother died so we had to to fly to FL on Friday and I'm just getting back and settled.

I am salaried - in my case, TG! :nod:

We finally cleaned out our garage last week in prep for the freezer... We just both took an afternoon off work... It still needs a little work, but it is SO much better! I just got the smallest chest freezer, 5.0 cubic feet I think... it is perfect... it doesn't take up too much room, isn't too much $$ and has good enough storage for us.
I wish I had a garage or a basement (Stefanie)...no such luck. We seriously need a bigger house, but with the prices skyrocketing, I don't see that happening soon. We do have a shed, but I am scared to go in there. That's DH's territory and only enter it on your own risk. You are most likely going to be bushwacked by a shovel or something. :lol:

I've been away on vacation then when I came back I had to finish up a big project. Then DH's grandmother died so we had to to fly to FL on Friday and I'm just getting back and settled.

I am salaried - in my case, TG! :nod:
So sorry about your DH's loss.

Back on the phone with Brazil. This guy is driving me nuts asking questions I cannot answer and then translating all of my answers to a guy who doesn't speak English. He really needs to talk to someone else but that person isn't here. I'm banging my head on my desk right now.

I am getting REALLLLLLLLLY sick and tired of my work screwing us around :banghead:

I am hourly so I get paid OT when I work late or work weekends. (As long as I haven't used any vacation or sick time within the same week)

I'll have to go back and read. I've been so busy, I don't know if I'm coming or going. :crazy: :lol: Hopefully I can actually post soon, and hopefully I can get off this phone call so I can LEAVE!!!!

Lisa, I know you're an attorney, and that you're working for a big bank, what kind of lawyering are you doing nowdays? :lol:

No lawyering at all, I'm a trust officer. :lol:

Ahh... I know how interesting that can be :lol: I do *TONS* of Probate/guardianships with one of our banks :nod:

I am soooo in Friday mood. I am off tomorrow. 4-day weekend coming up.......ahhhh :ura1:

Those of you who eat breakfast, do you eat at work, on the way or before you leave?

If you eat at work, what do you eat?

I'm kinda sick of my oatmeal every morning :dead:

Ugh, I wish I ate at home, but I don't usually have time by the time I get the kids fed and dressed - I would if I got up even earlier, but who wants to do that? - so I usually grab a pop or coffee and something to eat on the way to work and eat at my desk.

Just finished off my morning bagel and am still working on my coffee. I pretty much eat a bagel with either butter or jelly every morning. My coffee choice depends on the season- hot if the weather stinks, iced if it's nice out. I haven't had an iced coffee all month, I don't think.... :(

I usually have a cup of oatmeal (with a hershey kiss in the middle :blush1: ) and a diet sprite.... Its getting a bit boring, though.

We have breakfast before we get the kids up. I can't function without breakfast.

2 days a week when going into one of the offices, I stop and pick up an earl grey tea and a fruit parfait (granola, yogurt, strawberries & blueberries). The other days I'm at another office and I grab a coffee first thing and then either buy a muffin or eat a granola bar that I bring from home.

Sometimes I eat on the way and sometimes I eat after I get here and sometimes I dont eat at all. :lol:

I usually grab a Quaker breakfast bar to eat in the car and occasionally go down to Einsteins or the coffee shop near by for a bagel or yogurt/fruit/granola cup. I almost never eat at home.

I eat when I get to work; during the winter I have been having 2 slices of cinnamon raisin bread with a cup of hot chocolate.

Anyone have plans for the long weekend?

I always make my kids breakfast. Its important, especially for my school age child, she can't think straight without some morning protein. My toddler can have breakfast at daycare but cereal or pop tarts is not what I would call breakfast. I always make eggs of some fashion, scrambled, omlettes, poached or my favorite, egg muffins. I need to eat breakfast too, so it's must at our house. If I'm late for work, tough....my kids need a good breakfast.

We have several parties to go to this weekend and we are taking my mom out to dinner for her 69th :eek: birthday!

I always eat breakfast before I go to work. Usually oatmeal with some fruit. First thing I do when I get up is put a bowl of oatmeal in the microwave to cook and turn on the coffee pot. Then get dressed and packed up. Then go eat my breakfast. I usually drink a cup of coffee at home and take a big cup to drink on my way in. I get up before everyone else at the house, so I just have to take care of me before I leave.

Man Becky! Will you come make breakfast at my house? My daughter only goes to daycare twice a week but their breakfasts are usually pretty good. Cereal and fruit or eggs and pancakes. The rest of the week she is at my ILs and I know they feed her well!

And Happy Birthday to your mom!!

I eat breakfast at work with my colleagues. It's free so why not!
We don't have much planned for the weekend. Tom and I are both off which is a small miracle.

Amanda

And Happy Birthday to your mom!!

Thanks Alysia. I never thought of my mom being so old!

Have a great weekend everyone.

Happy Friday everyone! Have a good weekend!!

Breakfast - Julian usually gets a cereal bar in the car (Nutri-Grain or the Target brand equivalent :lol: ), and he also usually eats whatever they have at daycare. Me, it's hit or miss. Sometimes I have a protein shake, sometimes I have actual breakfast food, sometimes I have a mocha latte from Starbucks, and sometimes I have chocolate chip cookies. :blush: :lol: Every once in a great while I manage to get up early enough to actually cook something for myself, like oatmeal (I'd give some to J, too, but he won't touch it). I wish I had more time to fix breakfast in the mornings, but I already get up at 5:30, I'm not getting up earlier just to eat. :lol:

No big weekend plans yet, although I might have a date sometime this weekend. :)

Spill it about the date, Lisa!!!

Yeah yeah!! Tell!! :lol:

What, y'all want to know about my little old date? :lol: Fair enough, although it may be more interesting to talk about it after I've gone out. :supergrin I've been talking to a guy, who we'll just call T, via e-mail and phone since the beginning of April. We've had lots of interesting conversations, and I really enjoy talking to him. About a week ago now, he was downtown for an interview, and called and asked if I wanted to go to lunch. We did, and had a nice time. I figure any lunch that ends with me getting a hug and a kiss on the cheek can't have gone too badly. :supergrin

Anyway, he's asked me to go to a movie this weekend. We're going out on Sunday evening, and I'm looking forward to it. I did warn him, though - I haven't been to an actual movie in so long, I might not know how to behave. :lol: So we'll see how the night goes!

Good luck on your date Lisa :lol:

:dude: (thats my new favorite smilie) That is *SO* awesome, Lisa!!! What are you going to go see? BTW, I have a friend in Dallas that may need to come visit you for some bank stuff :nod: I'll PM you later about it :)

Thanks, y'all! I'm a bit nervous, which seems silly, seeing as how we've already met in person and talked about all sorts of things. But I guess a date at night is a little different than lunch - feels more like an "official" date, if that makes sense. Of course, I'll pop back by and update, let y'all know how it goes. Probably not until Monday night, though - I'll be late getting in tomorrow (we're going to the 7:30 showing o