9 Months

For the first time since Isabel was born, I didn’t take her picture on her month anniversary. She went to daycare Tuesday morning without her 9 month birthday even being acknowledged. By the time I got home in the evening, she was in bed or nearly there anyway.

There is so much about her growing up that I’ve forgotten already. I can’t remember the day I first felt a little tooth against my skin, though I know it happened. I can’t remember how old she was the day she finally opened her mouth to accept a spoonful of yoghurt. I can’t remember how long it’s been that she’s been babbling, talking her own little baby language. She’s growing so fast and I feel like I’m failing at documenting it properly for the days when a toddler takes her place and I want to look back on the baby that she was. 

I take comfort in knowing that this is the way it’s supposed to be, that the person she is becoming will always be worth celebrating over the person that she was. So, let’s talk about who she is today. 

She’s a napper. A consistent, twice-a-day napper. 

She’s open and friendly with everyone, but saves her best smiles and cuddles for the faces she sees on a regular basis. 

She’s an adventurer, willing to lean just a little too far forward to reach new boundaries, even when it means falling flat on her face. 

She’s an animal lover, bursting into peals of joyous laughter at the sight of Pekoe across the room. 

She’s smart. She’s needy. She’s independent. She’s curious. She’s bright. 

And she’s growing way too fast. 

Pumping Tidbits #6

Two more weeks left of school. It’s time to focus, refocus, write papers, complete research, check off the final bits of group work.

I was recently approached by a mom-to-be who had been accepted into a masters program. She wanted to know what my experience had been like. My response was a bit disjointed, a stream of random thoughts about this crazy journey I’ve chosen to send myself on. By the end of it, I felt like I had represented these past 7 months in a very negative way. 

Except that I don’t feel negative about it at all. I’m quite proud of what I have set out to do and what I have accomplished despite sleep deprivation and distraction. This is what I actually meant to say:

It’s hard. 

So, so hard. 

There will be days when you want to give up. 

There will be days you want to drop-kick your breastpump off the balcony of the student lounge. 

There will be days you can’t handle your baby’s crying at bed time because you have three papers due soon and time seems to be slipping through your fingers. 

There will be days when you sob over the grade you receive on a paper because you did the best you could with the mental resource you had and barely scraped by with the minimum. 

But there will also be days that are good, great even. Days that seem perfectly split between happy baby giggles and nap time productivity. Days filled with conversation about the direction you’re headed in. Days filled with new information, bits of research and reading that get you excited about what you’re studying and where it may take you. 

If this thing you want to do is important to you, you can do it. 

You will be happier for it. 

Your family will be happier for it. 

(Your house, on the other hand. It might be a little messier for it.)

Pumping Tidbits #5

I used to think it wrong to knit in class. Then, I stopped sleeping through the night every night and started dozing with my eyes open through every lecture. Now, I bring a sock to every class, a simple pattern, and a sharper mind. 

I just hope my professors don’t mind. 

Pumping Tidbits #4

On my way here, to my weird little room off the 8th floor bathroom, I saw a woman and a stroller head toward the iSchool’s elevators. Was she a student? A professor or one of the library staff on maternity leave? She was gone too fast to ask, but I wanted to, I really did. 

This gig can be so lonely. There are school friends. There are mom friends. I love them both. But I also wish I could have just one school mom friend. 

Pumping Tidbits #3

Yesterday was my birthday. I’m never very good at celebrating it. Maybe that’s because it comes right after February, in all its grey bleakness. Maybe I’m too tired and too cold to care enough about the day. This year, I kept forgetting that it was coming. There’s too much else going on I my life to spend much time thinking about another year passed.

Yesterday, I hermited, stayed home, did some work, spent some time knitting, spent some time watching Isabel learn to push herself backwards across the slippery floor. I spent the evening with my parents, the husband and the baby, eating good food, chatting about all the things going on in our lives. It was the perfect, normal day, polished off with two thick slices of birthday cake. 

Perhaps I should explain these posts. I have very little time to blog lately, but I miss sharing bits of my life. I’ve been spending a lot of time pumping breastmilk for my daughter on the days she goes to daycare, and there’s not much I can do while I sit in the breastfeeding room at my university. These short posts are composed during those 20 minutes or so. Hence, Pumping Tidbits.

The state of this blog is still under question. 

Pumping Tidbits #2

There is one month to the end of this semester. A summer of being nothing but a parent stretches before me. Almost five months, just for me and Isabel. 

What am I going to do with myself?

No papers to worry about. No group assignments to juggle. No pump to lug around, no pumping sessions to squeeze in. 

Maybe it will be the start of things. The start of getting my body back. The start of sleeping through the night. The start of mobility and toddlerhood. 

Maybe I won’t be so exhausted all the time. 

Maybe I’ll get bored. 

Maybe I’ll be lonely. 

Maybe I’ll knit every day. 

(Oh, wait. I already do.)