Maternity leave ends today, with mixed emotions. I really enjoyed the fourth trimester and feel like we’ve gotten the divine miss M off to a great start. She continues to be an easygoing baby—I’m sure part of that’s ‘having’ to go with the flow in light of her older sister’s needs, as well as benefiting from more laid-back parents. She doesn’t quite need the maintenance that little she-who-is needed, but perhaps it’s just that we had the time, energy and focus to maintain her.

This weekend was a wonderful end to maternity leave. We took advantage of the beautiful weather and went to the Cherry Blossom Festival. Someday when the kids are older we’ll Metro it, but this time we drove, which was a pain until we found the lot at L’Enfant Plaza and then everything went smoothly. M napped in her stroller, and C enjoyed the fountains at the FDR memorial. By the way, if you haven’t visited that memorial, with its large stone “rooms” and inspiring quotes engraved thereon, you should go, especially if you have a keen sense of irony.

"I see one-third of a nation ill-housed, ill-clad, and ill-nourished. The test of our progress is not whether we add more to the abundance of those who have much; it is whether we provide enough for those who have too little."

"We must scrupulously guard the civil rights and civil liberties of all our citizens, whatever their background. We must remember that any oppression, any injustice, any hatred, is a wedge designed to attack our civilization."

But I digress.

The serendipity of the day came on the way back to the car, as we were passing a series of fish markets and restaurants none of us had ever seen before. And whaddya know? We had a small cooler tucked into M’s stroller that had held our lunch! So R ran down to pick up some fresh seafood, and we had shrimp and grits for dinner. C enjoyed the shrimp but not the grits. We’ll have to work on it.

I am assembling various provisions for having M at the church with me—diapers, changes of clothes, toys, swing, nursing pillow, pilates ball (the better to bounce her to sleep with), and various and sundry. The current schedule is:

Monday: work from home
Tuesday morning: staff meeting, M with me
Tuesday afternoon: Church Saint will pick her up and watch her at her house while I work
Wednesday morning: C’s Morning with Mommy
Wednesday afternoon: M at the church with me
Thursday morning: TBD. I teach every other week, so I’m wondering whether another Church Saint might watch her at the church?
Thursday afternoon: work from home, with Retired Office Manager watching M
Friday: off

By the way, everybody needs someone like Retired Office Manager in her life (maybe she needs a new moniker). Not only did she watch M last week, but during M’s naps she threw a couple loads of laundry into the washer, unloaded the dishwasher, and brought us a delicious dinner on Friday. I am in awe. I have issues with receiving gifts from people—don’t always feel deserving, feel like I should be able to handle my life without any help. I suppose being a mom, and a mom who works, has helped me get over that somewhat.

And since this is a virtual baby book entry, here’s a list of M’s latest activities:
• She is grasping objects now. Look out earrings!
• She is almost laughing. She smiles big and kicks her whole body. Adorable.
• She loves sitting up, so we got her aBumbo chair. Also enjoys the exersaucer, although that’s for four-month-olds so we don’t keep her in it for too long.
• She is drooling like a champ.
• She seems to be dropping one feeding during the day, although which feeding has varied depending on what’s going on.
• Sleep: with Retired Office Manager she sometimes slept a couple hours at a time, but now she’s back to her eat, awake, sleep 45 minutes schedule. At night: 9 hours. Blessed be.
• She’s still doing the cup. We haven’t tried the bottle recently and probably won’t. Why bother now?

I’ll do a separate post for C sometime soon. M’s waking up!