SAHD Week: Day 2

So here we are. Day 2 of SAHD week, which is anything but sad. It's not sad, but it sure is tiring. I think Mommy put it best today when she saw me looking completely drained around 3pm. "It's tiring when your brain doesn't work all day right?" It was a funny thing to say, and could even be seen as an insult to stay at home parents all over, but it's true. At least in our case.

You would think we had nothing to be tired about. Mommy passed out last night around 10:30pm, and I fell asleep shortly after (with the Yankees game on) around 11:30pm. We both slept the night until Kaylani woke us up around 7:30am. Do the math and it means we got 9 and 8 hours of sleep respectively, which for me, is more than I would get if I was working. The morning went by quickly with breakfast (blueberry pancakes) and then some play time before nap time (which thankfully was much easier today with Kaylani falling asleep after 20 minutes). During nap time, we met with a basement contractor to see about getting things finished (hoping to make a decision and get ourselves a basement before her 1 year birthday).

Conveniently, Kaylani slept the entire visit and right up until it was time to meet Sonia and Aadi for lunch before Gymboree class. Gymboree was a lot of fun, with Kaylani crawling and walking (with our help) up and down some padded mats/ramps/toys, and wasn't that tiring since she clung to us for awhile instead of running off by herself. After class, we made a quick trip to Whole Foods, and then it was home for a yogurt and a nap. Thankfully again, Kaylani went down like a log and nap time was on. That's when Mommy made the "tiring without the brain" comment to me.

Looking back on it, we really hadn't done that much. We stayed at home, Kaylani napped once, we drove to a few places to have lunch and errands, and then that was it. It was 3:30pm and I was exhausted. Normally at work, it'd have to be a really tough day for me to be wiped out by 3:30pm (or a really bad day). At work, I could be in meetings, on the phone, writing a presentation, or digging through data for hours on end, and I'd still truck on through until 5 or 6pm without a problem. Sure I'd be pretty tired when I got home, but today was a different type of tired.

I think it comes down to being the type of person that can handle being a stay at home parent, or stay at home anything for that matter. Maybe I'd get used to it over time, but so far, 2 days has not been enough to adjust to being a stay at home dad. Again, I love spending the time with Kaylani and Mommy, but I just don't think I'm cut out for it. Mommy didn't think she was cut out for it either, but she's much better at it (or much more used to it). What I'm trying to say is, kudos to all of you stay at home people out there. And to Mommy especially, thanks for doing what you do. Kaylani and I both appreciate it more than you'll ever know!

Just A Great Day

Today was a great day. That pretty much sums it up. Good night!

Just kidding. I would never leave a post that short. Even on a Saturday. But today really was a great day. Kaylani slept 9 hours last night which meant our (read: Mommy's) day started a little bit after 6am. After a nice family breakfast (cooked by yours truly), we took a ride around town to see if Kaylani would fall asleep before Daddy had to go to his baseball game (which of course she didn't).

Mommy and Kaylani watched my game today which is always a fun treat. What made it even better was that we won again! That makes 2 straight, which in the sports world, is what we call "a streak." We won the game convincingly 8-4, but that doesn't mean I didn't have a few panic attacks. But this time, the panic attacks were when foul balls went towards the area of Mommy and a sleeping Kaylani. I kept having visions of the ball crashing through her sun protector hood and hurting her, but luckily, no ball landed closer than 10 feet. Phew.

To celebrate the victory, we went on some errands to get ready for Daddy's big cooking adventure tomorrow, which is more commonly known as Mother's Day. Kaylani helped out by falling asleep while Daddy was wearing her in the Baby Bjorn, which made the whole day just seem like it was working to our plan. After a quick bath for Kaylani while Daddy fired up the BBQ, we were all ready for dinner.

So here we are getting Kaylani ready for bed and it's only 7:15pm. There was nothing really special about today, but it was just a great day. Hopefully Kaylani will sleep real well tonight because we've got a busy day tomorrow. After all, it'll be Mommy's first Mother's Day, and that's never going to come around again as a first so we're going to make it special. We're planning on having 2 great days in a row. And in the parenting world, that's what we call "perfect."

You need to be committed

You need to be committed if you're going to have a baby, and I don't mean mental institution committed (although for some people, that may be the case). But having a baby does take a real commitment because they consume so much of your time and energy. If you're head or your heart aren't in it 100%, then there's a chance that things won't go that well for you.

We're completely committed to Kaylani and would do anything for her. Today, we ran a bunch of Kaylani errands, which are slightly different than our normal errands. And since Kaylani slept until 10:30am (after waking up at 6am initially), we got a late start heading out the door. But after a long stop at the bank to open her own savings account (she now has more money then we do!), and lunch, we decided to head to IKEA to find things for her new playroom.

If it was just us running errands, there probably would have been a good chance that we called it a day after lunch and avoided the 35 minute drive out to PA. But we did it because we had to take advantage of a free weekend, and also because Kaylani deserves a nice playroom. So 3 hours later, we were headed back towards home finally (empty handed, but with some great ideas).

We've also been committed to our sleep training, and have avoided picking her up and rocking/bouncing her to sleep lately and I think it's finally paying off. She typically falls asleep on her own pretty quickly, and then when she wakes up in the middle of the night or the morning, she'll just stay quietly in her crib and sometimes falls back asleep.

And lastly, Daddy has been committed to his weight loss goals. At exactly 2 weeks after his Doctor told him to lose 18lbs, he's lost 10lbs already, and is going strong after the remaining 8. Without Kaylani, it's hard to say if I would have been this committed towards losing the weight (especially this quickly). But that's what Kaylani does for me. She has me committed...which is different then her having me committed, which won't be for many years I hope.