Getting Things Done
Well, the last few days have been pretty full and are actually starting to be productive. Monday was kind of a bust in terms of the going places component, but in terms of networking and making necessary telephone calls, I almost made up for that. That and, it couldn't be helped. Poor Candice, not elaborating because I think she posted about it with protected status, but long story short, I was going to visit with her, bring her a woven wrap carrier, show her how to use it, hang out, then go from there to Wegman's to do some shopping, and then come home. Due to forces completely beyond her or my control she wasn't home then and so I canceled my rides. For those who don't know how our lovely Para Transit works, or any paratransit for that matter, as most are pretty restricting in their day-to-day use and operation, you cannot change your rides the day of "I was going from point A to point B, could you take me to point C instead?" If you cancel the same day you get a penelty which is of course counted against you, if you get more than 10 in a rolling 6 month period, you are suspended for 2 weeks, if it happens again you can be dropped from service all together, and, such sweet people as they are each round trip counts as 2 rides, 2 penelties. The good news is that Candice was able to let me know that I wouldn't be able to drop by on Monday, on Sunday evening, which is a really good thing because if you cancel before midnight of the day your ride is scheduled for you will not be pennalized for a late cancelation. It's unfortunate,, but it's really no big deal, and the important thing is that what prevented Candice from having me over on Monday is resolving it's self now and things should be just fine quite soon.
So, having plenty of advanced notice, I decided to make yesterday the day of calls. I made, erm, haven't counted yet, let's see:
Strong Midwives Practice,
Strong Blood Lab,
DHS/Medicaid Office,
Target,
Walmart,
Liftline,
Liftline again,
Liftline a third time,
Our couples counsilor,
The Eastman Community Music School,
The Bayview YMCA,
Bright Raven Gymnastics,
Jim's mother,
Amanda,
Jim, 1, 2, 3 times,
Bridgitte, homebirth midwife who also provides well-woman care,
in no particular order, 18 calls, some of them quite lengthy.
Today I took liftline from home to the blood lab, had blood drawn, went upstairs and snagged a blank form for renewing my Medicaid from the appointments window of the Strong MidWives Group, they had their resident social worker run 1 up for me, then I took Liftline to Wegman's to do some grocery shopping, then returned home.
Jeremy really loves to help me put groceries away, he'll grab one thing at a time, bring it to me, then we'll talk about what it is, then I'll put it away and he'll get the next thing. It's not the most efficent system, but Jeremy loves it, it is building muscular strength, math skills, vocabulary and giving him a foundation of enjoying being helpful and part of a household team. I know I know, I'm talking like an early childhood educator. Can't be helped, that's how I think most of the time, how I try to think all of the time when I am mindful of it. Usually it's a bit of a pain in the butt to guide him through this process, but I have this disgusting painful as hell congestion in my head and every time I bend down my head goes from a 2 of barely perceptable discomfort to about a 6 of "Someone please make it stop" pain." So, Jeremy picking up the groceries out of my reusable shopping bags way down there on the headache inducing floor and bringing them from the livingroom to the kitchen for me was rather nice.
I had the nicest lady at the lab today, she's black, youngish, has an excellent sense of humor and is quite good at taking blood. She's never rolled a vain, also, it will always prick a bit, but the discomfort is really minimal when she handles the neadle. She's only ever seen me with Jim in there, quite a lot lately, and this was the first time I've come in alone, and I was curious if shhe would be overly careful, cilisitous or anything, and she was just perfect. No condesention, same jovial self, and a really pleasant person to start my day out talking with.
I was a little worried that picking up the form from the Strong Midwives would be a touch ackward, since I switched to recieving my well-woman care from Bridgitte Rhody, 1 of 2 excellent home-birth midwives in Rochester who also provide well-woman care. It was a bit of a, well, not a faux pas exactly, but not especially kuth to come to them for the form I needed, but I don't really care. Their social worker had a copy of the form I needed, and I was already in that building, getting my blood drawn, and Jinnie, mom's volinteer reader is coming this evening, so she could help me with it , therefore I needed it today. But, they didn't seem to notice anything amiss. They just said hi, got me the form, end of story. I mean, they didn't coo over Jeremy, but they see so many newborns in their line of work, on a daily basis, that I guess toddlers don't register on their cute-o-meeters anymore.
Wegman's went pretty well also. I had a nice assistant, she stocks shelves, does Helping Hands, and is a cashier, so down-to-earth, but plenty intelligent, flexable and really pleasant to work with. I noticed that more and more our lists are heavy on the produce, bakery, deli, Nature's Market, butcher and dairy sections, with less and less in the paper products, prepared foods, canned foods and frozen foods sections. It was especially blatent today when I got only 3 or 4 items in the second group of sections I mentioned and all of the rest from the first. It feels really good. I mean, we don't eat all organic yet, and we're far from perfect or home grown, but more and more we are shopping more fresh, more local and doing more home-made things with our meals and other purchases. Jeremy took a 30 or so minute nap at Wegman's, so I don't know if he'll go down for a nap today or not, but I'll give it a try.
I'm going to clean the microwave next, then take a shower then try rocking Jeremy. Olivia, one of his favorite shows is coming on now, so that should keep him busy long enough for me to do the microwave and shower without him getting too upset or reeking too much havik on the house. I've made a resolution that has 2 parts to it. First, I'm going to pick one thing and clean it top-to-bottom every day, so that as I go I really feel like things are being made clean, not just spot cleaned. In the mean time I'll spot clean the other things not on the individual day's adgenda, and wipe up messes as they happen so they won't get out of hand. But, if it's not on the list for the day, I won't stress about getting it perfect. I'll do the microwave today, tomorrow I will do the stove and the front of the oven. Cleaning out the oven I need to research further as it's a self cleaning oven and I want to figure out what I need to do to prep it for that, after it's finished and while it's cleaning it's self. Secondly, I am going to make 1 home made dish every day so that I don't resort to buying commercial doughnuts or pie or cookies when i need a sugar fix, or frozen, canned or boxed meals when I'm too tired to cook something complicated. Today I'm doing an Old Fashioned Gingerbread recepie from Ina Gartin, one of my favorite Food Network chefs. I'll journal briefly about it tonight, what the recepie was, what if any substitutions I had to make, how it turned out and what I might change next time. When it comes to baked goods, at least the first time I make them, I generally shut the heck up, follow the rules, the recepie that is, as closely as possible, then tweek the next time I make it. If it's a sauce or cassarole or soup I might play with it the first time I make it, but not with baked goods. They're just not my strong suit. Later, maybe tomorrow I'll go back and talk briefly about one of my earlier resolutions and what I did on Sunday as well.
That's all for now.
So, having plenty of advanced notice, I decided to make yesterday the day of calls. I made, erm, haven't counted yet, let's see:
Strong Midwives Practice,
Strong Blood Lab,
DHS/Medicaid Office,
Target,
Walmart,
Liftline,
Liftline again,
Liftline a third time,
Our couples counsilor,
The Eastman Community Music School,
The Bayview YMCA,
Bright Raven Gymnastics,
Jim's mother,
Amanda,
Jim, 1, 2, 3 times,
Bridgitte, homebirth midwife who also provides well-woman care,
in no particular order, 18 calls, some of them quite lengthy.
Today I took liftline from home to the blood lab, had blood drawn, went upstairs and snagged a blank form for renewing my Medicaid from the appointments window of the Strong MidWives Group, they had their resident social worker run 1 up for me, then I took Liftline to Wegman's to do some grocery shopping, then returned home.
Jeremy really loves to help me put groceries away, he'll grab one thing at a time, bring it to me, then we'll talk about what it is, then I'll put it away and he'll get the next thing. It's not the most efficent system, but Jeremy loves it, it is building muscular strength, math skills, vocabulary and giving him a foundation of enjoying being helpful and part of a household team. I know I know, I'm talking like an early childhood educator. Can't be helped, that's how I think most of the time, how I try to think all of the time when I am mindful of it. Usually it's a bit of a pain in the butt to guide him through this process, but I have this disgusting painful as hell congestion in my head and every time I bend down my head goes from a 2 of barely perceptable discomfort to about a 6 of "Someone please make it stop" pain." So, Jeremy picking up the groceries out of my reusable shopping bags way down there on the headache inducing floor and bringing them from the livingroom to the kitchen for me was rather nice.
I had the nicest lady at the lab today, she's black, youngish, has an excellent sense of humor and is quite good at taking blood. She's never rolled a vain, also, it will always prick a bit, but the discomfort is really minimal when she handles the neadle. She's only ever seen me with Jim in there, quite a lot lately, and this was the first time I've come in alone, and I was curious if shhe would be overly careful, cilisitous or anything, and she was just perfect. No condesention, same jovial self, and a really pleasant person to start my day out talking with.
I was a little worried that picking up the form from the Strong Midwives would be a touch ackward, since I switched to recieving my well-woman care from Bridgitte Rhody, 1 of 2 excellent home-birth midwives in Rochester who also provide well-woman care. It was a bit of a, well, not a faux pas exactly, but not especially kuth to come to them for the form I needed, but I don't really care. Their social worker had a copy of the form I needed, and I was already in that building, getting my blood drawn, and Jinnie, mom's volinteer reader is coming this evening, so she could help me with it , therefore I needed it today. But, they didn't seem to notice anything amiss. They just said hi, got me the form, end of story. I mean, they didn't coo over Jeremy, but they see so many newborns in their line of work, on a daily basis, that I guess toddlers don't register on their cute-o-meeters anymore.
Wegman's went pretty well also. I had a nice assistant, she stocks shelves, does Helping Hands, and is a cashier, so down-to-earth, but plenty intelligent, flexable and really pleasant to work with. I noticed that more and more our lists are heavy on the produce, bakery, deli, Nature's Market, butcher and dairy sections, with less and less in the paper products, prepared foods, canned foods and frozen foods sections. It was especially blatent today when I got only 3 or 4 items in the second group of sections I mentioned and all of the rest from the first. It feels really good. I mean, we don't eat all organic yet, and we're far from perfect or home grown, but more and more we are shopping more fresh, more local and doing more home-made things with our meals and other purchases. Jeremy took a 30 or so minute nap at Wegman's, so I don't know if he'll go down for a nap today or not, but I'll give it a try.
I'm going to clean the microwave next, then take a shower then try rocking Jeremy. Olivia, one of his favorite shows is coming on now, so that should keep him busy long enough for me to do the microwave and shower without him getting too upset or reeking too much havik on the house. I've made a resolution that has 2 parts to it. First, I'm going to pick one thing and clean it top-to-bottom every day, so that as I go I really feel like things are being made clean, not just spot cleaned. In the mean time I'll spot clean the other things not on the individual day's adgenda, and wipe up messes as they happen so they won't get out of hand. But, if it's not on the list for the day, I won't stress about getting it perfect. I'll do the microwave today, tomorrow I will do the stove and the front of the oven. Cleaning out the oven I need to research further as it's a self cleaning oven and I want to figure out what I need to do to prep it for that, after it's finished and while it's cleaning it's self. Secondly, I am going to make 1 home made dish every day so that I don't resort to buying commercial doughnuts or pie or cookies when i need a sugar fix, or frozen, canned or boxed meals when I'm too tired to cook something complicated. Today I'm doing an Old Fashioned Gingerbread recepie from Ina Gartin, one of my favorite Food Network chefs. I'll journal briefly about it tonight, what the recepie was, what if any substitutions I had to make, how it turned out and what I might change next time. When it comes to baked goods, at least the first time I make them, I generally shut the heck up, follow the rules, the recepie that is, as closely as possible, then tweek the next time I make it. If it's a sauce or cassarole or soup I might play with it the first time I make it, but not with baked goods. They're just not my strong suit. Later, maybe tomorrow I'll go back and talk briefly about one of my earlier resolutions and what I did on Sunday as well.
That's all for now.