The Saturday 7

1. Tuesday was the last day of my nanny job. It's still a little surreal. I've taken vacations before. In the back of my mind, I feel like I'll be going back eventually. I ended up getting the kids each a nice book and a framed picture of them with me. And they gave me a $50 Meijer gift card and a sweet cake.

I'm ready for the next chapter of our life, but I feel a little bad for Lucy. Lyla is one of her closest friends. She doesn't understand that we're not going to see much of her anymore.

2. I've been trying to work on my daycare license application. Holy cow. It is so confusing. I consider myself a pretty well-educated, intelligent person, but I can not figure this stupid application out! I think I'm putting it off because I keep hoping something else will drop in my lap. I just think the timing is weird. Until the week before my job ended, I had a plan for being a stay-at-home-mom. If I hadn't had that plan, I would've been sure to be licensed by the time I was done nannying. But God led me to believe I wouldn't need to get licensed. On Sunday at church, I had a friend ask me to watch her kids. That felt like an answered prayer - some money to get us by until I could get licensed and take on some more kids. But she's since found someone else to watch her kids, so now I don't know what God is doing. (Haha - do I ever?) Is he taking away that supplemental income so we'll depend on Him? (God - haven't we learned our lesson about depending on you yet??) Or does He have something else planned for us? I guess until I know for sure, I have to get back to that stupid application . . .

3. Now that I'm done working, I have no excuse to put off the potty training any more! We started again on Thursday, and I'm determined to stick with it this time! Haha. I've been very faithful with keeping Lucy in undies unless we go somewhere - and I've been trying to stay home so she's not in diapers often. She's doing pretty well. Don't get me wrong - I've cleaned plenty of pee off the floor in the past two days, but she's cooperative and has had many successes. I'm convinced it's going to work this time, because we're sufficiently stocked up on bribes:

Thanks Aunt Niki! These are actually the "poop toys." Haha. She gets to pick one when she poops on the toilet . . . which has yet to happen.

4. I moved our big box of books to a new location, and suddenly Lucy has new interest in them! I absolutely love watching her get a stack of books, scooch her little buns back on the couch, and read to herself. She's starting to actually "read" about what she sees on the page, and not just mutter gibberish.

5. Lucy and I visited my friend Carissa and her newborn baby, Camden, earlier this week. Ahhh, I remember now why I'm having another baby. Haha. I just love those little newborn snuggles. And Lucy did surprisingly well with him. She loved rubbing his head so gently. I also went to a couple baby showers for my cousin Esther this week. She's having a boy, too, so I did some shopping for boy clothes. I've written before that I'd be excited either way if this one is a boy or a girl, but I've always thought girl clothes are so much more fun. After shopping for boys this week, though, I have to admit there's some pretty cute stuff out there for boys, too. :-)

6. I made a list of some things I want to get done around the house now that I'm staying home full time. One of them was to do something with our front porch. Once in a while I hang a wreath on the door, and we do have a welcome mat, but that's about it for the front porch decor. I went out there to see what kind of space I have to work with, and found a ginormous spider web in the corner. I guess I have a head start on Halloween decorating!

7. I debated about writing this one because it's kind of embarrassing. But if nothing else, you can expect honesty from this blog. And I'm looking for a little commiseration. Please tell me I'm not the only one!

Yesterday, I was home all day with Lucy and 2 other kids I was watching for the day. My hips and back have been absolutely killing me, and I was exhausted, and so sick of cleaning pee off the floor. Then Lucy refused to take a nap - which is very abnormal for her. When Justin got home, I burst into tears and said, "I have to leave." I just needed to get out of my house, away from my life, away from Lucy. And then I cried even harder because I felt so guilty about wanting to get away from Lucy. She was dancing around laughing and smiling and I just looked at her and thought, "How can I not want to spend every second with her?"

Justin talked me into leaving, though, so I tried to erase the evidence of tears from my face, then went to Goodwill all by myself and wandered around for almost an hour. It was soooo nice. I got a cool Mason jar type thing for 80 cents (on the list I referred to in point 6 is a bunch of Pinterest projects), and a cute dress that I'm going to use for my Halloween costume, but will also actually wear in real life! Then I went through the Arby's drive through and sat in the parking lot eating by myself. Haha.

By the time I got home, I felt back to normal. I'm just so frustrated that I feel this way. It's not really a new thing. I used to come home from work every day practically in tears needing some adult interaction/time to myself. I'm really really hoping this is just a result of crazy pregnancy hormones and not a newfound drama queen gene. I used to pride myself on being pretty even-keel and low maintenance. If I wasn't pregnant, I might seriously consider upping my anxiety/depression meds. :-/

So there you have it - my embarrassing confession of the week. Here's hoping my hormones level off and I go back to normal soon! :-)