No time like the present

Monday evening, I was driving home with Micah in his brand new carseat. There was complete silence - usually he falls asleep on the way. But about halfway through the commute, right when I was committed to reaching the house, having passed all gas stations or other convenient pull-offs, that golden silence was broken with a resounding SPLATTER.

That's one of those parenting moments where you freeze in your seat, because you don't want to know what just happened.

Sure enough, my darling child had expelled what looked like every bite of food consumed within the previous 72 hours, all over himself and the carseat. I think both our faces bore the same look of "WTF WAS THAT?" I scrambled for a few wipes to clean up what I could, but there wasn't much I could do. He had to marinate until we got to the house. The brand new carseat? Decidedly broken in.

The next morning, when we went in to get him up, he'd had a repeat performance in the crib. So I spent Tuesday with a sick, clingy baby in tow. It looks like it was just a 12-hour stomach bug, the sneaky kind with no fever. Really, by Tuesday afternoon, he was mostly back to normal, so we met up with my sister and her children for a walk.

Back at the beginning of June, I talked to my bosses about going part-time and they were very supportive. Then, just as we were about to sit down and work out specifics, I found out I was pregnant. Facing the prospect of three months without any pay at all, plus all the extra costs without that second insurance policy, I changed my mind and told them I'd continue to work full-time.

Of course, at the end of June we found out that wasn't the case at all. But I felt bad about jerking my company around, the workload increased exponentially, and we learned that one of my coworkers is moving to North Carolina at the end of October. Since then, I haven't given the issue much serious thought, and when I have, I've wondered how I can possibly keep up only working three days a week.

But Tuesday afternoon was actually a lot of fun. And yesterday, I left work early, picked up Micah from daycare, and took him home so we could sit out in the yard and play. Micah's becoming a little person, one with whom you can actually Do Things, and I enjoy spending time with him. It's finally hit me (again) how much I want that time, how much I want to be the one taking him places and showing him things. I could never stay at home full-time, but I think part-time would give me the best of both worlds.

So, I suppose it's time for me to once again sit down, go through our budget, sort through my work, and start trying to make it happen.