As was implied in the last post, it is time for my maternity leave to end and me to head back to work. Jace is only 10 1/2 weeks old but since he was almost 2 weeks late, my 12 weeks of unpaid leave are up. We have daycare all set up at a family daycare around the corner from our house. The daycare provider, April, was closed for the summer as she just gave birth to her third son in May. So Jace will have a playmate his age. In addition April is taking care of her middle son and another boy who are about 2 1/2, a girl who I am guessing is about 3 and another girl who is about 4. Her oldest son has just started kindergarten. So yes, she has a very full house but she has tons of experience working in daycare centers before she started her own several years ago. She seems very capable and organized. Jace and I went over for a visit last week and she runs a tight ship. The kids were running around in the backyard having a great time but she kept a tight watch on them and they certainly listened to her when she told them to do (or not to do) things. I’m sure Jace will be very safe and happy there.

That said, I will still worry about him. We haven’t spent that much time apart since he was born. The longest period was 5 hrs when I left him home with Steve while I went shopping with Deb at the outlet mall because I desperately needed new shirts that would actually button for work. And those 5 hrs were hard. It probably didn’t help that there were tons of babies at outlets but still…He will need to learn to drink from a bottle without fussing (right now he can drink from a bottle but protests loudly), nap without me bouncing or walking him to sleep, and play with new toys. I get teary eyed just thinking about it. Packing stuff up tonight for him to take with him will probably make me cry. Not to mention when we drop him off tomorrow morning.

As for me at work, I have arranged to work 2o hrs this week and next followed by 30 hrs for the two weeks after that so that I can adjust back to working full time. I thought I was just going to ease back into my Florida project slowly this week, checking drawings, reading emails and catching up, but apparently my boss has other ideas. I get to go work for one of the other partners in the firm, figuring out a complex stair and elevator entry tower for the Patriots Place retail project we are working on. Talk about diving in head first. At least it should keep my mind off worrying about Jace as I worry about not screwing up for the partner who is most intimidating to work for.

I will let you all know how it goes.

Categories: The Kid, The parents
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