Indoor and Outdoor Projects

It has been a rainy, rainy, rainy month. We saw the sun on Friday and Saturday for the first time in several weeks. I seized the opportunity to go grocery shopping without an umbrella, and I also got a few yard work projects done. I trimmed up the yellow bushes in front of the house, and put down two bags of new mulch. I had some mulch left over, so I repotted a few plants that were looking a little sicky and put mulch in the top of the containers. Usually I forget to mulch the top, and water evaporates before the plants can drink it. With a crown of mulch to block evaporation, the roots get a chance to work. I also gave the sunroom a good cleaning.

Now that the rain has started again, I'm going to be stuck indoors for another few weeks. I've been plotting a remedy for my stained concrete living room floor. The stain has become chipped in several places, and was looking patchy in others. My first thought was getting one of those pens that you use to remain dings in furniture, but was doubtful about how that would work on concrete. So I went to Home Depot and just browsed around for some kind of concrete stain patching tool. What I found was rust-oleum in a nice chocolate brown. I sprayed it directly on the concrete in some places, using short, controlled bursts. For the chips, I sprayed the rust-oleum into a paper bowl and dabbed it into the crevices using a cotton swab. In retrospect I probably should have filled the holes with spackle or something, but whatever - good enough.

Right now the floor looks a million times better - much closer to the "seamless piece of mahogany" that the company had originally promised. We'll see how it holds up over time, but for a $5 fix I'm pretty pleased!

Planning for the worst - rising sea levels

You would think that an area that is three feet above sea level on a good day would have unanimous support for playing it safe and making sure that we don't all drown in fifty years. But no - lots of believe that the sea levels are never ever going to rise for any reason, and that legislation to protect us from rising sea levels is part of a worldwide conspiracy.

I love how Stacy Ritter very politely tells them that they have a right to their poorly-informed opinions but she's voting for the measure because she does not believe in their theory of a conspiracy. Check out the story in the Sun Sentinel here, and make sure to watch the video.

Personally, although I am a fan of nearly everything in Agenda 21 and do believe that climate change is real, I don't think that the points in Agenda 21 are going to help save us from rising sea levels much. The changes that they are suggesting - striving for sustainable populations, combating deforestation, etc - will not slow down climate change enough to prevent us from having a dramatic change of life here in South Florida. What I like about the blueprint for change that is being adopted in Broward County is that it acknowledges that we need to make infrastructure changes just in case, "The idea behind the planning blueprint is that the rise in sea level should impact decisions about what's built here and how, from sewers to sidewalks to seawalls." We need to stop further encroachment into the Everglades and we need make modifications to keep existing properties above water as long as possible. 

Back online, with company

It's been a while! First morning sickness kicked my butt, then nesting mania set in, then finally my little bundle arrived and proceeded to wear me out. (Sometimes she is a little bundle of joy, sometimes she is a bundle of other things.) Now Little C is three months old, and I'm slowly starting to find a routine.

Six months old. Until Little C was about two months, I didn't worry about a routine. I just let her sleep on me all day.

I've had to forge my way pretty much from scratch. It seems like most parents are either working parents with a baby in day care, or stay at home parents who are otherwise unemployed. My situation is different - I stay at home with the baby but I also work from home. I don't work for myself, I work for a company, so I have to complete all the tasks that I would complete in an eight hour day before I was pregnant, but with a little baby underfoot. I got only six weeks of maternity leave, so I've been going full speed ahead for a while now.

Here is our basic routine:

• 6:30am - I wake up and get myself ready. I don't get dressed to the shoes, but I do put on presentable clothes, tidy my hair, and step into some indoor slip-ons. I tidy the bedroom and bathroom and kitchen, clean the cat boxes, water the plants, start some laundry, and MAYBE gets a look at today's email and RSS feeds. Sometimes I'll get up at 5:30 just so I can get more computer time, but lately I've really needed the extra hour of sleep!
• 7:30am - Little C wakes up and gets six ounces of formula. If it is still under 80 degrees when she finishes, we'll go for a walk around the neighborhood. But that's only happened once so far. Usually she goes into her bassinet in the living room to play with her rattles. While she plays, I change the laundry and get some computer work done.
• 9:00am - 4 ounces of formula, followed by tummy time on the activity mat. This is basically Little C shrieking and squirming for 20 minutes, even if I'm next to her trying to be encouraging. After tummy time I hold her for about 20 minutes, patting her back and walking around the house, narrating things. Then she does into her swing for a bit, and finally goes into her crib in her room for a nap. While she swings and naps, I put away the laundry and get a bit more work done.
• 11:00am - 4 ounces of formula. Then she lies on her back on the activity mat to swat at rattles, while I work on the computer. When she gets sick of that, I pick her up and dance around with her while her music CD plays a few songs. Or I roll her on my yoga ball. Then back on the activity mat. When she tires out she goes down for another nap in her crib, this time for one hour (sometimes two!). I have my lunch and get lots of computer work done!
• 2:00pm - 6 ounces of formula. If we have any errands to run, this is when I do them. Otherwise, swing, activity mat rattles, or maybe another dose of tummy time. Another walk around the house. Finally, another nap. Computer time. 
• 4:30pm - 4 ounces of formula. Activity mat or bath time. Then vibrator chair, while I start dinner preparations. Once Daddy gets home from work and takes over, the last computer time crunch begins.
• 6:00pm - Change into jammies, then the last bottle of the night, if she stays awake for it. She falls asleep fast and stays asleep all night, thankfully. We have grown-up dinner and watch TV, sometimes with me finishing up computer work at the same time. I clean up the kitchen, or delegate tasks. Bedtime is around 10:30 or 11:00.

These times aren't set in stone. Foe example, today she went down for her lunchtime nap early and woke up after only an hour, so in the afternoon she had two naps instead of one. On Saturdays I clean the house and do any baking or cooking for the week, usually getting done by noon. On Sundays I go to church, leaving the baby home to have Daddy time. Sometimes I have to do computer work Saturday or Sunday to get caught up from the week, and sometimes Little C's daddy has to work over the weekends so I have to keep on pulling double duty. But fortunately that has been pretty rare!