Presidential Debate

 What am I watching????  I need more wine for this....three grown men on the screen all trying to talk over, not even letting the moderator ask the questions...Does any one remember in the 1980's when Bush Sr. accidentally dared to interrupt someone and it was super dramatic???

Hiring new employees during an international pandemic

 Today I have a new employee starting to work for me, this is my second new employee to start in two weeks, and I am currently interviewing for a third.  

Interviewing/hiring during this strange time in this strange environment was quite an experience.  One of the people I hired was someone who had worked for us before so that was a much less strange interview as were the internal applicants.  Speaking to them on the phone and via zoom felt normal.  But interviewing external applicants was very odd.

Phone interviews for preliminary screening is pretty normal, so that wasn't that big of a deal.  Video interviews for finalist though were a bit more odd.  We normally have 1:1 interviews across the board, but having back to back 1:1 video interviews felt strange so instead we had me and my 2 bosses on a panel type interview.  But then it was odd figuring out how to handle asking questions, so we had to kind of appoint one of the individuals the point person for holding the interview.  We were able to figure it out and things ran fairly smoothly but it still felt strange...

But now for the really strange part...in about 2 hours I will be meeting my new employee for the first time.  I hired someone I have literally never met before.  It all feels so strange and there is no way that this would ever normally fly in my company.   Yet here we are in a world where it would be perfectly acceptable for me to even say "you know what...work from home until January and I'll just meet you for the first time ever then."  

Today is going to be odd...wish me luck!

Racing Baby

 I received what I found to be a funny flyer from Little Dude's school last week.  They are hosting a "Fund Run" in October where all of the students run to raise money for the school, a great idea for a fundraiser in my option; people love sponsoring kids to do active things and it has low overhead for the school; but the funny thing was when I realized there is a heat for Little Dude's infant classroom 🤣

So I obviously did the only thing I could and registered him to "run".   I hope that the teacher sends me pictures because I'm sure it will be cute, unfortunately I won't be able to go watch. 

Breastfeeding Troubles

 I always knew that I wanted to breastfeed any children I had.  All of the research talks about how much healthier it is for babies with the extra immunity protection from mom and great healing properties etc.  But honestly a large part of the reason I wanted to breastfeed was cost - Formula is expensive!!!

I also spent the last few years volunteering with the local Milk Bank through the Junior League of Norfolk-Virginia Beach.  We volunteer on Saturdays to man donation drop offs for the Milk Bank so that mom's have the opportunity to make breast milk donations outside of normal business hours.  Through this program we have really helped our milk bank grow and given lots of mom's more flexibility in when they can make donations, thus increasing the frequency of donations being made.  

Specifically I volunteer with The Kings Daughter's Milk Bank at CHKD and I highly encourage you check out their website if the idea of a human milk bank makes you a little squeamish or curious about why it is important.  For now I will just say that 1 ounce of human breast milk can provide 4 treatments for the average NICU infant and because of everything I learned while volunteering I was very hopeful that I would be able to not only feed my baby but be able to donate to help feed others as well.

After Little Dude's exciting entrance into this world we had more than our share of trouble getting started breastfeeding.  We started life on O2 and with a feeding tube, he was quickly transitioned from the feeding tube to a bottle but Little Dude was still unable to feed at the breast for his first couple of days.  I was pumping at the hospital but my milk was slow coming in so I wasn't able to pump nearly enough to cover his bottle feeds so he was receiving the .25-.5 ounce that I was able to pump followed by a bottle of formula.  After a couple of days we were able to attempt breastfeeding but we had a very rough time getting Little Dude latched and on more than one occasion I almost gave up.   

I will never forget one evening in the NICU trying to get him to latch, my husband was dripping sugar water down my breast to the nipple with a syringe to entice Little Dude to latch, one of the dear NICU nurses was next to me showing me how to hold my breast so that my nipple would fit more easily into Little Dude's mouth, another nurse was across from me cheering me on and tears were streaming down my face because I felt like such a failure.   

Luckily once my milk came in I was able to produce enough and we only opened 2 bottles of formula after we came home from the hospital and those were both only used to get him to latch onto me, not given to him in full but I honestly didn't think we would ever be as successful as we have been with breastfeeding after that rough start. 

By the time we brought Little Dude home from the hospital I was able to get him to latch with just my husband helping drip formula or expressed breast milk down my breast with a syringe (and sometimes into the corner of Little Dudes mouth to encourage him to start sucking) and by the time hubby went back to work I was mostly able to get him to feed on my own but it was painful and never quite felt "right".  After about a day I was in pain and by the second day home my nipples were chapped and starting to scab over.  

I was able to get an appointment with a IBCLC (International Board Certified Lactation Consultant) at the hospital where Little Dude was born and she was a life saver.   She helped ease my fears that he wasn't getting enough milk by doing a weighted feed, and showed me different positions to make breastfeeding a little easier.  She also was able to identify that he had a lip and tongue tie and wrote me a referral to get those fixed.

Using the tricks I learned from the IBCLC I was able to feed Little Dude successfully with less (though still some) torture to my poor abused nipples until we were able to get in with the dentist I chose to perform the tie release (generally the dentists who perform these releases use lasers which are less invasive than the cutting that is performed by ENT's and surgeons) was able to get us in.  After we had Little Dude's ties released it was like I was feeding an entirely different baby.  

I will admit I didn't do the best job with his stretches after we had his ties released and the lip tie has grown back slightly but it is significantly better than it was before the release and I am counting on a childhood fall to re-release it so that he doesn't have any long term cosmetic issues from the tie.  As for the tongue tie I believe I did a better job stretching it and it appears to still be fully released to my untrained eye.  Either way I no longer have any breastfeeding pain caused by the ties and we can just hope that if it has grown back any it isn't enough to cause any speech issues in the future.

I have now successfully breastfed my baby for over a year.  I am still sending a sippy cup with expressed milk to daycare every day and breastfeeding multiple times when we are together (here's looking at you 03:00 wake ups!) I also have been able to make a few donations to the Milk Bank and gave some milk to a mom who wasn't producing enough that the Milk Bank couldn't take because it was pumped while I was sick with strep throat (they have VERY strict screening guidelines for every donation to protect the high risk NICU babies).  Now I am hoping that we will be able to make it to 2 years of breastfeeding at least twice per day to keep giving Little Dude the great immunity boost from my milk.  I plan to continue to pump until I go back to work in the office in January but am thinking that I will begin to wean myself off of the pump in December so that I no longer have to take time out of my in-office work day once we are back onsite.

If you want to breastfeed but are having troubles please do not hesitate to ask for help.  If you can't afford an IBCLC at least reach out to a local La Leche League   for free support and guidance.  And if you want to breastfeed but really aren't able to because of low production or medications or any of the 100's of other valid reasons don't feel guilty.  Formula is perfectly fine.  It is formulated specifically to meet the needs of a baby and many perfectly healthy, well adjusted adults (especially those born in the 70's-80's-and-90's) never had anything other than formula that was less advanced than what we have today.  But if you really want your child to have human milk you always have the option to check out Human Milk for Human Babies  which is a milk sharing network that helps put mom's with extra milk (me) in touch with moms in need of milk.   

All of this is to say - feed your baby - that's the important part :)

Starting a New School (Daycare) During a Global Pandemic

 Since a lot of kids are in the process of going back to school right now and I know that looks very different from last year for all of them wether they are going back for in person instruction or virtual learning or some sort of hybrid model due to the current pandemic I thought I would take a moment to talk about our decision to not only send Little Dude back to daycare but to start at a completely new facility in June during what we thought at the the time was the height of the pandemic for our area.  

The daycare that Little Dude attended in Virginia Beach from the time he was 11 weeks old until he was approximently 8 months old (with a brief hiatus when we had to go back to Kentucky to help my mom while she recovered from surgery) was perfectly fine.  I loved the diversity in students and staff and very much liked the way they were set up for infant care.  They allowed me to use cloth diapers and glass bottles and gave great daily reports about how Little Dude had spent his day.  

However there were 2 things I really did not like about this center - first and foremost they had an open floor plan with all ages other than infants separated by half walls at most and with 4 year olds and up in the same area together (the center also offers before and after care so there were 4 year olds in the same space as 7 or 8 year olds).  While not an inherently bad thing it is not a set up I would choose for my child to be in daily; specifically I would walk in sometimes and a child who had learned a new 4 letter word would be using it loudly so that all of the other children were now learning a 4 letter word, while my husband and I certainly drop our share of F bombs I don't want my child to learn those words sooner than necessary.  Second, and perhaps more importantly, the center does not allow parents to provide their childs food, all children must eat the food provided by the center.   While the center serves a perfectly fine USDA menu similar to what I had when I was in school my husband and I don't necessarily agree with these guidelines (more on that later) so for these two reasons we had left Little Dude on the waiting list at a couple of other daycares that we like more than the one he was at in VB in hopes that something would open up before he was too far into solid foods.

Luckily for us a global pandemic happened and Little Dude was home with me starting in mid-March before he was really eating more than vegetables at daycare and I had full control over the food he ate daily.  

Working from home with an infant is not easy, even though he was only really army crawling and not getting into things yet it was tough juggling giving him the attention he needed and getting my work done.  Many nights I would log back on after putting Little Dude to bed or be feeding him dinner in my office while I continued to work because trying to juggle being a full time single mom (remember hubby was deployed until mid June) with being a full time work from home employee was tough.   

In the beginning of May I realized that Little Dude was starting to need more hands on attention than I could provide and still get work done, so I called in reinforcements, my mom came to stay with me for a little over 2 weeks and I was able to bust my butt and get reasonably caught up with my work.  I knew it would still be tough working from home once she left but we had a general idea that hubby would be home soon and I knew once he came home worst case I could make up the time I needed to stay caught up with my job in the evenings after he came home from work.  

Luck was on my side though.  The day my mom left my phone rang and it was Lincoln's daycare, they had a spot available for him if I wanted it.  I didn't have to take it and I could keep my spot on the wait list until another spot opened up but I could start as early as the next Monday if I wanted.   

I talked with the daycare director about the steps they were taking to mitigate COVID-19 risks and decided that the best option for my mental health, Little Dude's development, and our family as a whole was to send him to daycare.  While there was certainly a higher risk having him at daycare than having him at home I was impressed by the steps the school was already taking and decided that it was worth the risk for us.  

Little Dude has now been at daycare for almost 3 months and there hasn't been a single red flag.  They center has not had any cases of COVID among the students, staff, or had any reported related to the immediate households that any students are part of.  I am a little extra concerned right now as school is starting back up since the center is integrated with a K-12 school but they are even taking extra steps to protect students there by limiting interactions between grades, using different entrances for various grade levels and keeping staff assigned by age range (daycare, K-2, 3-5, 6-8, and 9-12) and keeping lunches in classrooms.  

Overall I think that it is a tough decision that parents are having to make and that each of us has to make the best decision we can for our families while balancing the risk of exposure against work obligations, technology access, developmental and social needs of the child, and mental health of all involved.  I even have one friend who has enrolled her youngest in a private school so that he can attend in person starting day 1 this year while keeping her daughter home for virtual learning through the public schools simply because the children have different personalities and needs and she felt that was the best option for each kid.  

It's tough being a parent and I want all of you to know that as long as you make the best decision you can with the information available in the moment you aren't doing anything wrong and you are a great mom/dad for your kid.  

 

We have a walker!

 Last week Little Dude's daycare had "back to school night".  Since the center is attached to a K-12 private school this wasn't such a strange thing and I really was glad to have the opportunity to see his teachers and get a better view of his classroom etc. since I haven't been able to go past the entryway of the building since his first day in the center thanks to the COVID-19 restrictions.  

I will talk more about the way his daycare/center is dealing with COVID-19 since I have been very impressed in general but right now I just want to share the exciting news, we have a walker!

At back to school night Little Dude apparently decided he wanted to show off in front of Mommy and his teachers at the same time and took off walking all around his classroom.  You could tell by the shocked reaction from his teachers it was the first time they had seen him take a step, he had taken 1-2 steps at home chasing the dogs but nothing really exciting and he would immediately would fall on his bottom, but that night he was all over the place taking 5-10 steps at a time and didn't fall at all.

After his first hurrah it was a few days before he really walked again but now I feel confident saying we have a full scale walker!!!  It's amazing how exciting the little stuff is when you're a parent.  Now send help because I'm sure we aren't properly baby proofed for this! 

Care Packages During Deployments

 Do you ever wonder the best way to send a care package to a deployed service member?  Or wonder what to send?  I don't necessary know about other branches but with deployed sailors in the US Navy the answer is simple...AMAZON PRIME!  

Last time my husband deployed I did  great job of sending a flat rate box full of goodies every month.  I took joy in making trips to the store to pick out items to send, decorating and filling the box, and going to the post office to drop it in the mail.  The USPS does a great job of making sending care packages as easy as possible, they even have a great kit you can order delivered straight to your house of shipping supplies. You can even order the kit here it comes with boxes, tape, address labels, and even customs forms.  

But here's the thing, this deployment I had a new baby, traveled to help take care of my mom after she had surgery, and then COVID-19 struck and I tried to avoid unnecessary trips to public places...so Amazon became my saving grace as a wife.  

Here are the perks of using Amazon to send your deployment care packages:

1. Free Shipping
2. Ability to send exactly what your service member needs without pressure to fill a specific size box
3. Flat rate boxes are all the same size and shape and therefore stack nicely, meaning they are usually bundled on the same pallet.  If a mail drop gets cut short guess which pallets have to wait until the next mail drop, that's right the ones that are nothing but flat rate boxes of care packages
4. If an order doesn't arrive in a reasonable amount of time Amazon will give you your money back, one of my orders for my husband (that I ordered in February) was split into two packages.  One package arrived in late March, the second package was just delivered to his office this week.  Amazon refunded the purchase price of the items in the second package in April when I submitted a claim that it wasn't delivered.  While flat rate boxes do include insurance the filing process with the USPS for your insurance claim is probably a little more difficult than just clicking a button in your Amazon account.

So all in all I realized that I did not totally fail as a wife this deployment with the care packages and hopefully others will take this to know that it's ok if you just use the ease of online shopping to send your loved ones the things they need.  Service members love getting cards from their kids and things from home but sometimes when they ask for a specific brand of granola bars it really is better to spend the extra $2 from Amazon and just order it on the spot.