The Longest Week Ever

Ada survived day care week two.

I almost killed Rick on Wednesday though...

You see, Rick dropped Ada off at day care in the car since he was driving to a client meeting, and he forgot that I'd be walking Ada home so he didn't leave a stroller at day care for me to do so. I easily could have made the same mistake so I wasn't so much mad at Rick but at the fact that it is six blocks between our house and day care and at the end of the day there is no energy left in Ada's little body to make the trek home on her own. At five months pregnant, with her being 35 pounds and me having herniated discs in my neck, carrying her is NOT an option. I've never wanted to hire a stranger to carry her home so badly in my life (or hers).

In an effort to break up the walk, I decided to take her three blocks to dinner and then four blocks home. That might have worked well but... the ladies at daycare didn't notice her bag on her hook at nap time (her hook changed at some point this week so there was some confusion) which contained our new strategy to encourage Ada to take naps. The bag held not one, but two secret weapons: her bug blanket and her stuffed piggy. Without these comfort measures on her cot, there was no way she was going to nap.

Result: I picked up a cranky, unrested, hungry, exhausted child, with no stroller, six blocks from home.

We started toward the restaurant and encountered a series of fits. She hollered and cried as I tried to sing and encourage her. She'd cut me off and say "up, up" with outstretched arms. I'd crouch down to her level to explain yet again how I can't carry her and it was just a little further. People were staring, their eyes burning me with feelings of judgement as my daughter goes screaming down the sidewalk as I pull her along. After two blocks, I potato sack her over my shoulder hoping that is a low stress way to carry her since putting her on my hip only works for about four or five steps and makes we worry about hurting the baby in the belly. I made it about twenty steps to the corner and put her back down to be distracted by the sliding doors at Walgreens. We eventually made it to the restaurant, ordered dinner, and went to the bathroom to wash up. She cried while I ordered and paid and a nice employee tried to entertain her with a page of stickers and paper but she wasn't having it. She was too crabby by that point and there was no turning back. Once at the table I went to get water and get settled into a booth. Somehow, over a distance of about eight feet, Ada managed to clobber her jaw against the corner of a table and got a bruise on her jawline, causing even more of a scene as she cried from real pain. She was fine during dinner, but the walk home was pretty bad. Again, I had random people stopping to tell her not to cry. She threw a good size tantrum on the sidewalk at one point. And finally I found a trick that worked and motivated her. A new game I call "Do you see a puppy? Let's go find a puppy!" She still broke down every half block since the dogs out being walked were all hiding within a block of our house but it finally paid off once we got to that block and she got to pet four dogs within 100 feet. And I got to commiserate with parents strolling down the street with two infants hoping their children wouldn't throw street tantrums like Ada. I just looked at them and said "Naps are your friend, and strollers are a must."

Moral of the story: ALWAYS have a stroller, or someone--preferably that you know-- who can carry your child a decent distance, with you at all times. Consider keeping an umbrella stroller in the trunk of the car for bad parking days too.