... is a full-time job and quite exhausting to boot. The things they get into! And I thought I had sufficient foresight! The ideas they come up with just blow me away too. For example, I was eating a bowl of curry (in bed) and Marguerite was busy playing in the opposite corner (I didn't place her there. She ended up there.). I glanced up and saw her eyeing me and I could tell that her brain was cooking. Without any preamble, she suddenly started crawling towards me, picking up her water bottle along the way. I thought she was going to ask for a bite, but when she got to me, she stood up and started shaking her water onto my food. Now, I thought I could second-guess her pretty well, but I really didn't see that one coming.
I attended the first ever home school conference here in the Philippines and I'm very glad I did. Husband and I were a bit torn about taking Marguerite with us since we weren't sure whether the setup would be kid-friendly (it was), so plan A was we would all go, and plan B was we would leave Marguerite with Nana (who's her favorite person anyway). I had to scrap both plans as I ended up going by myself. Husband woke up with a fever (his temp hasn't gone down yet actually). Anyway, I learned some new things, but what the conference mostly did was to reinforce most of the things I believe about homeschooling. I borrowed Husband's phone (because you know what my phone is, right?) for the camera because I didn't want to wield our Nikon, which is practically the same weight as Marguerite with all the contraptions and doodads. I took a picture of the guest speaker Barbara West, but it's too blurry to post here. I really wasn't on picture-taking mode perhaps because I didn't know anyone there, so no pics to post here (oh, if only I'd remember to take those birds' pic). Many people attended the conference, but I think most of them were members of the church that sponsored it, so they all knew each other already. There were some great raffle prizes too. Gymboree gave away lots of free passes/classes. Two of the grand prizes were free classes for a year and that's huge. I asked before (just for the heck of it) and it costs 500php just to sit in and observe a class. The other grand prize was a microscope set. Other prizes were books from the different booths set up there, Kindermusik CDs, DVDs, toys, etc. I think the organizers themselves were pretty surprised at the number of donated prizes. Anyway, I didn't win anything because I always suck at raffles. At one point the emcee was just calling for five moms who came with their babies (is Marguerite still a baby? Technically, no, so I tried not to feel bad about missing that chance), for five dads who came with their toddlers (that could've been Husband and Marguerite, but, duh, they weren't there...), for seventeen couples committed to homeschooling (there was no way I could have disguised myself as a couple even with the excess baggage) to come up to him since they were trying to get rid of the prizes more quickly. With all the prizes practically flying about, I went home with a fistful of brochures and fliers.
Since Husband is sick, Marguerite is sleeping in her crib again. We generally co-sleep, but there was a time when Marguerite regularly slept in her crib in our room. That must have been between her third month and seventh month. Before that, she would fall asleep on my chest and after an hour or so, I would place her in her portable bassinet (I loved that bassinet with its vibrate, music, and white noise options. I was really sad when the baby got too big for it) which was parked between Husband and me on the bed. She started using the crib when she was already sleeping through the night. We were pretty loose about it. I didn't establish a bedtime routine, but rather just followed the baby's cues. Marguerite would sleep in the bed with me and when Husband got home (his work is mostly overtime), he would move her to the crib. About the time we felt that the crib needed to be lowered, Marguerite started cutting her first tooth. She woke up crying more at that time and since I'm a shrimp, I had a hard time reaching down to pick her up (I definitely do not adhere to the concept of letting a baby cry it out). I decided our collective sleep would be more peaceful if Marguerite slept in the family bed again. Right now, she's still sleeping and seems to be doing well in the crib. Better than me anyway. It felt strange not having her in bed with us. Hopefully Husband is better by tonight so we could go back to normal.
I attended the first ever home school conference here in the Philippines and I'm very glad I did. Husband and I were a bit torn about taking Marguerite with us since we weren't sure whether the setup would be kid-friendly (it was), so plan A was we would all go, and plan B was we would leave Marguerite with Nana (who's her favorite person anyway). I had to scrap both plans as I ended up going by myself. Husband woke up with a fever (his temp hasn't gone down yet actually). Anyway, I learned some new things, but what the conference mostly did was to reinforce most of the things I believe about homeschooling. I borrowed Husband's phone (because you know what my phone is, right?) for the camera because I didn't want to wield our Nikon, which is practically the same weight as Marguerite with all the contraptions and doodads. I took a picture of the guest speaker Barbara West, but it's too blurry to post here. I really wasn't on picture-taking mode perhaps because I didn't know anyone there, so no pics to post here (oh, if only I'd remember to take those birds' pic). Many people attended the conference, but I think most of them were members of the church that sponsored it, so they all knew each other already. There were some great raffle prizes too. Gymboree gave away lots of free passes/classes. Two of the grand prizes were free classes for a year and that's huge. I asked before (just for the heck of it) and it costs 500php just to sit in and observe a class. The other grand prize was a microscope set. Other prizes were books from the different booths set up there, Kindermusik CDs, DVDs, toys, etc. I think the organizers themselves were pretty surprised at the number of donated prizes. Anyway, I didn't win anything because I always suck at raffles. At one point the emcee was just calling for five moms who came with their babies (is Marguerite still a baby? Technically, no, so I tried not to feel bad about missing that chance), for five dads who came with their toddlers (that could've been Husband and Marguerite, but, duh, they weren't there...), for seventeen couples committed to homeschooling (there was no way I could have disguised myself as a couple even with the excess baggage) to come up to him since they were trying to get rid of the prizes more quickly. With all the prizes practically flying about, I went home with a fistful of brochures and fliers.
Since Husband is sick, Marguerite is sleeping in her crib again. We generally co-sleep, but there was a time when Marguerite regularly slept in her crib in our room. That must have been between her third month and seventh month. Before that, she would fall asleep on my chest and after an hour or so, I would place her in her portable bassinet (I loved that bassinet with its vibrate, music, and white noise options. I was really sad when the baby got too big for it) which was parked between Husband and me on the bed. She started using the crib when she was already sleeping through the night. We were pretty loose about it. I didn't establish a bedtime routine, but rather just followed the baby's cues. Marguerite would sleep in the bed with me and when Husband got home (his work is mostly overtime), he would move her to the crib. About the time we felt that the crib needed to be lowered, Marguerite started cutting her first tooth. She woke up crying more at that time and since I'm a shrimp, I had a hard time reaching down to pick her up (I definitely do not adhere to the concept of letting a baby cry it out). I decided our collective sleep would be more peaceful if Marguerite slept in the family bed again. Right now, she's still sleeping and seems to be doing well in the crib. Better than me anyway. It felt strange not having her in bed with us. Hopefully Husband is better by tonight so we could go back to normal.
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