1st week of school

Well, we all survived the first week of school.  It was Gavin's first week of TK (Transitional Kindergarten) and it was Nick and I's first week of the Fall semester.  Nick and I are teaching opposite schedules.  I teach Mondays and Wednesdays ALL day (my first class is at 9:30am and my last class doesn't end until 8pm) and Nick teaches Tuesdays and Thursdays (from 8am-5pm).  On the days we are not teaching, we are home with the kids and serving as Gavin's taxi to and from school.  Gavin goes to school now 5 days/week for a 1/2 day in the afternoons.  He also started gymnastics again on Tuesdays.

I was really scared at first about our childcare set up but I think we are going to be just fine.  I LOVE this set up for many reasons:
1.  We each get 2 days by ourselves with the kids so that is 1/2 the load I had last year and it makes it easier to plan activities with the kids.  It's hard to plan activities every day.  Nick and I have different strengths and we like to do different things with the kids.  By having an ON day and an OFF day, it gives us the energy and motivation to have quality time with the kids.  I tend to plan more "enrichment" activities as Nick says but Nick is the one that has the courage to leave the house with all three!  Nick took the kids to the children's museum this Wednesday and learned that every Wednesday there is story time and art time in the mornings.  Best of all, Liam enjoyed it and participated (unlike when we paid for Kindermusik art class and he just wanted out of the classroom!).  So, now Nick has an "enrichment" activity on one of his days too.

2.  It is awesome to be able to have an ON/OFF day from work and the kids.  It feels balanced. I know it's only the first week and it may get worse later on, but this week we both felt like rock stars!

3.  We don't have to feel guilty about having someone else watch the kids.  This is something that I am constantly thanking the universe for.  We are so incredibly lucky that our plans have worked out the way we intended them to and that we have the life that we have and the privilege to stay home with the kids.  I know that only very few parents are able to do this and I'm so grateful that we can.

4. It's cheap!  Let's face it, the more time we spend with the kids, the less money it costs for childcare so we're taking advantage of it.  There's no cheap childcare when you have three!  

I prepared for this week expecting the worse but the preparation is a big reason for why it went so smoothly. Last weekend I prepared meals for us to eat for lunch or dinner throughout the week.  I also made snacks for the kids to have.  I ironed all of the clothes that needed ironing and I set clothes aside for the following day each night (something I NEVER do on a regular basis).  It's amazing how much stress was relieved just by taking these small steps.  So, this is something that I need to keep going so that we can continue operating like a well-oiled machine!

With all that being said, we still do need to find a babysitter for the times where we just can't be in two places at once such as this upcoming Friday!!!  Once a month Nick and I have faculty meeting and the bad thing is that the meeting starts at the same time that Gavin starts school.  Every 2 months, it gets even more complicated because Nick has to attend Faculty Senate in Columbia (about 1 hour away) on the same day as our Faculty meeting.  This is the case coming up this Friday.  I've already arranged to drop off Gavin at one of his friends' houses for them to drive him to school.  So, I'll be by myself driving around dropping kids off and rushing to and from the meeting.

I know people say we should have a babysitter so we can have date night or some time to ourselves but I don't know why I still feel super guilty about hiring someone for that purpose.  I just can't bring myself to do it.  Maybe we just haven't been stressed enough to feel it justified.  But I know we need to find someone or a couple of people to be back ups just in case.