Ducks in a Row

Only 5 days til I start the new job. Such mixed feelings still swirling in my head, but I think I'm finally getting all my ducks in a row and preparations in place. We were lucky enough to get into Katie into our first choice of daycares. Yay! She already had a trial run for a few hours yesterday morning and she seemed to love the place. Didn't even look at me funny when I left her there. When I came back 2 hours later she was sitting at the little play table with all the other kids playing with playdough like she'd always been in daycare. I asked her if she had fun and she threw her arms in the air and shouted, "Yeah" with a big smile. The teachers both said she did fine and no problems. *sigh* I have to admit to feeling a little bad that she didn't even miss me, but I wasn't entirely surprised as she has always done fine for the hour at nursery at church on Sunday. I guess Monday when she has to have lunch and nap there we'll see. Probably the whole thing will be harder on me than on her and I guess that is the best that can be hoped for. She goes for another dry run tomorrow morning for another 2 hours - I just want her to be familiar with the place before I leave her for an entire day.

Figuring out what to do with Alex has been more problematic. It seems all his friends stay home for the hour or so after school before their moms/dads get home. I wouldn't necessarily have an issue with this for Alex if we lived closer to the school. He does really well for an hour or so on his own, it isn't a matter of him not being mature enough or responsible enough. His friends live within 3 - 4 blocks from school and we live more like a mile and a half from school. He can manage the walk if necessary, but I really don't want him doing it everyday especially in cold weather which is very common for WI. For the first week or two I should be able to get out of work in time to pick him up from school, from there we are going to play it by ear and see. Hopefully I'll be able to keep my schedule like that, but if not we may have to send him to the Y after school or possibly the after school program at Katie's daycare. We haven't been too enthused about doing that right away just because it seems most of the kids in those programs are 1st and 2nd graders and Alex is in 5th grade.

Other than the daycare issues I've been trying to get all the major tasks taken care of before I start back to work since my free time is going to be seriously affected. I got both the Federal and State taxes filed for the year and I've been working on giving the house a good cleaning. (It needs it!) I also want to complete some stitching goals before I start since I know I will have lots less stitching time. I started part 2 of the Sampler Mystery this morning and this part looks smaller than the first part which is good. No peacocks though - Martina had hinted this part would have peacocks, but it is just an inner border and some flowers. It's pretty though, so I won't complain. After I finish that I have to work on Lisa's RR for the Band Sampler RR. I have an idea of what I want to stitch though and those band samplers seem to go pretty quick for me. Hopefully I can have both done before I start work on Monday. We'll see - if not I should be pretty close.