2009

Nora has been very cranky over the past few days. She must not be feeling well or something. I don't even want to say it's teething because I always say that and it never is. Every time I put her down or try to walk out of the room she freaks out and starts screaming. I hope she starts feeling better soon. Milo is still his happy little self.

I have been struggling to find a way to give the kids some more variety so that they don't get bored cooped up at home all day every day. In the summer and the fall we took walks all the time, and we could play outside, but now that it is so cold we can't rely on that anymore.  When it gets too cold for a walk, even, then what can we do? I have been looking around at various baby/toddler activities or open gym type things, and the biggest challenge is that most of them have set hours that happen in the morning, smack dab in the middle of Milo and Nora's nap. They still nap in the morning as well as in the afternoon, so the only big chunk of time we really have is in the late afternoon when nothing is open or scheduled.

So I can take them to the mall and let them play in the germfest that is the play area, or....hmm. What else can I do with them? Then I realized that I could join a gym. This would solve several problems at once:

-- The gym has a supervised playroom that's open in the afternoon so I can drop the kids off there and give them some variety.

-- The gym will give me a chance to work out when it's too cold to take the kids out in the jogging stroller, which it is most days.

-- Getting some kind of better work-out schedule in place (other than my lame 3-mile walk to and from work) will help with getting in better shape.

I weigh more now than I weighed this time last year, 3 weeks after the babies were born. That's pathetic. I weigh more now than I have at any time of my non-pregnant life, and it's time to stop. None of my clothes fit and I'm sick of it. I haven't really gone crazy with eating or anything, so the only thing I can think of is that I don't exercise like I used to because, of course, it's impossible to get anything like that done with the kids. So if I join the local gym and can drop the kids off in the playroom, my hope is that they'll get some variety into their day while I get some much-needed exercise time on my own.

When I lived in San Diego my apartment complex had its own gym that was free and 30 feet from my front door. It was filled with nerdy grad students and visiting professors, and it was kind of dingy, and small, and completely non-intimidating. It was just my kind of place. I used it every day and that was eventually how I started running (I started on the treadmill). I'd much rather find something like that, but on the other hand a) I'm not a grad student anymore and I don't want to run into my own students at the school gym, and b) those places don't have childcare. So I'll give this a try and see how it goes. I definitely have to do something about this weight problem, pronto.

I've never made a health or weight-loss NY resolution before. But it's time. The babies are a year old, they're done nursing, and it was reasonable to give myself their first year to just recover and cope and deal. Now it's time to move forward and get healthy again.

2008 was a big year. The babies went from being mostly out of it to being real little people. I went from barely being able to walk around the block to being able to run again, all while pushing a heavy stroller. Jake and I learned that sleep deprivation is hell on a marriage (and life) and the only saving grace is a sense of humor. Thank God Jake has a great one. I had an article published, two accepted for publication, and two submitted. I traveled for the first time and spent two nights away from the babies. Jake ended his business and started his graduate program. The babies learned to sit up, roll over, crawl, pull up to a stand, stand alone, eat solid foods, and talk. 2008 was a hard year but it got better with each passing month, and I hope that 2009 will continue along that trend.

Above are the kids' eyes. I can tell immediately whose is whose, but I don't know if it's that obvious to everybody else.