Healing Anaya: Fed-Ex Shipping Sponsorship

Healing Anaya: Fed-Ex Shipping Sponsorship: "We have received a frozen breastmilk donation from a mother in Nanaimo. We are very blessed that the transport of the milk all worked out ..."

Please read this post and leave a comment to encourage Fed-Ex to sponsor the shipping costs of breastmilk donations for this mother and her child.

Perspective from the greatest Mother and former First Lady

"If you bungle raising your kids, I don't think whatever else you do matters very much." Jaclyn Kennedy Onassis

I came across this quote on a friend's facebook page this morning during one of my pump sessions at work. I was sitting here fuming about a coworker that shifts her work responsibility onto others through the guise of delegating or trying to give everyone ownership in the department policies but in reality she just wants someone else to do her work. In the past this has typically fallen on me because I am a people pleaser (read doormat). But I'm tired.
Most of my efforts are going into raising my son, then there is a rotating tie between hubby, responsibilities of a classroom teacher and coaching and then everything else falls as it comes up. I spend most times putting out the little fires just enough that I can get through my day and nothing more because I want to channel my energy where it really matters, my son.
So this quote really came swooping in at a time I needed it most. First so I didn't feel so guilty for feeling the way I did and secondly to have the guts to for once tell her where she can stick her thinly veiled attempts at getting everyone else to do her work and then not giving credit to those that do it. I've got milk to make and a baby to entertain!

The best laid plans of diapers and daycares...

I know I sound whiny and I should just find a new daycare but I think the point is more about me then them. They are doing a good job with my son. I know because of how happy he is when I pick him up. He is engaged with other kids and his caregivers which is what I wanted from a daycare. He only goes for 3 hours, 4 at the most each day. But it is the little things that get me. Like being unable to understand that his diapers had a built in cover and were compliant without needing the extra cover. Or requiring that we keep ziplock bags as well as the sealed container for the diapers, clearly a lack of concern for landfill waste.
Today when I gave in and sent 7G disposables and they wrote on each diaper with a permanent marker, his initials which because they are wood pulp and paper bled onto his onesies and now he has the mirror image of his initials on his shirt bottom. Why wasn't it satisfactory to have the name on the package? Why the need to take it a step further and write on the actual diaper? Does a large majority of the 8 kids in his room have the same diapers? How much time did it take them to write the initials on 34 diapers? What did that effort take them away from?
For me it is the things they choose to micro-manage and the broader ideas they completely miss by being so focused on that one thing. So here is to hoping that Little Man uses this experience as a teaching tool of what isn't necessary to put your efforts in and how seeing the whole picture is a better approach.

This may be the day that broke this mama's back

Daycare has been driving me bananas. They complain about EVERYTHING. They complain every day to my husband when he drops off Little Man. The harp on the diapers everyday. But when I pick him up there isn't a peep about any issues unless I ask about it and then it's like 'oh yeah, we did have a problem with...(fill in the blank)'
It's frustrating because I chose this daycare precisely because of the level of communication they claimed to have and the fact that they said they would do cloth diapers, no problem. They showed me these wonderful communication sheets and told me that I could expect to see one every day and it would tell me what they did in class that day, how many and at what time he had a bottle, diaper change, nap etc. The first day I dropped him off back in September it said they read Rainbow Fish and sang Alligator Purse, after that it seemed they never read or sang anything because that part of the sheet remained empty. They were doing fine with the cloth diapers until he got an ear infection and had to go on antibiotics and got diarrhea. He apparently leaked out of the diaper and onto a chair. They got extremely upset and talked to Hubby (not me) about it every time he dropped him off. Then they called the house one morning and said that Hubby needed to put plastic pants on Little Man and bring a covered container to put the soiled diapers in. Now mind you we have been at daycare for a month and I had asked prior to coming to daycare what I needed to do in order to be compliant with State regulations for daycare and cloth diapering. I had done my research prior to asking these questions and I had come up with a plan just in case they tried to tell me that the state wouldn't allow it. So I had already read what the State requires and it states there must be a cover over the cloth diaper. Well, correct me if I'm wrong but the Bumgenius 3.0s have a built in cover which, should preclude the requirement to have a second cover.
Well in order to avoid conflict Hubby puts a Blueberry cover over the Bumgenius and sends Little Man to daycare that way for 2 days. So for those of you not keeping track he already has diarrhea from the antibiotics and now we are double wrapping him in PUL fabric. So yup he gets diaper rash. I try to call the head teacher and explain some of these facts to him as well as state once and for all that they need to change the diapers more often then they would a disposable which would prevent accidents in the first place but he isn't there.
So now I'm battling the worst diaper rash he's ever had. I call his pediatrician and it turns out to be a yeast diaper rash which I need to treat with antifungal cream and switch my diaper cream to one not approved for use with cloth diapers and use non latex disposables and purchase $40 infant probiotics. Luckily the diaper rash goes away after just two days using the cream combos.
So now back to daycare we go and they question my Hubby and ask where is the second cover. Hubby tells them exactly what I had said about that would not work because of the rash it caused. They tell him State regs state he needs a cover and Hubby caves and tells them that we could send disposables without latex. Even thought I'm right there with him that they are annoying about this and that it would just be easier to give them disposables and not have to hear their complaints, I could smack him. We wanted to save money. We went with this place because they said they would do the cloth for us. Now we have to shell out money to purchase disposables. GRR!
Another thing that drives me nuts is that they said that they had very strict rules about people picking up the babies. They stressed that everyone would have to show ID and be on his pick-up list. So I fill out the pickup list and explain that I coach and would have a babysitter pick him up on the days I had late games. I put her on the list and figure all is well. SO I send the sitter to get him. First time no one checks her ID (WTF), second they wouldn't let her leave because they weren't sure if she was allowed to pick him up (check the list, duh!) The next time my sitter gets sick so my sister in law is going to pick him up. She is not on the list but she waltzes in and picks him up and takes him home. No one looked at her ID. So my feeling is some crazy could walk in there and as long as he smiles at them, they are going to let him walk out.
But anyhow pumping has been going good. I still have to get up in the middle of the night just to get comfortable. But I do this for him and that is always my motivating factor.