And now...The News

My Mom brought home a bag filled with mementos of my Grandfather. Apparently there was a t-shirt made up. I haven't opened it yet. I guess I fell that as soon as I do, it will become real and my Grandfather will really be gone. I guess I'm just not ready to come to terms with it just yet, so it is sitting on top of my make-up case. My mom asked me this morning if I liked the T-shirt. I told I hadn't looked at it yet and she just kind of harrumphed. Whad-ever. I haven't talked to her again, but I have heard hopeful things about her desire to move back to Seattle. My co-worker as it turns out has a wife that is trained in child-care and said she would probably be able to watch the kiddies in the short term. That is nice. I told Jason maybe I should just tell HR to just turn over the balance of my pay check to him. Har har har. So we were going to get an Au Pair, but the more reading I do, the worse I feel about it. Like we are going to get some crazy twenty-something that will just want to party and will hate us and resent us. Then it occurred to me, that is probably who works in day care. I don't know. Who are the actual workers in a day care center? I have heard they have high turnover, etc. The benefit of an Au Pair (or AP) is that she will live with us and become like part of the family. This would be good. The kids would really get to know her, and since she is from a different country we would get that aspect as well. Jason is English and I think it is important to both of us that our kids grow up realizing there is more than just the US. SO we will see. I'm sure you'll hears lots as we go through the process. Looking over at my sidebar, I notice that once again, it is woefully out of date. I encourage you to head over to Manic Mommies. Beware, it is a podcast, they have a blog but the podcast is really nice. What! You don't know what a podcast is or why you should care? Honey child, get your tech butt in gear, get a player and listen in. This link will get you started. They even have a free player. Or you can use I-tunes. Get on the tech wagon! So, you may know that I am a pumping mommy. On my recent cluster of business trips, I finally got a new laptop bag. Tis verrrr nice. Rosemont I have it in Avocado. This was a super improvement from my old bag. It was a Swiss Army backpack. It was nice, if I only had that bag. Also I could cram so much crap in it, but it would get very heavy. When I switched over to Avocado I had this nice small stylish bag. It also has all these inside pockets so I ca easily fit in this bag: Humungous Dell Latitude D800 laptop Power supply for above cosmetic bag wallet various small items to include: lotion, kleenex, mints, inhaler Various notebook accessories to include: USB cables for syncing, USB thumb drive, USB mouse A pen panel A wallet panel My Ipod My Pocket PC A water bottle A bag of snacks Some files and/or papers It does get heavy, but not to much so. The straps do tend to dig in. The thing I really like it that I can put all my "purse" stuff in it, so I don't have to carry my purse through the airport, ot jam it in my backpack. I have a whole shoulder to sling my pump bag on (My Medela Pump in Style Advanced). The FAA has this silly rule of only allowing two pieces of carry-on whatever. Some don't care, but some do. The last thing you want t be is getting on the plane and being stopped for three bags. Because it has happened to me. What occurred to me though was that I can't be the ONLY woman in this situation. There has to be another who has a laptop and a pump so I think someone should make a bag that you can carry your laptop, your pump and crap around. It could even be like a little wheelie bag, with a removable part for your pump. That would be soooo nice. Just thinking.