Starting back to work

I started working part time back at my old school this week. Graham is going to a babysitter two blocks from the school who watches two teachers' babies that were born right after Graham. The babysitter's name is Luisa and, while she has older kids herself, she loves babies! She seems genuinely excited about what they do and learn. I find myself hanging out over there playing with the babies when I go to pick Graham up. I know their moms, so it feels normal to sit and play with them. And Luisa and I get a chance to have some nice conversations. I'm not sure where she is from originally, but she lived for several years in Fairfax County with her husband. When I'm there, the kids seem to play very nicely with each other and they don't want Graham to leave. I think it's great for Graham to be around other babies very close to his age. What's interesting, too, is this has been the only time he has spent significant time around other kids where he is the oldest. And I'm not worried as much about his getting sick over there because all the babies are only children in their families, so their exposure to germs is probably the same as Graham's. This and the fact that he seems pretty happy over there make me feel really good about leaving him for a bit.

I am enjoying the time at work. They really need help over there preparing for testing season. I am not working with students directly but instead helping the administrators with their entry and testing processes for their ESL/LEP (Limited English Proficient) students. I was able to jump right in and get something fairly crucial set up this week already. It was nice feeling skilled at something and putting my mind's energy towards tasks other than those related to house and baby. And I'll be honest... I don't think I'm ready to work with angsting teenagers quite yet. I'm only working 8 hours spread over Tuesday and Thursday each week at this point, so I really feel it's the perfect scenario for both us. We get regular breaks in the week and hang around other people, but we don't miss each other because we're not away from one another that long.

I have to say I have been a bit surprised with myself. I thought for sure that during my recent trip to Cali to visit Kathy and Nichole and going back to work that I might have lost all social skills after being at home with Graham for so long. I have spent a majority of my time talking to a baby and thinking about a baby, so I was preparing for major embarrassment trying to function in the real world. But you know what, I think I still got it. Thank God!!!! I have been really shocked at how easily I've slipped back into parts of my old life with a lot of myself still in tact. It's nice to know that I haven't completely lost it! I think going back to work part time is a good thing and perhaps I'm timing this right so that I don't lose a lot of intellect and ability keen in areas other than baby. And I guess it's important to me that Graham knows his mommy's passions lie in multiple places. But of course, when I leave school I just wanna get over there as fast as I can and squeeze his little head off ;-)