None of my stories will really go in order since I am already 2 months behind. I thought I could put a little thought up each day about what happened but that really isn't going to happen.
So while Michelle was on bed rest last summer she had a lot of time to think and one of those thinks turned into the cost of diapers. She made several phone calls to different places like Walmart, Costco, Babies R Us, Target and other retailers to find out the typical cost of diapers. She then call several family members, friends and neighbors to see how many diapers they went through a day at different stages. Anyway, it led to a few pages of notes and an explanation to why cloth diapers would fit our budget better. I took a look at the numbers and thought, this completely makes sense because my part-time work is definitely not going to be able to pay for disposables.
Michelle checked out a few dealers and found a person in American Fork called My Diaper Piper. She has a huge selection of brands, colors and sizes that she sells from home. After Maggie was born, Michelle went with her parents to go check them out. We found out Maggie was too small for the one size fits all so we had to spend a little extra than we had planned. But after a few weeks we realized that this whole saving money on diapers was really a
Pause...While in the middle of this sentence I saw something falling towards the computer and it was our lamp. Maggie had army crawled over to it and pulled on it and it almost smashed into the computer! Everyday is a new adventure
Resume...good idea.
Now that I am the one taking almost all of the responsibility at home I've found cloth diapers are more work than those first few weeks. First of all you're washing these things about 4 times per week. Because we don't pay our utilities we're still ahead on cost of disposables but if you forget to put them in the wash on time you have to use disposables while they're washing and drying. We always get a couple packages of disposables when we go on vacation and then use them when needed afterwards. It would be impossible to do cloth on vacation.
Well, the worst part of cloth diapers is that whatever goes in them has to be washed out. Most of the time if it's solid in there you can just dump it in the trash but sometimes it's not solid. What do you do then? You have to kind of rinse them out before putting them in the wash. Sometimes I just wish I could fold up the whole thing and throw it away but then I think of the money we're saving.
Maggie is now in the one-size-fits all and things are going great. The biggest problem now is trying to hold her still while changing her.
Monday, June 21, 2010
Friday, June 18, 2010
At the beginning...
Just to explain real quick, I thought this blog would help me remember all the great times I got to have with my daughter for an entire summer and I stay home. It actually is making me feel guilty everyday that I don't put something down and I now I can't remember when things happen. So I will just start from here. As I remember a funny story I will add a new post.
Let's start with a little bit more background. This last school year Michelle has been home everyday taking care of Maggie and the apartment managing stuff. Every morning she would wake up with me and while I would shower she would pack a hearty lunch, get breakfast ready, feed Maggie and get my clothes figured out. We would eat breakfast together and then I would be gone for up to 18 hours some days! Michelle did this 5 days a week for 32 weeks this school year. You can't ever repay someone for that kind of service, but I'm starting to learn how hard of a job it really was and Michelle is only gone 20-25 hours a week.
Day 1:
Alarm at 5:45! You've got to be kidding me, who wakes up at 5:45 when they don't have school or work? I do. Time to roll out of bed, start packing Michelle's lunch, pray that Maggie sleeps a little longer, prepare breakfast, open my eyes, find the a suitable container for Michelle's lunch (I ended up using a small insulated pouch from Similac that is made for taking bottles, but there was no way I was going to let Michelle use my HSM lunchbox. What if it got lost?), eat breakfast with Michelle and send her on her way to her first day of classes.
The next thing I knew I was awakened by a hungry little girl needing a diaper change. I quickly ran into Maggie's room and changed her diaper and carried her into the kitchen to prepare a bottle. This girl loves her bottles. When she's hungry and she sees a bottle she starts this really excited squeak, laugh, pant then cry until it is in her mouth while trying frantically to grab the bottle. I learned very quickly to find a place to set her down, then go into the kitchen and prepare the bottle before she sees it. That first time I wasn't smart enough to place her elsewhere and tried to make the bottle while holding her in my arms. She threw a fit and a few punches at me while trying to get the bottle out of my hands. Water was everywhere and I barely got formula in and the lid on before she pried the bottle out of my hands.
I set her down in the living room to drink her bottle and dashed for the shower because our office for the apartments opens at 8am and it was already 7:50. Michelle warned me that the days you are not ready is when someone comes knocking at the door and I didn't want to be caught with my shirt on backwards because I was so frantic to put some sort of clothing on. I was able to take a quick shower and get dressed when I remembered I left Maggie in the middle of the floor with a bottle.
I quickly returned to the living room to see Maggie about 10 feet from her bottle trying to reach some extension cords by our air conditioner. She was caught and the look on her face was priceless as she realized that I didn't want her playing with the cords.
The rest of the day was usual routine and she actually followed her nap schedule well. After surviving day one I realized this wasn't going so be such a bad summer after all.
27 April 2010
Let's start with a little bit more background. This last school year Michelle has been home everyday taking care of Maggie and the apartment managing stuff. Every morning she would wake up with me and while I would shower she would pack a hearty lunch, get breakfast ready, feed Maggie and get my clothes figured out. We would eat breakfast together and then I would be gone for up to 18 hours some days! Michelle did this 5 days a week for 32 weeks this school year. You can't ever repay someone for that kind of service, but I'm starting to learn how hard of a job it really was and Michelle is only gone 20-25 hours a week.
Day 1:
Alarm at 5:45! You've got to be kidding me, who wakes up at 5:45 when they don't have school or work? I do. Time to roll out of bed, start packing Michelle's lunch, pray that Maggie sleeps a little longer, prepare breakfast, open my eyes, find the a suitable container for Michelle's lunch (I ended up using a small insulated pouch from Similac that is made for taking bottles, but there was no way I was going to let Michelle use my HSM lunchbox. What if it got lost?), eat breakfast with Michelle and send her on her way to her first day of classes.
The next thing I knew I was awakened by a hungry little girl needing a diaper change. I quickly ran into Maggie's room and changed her diaper and carried her into the kitchen to prepare a bottle. This girl loves her bottles. When she's hungry and she sees a bottle she starts this really excited squeak, laugh, pant then cry until it is in her mouth while trying frantically to grab the bottle. I learned very quickly to find a place to set her down, then go into the kitchen and prepare the bottle before she sees it. That first time I wasn't smart enough to place her elsewhere and tried to make the bottle while holding her in my arms. She threw a fit and a few punches at me while trying to get the bottle out of my hands. Water was everywhere and I barely got formula in and the lid on before she pried the bottle out of my hands.
I set her down in the living room to drink her bottle and dashed for the shower because our office for the apartments opens at 8am and it was already 7:50. Michelle warned me that the days you are not ready is when someone comes knocking at the door and I didn't want to be caught with my shirt on backwards because I was so frantic to put some sort of clothing on. I was able to take a quick shower and get dressed when I remembered I left Maggie in the middle of the floor with a bottle.
I quickly returned to the living room to see Maggie about 10 feet from her bottle trying to reach some extension cords by our air conditioner. She was caught and the look on her face was priceless as she realized that I didn't want her playing with the cords.
The rest of the day was usual routine and she actually followed her nap schedule well. After surviving day one I realized this wasn't going so be such a bad summer after all.
27 April 2010
Wednesday, June 9, 2010
Where it all began...
I don't completely know how to start this story, but I'll do my best to get the facts straight. One Sunday afternoon Michelle and I were on our way up to my parents' for dinner when Michelle mentioned that she was still planning on going back to BYU to obtain a degree. I thought, "Ok, she's still set on going back to school. That's good." She then said, "What do you think if I go back to work at Deseret Book the days I'm not in class?" I wasn't too happy about that because I wanted to have an out as well. I didn't want to be working as full-time apartment manager while Michelle would be gone 5 days a week. I told her that I didn't want to be stuck all summer and it would make more sense for me to work at the Joseph Smith Memorial Building (JSMB) on the days she doesn't have classes because I make more money there than she does at Deseret Book. After a long discussion I realized I chose the wrong word... "Stuck" is exactly how Michelle felt when I was taking 19 credits and working 15-20 hours a week this last semester. She was ready for a break and we tried to organize a compromise.
A couple Sundays later was Fast and Testimony Meeting and also the baby blessing of our home teacher and his wife's baby. I don't remember anything that was really said but, our home teacher, Tyson Bringhurst, shared his story of being the stay at home dad, his wife, Alyson, shared her story of Tyson being home and then Michelle got up and shared her feelings of going back to school and us switching roles for the summer. Even though it hadn't started yet she said she knew I would do a great job.
Well, our compromise was to see how classes would go and then if Michelle felt like she could handle work at Deseret Book she could do it. Now we are almost done with her first set of classes, I'm home MWF from 7-3 and we are usually both home TTh before I go to work at the JSMB. Michelle isn't working at Deseret Book because there is still so much to do here for the apartments and we like to have some time together. I'm working mostly evenings at the JSMB about 30 hours a week and Michelle is picking up the slack around home while still doing really well in school. I never thought I would enjoy being a stay at home dad as much as I do. I'm just sad for when August 16th hits and I begin my student teaching.
A couple Sundays later was Fast and Testimony Meeting and also the baby blessing of our home teacher and his wife's baby. I don't remember anything that was really said but, our home teacher, Tyson Bringhurst, shared his story of being the stay at home dad, his wife, Alyson, shared her story of Tyson being home and then Michelle got up and shared her feelings of going back to school and us switching roles for the summer. Even though it hadn't started yet she said she knew I would do a great job.
Well, our compromise was to see how classes would go and then if Michelle felt like she could handle work at Deseret Book she could do it. Now we are almost done with her first set of classes, I'm home MWF from 7-3 and we are usually both home TTh before I go to work at the JSMB. Michelle isn't working at Deseret Book because there is still so much to do here for the apartments and we like to have some time together. I'm working mostly evenings at the JSMB about 30 hours a week and Michelle is picking up the slack around home while still doing really well in school. I never thought I would enjoy being a stay at home dad as much as I do. I'm just sad for when August 16th hits and I begin my student teaching.
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