Stay At Home Mommy

So... 5 months have passed since I closed the door to Accounting. Regrets? NONE!! :) Walking away from it all has already exceeded the expectations I had envisioned when I was considering doing it. I knew I was stressed, but never realized how much until the stress was gone. I new I was tired, but never realized how tired until felt what rested feels like. I knew I missed Bradyn, but never realized how much until I started getting to see him so much every day. I knew I hated number crunching, and remembered how much when I sat down to do the taxes. I knew I had a messy house, but never realized how messy until I actually had a chance to clean it up. I could probably go on and on, but you get the idea. I have thoroughly enjoyed these last few months with Bradyn. I keep him home three days a week and let him continue the daycare experience two days a week. We felt it was important that he continue to get that social interaction, and he picks up so much when he's there. We just couldn't bring ourselves to pull him out completely.

I have tried to keep a fairly similar schedule to the daycare experience, so much I guess that the first day we were home together Chad asked Bradyn what we did that day and Bradyn's response was, "we played school." LOL. Thankfully Bradyn plays very well by himself as well as with others, so we have "mommy & me" time and "just Bradyn" time throughout the day. The kitchen egg timer is the greatest invention ever and has come to be a constant background noise at our house. We wind it all the way up, when it dings it's mommy & Bradyn time. When it dings again, it's time for Bradyn to play by himself. This allows me to have some time to straighten up around the house and work my business as well as spend plenty of time interacting with him. Ding! Time to clean up. Ding! time to eat. Ding! Time to turn on soft music and take a nap. Ding! Ding! Ding! Love it!

We are super glad that the weather is about to turn around and get nice out because with such an energetic kid, it has been difficult to find things to do that let him burn off some of that energy. Bradyn even told me one day, "Mommy, we need a carpet." (referring to the fact that we have wood laminate in the living room now). I said, "Why do we need carpet?" Bradyn said, "So we can wrestle!" LOL He apparently misses that. We do have a family pass to the Children's Discovery Museum here in town, so we are frequent fliers to that place and have had a couple playdates with friends and family there. We have gone to a couple of indoor waterparks and down to St. Louis to the Zoo and City Museum. I knew Bradyn was an amazing kid, but only seeing him for a few hours a day when I was working only scratched the surface of what I knew. He stuns me daily with his vocabulary and conversations. He makes me shake my head at the phrases that he comes up with that are somehow used in the correct context, who knows where half of them come from. He knows his alphabet, colors, shapes, how to count to nineteen (LOL), is so athletic and energetic, loves to sing and dance, is a kid genius at puzzles, can identify quite a few letters, can have a book memorized after only having read it to him a couple of times, "shh, don't talk mommy, I'll read it", is very caring as he takes care of his "babies" (Nemo, George, Punkin, & WhiteSox Dog) "we have a really big day tomorrow, good night, I love you," and is very well mannered and polite, "may I be excused?" He is completely potty trained during the daytime including at nap, all we have left is overnight. Thank goodness I'm not missing any of it because he's growing up soooo fast!