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a portrait of my son, once a week, every week in 2015

Jimmy: Mummy! Grrrr!

This photo, taken by Michael, pretty much sums up this week for Jimmy: happy, cheeky, and wanting Mummy close whenever we're at home. It's sweet. It's tiring. It's hard on Daddy, because Jimmy is only interested in having Mummy help or assist or do anything. Not to worry, Daddy does get a look in, especially if Daddy is doing something in the kitchen, but many meals have been taken with Jimmy on my lap. It's all down to Jimmy realising that daycare school is the new normal and he's trying to make up for our separation... Sweet boy... Until! he unleashes his scary face!

Grrrr!

Scary, right?

Back to work: Jimmy's first week at daycare...

Or "school", as they call it...

This story really starts on the Friday before Jimmy started full-time at school. Friday morning, around 9am, after taking the above photo, I took Jimmy to school, told him I would pick him up after lunch, made sure that he was suitably engaged in something and left. Naturally, I did leave a few supplies for the "teachers", a change of clothes, a few nappies diapers, and a change of shoes because you never know.

Two hours without Jimmy... what was I to do? Meh, some chores. Meanwhile, Jimmy was having a great time "mowing" the lawn.

When I walked in while they were eating lunch, Jimmy didn't notice me. I sat down opposite him and saw his tired little face. Then he looked at me...

"It's Mummy."

No tears of relief, no jumping into my lap. None of that. He kept eating, asked for more food, ate that. He was fairly hungry it seemed. Hungry and tired and happy. He slept for nearly 3 hours when we returned home.

When I sat next to him I noticed that yes, his shoes had been changed. I also remember how small those shoes were getting, which is why we had an adventure the next day.

In addition to that adventure, there was a pillow to make, spare clothes to organise, sunscreen to decant (they didn't need the whole bottle), a packet of pull-up nappies diapers to pack... And a little boy to make a fuss over, so that he knew that he is loved even if he's not around us.

I mostly made a fuss about the pillow and the fact that it was for his naps, that I was making it especially for him, and that it has a cool feature or two. Don't worry, I think I managed not to overwhelm my little boy.

Jimmy knew something was up on Monday morning. He wasn't sure what to make of all the fuss we were making, trying to get him ready and out the door at the same time as Daddy. When we arrived, all 3 of us, he did his best to follow us out, saying that he wanted to go into the area we had to walk through to leave the building. There were a few tears, but I was told that he settled down after 5-10 minutes. When we picked Jimmy up, he looked over his shoulder and, after being questioned by a teacher, said:

"It's Daddy."

And kept doing what he was doing. Then he saw me.

"It's Mummy."

No fuss. Clearly he had had a good day.

The next morning was the real test. And he didn't want to go through the door. He was not having a bar of it. But Michael and I managed to get him into his room. We managed to say bye-bye without tears and the second Jimmy was distracted, we ran for it. 

When I picked him up that afternoon I was met with the same level of cool recognition. Clearly another good day. I think the highlight was painting "dinosaur skin", because Jimmy has never painted before - I take full responsibility for that.

Wednesday? Jimmy woke up and started talking about paint and painting - clearly it was an exciting event. Another thing Jimmy likes is riding Daddy's bike, and he wanted to ride it to school, but Daddy was in a rush, so that didn't happen. From memory the drop off went well. Michael did indeed pick Jimmy up that afternoon and Jimmy did get to ride on Daddy's bike. So far, so good.

Thursday... Well... Daddy was under instructions to have Jimmy in his swimming gear at drop off because they would be playing with water that morning. Well... Jimmy was most put out by this change in routine. Oh man... it was a struggle to get him into his swimmers and out the door, but we did it. And the Jimmy and I arrived and it turned out that they weren't even sure that they would be doing anything with water, especially as it was a cool morning. Well... all that fuss and bother for nothing... I changed Jimmy into normal clothes, including his fruit shorts, which he had been wearing all week, because they are his favourite shorts. And after a few minutes Jimmy was into the swing of it, and he even blew me a kiss and waved bye-bye. Sweet, sweet boy. 

Daddy picked him up again. And they had played with water! And Jimmy was so, so tired. He wasn't interested in his dinner. He was keen to vacuum. He was not going to have a bath or a shower, nope, no chance. I managed to brush his teeth and then he was in bed by 8pm, which for summer is unheard of. He was exhausted. And running a little hot... 

But on Friday morning Jimmy woke up and was kicking his legs about and asking to watch Gummi Bears. He wasn't sick. Just worn out. Phew... Friday's drop off was rather long... I don't know why, but it was. It might have had a lot to do with me not leaving at exactly the same time as Daddy, or it could have been that Jimmy was just over it. Overtired. Overwhelmed by the week. Over being away from Mummy. Over it. But I managed to leave and he wasn't crying, so that was good.

I told his teachers that I was going to pick him up early, so when I did arrive Jimmy was wearing his backpack and hat and ready to go home - the night before I had decided that if Jimmy wasn't sick, then I would pick him up early, after naptime, and we could watch Gummi Bears and eat popcorn at home. And we did. 

Jimmy seemed to enjoy school, and even though he was tired for most of the week, and wasn't happy to see us leave each morning, I think he enjoyed himself. It's now nearly the end of his second week and he seems to be fairly settled into the daycare, which is great, because Jimmy really didn't have much choice but to like it. So, we're good. At least as far as daycare choice.

On the needles: a little pillow...

Jimmy needed a little pillow for naptime at daycare, so after finding out that 10x8 inches was about the size that would fit their beds, I arranged to borrow our neighbours sewing machine and set to work. I may have already talked about it, but I wanted to share some more details about it (and I now regret not taking more "in progress" photos).

I wanted the pillow to be special. I used some red bunting fabric that I had bought a while back, and had already turned most of it into a pillowcase for a regular sized pillow - for Jimmy, of course. So, using the leftover fabric made perfect sense. Only there wasn't enough of it. Enter an old white cotton shirt.

I bought this shirt when I was in highschool, at a local opshop and probably paid less than $3 for it. It is 100% cotton and the cotton is lovely. The shirt is so old... I've had to cut the collar off, replaced one button and repaired the shirt area around another, and just had to deal with a work-related stain that slowly faded. And then I work it in the pool and it ended up with awful discolouration and that was that.

But I just couldn't throw it away. No chance. The fabric was still in good condition (except around the cuffs, oh well), so I was hoping that I would be able to put it to good use before we left Manhattan, KS, otherwise it would be binned (sad face). It was still hanging in the wardrobe after its replacement arrived. The fabric of the replacement is no match, in terms of quality, but the cut is about the same... anyway... I used the fabric for the pillow and the pillowcase and, to me, it makes Jimmy's naptime pillow all the more special.

I'm so happy with the end result. So is Jimmy, although he is too young to appreciate the two pockets on the same side as the opening, but he will. He saw me making parts of it, most of it even, and I made a fuss about it, and made sure he knew that I was making it just for him. A special little pillow, for naps away from home, made from things at home. He's napping at daycare, and hugging it too, so I think my plan worked - my plan to give him something special, from me to him, that is just his, but with a little of something of mine too.

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a portrait of my son, once a week, every week in 2015

Jimmy: Off to school... day 3.

Oh man... there's a post coming about this, I promise... Jimmy is in daycare. Or school as they call it here. Everything is called school here. Even university. It can get confusing. Anyway...

On Wednesday morning was the first morning in a long time that it was cool out. Cool enough for Jimmy to wear his big red car hoodie - one of his birthday presents, thank you Grantie L!!! And Daddy just couldn't resist the cuteness and took a few photos. It was hard to pick the best one, because they were all good and filled with epic-Jimmy-cuteness. The backpack has his toy dog in it, another birthday present, thank you Grandma!!!

From memory, it was an easy drop-off that morning, but I could be wrong about that...

Losing my Australian filter: hidden costs...

One of the great things about buying anything in Australia is that the ticket price is the price of the item - with a few exceptions that we can put down to human error, with the item being in the wrong spot the main culprit, although finding out that the item is "on sale" is always a nice surprise. Anyway... My point is that in Australia that $7 sandwich costs $7. Jeans for $50 cost $50.

Things are a little different in the good ol' US of A...

That $7 sandwich is taxed at 8% (roughly the tax charged on items in Kansas), and then there's the 15-20% tip if the sandwich is from a cafe or restaurant. Let's pretend we're feeling rich and generous and we'll tip the waitstaff 20%. So: $7 plus 8% tax AND 20% tip. And that's 20% of the bill which includes the tax.

That $7 sandwich now costs $7.56 after tax, and $9.07 after the generous 20% tip of $1.51.

We can round that all down and say that our $7 sandwich cost us $9, and the waitstaff still received a reasonable tip.

That shop assistant who we buy those $50 jeans from does not get a tip, but there is still 8% tax on the jeans. Once that is added those jeans that seemed like a reasonable purchase cost $54. It's not totally outrageous but it's still a hidden cost and it still frustrates me, because the bigger the ticket price, the bigger the price hike sales tax.

When we arrived I tried my old trick of adding up the prices of grocery items as we went along, just to get a sense of how much our shopping was going to cost. Well, let's just say that my efforts were in vain and that I gave up on the process pretty quickly because there was an 8% surprise at the checkout. It was annoying to say the least.

Why don't they just add the tax before putting prices on menus, stickers, and labels? I really don't know. Perhaps it's because there is taxation from three different levels of government on any item, and the levels of government want their cut of sales tax clearly marked, clearly theirs, and having the tax added at the checkout is the simplest way the Americans can do it.

(*sigh* I can't change the system...)

Before coming to the USA we were warned about the tipping and how it was the done thing, but no one talked about the tax that is added at the point of sale. I guess it's an easy thing to forget if you're just passing through, especially when everything seems so cheap. For me, I'm reminded of the addition of tax with every single transaction, no more so when buy things online and the tax does not help me get to the "free shipping" threshold (and I only aim to reach it, if the threshold is $50 or less, because it's a waste of money otherwise - but this is a tale for another time...).

Plus tip? Plus tax... I'm sort of used to both of these hidden or added costs, but clearly it still bothers me enough to write about it.

Over the weekend we...

Went on a mission to find some new shoes for Jimmy's ever growing feet. Our brief: to find the cheapest, best fitting, daycare appropriate shoes. Hopefully Jimmy would like them too.

We trecked out to Goodwill opshop thrift shop and found no shoes for Jimmy there. We stopped at Dillons East and bought supplies for lunch. Jimmy was being his cheeky self and was scaring us with his scary face (he's making it in all these photos, if you couldn't tell).

Scary right?

We checked out the Salvation Army opshop thrift shop and found one pair that would have done the job. For 2 seconds. Before they fell apart. Hmmm...

We ended up buying new shoes. They went on easily, Jimmy said they were good, so they came home with us. I'm sure we spent more on transport and refreshments than the shoes themselves, so perhaps next time I should just order shoes for Jimmy online - only this time I would have bought shoes that would have been too small. Actually, it was good to have Jimmy involved and trying on the shoes, because we had an idea of what size to get and having Jimmy try them on confirmed our guess. And I'm not sure how his feet seem to go up two sizes at a time... but they do.

Another thing that has been happening: Jimmy has started helping with the washing up. Not every time, but some times. It's early days yet, but he's good at rising the inside of cups, and scrubbing the frying pan. Mostly, I think, Jimmy just likes to feel like he's part of what Daddy and Mummy do, which is very sweet, because...

Our little boy started daycare on Monday, so I spent sometime on the weekend making this little pillow for nap times. The pillow is made from an old shirt that was due for repurposing, and the button closure on the pillowcase is also from the same shirt, mostly because there wasn't enough of the bunting fabric for the cover. I'm really happy how it turned out (and there are two pockets on the button side), and I made a bit of a fuss about making it, telling Jimmy that it was for him, for naptime at daycare, that I was making it just for him. And the best part? The bunting fabric I used was leftover from a bigger pillowcase I made for him, so Jimmy has a little bit of home while he naps.

And then on Monday Jimmy had his first day at daycare...

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a portrait of my son, once a week, every week in 2015

Jimmy: Cheeky... cheeky boy...

I love this. This is Jimmy. All cheek. All spunk. He is also all sweetness and affection, but he does like to act up for the camera - especially when Daddy is taking the photos, just like here.