I’ve been reminded of that lately with our older GD, too. She only seems to remember the video books that the teacher plays quietly during rest time for the kids who can’t nap, and has said they don’t have books to read. I saw several pictures online of the classroom and there are many books. In addition, they have guest readers each week who sub for the teacher/aide at story time.
It makes me wonder what GD tells her parents about her time with us. 
When D1 was 4, she came home crying because a boy in her class took away her stickers. We felt so bad for, we bought her so many more stickers. Next day I called the teacher to find out what happened. The teacher said apparently D1 liked this boy’s stickers. She took them when he wasn’t looking and put them in her shoes. The boy found out and tried to get them back from her.
Needless to say we took back all her new stickers.
Ha! Got pg with number three on day 7. Certain. And I was very regular.
And I simply can’t imagine life without him.
All I can say is DD1 has a very long fertility window.
All their children are precious, but they definitely will be working on all pistons running with 5 children in 2025, with ages newborn - 7.
At our house, we called it “maintaining economic viability.” I definitely paid a price for being out of the workforce for three years, but I was able to stay in my career field, so that was a good thing. Was offered a big promotion at one point, but the guys were 5 & 6 and H was working 70 hours a week plus 2+ hr daily commute to/from DC. No nanny, no house cleaners, H traveled regularly, no family within 600 miles. No go. At least my boss was flexible when I decided to switch to PT periodically. Of course, it didn’t decrease my workload one iota, but it was better than when I was at a big consulting firm in my 20s where folks were told that if you couldn’t work 55 hours a week after maternity leave, don’t bother returning. They lost so many talented folks who the company had spent years and much $$ to train.
By the time my sons were old enough for me to reconsider the idea (the previous director of pension administration had just been fired), my medical situation was driving me back out of the workforce. In retrospect, I dodged a bullet, as the third generation of the family firm has pretty much run the business into the ground with its lack of attention to detail. (That, plus institutional history on how the business was run, were what I brought to the table.)
My sons’ partners are far more assertive than I, so I expect that they will insist on a balanced workload no matter what kind of work they are doing. S2 told me last week his support for DIL’s career is directly based on what he saw in H and my marriage. Ouch. But good for him – he doesn’t want to repeat it.
My mom had a medical procedure done yesterday. The young male doctor did such a good job that my mom asked to see him again for the follow up. He said yesterday was his last day before his paternity leave. So I think things are different now.
Things are much better now, IMO. Work from home/hybrid schedules are very helpful, D is able to get laundry done/start dinner on her days she works from home. It also eases the commute. Paternity leave is much more common and accepted.
My nephew in law enjoyed fixing things around the house during his paternity leave and picking their D up early from daycare. He took his leave after they had finished buying their home (my parents old home) and after my niece had re turned to work. He worked for the fed govt and was able to schedule his leave.
My D left her company when they took away maternity leave (even though D didn’t intend to have more kids). Instead of three months paid leave, women had to use PTO and short term disability. The change was the result of a merger with another company that wasn’t supposed to result in major changes. D viewed that change as a sign that family friendly policies would fall by the wayside. She moved to a company run by former coworkers, and she made certain that everyone in charge truly believes in flexibility for family needs. Two years later, it has been great. She works from home & travels some, but it’s limited. SIL works from home, and he had a paid paternity leave. His company is also family friendly, although the nature of his job requires him to concentrate his work during business hours (D can do some of her work after GD goes to bed if necessary). It’s so much better than what was available when H & I were raising our kids.
It is great that DD saw a way to switch work – the merging with companies has decisions far removed from what DD envisioned. DH was unfortunately ‘stuck’ too late in his work career to make the move - in the city where we are at, he could have made a move had he obtained a security clearance earlier in career. He has a high level of skill (ECE). Original company changed 3 more times - and had cash and stock from last two conversions. Lost a pension plan on the last conversion. His phone extension stayed the same. He had to do a lot of traveling starting 15 years in - international and national, and at the last two years had to spend one or two weeks a month supporting another facility in CA (so the flights from our southern state). We would have had a different trajectory if we had not moved for this job in 1983 - but I also knew that he really wanted this job and he had to be happy with his work. As things changed, he did stick through it all because of the sacrifices I made for what he wanted.
Well, can now share, as hopefully the worries are behind us, but youngest gs is getting a baby brother for his birthday! We, however, will be out of the country 
I kept GS tonight while D went to a neighborhood moms group and SIL took GD to church for children’s choir (D has decided she likes free exposure to music 
). I put him to bed and he started fussing 30 minutes later. I went in and patted him & rubbed his back for about 5 minutes. I love those sweet moments better than any holiday or birthday. I tried to leave several times, but he would resume fussing and look for me to stay. So sweet how he kept checking for me with both pacifiers and watching him finally surrender to near sleep.
When GD stays over, she’ll sleep on the king bed with me. Through out the night she would put her head on my shoulder or put her hand or foot on me. If she woke up early she would start talking to me or climb on me and I would have to pretend I was sleeping. The funny thing is she would never get out of the bed, even though she could, unless I told her that she could.
Writing this with my almost 13 month old GS snuggled against me for his nap. Tried the pack-n-play but after 10 minutes of screaming, I declared defeat, picked him and he was down in <5 minutes. Hoses my plans for the afternoon but I will be OK. :).
He and his folks are hanging out here before we go to dinner at our neighborhood Mexican joint. 2 of the staff there have become his aunties. He walks up to them and asks to be picked up.
Sounds like a victory (rather than a defeat) to me! Enjoy.
Little Miss Mess is teething badly. Got her ninth tooth a few weeks ago, and it looks like she will get a few more - all at once! 
12.5 month old GS has all of a sudden become fussy while eating as if it is hurting him. SIL got a good look in his mouth yesterday and discovered 4 top teeth all coming through at once. Hoping things get better for him and for BB’s GD this week 
5 year old GD spent the night last night while mom and dad had date night. As they were having dinner not far from my house, they dropped her off. Late this morning I notice the freezer what not closed all the way; it is a french door, so freezer on the bottom. When I opened it, I can tell that it has been opened since D put a freezer pack in there at 6:00 last night! While things were still cold, most had thawed.
As I picked up the carton of ice cream to toss, it slipped and tipped over; liquid ice cream went everywhere in the freezer and ran down through the wire drawers. GD has an anaphylactic allergy to dairy and eggs, so I told her to stay in the den while I attempted to clean up ice cream running everywhere. Oh, and we needed to leave for swimming lessons in 10 minutes across town!
I got up what I could to avoid a terrible mess, knowing when I came home I would have to handle the bulk of the cleaning. I did want to expose GD to the ice cream, so left everything in the freezer until I got home.
This sweet child came over to me as we were leaving and said she was sorry I have to clean the mess up by myself, and if she wasn’t allergic, she would have helped. 
She then told me, this wasn’t the kind of sorry when she did something wrong, but the other kind of sorry. I was impressed with the empathy and gave her a huge hug. She also is one to say “I love you,” and mean it, without someone saying it first.
Only a fail since parents are working on getting him to nap on his own. Definitely not a fail for the snuggles 
Owww… 
that probably hurts badly. Poor baby. Our little one wouldn’t eat anything other than bananas and Cheerios when her first teeth started to come out… then her appetite returned. Now she is fussy about food again.