One Day at a Time

Pardon me while I flop down tiredly with my cup of tea.

Miss K and I got back from a rather long walk this afternoon.  It was like most of the days here lately where the rain is light be ever present and just looking outside makes you feel depressed. I'm bracing myself since I know rain is in the forecast for another few days.

Our letting agent came by for a an inspection, which meant that though I was sure as hell not cleaning the flat top to bottom for a five minute chat, I did at least feel compelled to tidy and vacuum the carpets. Not that the vacuum really sucks up anything. Just enough to make it look a little better but not enough to actually clean the carpets. This annoys me to no end, especially with a three year old around who's always playing on those carpets. But in this rental living game I've learned some important lessons and one of those is to pick your battles.

In this case it means though while my comments and list of things wrong with the place is as long as my arm, in reality I only mention the top three in hopes that they might actually get taken care of. If we're lucky.

This time it was a repeat of all three of the things I mentioned before: Our sinking bathtub, the foot board for the cupboards that needs cutting and reinstalling so it's not laying on our kitchen floor by our feet, and the awful mattresses. He really seems to be on top of them this time, but I think I won't get my hopes up. I know a lot of it depends on the owner, and it's probably unlikely the owner probably hasn't set foot in the place in years to know what really needs help, so this is where our intermediary letting agent comes in, right? Maybe. We'll see.

In any case, the flat is clean, I baked banana bread and made lunch and then we went for a walk. Stepping out into the misting rain, I pegged the temperature at about 4 degrees C. It was definitely chilly and so I was glad Miss K cooperated enough to let me put a hat and gloves on. She however is refusing to let us put on her winter jacket since if she goes in the stroller, she can't put her arms in the straps. She likes doing that a great deal, so goodness knows what happens when it snows and she doesn't want to walk.

We walked down to the River Clyde and on the approach to the river I was kicking myself for not bringing my camera or my phone. The river was rather still and glossy, creating near perfect reflections. Considering how rare this was, my eye was snapping pics in my head and I pouted to myself.

Despite the rain it was a fairly enjoyable walk, once we got passed the part where Miss K insisted on going to the Science Centre and we couldn't because our passes had expired and we won't be renewing them until after the new year. If we head anywhere near there and we just walk by, she freaks out. I felt for her truly because I would have loved to have taken her this afternoon, but it wasn't going to happen. C'est la vie. We had to settle for the active (and free) walk.

You'll notice that we went out in the afternoon. Yes, that can only mean one thing: she's stopped napping. What began when she was sick a couple weeks ago has continued and no amount of trying can get her down for a nap.

It's an adjustment for both of us because I felt like I lost that time I needed to do anything, like write, or bake, or clean, or more importantly some days, nap. Last week I figured out what her energy levels were like and I've learned she works best when she is very active in the morning and then in the afternoon she is then happy to do quiet things and even curl up on the couch. She may not nap, but she rests and I can actually do something. Which is how I'm writing this post right now.

I'm slowly building an arsenal of activities to keep her busy in anticipation of the many days where it's too wet to play outside and I can't afford to do extra things at indoor places. We know which museums we can go to within easy walking distance, but to be honest I can't go there all the time. It gets boring. However, I am lucky to have made some friends and hopefully there are play dates in the future.

Part of this shift has been realizing just how much activity she needs and also how to balance the quiet time for both our sakes. We can't go, go, go for 8 hours straight, so working out a good balance is key.

In other news, her vocabulary is improving, so one can only hope that she will find her words sooner rather than later to ease her frustration. This week has been far better than last week, and I attribute that to her not being sick and to us adjusting to the no-nap scenario.

I'm exhausted most days though, and barely have time to do any of the creative things I love. I know it will get there, but it's frustrating too. I also had a three-day headache over the weekend and that was frustrating because we had some nice days and all I wanted to do was go out with my camera.

Speaking of which, naturally now that I'm inside, the rain has stopped and the sun was poking out a little. Yeah, so not cool. But it's too late to go out again and I need to go make pizza dough for dinner, which got so much easier to make when I figured out how to get it not to stick to my pan and now that I own a rolling pin.

Simple things.