Hold On a Second...

That phrase comes out of my mouth about seventeen thousand times a day.  Seriously, hold on Ingrid, I'm feeding your brother.  Hold on, Otis, I'm just putting this laundry away.  Hold on, whoever is calling me, I'm making dinner.  Hold on, hold on, hold on.  I have been feeling so pulled in a million directions lately, it's driving me nuts!!

I used to pride myself on being able to multitask.  I think that was at a time when, if I got the things on my list done, I got to go home.  Now, though, the list just keeps on going.  If I finish ten things, there are just going to be ten more things to do after that.  So I'm not as motivated to do things, maybe.  Whatever the case, I have been seriously behind on lots of things, trying to focus is hard, and I'm always telling Ingrid to hold on. 

I'm just starting to realize how different her life is from just a few months ago.  I know every kid goes through this and every mom goes through feeling guilty, but it just hit me how hard this must be for her to have a new sibling, move, have a crabby mom all the time.  She keeps saying things like "I need you to take care of me, I want you to play with me, I need you."  And I always say "Hold on, I have to do..." insert mundane task here.  It's never important either!  I am just always pushing her away, telling her to wait. 

The past few days I have tried really hard not to make her wait.  I drop what I'm doing and just hold her.  Yesterday we cuddled on the couch while Otis napped and I made up dumb stories about sparkly unicorns.  She looked up at me and said "I love you so much, mom."  Oh dear.  I have to make more time for her.  I have to!  The floor will still be dirty in twenty minutes, the laundry will still be there to fold after we play or cuddle or just read books.  Perspective, Amber!  Remember all those nights where I didn't want to rock her to sleep because I was tired?  And I said she's only going to be this age once?  Well the same thing applies here and I have forgotten that.  She will only be almost-three once, and I have to enjoy these cuddly moments so I can look back upon them fondly when she's rolling her eyes at me every ten seconds in ten years. 

So you guys will have to hold on while I go play with my daughter.  Hold on, I'll be right there. 

Stress Dreams

No matter how calm I feel on the outside about having another kid, and dealing with Brendan getting a job and having to move soon, it creeps up on me in strange ways.  Usually I have stress dreams.  While pregnant with Ingrid it involved working at the coffee shop where I met Brendan.  Somehow things were always dirty, orders were getting overlooked, customers were rude and I woke up in a cold sweat.

Last night I had two of these gems.  Both involved not knowing what to order from a menu at a restaurant, which I find amusing as I have never had that problem!  In one of the dreams everything on the menu was $40-60, so perhaps I'm worried about money??  And in the other I kept asking for my cup of coffee with two creams and they kept ignoring me.  I don't know what that was about...

I'm glad I'm able to let go of my worries through dreams, though.  Because in the daytime really I am pretty relaxed.  I daydream about our future and what it holds and what the possibilities are, but I don't really stress too much because I have no control over where we end up.  Frankly, neither does Brendan.  He can just go on interviews and do his best and whoever offers him a job will give us a new life.  How can you stress about that?  We have absolutely no control.  Instead of that worrying me, I just let it go and see where life takes us.