I’m currently feeding Ellen before she goes to bed for the night, and I’m feeling decent about how day 2 back at work went.

Work itself went swimmingly. I’m already getting my groove back and feeling productive. 

Ellen took an extremely long nap at school this afternoon, which is similar to what she would do at home. That’s an excellent sign. Her teacher reports that she was mostly in good spirits as well, and did tummy time and played really well.

Where we’re still not doing great is the bottles. She only took 3 oz total from her teachers all day – less than she should have in one single feeding. Yikes!

When I arrived to pick the kids up, I grabbed the active bottle and coaxed her into drinking the whole 5 ounces. It took her opening her eyes from her screaming to see it was me, and then a little song, and then she chugged the whole thing.

So we know she knows how to drink from a bottle. It’s clearly a matter of who is delivering it. Maybe she’ll pull a Lewis and never get on board with bottles and lose a bunch of weight, or – more likely – it will just take her a few days to begin to trust other people to keep her alive. I’m holding off on drawing conclusions until more time has passed.

The evening was mayhem again. Kyle came home early for the second day in a row so I’d have reinforcements, which was so lovely of him to think to do. But even with him home, it was crazy town.

We are at the calm part of the evening now, getting the kids in bed and winding down. Building up to this point was certainly not easy, though.

I was out of clean pump parts (must buy more!), so the dishwasher had to be emptied, reloaded, and run. Ellen had a blowout at school, so laundry had to be done. And since I did one load, might as well throw in a second. Ellen needed an evening nap. Mail needed to be checked. Dinner cooked and eaten. Breast pump parts for one session hand washed for an evening pump due to skipping an evening feeding in favor of the daycare bottle. Breastmilk from all day stored and labeled. Toddler tantrum over peanut butter vs. Nutella sorted out. Ice pack applied to toddler head bonk. Groceries ordered, because of course we ran out of milk and bread mid-week.

All I have to say is that I’m glad it wasn’t bath night on top of everything else.

Ellen did get to have some playtime during all the madness, and this was the reward for the day. She showed off a new skill -grabbing stuff!!! She has been working on it for a while, and today she nailed it. Then she took it a step further and almost rolled over. Below is an action shot (kind of) showing both. Slow down, little lady! Don’t grow up so fast!