Trying really hard not to be stressed

It's been a nice Thanksgiving weekend. It really has, but this dark shadow has loomed over me throughout it. Tomorrow is my first day back to teaching. I went back on Wednesday before Thanksgiving for a PD day with the English department, but tomorrow I actually have to teach. The administrator assigned to evaluate me for my bonus will definitely be coming some time (or many times) this week to evaluate me, since their evaluations are due at the end of the week. (Our school is on a merit pay system, so this bonus is a pretty significant part of my income. I need to get the whole thing.) My administrator and I don't exactly see eye-to-eye on everything, I think because she is used to elementary school, and she has very, very high expectations, so this is a stressful thing to walk into on my first week back.

Making things worse... my copy code is messed up and the supply woman at school emailed me that she has the new one, but she didn't email me the code, so I guess she wants to give it to me in person. That's fine, but I have a ridiculous amount of copies to do for this week, even for tomorrow. Since I have heard through the grapevine that the copy situation at school lately has been messy (my sub even completely stopped doing the grammar lessons we start with each day, mostly because he wasn't able to make any copies of the lessons), I think I am going to just bite the bullet and pay to copy what I need for tomorrow so I just have it ready when I walk in the door tomorrow.

Marc was supposed to take this week off to spend with Tiana, but it didn't turn out to be the best week for it. His co-director who runs the site on the other end of town is moving to another state, so things are a bit busy right now without her. Marc is actually going to take Tiana with him to do some work this week. He thinks it is no big deal, but he doesn't know what its like. I have taken  Tiana to work with me in the past few weeks for meetings and whatnot, and sometimes it goes well, but sometimes it is really hard... and all I do is sit in meetings. He is going to be driving kids around. Tiana doesn't like the car. (I know, all babies like the car, right? Well, not Tiana). So, he is probably going to spend a pretty decent portion of his day listening to her scream. And he's going to need to warm up her bottles and points throughout this busy day, so we had to buy him a bottle warmer for his car. I just hope it goes smoothly. I am sort of glad he will be having a minor surgery on Wednesday and physically unable to make a bunch of plans for the latter part of the week.

I also am feeling very guilty lately about my inability to get Tiana back into her own bed. I did not have this problem at all with Vinny. It started with just bringing her into bed with me to feed her when she woke up at like 4 am (she only wakes up about once each night now, and it is usually around 4-5am). I would fall asleep nursing her, so she'd end up next to me until the morning. Then, about a week ago, when it got really cold, when I'd lay her down in her bassinet next to me (already asleep) she'd start whimpering after a little bit. I'd feel her hands and they were ice cold, and I just felt so bad leaving her in there without any blankets or anything, so I pulled her into bed with me. At least with her next to me, the blankets are over me, but they are not near her head or anything, so I don't worry about her suffocating and she stays warm from being with me. But now, even with the heater on for a while before we go to bed so that the house is nice and warm, she just doesn't want to sleep by herself. Why would she? I know a lot of people co-sleep for a very long time, but I really feel like she needs to get back to her own bed. I don't even know why I feel so guilty about it. I am not really worried about the safety aspect as I am very subconsciouly aware of her while I sleep, but I think I just need my space. There are times, like in the early morning, that I really enjoy cuddling with her, but at night, when I am going to bed, I really want to be able to spread out. And I don't want to create a habit of this long-term. I need her to be able to sleep independently, so getting her back to the bassinet is the first step. Once she drops that 4am feeding, I would really, really love to get her in her crib in her own room, but that feels very far from possible right now. Bleh..

Back to writing lesson plans.