Sick, again.

Well, chalk one more up for new experiences in the Rossi/Krumholz household: broncopneumonia!

Sofia had 4 days straight with a medium-to-high fever, then came down with this form of pneumonia. Our ped put her on antibiotics and now, four days later (I think...I have lost count of days, hours and months of my life by now), she's doing just grand. Only problem is the three of us have been having just a weeeeee little bit too much quality time. Or, well, quantity time.

One of the (many, innumerable) things I wasn't prepared for in Mommydom was just how boring it can be sometimes. I guess I just never thought of it: was so prepared for the excitingness of it being new and scary that I never (ever) focused on the "down" times. Those times during the day (every single day) that Baby just wants you to sit there on the floor while she stares at her feet or draws on the table or (worse, much worse) expects to be entertained.

Because, well - and this may not come as a surprise to any of you - babies aren't really into the same things we are. They don't want to learn new recipes or play sudoku, they are disdained by the simple idea of folding clothes or even watching movies (who doesn't freakin like movies!!?). They don't know how to read yet and, even if they did, they certainly would scoff at the idea of doing so by themselves. They (or at least mine) hate shopping - sitting still while the attention goes to all those colorful clothes and not moi, are you kidding me!?

So, much of my life is spent trying to balance what Sofia enjoys with what I enjoy and - during our stint at home with Papà too, we've had to calculate him in there, too (this might be a good moment to add that, thanks to work being done on our building, we have also been without cable this week). So far, I've found some stuff: play-doh, reading books, coloring (when I don't have to take them away as punishment for coloring up our couch - so, basically, scratch that one).

Then, there's the times I have to get creative: "Sofia, why don't you go to your kitchen and make Mommy a nice cup of coffee!" (I get about a minute out of that one). And then there are the few moments (which are actually becoming more common, THANK THE GOOD LORD) when Sofia is perfectly content taking object A and putting it together with object B, then moving object B to sit near object C, then moving chair to place objects A, B and C on top of it, and so on.... These are sacred times in our household, because they mean Mommy and Papà can stare blankly at a wall for a few minutes, perhaps even (gasp) shut their eyes for a moment. Because, well, we're not actually allowed to leave the room or talk amongst ourselves during these times, but at least it's something.