Week of Money: Where Little Bun gets vaccinated

DAY ONE

??:?? — I wake up with Little Bun snuggling me.

7:12 a.m. — We head out to the living room and chit chat as he recounts what he has learned – facts, interesting things, stories, what he found funny. I listen.

7:59 a.m. — I make a cup of tea and try to regain control of my brain. I forgot to account for a bill last month and as I operate on zero-based budgeting, I stupidly sent that money to another bill instead, leaving me short. I want to be sure I don’t have any more surprises now.

8:25 a.m. — I head into the bedroom with Little Bun and we hang out. He plays his app to collect minerals and save the Earth with his robot:

9:11 a.m. — I read my newest book – Salt – and I am loving the word origins and the history of salt in general. It’s SO well done.

11:15 a.m. — I have lunch and Little Bun helps me crumble up the organic rosemary to eat.

12:28 p.m. — We got our beading supplies! So we sort them you. Little Bun instinctively starts sorting them into rainbow colours.

1:15 p.m. — I start reading up and watching tutorials on how to bead.

3:14 p.m. — He starts practicing after his nap, and it’s tricky as they are so tiny.

5:50 p.m. — Time for dinner, we take a break to eat and stretch. Beading is hard work!

8:19 p.m. — We watch a Christmas-themed movie, and then we get ready for bed.

9:30 p.m. — Bedtime. We chat, and drift off to sleep. As I am about to sleep, he pipes up: “Did you tell me your Great and Not so great things today already??“… I thought I did so I struggle out of my sleep fog to reply, then go back to sleep. Every night we talk about what went well, what did not go well and what we wanted to do better for tomorrow. Sometimes we hash out things that happened.

Spent: $

DAY TWO

??:?? — I wake up with Little Bun dragging his blanket over, wrapped up like a burrito to come cuddle with me in the morning. I snuggle around him and he makes cute baby noises of happiness (usually it sounds like “wee wee awww wee wee”…)

7:11 a.m. — I log in and start working.

7:59 a.m. — I really think this minimalist decor, with a lot of warmth is beautiful and calm:

8:08 a.m. — Meetings all day. THIS IS SUPPOSED TO BE A HOLIDAY WEEK AND WHY AM I BOOKED 24/7.

12:05 p.m. — I break for lunch. With the new variant going around spreading quickly and our vaccines dropping in effectiveness, I am kiboshing going out until I get a booster. It does seem to be milder but I am not taking chances, and Little Bun is not fully vaccinated yet.

12:28 p.m. — I log back in for a meeting.

2:56 p.m. — Little Bun up from his nap, he collects his “daily rewards” from the apps he plays (so cute!), and generally leaves me to work until I log off.

4:56 p.m. — I log off, do dishes, wipe cutlery, etc.

5:13 p.m. — As an Elder Millennial who straddles both the pre-dot com era and now, these really made me feel old.. haha

 

5:25 p.m. — We have dinner, and then we start beading again, a new project underway.

8:56 p.m. — Time for bedtime routine. Tomorrow he is going in for his vaccine, so I prep him. I tell him what the vaccine is (he knows, but I repeat again that it is the virus but modified without the harmful bits). I even ask him if he wants to feel what the pinch is like, and he nods. I pinch him very lightly with my fingernails, and he nods and says it hurt but it wasn’t that bad. I talk to him about keeping his mask on, staying near Daddy, and if he gets nervous or scared, hold his father’s hand. I tell him his arm may hurt afterwards, and if they do it, it will be injected into his non-dominant arm, as he will still need to write, and do things.

Spent: $0

DAY THREE

??:?? — Today is the day! Little Bun is kind of excited.

6:30 a.m. — I log in and work.

8:08 a.m. — He heads out for the appointment, and I wave goodbye.

10:23 a.m. — Back home, he tells me: MOMMY it was ALMOST exactly like you described it, except there were NO children crying!!!

My partner: Why did you tell him that there would be kids sobbing!?

Me: NO! I said there MAY be children crying. MAY. Not that there WOULD be. So he wouldn’t get nervous / scared if it did happen!!!

11:20 a.m. — Lunch in front of the computer for me.

12:15 p.m. — He has lunch, but I am on calls all morning.

12:53 p.m. — He goes down for his nap, and I am on calls. But am browsing a little and love the look of this place:

3:25 p.m. — He slept a bit over, not by much. Maybe he will be more fatigued later, or not at all. The second shot really knocked me out more than the first.

5:30 p.m. — I finally log off. I think we resolved something today, but with people on holidays, WHY ARE WE INSISTING ON DOING THIS. Why not wait until the new year? Key people are missing to make decisions.

7:46 p.m. — Little Bun has schooling with his father, and because he gets so distracted, my partner gets irritated. It has been almost the entire year, every weeknight, of him telling Little Bun to pay attention. My partner finally snaps and takes the iPad away for the day. Little Bun is sobbing and very very upset, huffing, getting angry, making angry noises, and my partner gets even more irritated and revokes it for a week. My stress level is through the roof but I can see both sides – Little Bun being told every weeknight to pay attention and him not doing it for almost 11 months now, and my partner snapping because of it.

8:13 p.m. — I try to calm down, I am also pretty angry / frustrated at the whole situation. I whisk Little Bun off to the bedroom by holding his hand, and we start talking. I hug him tight and ask him – WHY did it have to come to this? Why did he have to scold you and revoke the iPad which then caused you to sob and lose it and get angry back at him?

Long story short, I explain a few things:

1. This was not the first time that I have heard this. I have heard my partner ad nauseam for the entire year, ask Little Bun to pay attention. EVERY NIGHT. So he was within his rights to be angry, and to scold him and revoke the iPad. This revoking of privileges was not just for this one night, it was 11 months and counting, all pent up irritation from having to do so and finally snapping.
2. The iPad is virtual. I explain to him that the iPad is not “real” or “reality”. Whatever games or things we do on these devices, social media, whatever it is – it isn’t real life – in the sense that if we do not get to log in and collect our daily rewards from an app, what does it change? I ask him if it stops food from appearing, if someone gets sick, etc. I try to get him to see that real life is not the iPad, so really, it’s just a fun diversion but to not get so caught up in it, that you think it IS life.
3. It is only one week. We will find other things to do. I suggest activities like reading his magazines / books, colouring, beading with me to make more things, helping my sort beads and things, upcycling, etc. I tell him all of these things can be done for a week and we can do without the iPad, right? He nods.
4. Life priorities. We talk about how some things are just not important. iPad is at the bottom of that list. What is above it, is people, family, getting your life in order. I explain that if I ignored everything and read books all day, I would miss my work meetings, not make money, I wouldn’t have clean plates and dishes for everyone to use because I wouldn’t do dishes, or laundry… etc. I tell him Priorities are what are important, and iPads do not make this list.
5. Taking responsibility. At the end of it all, I ask him if Daddy was in the right to punish him like this by taking away the iPad. I ask him if he is taking the responsibility for having caused this to happen in the first place. To get to the point of where he is sobbing and unable to calm himself, angry, and so on, I 100% agreed with Little Bun that Daddy should have let him calm down, but Daddy was SO ANGRY he was unable to provide this. But to get to this point, Little Bun started it or provoked him over the course of the year and he knows it. Little Bun nods, and agrees he was responsible. And I tell him I agree that it was not reasonable to expect you to keep schooling while crying either, but parents also make mistakes just like children.

I tried to emphasize that it SUCKED to have something you really enjoy playing and having fun with taken away from you, but it wasn’t the end of the world, there are other things to do, and it isn’t important to what really matters in life. I tell him the #1 most important thing to me, is him. Anything to do with him. I’d give up everything for him, even my own life. He starts to cry because he’s so sweet and sensitive, and I apologize for making him sad. He tells me when we talk about these situations, he imagines them and gets sad. I tell him I did not mean for this to happen but it is what is the truth.

22:15 p.m. — What a night. We finally get to bed late. But I still take the time to do our night time round down chats, and I ask him about the FULL DETAILS of what he saw when he was vaccinated today. He tells me he saw a little baby (everyone is a baby when they’re smaller), touching the ornaments on a tree. He tells me how the needle both pinched and tickled at the same time which is why he laughed. He tells me how he coloured in the waiting room after the shot, and how it all went as I had said. Except no kids were crying like I had promised. LOL

Spent: $0

DAY FOUR

??:?? — We wake up super early despite having slept later. We wake up at the same time – I tend to wake up at 6:30-ish and then I force myself to lie there to see if I can squeeze any more sleep out, but today I could not.

6:30 a.m. — I start on my emails – about 30 from last night – and weed my way through them.

7:25 a.m. — Looks like people are still trying to hack into my accounts, I got a lot of Password reset attempt emails. Do these losers have nothing better to do with their lives than harass me? Clearly not.

8:00 a.m. — First calls of the day.

12:08 p.m. — Lunchtime.

12:28 p.m. — More calls. This holiday is so busy. I actually worked more this week than I think I have done in previous weeks, due to all of the people trying to close out things before leaving.

12:33 p.m. — Little Bun asks me before I leave why I am going out so often. I tell him that Mommy needs a break and Happy Mommy = Happy Baby. He nods.

Edit: That was the last time I went out, as then the variant Omnicron exploded in Canada, and as I got vaccinated before, but the immunity wanes, until I get a booster I would not feel comfortable going out again, even into the elevators with people who do not wear masks in my building in the common areas.

12:56 p.m. — Back home, I take a short break and have a tea while I try to focus and read more of my book.

3:30 p.m. — He slept in today because I am sure the vaccine knocked him out a little.

4:15 p.m. — I log off for the holidays, then do dishes, laundry… I also started watching the show – And just like that – a spinoff sequel of the original Sex and the City cast (minus Samantha), getting older and talking about being in their 60s. The fashion is still AMAZING. I absolutely love this vintage jumpsuit. I am not going to rule out getting one made one day, maybe.

6:15 p.m. — Dinner time! I make sushi with the pre-cooked food in the fridge, rolling up the rice with cauliflower into nori, and Little Bun sits there, eagerly waiting. He loves sushi of any kind.

7:50 p.m. — I go through my To Do list – I plan on, during my quarantine time, staying inside and conditioning all of my leather items – belts, shoes, bags, and cleaning everything while I am off this holiday season. I guess I will also be reading a LOT.

9:33 p.m. — Time for bed. We finished watching Cinderella, a beautifully redone version of the fairytale that I MUCH PREFER, and then it was bedtime.

Spent: $0

DAY FIVE

??:?? — FREEDOM!

??:?? — I wake up and just lie in bed. Little Bun isn’t awake yet, and I want to be here when he wakes, he always gets a bit sad if I am not. I lie there until I can lie there no longer (at least an hour by my feeling), and I cannot sleep. I get up and go to the living room.

8:03 a.m. — Little Bun immediately stomps out, he has a sixth Mommy sense or something, and runs into the living room blinking, face all sad – MOMMY??? .. he calls out. I rush to him and hug him tight and give him kisses. He starts to cry. I ask him what happened (was it a nightmare?).. he tells me no, he woke up and I wasn’t there to cuddle on the other side, and he thought I left him. I am horrified. I tell him – I WOULD NEVER leave you without telling you. I ALWAYS tell you when I am about to go out so you are not surprised or scared, right? I pull him onto my lap and snuggle him. He is extremely attached to me, which I think is normal considering that he is a quarantine child, and based on this book about children not having enough parental attachment it is not a bad thing at all that we are so incredibly close.

Long story short – parents need to matter more than peers because their peers are still children. Essentially, if you have their friends matter more to them, you are having children lead other children in decisions about life, etc. It is nonsense as parents (generally speaking) have their own child’s best interests at heart and will never ever say or do anything that would harm them for their own benefit. So parents need to matter more to their children. Period.

8:59 a.m. — Cup of tea in hand, I settle in to check my bank accounts, notes and everything to make sure I am not forgetting a bill of some sort. Sometimes I can forget because I have so much going on. I am also ordering items for my mother, making sure she gets them, making sure I don’t have to ask for a refund. In this case, she sent me an email this morning saying she got everything except one item, so now I have to contact them to ask where it is, etc. A lot of this is follow-up and doing this for someone else, myself and my family, plus a job, etc, can mean things fall through the cracks.

9:22 a.m. — We head into the bedroom and watch a Christmas movie.

12:08 p.m. — Lunch! We have a delicious melted cheese pasta made with peas and mushrooms. Little Bun closes his eyes, eating in rapture. Haha…

1:15 p.m. — I start on a gift for Little Bun. I bead a Stuffie necklace, and I work on earrings as well.

4:20 p.m. — Still working . The background is blue, and the brown circles are cookies. It was a very specific design. This is what Little Bun gave me to work with as a design (x = White, he forgot the “i”)

And this is what I ended up with as a translation:

9:34 p.m. — I finally finish it. It is adorable! Little Bun goes crazy over it.

 

Spent: $0

DAY SIX

??:?? — I wake up to Little Bun staring at me, watching me sleep. It didn’t feel creepy – it was more that he was waiting for me to sleep in and wake up on my own as he didn’t want to wake me. He sees me stir, and then runs over and jumps on me to cuddle on top. I kiss and smell his little boy-ness and feel so incredibly happy.

8:25 a.m. — We emulsify the concentrate shampoo I bought  because I am trying out liquid shampoo but eco-friendly, rather than the shampoo bars being rubbed onto my scalp. These are concentrate bars that you melt down with 300 mL of boiling hot water, mush it down, and it turns into liquid, feeling a bit like a lotion to use as a shampoo.

Once you chop up the bar, and mix it in, it becomes liquidy, like a lotion:

I put it in a bottle I had. ALL DONE!

12:08 p.m. — Lunch.

1:39 p.m. — Little Bun goes down for a nap and I work on my blog.

2:08 p.m. — I take a break in the bedroom before he wakes up to read my book.

4:15 p.m. — Little Bun shows me a sign he made for Sunday:

7:25 p.m. — We play in the closet and Little Bun dresses up his Stuffie:

8:44 p.m. — Bedtime! We go through our routine and then read a page from his favourite book – Usborne Periodic Elements. He LOVES this book. Reads it often, loves learning about each element, and it is so well done and fun for kids.

Spent: $0

DAY SEVEN

??:?? — We wake up quite late. I can tell as it is light.

8:08 a.m. — Wow we really slept in.

8:45 a.m. — There is something about this beautiful bedroom that I like. It’s so weird but so good.

9:47 a.m. — I spend the morning ordering items for my mother, following up on refunds, etc.

10:30 a.m. — Then I set to work making some matching Stuffie earrings.

12:01 p.m. — Lunch. This time it’s rice and cauliflower, with seasonings. Little Bun hovers around me until I fix him a small bowl of his own.

1:10 p.m. — Nap time. I work on the earrings.

3:04 p.m. — Up from his nap, we take a break and vacuum the entire apartment. Then we do a yoga session, play with Stuffies and read books together.

5:14 p.m. — Back to the earrings, just talking with my partner, Little Bun hangs out and watches Shaun the Sheep which he adores. It is like Wallace & Grommit back in the day.

8:44 p.m. — I finish my project and Babiest Stuffie models the earrings. The red part is a fringe heart.

8:44 p.m. — We stretch with a yoga session then head to bed after a read through his books.

Spent: $0

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Want more? Read all of my previous Week of Money Diaries.