T.KOPJ.I.F.

Wahoo - it's Friday, right? Here's a little rundown of my day.

This week was a little bit different than usual because I had a training I couldn't miss at work so I had to be in the office on Friday. Add to that the fact that the kids would be going to daycare in the city (more on that later), combined with the fact Taki had to be at work at 5:30am for Park(ing) Day (again more on that later)...it all totals up to CHAOS.

Planning to be in the office at 8:30, I got up at 7 and quickly got ready before the kids woke up. My company offers a great benefit - 20 days a year of back-up daycare. The daycare center is awesome, in the city about 8 blocks from my office and is FREE. At least for the 20 days. If I wanted the kids to go there full-time (which would be sweet!) it would be $1800 a child. YES, you read that correctly. So obviously that is not going to happen. When we take the kids there we have to pack their lunch (our daycare provides lunch - not bad for $1000 LESS a month!) and I am always behind the ball on this. Usually Nikos and I stop at the Starbucks across the street and grab a fruit and cheese plate for his lunch. Ha! Anyway, we can either drive into the city and pay for parking or load the kids on bart in their stroller and then walk to the building from bart (about 6 blocks.) In order for things to move faster (and being a little worried about being alone with 2 kids on bart) I decided to drive. While the kids were still sleeping I packed Nikos lunch and got the diaper bag ready and put it and the stroller in the car. It was 7:3o and I was on the roll! Now I just had to wake up the kids, put them in cute outfits (for possible office visits after daycare) and drive into the city. Being the fact that it was a Friday and we could use the carpool lane I knew we would be across the bridge in no time.

I enter the kids room and am immediately assailed by the fact that Nikos needs a diaper change PRONTO. Being the genius, pro mother that I am, I decide that I will leave the lights off (Olive is still sleeping and I want to take advantage of that fact.) Since it is after 7:30 it is fairly light outside and the light is creeping in on the sides of the blackout shades. I figure I'll grab Nikos (who is super chatty in the morning) and take him out to the living room for a diaper change. Here's the conversation that followed when I walked up to the crib.

"Hi Momma, I pooped"
"Yes, that you did."
"I took my diaper off"
"What?"
"I took it off." (Holds up diaper - very proud of himself.)

I sprint over to the light and turn it on full blast (poor Olive's sleep be damned) and am greeted by what can only be described as a horrendous sight. The carnage is littered about the crib, encompassing everything from his pillow, blanket, hands, elbows, shorts, shirt...not even monkey escaped the brown. UGH. I gingerly scoop him up and off we go to a morning bath (of course, to Nikos a morning bath is the best thing ever, so hopefully I didn't just give him some kind of positive reinforcement.)

We finally get into the car a little after 8 and drive in to daycare. Each day they post the name of the kids outside the classroom that will be occupying the room that day. Since it was Olive's 1st day I made sure to take a picture of her outside her classroom.

Olive was actually the only one in her classroom today so I am sure she was lavished with attention.

While I was working hard, Taki was setting up method's Park(ing) Day spot. Basically you convert a parking spot into a mini park for the day. method's was complete with sod, hedges, flowers, a Japanese maple tree that held wishes (involving "please don't close ___ park" and to be send to CA congressmen) and a table and chairs. I know, a little bizarre but you can visit the link in the first paragraph if you are still curious. And it's not just a wacky San Francisco thing, they do it all over the world.

Since he went to work at the crack of dawn, Taki was able to leave early, pick up the kids and walk them over to the Park(ing) spot. He stopped for a brief visit at my office where Nikos demanded "I push 17!" when he got in the elevator. He remembered where my desk was and promptly ran up to my chair, climbed up on it, and started tapping on my keyboard and saying "I watch videos Momma!" Too bad for him my work blocks YouTube so we couldn't watch any videos of Nikos (those are the ones he requests the most.)

After I got off work I walked over and met up with Taki and the kids. We walked down to the Embarcadero so Nikos (and by Nikos I really mean me) could get a pretzel and chase the seagulls. Here's a little video Taki took of the chase.



On our drive home Nikos was cracking Olive up. While we were waiting to get on the bridge I decided I wanted to take a video of it so I asked Taki "does it matter which way I hold your phone for the video?" The answer I received was "No." Uh huh. Please enjoy - by tilting your head to the side of course.



We think he is saying "thumbs up."