Rosie has started Pre-School!

I am cross-posting this picture all over because I like it so much. Rosie is two now, and is going to preschool two mornings a week. The preschool she's at is highly regarded by many moms I know, so that's nice. They have good student-teacher (+assistants) ratios. And I like her teacher, who among other things knows a lot of sign language.

The preschool, A Child's Garden, was originally founded by some moms at the First Presbyterian Church here in Albuquerque, and is located right next to the church with its own entrance and a second floor walk-over. There's no religious instruction though. They have three different playground areas, for different ages, and a nice big atrium for whole-school activities. And a garden, per the name. Because the church donates the space and some of the utilities to the school, it's quite affordable, so we felt lucky to get a space through the waiting list. My grandmother spent many decades volunteering at the First Presbyterian Church in Flint, so some part of me feels like we got some help from her First Presbyterian karma. Thanks, Grandma!

We've been on the waiting list for UNM daycare since Brian got accepted for the fellowship (it's rumored to take 3 years on the list to get in, and you have to pay $25 each spring and fall to stay on the list), but a mom I know recommended we just stick with a Child's Garden, and we probably will. We have enough time between now and the fall UNM list fee to have a sense of how much we like it.

This picture was Rosie on her first day to preschool. I stayed with her that day, but she didn't nurse, she just ate snacks and lunch with the others. And wednesday I managed to keep to that schedule, but over the weekend it totally fell apart. And Thursday she fussed a bit when I left but *today* she really knew what to expect, so as soon as I started to say goodbye she grabbed me and asked for boobs and then started screaming when I persisted in leaving. She'd nursed 40 minutes prior, and then had breakfast, so I knew she wasn't hungry, and a couple of the ladies at the school stepped in to pick her up and whatnot, but that was hard. Not *quite* as hard as leaving her on Thursday, but differently hard.

Ah, kiddo.

But the teacher said she fussed less Thursday than a few other kids who'd been there longer, and she thinks she'll transition well. Still, I think I'm going to work harder at emulating a pre-school-like schedule of snacks and lunch on Mondays.

Unfinished and Prospective Projects; Wellspring

So... now that Rosie has started preschool, I sat down and wrote out a rough list of unfinished and prospective projects I'd like to spend some time on before looking for part-time work.

And, wow, the list was two pages long. On narrow-ruled paper.

I put some time estimates next to things, and that seemed to help, both in making some of it look doable and in figuring out what to tackle first.

I know these two mornings a week are going to go fast, but having them to myself also seems to be improving my mental energy for the end of the day, so I'm getting some more productive time there as well. Rosie's also (knock on wood) starting to sleep a little longer during the night than she was last week, which also improves my overall energy and brain worky-ness. :P

One of the things on my list is to finally publish the fanzine that I'd intended to publish right before I got pregnant and the first month hit me like a ton of bricks (constant low-level nausea and exhaustion). I'd like to start Wellspring and then publish it at least once yearly from now on. But the first issue I definitely have to publish. If nothing else, I owe it to my friend Joe Conat, who made me an awesome cover. I'm sort of afraid to go back and look at the rest of it and in any case I have some higher-priority projects that must come before it, but I'll try to get it out by December, and bring printed copies to ConFusion in January.

If you would like to receive Wellspring by post, drop me a line with your address to akg.netmouse ( @) gmail (dot) com

Oh, and the overall theme of the issue had to do with comics, so if you'd care to review any comics or other graphic stories or write about your relationship to comics, or issues therein, or blather about the graphic stories Hugo category, or whatever, I would welcome articles of that nature as well, preferably to be received no later than October 31st.