Supernanny to the Rescue!

Well, yesterday was Sadie's last day of daycare. It's hard for me to say whether or not yesterday was any better--mainly because the teacher did not say a word to me when I arrived to pick Sadie up. Weird, right? And when I actually asked how Sadie's day went, the only response was this: "She didn't take a very good nap." Alrighty then. Very informative. I don't know if the staff at this place sucks or if my feelings about the daycare based on Sadie's reaction to it are coloring my perceptions. I guess it doesn't really matter anymore.

Sadie's report of her daycare day goes something like this, "I cried. I sat on a bench. I waited for you to come." Indeed, she had all her things right at her side the entire day so she'd be ready to jet as soon as I arrived. The poor bean is now freakishly clingy with me. She cried for 30 minutes this morning because she didn't want me to go to work. And this is with Dean staying home with her today. She was not like this before daycare. And what's just so shocking about this is that Sadie is the world's most easygoing kid. She'll let anyone do anything to her. She'll go anywhere. Her reaction to daycare was completely dumbfounding.

Over the weekend, my FIL (knowing daycare was going badly) proposed that he start watching Sadie four days a week. For the past year, he has watched the girls one day a week, but once Ella started school and Sadie started daycare, we suspended the arrangement, mostly because it's a long commute for my FIL. However, he is going to try taking the train back and forth to our house, and we're going to do a trial period of one month with him watching Sadie and also picking Ella up from school so she can avoid the dreaded After Care. Even if my FIL decides he'd prefer to go back to just one day a week, this still buys me ample time to find a new nanny. And honestly, if I'm going to be working during the day, who better to watch my kids? Grandpa is Ella and Sadie's favorite nanny, and I'm so grateful that they have a grandfather who is not only willing to watch them but who is also willing to place prince (or horse) to their Cinderella, crawl around on the floor with them, build forts, and take Sadie to gymnastics.

Of course, last night I found myself wondering whether we gave daycare a fair shake. It's easy to question my judgment now that I know Sadie isn't going back. I am not a perfect parent and could offer you a laundry list of my faults but probably one of the biggest is that I have a really hard time going with my gut instinct on things. That, and I'm just really have no idea what I'm doing half the time.

For some reason, I always thought that there was this automatic knowledge that came along with being a parent. But the truth is that I have no more of a clue now than I did when I was a child myself. I mean, sure, I can explain the water cycle to my 4.5 year old. Even if I don't know the answer to one of her many questions (like "How do you make gum?"), it's easy enough to Google it. Much harder are the answers to the questions we ask ourselves every day. Like, for example, what to do about the kid's smart mouth. There are times when I think a spanking now and then would solve that problem in a heartbeat. I was spanked as a child, and I can tell you for certain that I would never, ever have called my father "stupid." In fact, I wouldn't call him "stupid" now either (though that may came down to a respect thing at this point). I had a pretty healthy fear of my father when I was a child. And I seem to have turned out fairly well. My sister also seems to do pretty well for herself, though I wasn't around enough during her childhood to know whether or not she was spanked.... My brothers...well, it's hard to say. I don't think it was the best approach for my brother Michael, but I can't speak for David.

Regardless, the thing that is clearer and clearer to me as I venture through the minefield of parenting is that my parents very likely had as little clue as I have. It's an interesting thing to think about--especially when you consider events from your childhood and wonder why they unfolded the way they did.

With my 4.5 years of parenting behind me, this is the very short list of things of which I am certain:

1. Car seats are very important. This is why Ella is still in a five-point harness rather than a much more convenient booster (though I'm starting to sway on the booster thing). And also why Sadie was rear-facing until nearly 2. (I'm exceptionally anal when it comes to car seats.)

2. Breastfeeding is best (but it doesn't always work and that's okay too).

3. Sleep begets sleep.

4. Television is a necessary evil (plus, I had no restrictions on television watching as a kid, and I turned out fine).

Kind of scary when you consider that I am completely responsible for the lives of two human beings. I could write the list of things I know about parenting on a cocktail napkin!