Monday, February 15, 2010

Happy Monday

Cha's school is closed today for Presidents Day. My office is open. We were closed for Martin Luther King day, which her school wasn't. We need to fix that.

I've been talking to many of my working mom friends lately about how to handle the transition from daycare to school. Cha will be starting kindergarten this September She misses the cut off for public school so we had to decide whether to hold her back a year or put her in a private kinder. That was the easy part. She's been going to a school-like daycare since she was 9 weeks old and I'm fairly certain she's mature enough socially. She is familiar with being in a classroom and listening to teachers. She knows what's expected of her and what she's allowed to get away with. So, holding her back just doesn't seem right. She'll miss a whole year of learning simply because she was born 29 days late.

The school district offers testing for those who miss the birthday cut off. However, from what I've heard they expect the kids to test at least two years ahead. Cha is a smart cookie but she's not on the level of a second grader. The other hiccup with the testing route is that our school district only offers half day kinder so we would need to set her up with before and/or after school care. I contacted the places that our elementary school works with and I am far from happy with any of them. (For instance, I heard the Y offers before/after school care which I was excited about. I love our Y and think they offer great programs. However, the Y that is assigned to our elementary school is in the basement of a church that's not in the best neighborhood. I just don't want Cha going there.)

Considering that private kinder was my only real option I gathered information from local facilities. That was a real eye opener and caused me to have a near panic attack. How is it that I am a total over-thinker but am just now worrying about what to do for child care when school is out? How could I have completely forgotten summer vacations?

We've decided to keep her at her current daycare. They offer private kinder which will allow her to start 1st grade in Sept 11.

I'm curious what other working moms have planned?

Wednesday, February 10, 2010

so here's the story

If you blog I'm sure you're familiar with those spammy emails from people wanting you to contribute such and such to their blogs. One of the things I've learned in this blog experience is that to some blogging is nothing more than a marketing tool. Getting your name out is first and content is second. Feelings, emotions, and keeping up with family and friends come in somewhere near the bottom. That's good for some I guess, but I'm not interested.

Last night however I had a moment of weakness. I've been getting emails from a site that has repeatedly asked me to contribute. I've been getting weekly emails from them telling me how wonderful it would be to share my breast cancer experience with others and help newbies. Thanks to what has become my new normal (insomnia) I was up late and not thinking clearly. So, I signed up with that site. There were policies and agreements and such that I had to digitally sign off on and it wasn't until after the fact that I decided to Google the site. (Note: Google is always your first step in anything!)

The site has been called fraudulent scammers by many reputable sources. Oops! What they do is tell you that your content remains your own and you do nothing other than continue blogging as usual. However, they now have rights to that content. They can do pretty much whatever they want with it and honestly, that makes me very uncomfortable. Yes I understand that my words are out there. My blog is public and pretty much anyone can do what they want with it anyway, but it's different when I sign something agreeing to allow others to do as they wish.

I immediately emailed them and asked to cancel. It was within minutes of when I digitally agreed. I haven't heard back from them and who knows what they'll say when I do. So, I wanted to take back my blog before they had a chance to do anything with it.

It's time for a new blog chapter anyway. Soon enough I'll delete the other blog and be more anon. In the mean time I will be posting away about being a tired, happy working mom who just happened to have/has cancer, a brother who killed himself, a husband with um 'baggage' and lots of funny friends and family who make life interesting.

Thanks for listening.