The life of a nanny!

My bestest friend from Nicaragua, Kate, recently asked me why I haven't been blogging at all lately.  I told her that I've never really been the "blogging" type, except when on an extended trip abroad as a way to keep family and friends at home up to date on my trip.  (And for those of you who happen to follow my blog, you know that even then, I'm not always very good at keeping it up!)  But Kate's question made me think that maybe I should start blogging on a more regular base. I have plenty of friends and family that live far, far away (Nicaragua, Japan, Texas, etc!), so this may be a way to keep updated everyone who would like to be.

Since getting back from Nica, my life has been fairly hectic and there are a million new things I could write about--jobs, classes, schedule, friendships, church, community group, volunteering, roommate, apartment, the joys of paying my own bills (mostly)...the list could go on!  I think this method would just be overwhelming (for you and for me!), so I think what I'll do is focus on one aspect of my new life here in Seattle each time I write.

For today, all about nannying!

God has been so faithful in providing me two WONDERFUL families to nanny for.  I'm getting a good taste of what motherhood must be like, and every time I tell my dad something about the kids--whether it's complaining that they lolly-gagged all morning so we were late for school, or they were squabbling, or we had a wonderful day--he replies with something along the lines of "Well, Al, you sure won't go into being a mom with any misconceptions or illusions!"  And it's so true...I'm learning what motherly patience and love is like by way of having to live it out every day.

One of the families lives in Sammamish and the other in Seattle, and I work for them on alternating weeks.  The Sammamish kids, Bella and Adrian (aka Adi) are 10 and 4 (soon to be 5).  Their mom, Laurie, is amazing and has already become one of my dear friends.  The weeks that I'm with Bella and Adi, I work from 5-9am, getting there when Laurie leaves for work, and then going through the whole getting-ready-for-school routine, then drop them off by 9.  Then I head to school and am in class 10:30 to 2:20, then go back to Redmond to pick the kids up at 3:15.  We head back to the house and hang out (playing Wii, taking walks, making lunch for the next day, eating dinner, and playing games) until Laurie gets home at 6.  I then go home, eat dinner, try to fit some homework in, and shoot for getting to bed between 8 and 9!  The days are very long and I have to be uber-organized to stay on top of things, but I absolutely adore the kids and Laurie and love every minute (usually) of the weeks I'm with them. I miss them on my off weeks!!

The Seattle family, the Zisettes, have 2 girls, Maya and Jana.  Maya is 14, Jana is 12, and hanging out with them is such a different ballgame than Bella and Adi!  It's much less care-intensive in the sense that Maya and Jana are both very responsible, and most of my job with them is making sure they get picked up from school, taken to their activities, helping with homework, and getting dinner ready.  Also, I only work from 3-6pm with them, so all of that combined makes these weeks a lighter load.  Maya does crew on Lake Washington and has practice after school every day, so I really only get to hang out with her in the car ride from school to crew practice.  Jana and I have gotten more time together and often enjoy making dinner, fun desserts, and occasionally doing the necessary grocery shopping to make it happen.  All of Jana's after-school activities are ramping up now, though, so there will only be one day a week we're home most of the afternoons together.  Jana does tennis lessons, violin lessons (at the moment, I'm being serenaded by her and her friend Henrietta's practice session), and school volleyball.  The girls and parents are all great and it's so awesome that they were flexible enough to have me work for them only every other week and get Friday afternoons off to volunteer!

Next update to look forward to: my awesome roommate and new apartment!