Here’s a bit to tide you over. Ellie had a doctor visit on Tuesday. She weighs an incredible 12 pounds, 4 ounces! She is 23.5 inches long, and her head circumference is an astounding 40 centimeters. It must be because of her massive brain.

So thanks for your patience. Please don’t stop checking the site! If you’re good, I might even post another video.

Going back to work was certainly a shock to the system. It was hard to be totally sharp or carry on adult conversations. I also found myself missing Eleanor terribly. I had really gotten used to her round-the-clock presence. But it was nice to be surrounded by people eager to know how we were doing and to hear about Ellie’s exploits. Plus, it’s been a lot harder on Tara who suddenly had to be the sole caregiver during the days, but she’s done a great job. And I know Ellie is benefiting from some quality Mommy/Baby time.

I realized that I hadn’t put a video on the blog since Ellie’s actual birthday, so I’d like to remedy that. Here is a clip of Ellie getting ready for a bath:

As most parents do, we’ve started collecting a bunch of silly nicknames for our baby. Some of the more pervasive ones are “Sweetpea“, “Beebers“, and “Squirmy“. But Tara recently came up with a hilarious one that needs a little backstory.

Many of Eleanor’s little one-piece jumpsuits have these ridiculously big collars. So she kinda resembles a miniature Elvis Presley when wearing them. And Mini-Elvis quickly got shortened to “Melvis“. Ladies and gentlemen, I present to you…

Melvis

If you need even more happy fun cuteness… you should go check out the pictures from cousin Molly’s 2nd Birthday Party! Remember to breathe!

But I’ll be back into the normal routine of work soon enough. I’m going to miss having day after day after day of quality family time. I’ve really enjoyed the six weeks that the three of us have spent simply hanging out. I also know it’s going to be a lot more work for Tara with me out of the house all day. I guess I’ll just have to be all that much more helpful when I get home in the evening.

A new batch of baby pictures have been added to the gallery. There is a healthy mix of “Ellie-with-Family” shots, and just plain old “Drop-Dead-Cute” shots. I hope you enjoy!

Oh, and if this is your first time here, please read the previous post.

Sometimes it feel like half my blogging is about the SAT’s. I guess that’s because I’m often left with nothing to do except think up posts while the kids are all taking the exams. Oh, I’ll have plenty of tedious paperwork to do once they are done… but for now I’m just sitting here doing Sudoku puzzles.

But thankfully, this should be the last testing-related post for quite some time. The next test date isn’t until April. And I’ll probably have other stuff to write about between now and then. Y’know, little things… like having a baby.

Hopefully I can get on with my life now. And maybe even have more things to post about here.

These tests get longer and more stupid all the time. It’s really an endurance test for these poor suckers kids. I’m so glad this kind of thing is behind me.

But running the show here isn’t exactly fun, either. I’ve already had a parent yell at me and another interrogate me. I’ve also had a kid refuse to take the test he’s supposed to and others demand special treatment. Gotta stay firm. But it’s kinda funny. The ones who insist on doing things their way are just screwing themselves over. And I don’t have time to argue with them and convince them that they are risking their scores being cancelled. They are making their own beds…

I had a pretty placid couple of days home from work. I got a new cell phone, replaced a blown power supply in my main PC, and ate some good deli.

I also finally got to see Serenity over the weekend. I highly recommend it to fans of the TV show Firefly. And for those who aren’t fans of the show, I highly recommend running out and getting the DVD’s to rectify that particular shortcoming.

Well, it’s back to work tomorrow. Should be a busy couple weeks coming up, unfortunately. I will be administering an SAT, a PSAT, and an ACT exam for hundreds of kids. Any one of these is no sweat by themselves, but back to back to back is a little much. Mainly just a lot of tedious details to keep track of and nervous parents and kids to assuage. The fun never stops!

But of course this leaves me in an interesting position. My former (and crazy) boss left abruptly in the middle of the year and was never really replaced. Jenny and I have been running the show by ourselves all semester. And the two of us do a better job than was ever done before Cracksmoke left. (Yes, Cracksmoke was her nickname). The upper administration has been getting a bargain and they know it. So they had no intention of replacing her. But now it’s a different situation.

Once Jenny is gone next year, I’ll be the only one who is actually able to run the Computer Labs, a fairly integral function in the school. They pretty much have to expand my job description (and hopefully salary) to match the broader nature of my duties. Plus there will likely be at least one new hire, though I’m not sure if they will be a direct replacement of Jenny or something new. We’ll see. But this might end up being someone I’ll have to manage. It’s been a while since I’ve been in a managerial position. I can’t really predict if it’ll be a good thing or not.