Working Mama, Growing Girl

I have five documents open in Word needing to be translated. Obviously this is an ideal time to blog!

The upcoming holiday has had me unusually busy for the last several days. In typical feast-or-famine fashion, I got TWO random phone calls on Friday from prospective clients I contacted ages ago, and then fielded various offers all day yesterday.

In fact, since I knew Friday that I'd be pretty busy Monday, I agreed with K's school that she would stay all day Monday since she'll be missing school this Friday. So K stayed in school 8-5 and I worked all day. It was strange, because while I've put in some very full work days since K was born, it was always working while taking care of her, or at most working while the Slovak took care of her. Translating for hours at a time with no one asking me for a spravočka (roz-, cartoon), pink milk, to come play, what I'm doing, if I'm done working yet...it was not my usual working environment.

Which brings me to a tangent on why I work in the living room, the loudest room in the house. I have a work station set up by the couch. The answer is, I've tried working in the bedroom at the desktop, but it happened about like this:

Me: working away.
K: keeps talking to me.
Slovak: keeps talking to me.
TV: on, because they like it.
Me: I'm going in the other room so I can concentrate. *goes, sets up, translates for 30 seconds*
K, opening door: Hi Mama, what are you doing back here? Do you want to play?
Me: I'm working, can you go play with Apo?
K leaves, comes back 30 seconds later: Do you want me to cook you some lunch Mama? Do you want me to sit on your lap?
Slovak, coming down hall: I'm coming back here with you, this is where all the action is!
Me: OK, I'm going back in the living room, and you two stay here!

My family wants to be close to me. I love that. But it does make it more practical to stay in the main room when I'm busy, because they follow me all over the apartment anyway. Haha.

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As I mentioned, K stayed at school all day yesterday. She was pumped, because the all-day kids take naps at school and she's been talking for months about wanting to sleep at school. The teacher said she did great and was cheerful all day.

She's also been attending swimming lessons every Tuesday for a couple of weeks, taking a mini-bus from school to the pool and back. My questions about how "swimming" went met with a flat refusal, however - "I didn't go swimming. I blew bubbles in the water. (or) I splashed with my feet in the water." Caught out by lack of precision again! I've mentioned this before.

I also told K recently not to put her shoes on the couch, to which she replied, "These aren't shoes. They're slippers." I told her that slippers are a kind of shoes and to get them off my couch now. Again, precision. Very important to my little girl.

K also continues to impress most everyone with her Czech. She speaks Czech most of the time at school and on Skype to her grandparents. Most of the time meaning that she doesn't always know how to say what she wants in Czech so she makes it up or says it in English. The kids and teachers understand her (Czech), though, which is great. She sings Czech songs she learns at school and gets mad at me if I don't know them. I know some of them, parts of others, and others are just new.

Somewhat frustratingly, her grandparents do NOT understand her. Or more precisely, they don't listen to her. Before, the Slovak and I could shrug this off as it was probably hard for them to pick out the three CZ/SK words from a torrent of English, but lately she's been speaking Czech to them the whole time, no English included, and they still don't respond to what she's saying unless the Slovak tells them LISTEN and asks K to repeat what she said. To be fair, it is probably also hard to hear over Skype, but the main ingredient here is not paying attention. Which is kind of too bad. It's frustrating for K to make a comment or ask a question and be answered with, "You're so cute, yes you are."

It may be better when we see them in person in a few months. Or it may not. We can deal with either.

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Ok, back to work. Or to get a snack. Hmm...