Pennies In My Couch: Labor Day

With Dave's schedule, and since Jack isn't in school yet, we don't generally get excited for the weekend or for extra days off. To us, our weekend comes when Dave finishes his go-around, as they call them, and he gets a 4 day or a 6 day.

As a firefighter, Dave works 24 hour shifts. His normal schedule is to work every other 24 hours until he's worked 96 hours, and then he gets either 4 or 6 days off in a row- it alternates. However, as he tries to pick up as many extra shifts as he can as well as teaches a class a few days a month for UCLA in conjunction with their Daniel Freeman Medical Center, he rarely gets the full 4 or 6 days. That makes our 'weekends' all the more rare- he's currently 'supposed' to be on a 6 day, but is only actually going to get 2 of these days off- the first and the last. He's teaching 2 of the days, and he picked up extra shifts 2 of the days. Have I mentioned before how blessed I am that my husband is such a hard worker and provides so well for his family, and also allowing me to be home with my child(ren)? I have? Good. I am so blessed.

We miss him a lot when he's gone- whenever he's not here Jack says "Uh oh, no daddy today!" But we love having him home all day on his days off, rather than just for a few hours each evening as it would be if he worked a normal 5-9. His schedule is rough, but it works for our family.

But anyway, I digress. What I meant to say was that 3 day weekends don't really hold a lot of appeal for the three of us just yet. Instead of looking forward to the weekend because our family will be able to spend time together, we look forward to Dave having a break in his schedule. In fact, we even prefer if this break does NOT happen on the weekends, because we like to be able to avoid the crowds and go places during the week! I'm sure this will all change once Jack Jack goes to school (ooooh I better move past that thought before I get all teary-eyed about how he's growing up too fast!), but for now, the main reason that Jack and I look forward to the weekend is because we can do weekend stuff with other people that have a normal 9-5, such as my parents or my sister (when she's not home on maternity leave, as she is now).

So, all that to explain that Dave worked over Labor Day weekend, and so Jack and I were left to our own devices. Which means, since it was the weekend, that I called my mom to find out what she was doing! Ok, I admit I didn't have to explain all that and could have just jumped right to my point, but aren't you glad that you know all that now? No, you aren't? Too bad. It's my blog. :P

Anyway, when Jack and I woke up on Labor Day, I tried to come up with a fun activity for Jack and myself. I couldn't think of anything that wouldn't be incredibly crowded on a holiday, but since it was promising to be so hot (and since it had been a few days and I needed my Baby Luke fix!), I decided that it would be fun if we could go swimming! Since I knew that Amy was in the foggy haze of the sleep deprivation that comes when you have a newborn I didn't want to wake her up on the chance that she was getting a much needed nap, so called my mom to see if she had heard from her yet. She said that she had, and she was actually headed over there pretty soon to watch baby Luke so that Amy could get some sleep! She said that she would love to come sit by the pool with Luke if it was okay with Amy, so Jack and I packed up and headed over there to swim and stare at Baby Luke!