Back to square one again

Over the last few months we've been developing patterns and systems, and we've fallen into a very comfortable routine at last. I like the pleasant tenor of our life. Jane is old enough to be responsive to simple instructions, and that's very gratifying. She is independent enough now to require much less intensive supervision, freeing me up to do a lot more around the house, so I've really taken off on the domesticity front in the last few months. I've figured out a good schedule for housecleaning, laundry (tossing the bibs and napkins in the wash just often enough to keep fresh ones always in supply but infrequently enough so as not to make them disappear too quickly down the lint screen), baking, cooking, snacking on fresh, healthful foods, shopping the sales, and playing. We've finally rearranged the furniture in the nursery to suit us, and I can't imagine why I didn't attack that project long before. (Until a few months ago, the nursery closets still contained camping gear, luggage, and other miscellaneous stuff that we threw in there upon our move, figuring that we'd find a place for it eventually.) Now the nursery is practical and efficient, not to mention bright and cheery, and I've been doing the same thing to the rest of the house as well, bit by bit, clearing out closets and finding stuff that we haven't touched since we moved in. It's all very satisfying and rewarding.

However, there is a slight cloud on my horizon as I contemplate this blissful state of things: it can't last. All these months of settling, all these experiences of adapting with Jane, all this trial and experimentation - it's finally paid off, and we've found our niche, just in time to have everything upset and rearranged. We're going to have to go off and invent the wheel again with an entirely new set of parameters. Baking, shopping, cleaning, laundry - all will fall prey to the demands of the new imperative, and only time will sort all these things out again. Oh, well. At least I'll have a baby out of the deal.