Daycare, Cats and Football

I am NOT babysitting!

So we started the twins in daycare this week.  We had a nanny but it didn't work out for various reasons.  I don't want to go into the reasons now I'm just writing this for posterity.  In a perfect world, we would have had the nanny for the winter to avoid taking the kids out in the cold and then switched to daycare when the cost reduces from Infant Ransom to simply Small Child Cost.

Ironically, our nanny worked for us during the relatively warm and unusually snow-free December and on the day when we had to start daycare, we get temperatures in the single digits.

The good news is that the twins are now sleeping through the night!  It's only been four days but three of the last four nights have resulted in them sleeping through the night with Monday night just having one sleep feeding.

This was starting to manifest already but we suspect that daycare is doing a much better job of wearing them out during the day than our nanny-grandma tandem was doing.  Not entirely sure what the weekend will bring but I'm hoping we can keep this going.

It just seems like I can never get to zero on the credit cards.  Before the flood, I effectively had a $2k balance on my card (for various reasons I don't want to get into) and now that I've paid the flood off, I'm back to that $2k balance.

Daycare has, of course, put us in an emergency budget lockdown.  In that same perfect world, we would have had one or two more months before we had to do this and I could get my bills under wraps better.  In December two big costs came up.  1) $500 for brakes for the (E)Lement* and 2) $300 to get the thermostat repaired.

* the E has fallen off the Element so we jokingly refer to it as the one-of-a-kind Honda Lement.

Update on our Cat

Austin still outweighs her

As you know we had to put our cat Maggie to sleep last June.  Her brother Austin developed diabetes and we have been treating him for it, along with his other health issues.  Austin is doing as well as can be expected from a cat of his age (14 years).  He does tend to pee outside his box which makes hosting a SuperBowl party problematic this year.  He is also struggling with weight though my informal weigh-in yesterday (where I weigh myself then immediately step back on the scale holding Austin) showed him at 14.5 lbs, which is a few pounds lighter than his high.

 Sadly, we don't know how much of 2015 Austin will see.  It's possible he'll make it another year or two but more likely that he will pass before Boris and Natasha really get to know him.


Football Talk

Watching football hasn't been as enjoyable for me in recent years as is was in the late 90s and early 00s.  Probably because of all the mediocre Bears teams but also because I've learned to enjoy other things with my time.  Still, I do enjoy a good game and this weekend would be a good one to stay in, start a fire and watch the game on the big screen assuming Moose and Squirrel co-operate.

For more reasons than one, I would personally love it if the Carolina Panthers upset the Seattle Seahawks and make it to the NFC Championship game.  It would be the first time a team with a losing record advanced so far.  And if they were playing Dallas or GreenBay they might have a better chance.

My picks for this weekend are New England, Dallas, Denver and Seattle.  With Indianapolis Colts possibly upsetting the Broncos.

I fully expect the NFL playoffs to be expanded not because the powers-that-be think they are broken but because they know there is more money to be made.  Football markets aren't quite as regional as baseball but I'm guessing more money is made off a Chicago-New York game than a Minnesota-St Louis game.

***************
Do me a favor? 
Click my "like" button and join our Facebook community.

Thank you for reading and I hope you will comment below. Here's the part where I beg for stuff because we get paid in likes, shares, re-tweets and feedback. If you like my posts, funnies and random facts, please also do any and all of the following:
Follow Mysteries of Life on Twitter (@MysteriesOLife), Facebook or subscribe via email.