Daycare Demons

So, last week I think I had my last straw with my son's daycare. Being a new mom I'm obviously pretty protective, and where we came from he was 1 of 2 babies in a private, in-home daycare so needless to say he got a LOT of attention and I was spoiled from it.

First, he came home with pink eye. DAMMMIIIIIITTTTTTTTTTTT. Of course they harped on us to get him treated and keep him home. Ok, ok. No problem. So after paying for a $130 bottle of eye drops that couldn't hardly fill a tablespoon if you emptied the whole thing in it, it started to clear up. By the time the weekend was over he was crystal clear and ready to go back. By the time we picked him up, his eyes were oozing again. Are you serious?! Fiiiiiiiiiiine. Whatever. I'll let it go.

Next, my poor baby had a 3 day virus. He was constantly puking. When I say constantly I'm talking the second anything went in it came right back up. I've never seen this baby sick and all of a sudden he's projectile vomiting for 3 days straight. Didn't sit well with me to say the least.

Now comes the kicker. I stopped by the daycare on Wednesday to drop off some formula because he ran out. He's sitting in their exersaucer (because the poor babies are either on the floor or in the saucer - ALWAYS every time I've been in there). He sees me, so of course I say 'Hi Bubby!'. I start talking to him and he's smiling and having a grand ole time then I hear, 'You need to go'.     ............ what. the. FUCK? So I look at his teacher and say, 'I'm sorry, what did you say?'. Honestly by this point I was PRAYING I heard this bitch incorrectly. She proceeds to respond with, 'You need to go now you're working his nerves'.

.... All I can think is no she did not just say that to me. Bitch you better be glad I respect the fact there are 10 babies in this room or I'd be through this door so damn fast beating the living FUCK out of you, you won't know what to think!!!!!!! I mean seriously, who does that?! I don't pay you two fucking grand a month to have you speak to me like that! Our son is at the separation anxiety age and I get that it sucks to have babies start crying but really?? I stormed out because I knew if I sat there any longer shit would hit the fan. I was meeting my husband for lunch anyway so I knew the poor guy would sit through a mini bitch session.

After venting to him, I felt a little better. Not much, but some and now calm enough to have an adult conversation with the director without looking like a crazy bitch. So I finished up my day and just said I'll talk to the director when I pick him up after work and not think about it for now. No big deal. So my husband and I meet there to pick him up and of course, no director in sight. Figures.

After not being able to speak with the director, I've calmed down enough and just convinced myself this stupid daycare demon bitch was probably just having a rough day and I'll let it go. We've alllll been there so I'm just going to not saying anything but keep an eye on it for the future.

Friday arrives. I've had a long week. I'm tired, I'm hungry and all I want to do is pick my baby up and get home. I go to his assigned room to pick up his bag. I notice there's some stuff on it that honestly looked like sand but brush it off and head to the other room where everyone moves at the end of the day. I get him and head to the lobby to get his hat and coat on. I open his bag and pull out his coat and jacket. What I had seen on the outside of his bag was formula (probably mixed with dirt and whatever else is on their floor). Are you shitting me?! There in the bottom of his bag was easily 7-10 ounces worth of formula. To top it off, there was a note in his bag saying 'bring more wipes'. Wow. No, "Have a good weekend! Btw Bash is out of wipes so please bring more!". I thought to myself, alright enough is enough. The supervisor (of course, yet again, director had already bounced. It's Friday I don't know why I would even think she'd be there still) was in the office so I go in there to have a discussion about the incident Wednesday and now today with the formula (no wonder he's running through it so quickly).

After telling her what all had happened and how it bothered me she apologized over and over. That made me feel a little better until, 'Ok I'm going to leave a note for the director, what's your name?'   ... 'Jac.'  ... 'Ok, and his name?' ........... We've been coming here over a month now, paying $2k/month in tuition (which is more than the toddlers because 'babies need extra attention') and you can't tell me my name which is fine, but you can't even tell me his name?????? I'd get if we just started coming here a week ago but a month??? And you're with these children 40 hours a week????

WOW. Just WOW!

So, this being the daycare from absolute Hell, they have been deemed Daycare Demons. I will immediately begin searching for a new place to take him. Which is unfortunate due to the fact that it's less than half a block from my hubby's work and right next door to the doctor but damn, those reasons unfortunately are not outweighing these issues! Makes me really wonder how the treat the kids when the parents aren't around. Scary if you think about it! Just as a reminder check these places out VERY carefully! We had to sign a contract stating we would give 30 days notice before leaving and in that 30 days our security deposit would be used as tuition! Sigh. Live and learn I guess.....

One Hit Down..

So, as you know from my last post I was entertaining the idea of becoming an event planner.

When I get an idea in my head, I waste absolutely NO time putting that thought into an action. 

I thought to myself, where do I even begin? Hello. NYC. There's only about a billion different ways I could go about this, but I really wanted to ease into it. It's not like this is lucrative (yet?!), so I didn't want to invest a lot of time and definitely not a lot of money (yeah I've got a kiddo in diapers, I hang on tight to my dollars).
There were a few different routes I took into consideration - make a Facebook page? hang up flyers? apply to already established event planning companies to get experience? I knew it had to be quick because hey, I've still got a full-time job that needs done. And then, that glorious light shined through - Craigslist. It's easy, it's free, and it gets TONS of hits every day.

So I started with a short, simple, easy post. In all honesty, I'm not really sure how this works and if there are legalities I need to be aware of or not. I didn't even know how I would want to bill people?! I knew one thing was for certain - I did not want people thinking I was a scam. If you meet someone in person, obviously chances are you're not a scam so naturally I put down a one hour initial consultation in person.

Fees. Yet again, I had no idea where I wanted to start. I know my worth, but unfortunately if I have no prior {professional} history to back that fact up in this arena, and there's hundreds of others who can. So I started with $100 as a deposit. Seems fair, right? (I hope, considering I have no idea what I could be getting myself into!)

So this was Saturday night (or Sunday? hell I can't even remember) and of course the next day I anxiously checked my email. Nothing. Nothing.. Nothing.... and still nothing. Eh, it was worth a shot right? It was free, didn't take much time, and mostly just an experiment to see if it would even work.

And then this morning a beautiful email came through. She had seen my post and was interested. She told me pretty much exactly what she was wanting and what her budget is. It's a lower budget, and definitely a tight timeline, but for what she's asking I think it can be done. I immediately started researching venues for what she was looking for. Yikes. This might be a slightly bigger challenge than I thought due to her budget and guest list not exactly performing a perfect balancing act, but again, I'm up for it! After about 25 minutes into it I realized, whoa girl - you aren't even hired yet! Before doing all the work, maybe you should wait until you get a confirmation. So I took a step back and here I am, releasing all of my bottled up excitement.

It really amazes me how someone can truly do whatever they want. All it takes is time and effort. This again, as stated probably more than enough, was just an experiment/test run but I must say I'm excited to see where it leads, if anywhere! So today I say, thank you Craigslist. You may not have done anything in the end, but you brought enough excitement to me to jump out of bed this morning and get my day going. I am NOT a morning person what-so-ever so that is a major feat in itself! I'm definitely anxious to see what the road ahead will bring. Maybe nothing, maybe just this one, or maybe even tons of business. Who knows?! It's an adventure that I hope can flourish! Stay tuned..

*Sidebar: Ha, after posting this I saw this advertisement on YouTube. Maybe I should intern! This seems like a good internship :)

Have I Found My Calling?

So, as you know from my last post I'm a young mom. My husband and I made a major move in our life because we are in a funk; however, it seems as though we may have just relocated that funk with us. We moved to the most bangin' city in the US and are still spending our Friday & Saturday nights in our pajamas and watching movies. Usually I have my brilliant ideas when I'm in the shower, BUT! last night this one came to me while I was brushing my teeth...
My husband and I had had a long discussion Saturday, about basically nothing other than work. With this new job I've taken, it's a LOT more time consuming and a LOT more stressful. I've been in sales practically all my working career, but particularly with this company the last two years. I've received two promotions in the three years I've been with them all together. Why I've always stayed in sales I'm not sure, because I've always felt like something was missing. While I have a very competitive nature, and succeeding definitely satisfies that side of me (which is more than likely exactly how I landed the two promotions), there still just was something about having metrics and numbers crammed down my throat and up my ass that I'm not totally crazy about. That being said, I can never pin point just what it is I want to do with my life. Do I want to be a stay at home mom? Do I want to be the CEO of a huge corporation?

WHAT DO I WANT?!

And that's when it hit me. After our lengthy conversation about 'What do I want out of life? What do you want out of life?' Holy. Freaking. Crap. I think I (MIGHT) have figured out what the missing part is & what it is I want to do with my life! I LOVE party planning. I am OCD-totally-anal-about-every-single-little-detail bonkers over party planning. As I was brushing my teeth (while my husband was snoozing in bed at 9:45) I realized it. I can totally live vicariously through other people by event planning!! Have I found my calling?!

That I'm not quite sure of yet, but I definitely felt like a light went off.  How could it have taken me this long to realize this?! I've always been a crafty, DIY-er. I planned every detail of my wedding as well as about 95% of my baby shower. Hello! How could I have not realized this before? I even went to the extend of Googling 'What do I want out of life?' ... Yes, it came down to that. Which sidebar - I totally found an interesting article by a woman who sat back and did basically the same thing. She however was single with no children and could afford to sit back and think about it while as I, on the other hand, cannot.

I am so excited about this, although I'm not really sure how I'm going to go about it. I've had some 'brilliant' ideas before, but then by the time I was ready to change panties I was also ready to move on to the next even more BRILLIANT idea! I'm not sure how to approach this - full time? part time? just another one of those awesome ideas that will remain just that?..

I can't really answer any of those questions, but thankfully I'm aware that good ideas come and go, and not everything will materialize how we want or plan. Now I've just got to chew it over and decide - is this something I actually want to pursue?


Stay tuned!

Hello My Name Is:

So. This is me. Jac.

I am 110% completely new to blogging! I thought first things first, to get started off on the right foot I should properly introduce myself. Maybe that first line was a rough go at it. Let's try that again..

Hi! My name is Jac. I'm 26 years old. Oh, and I'm a girl! I'm married and we've got a beautiful THE MOST GORGEOUS (or should I say handsome?) baby boy!!

If the "F" word offends you, this might not be the blog for you. I try not to say it as much as I did in college, buuuuut it comes out from time to time along with a few others. Sorry, just thought I should be clear from the get go!

So here's a question I'm sure many of you are wondering since my blog name is 'Double X Factor':

What in the hell does that even mean?

For those of you who don't know me in real life, my maiden name was (is?? whatever!) Shaddoxx. Yes, kickass name for sure. My husband always tells me when I'm acting sassy, "there's that double X in you coming out" so needless to say, there is a little something to be said for that 'Double X Factor'. (btw - that's my twitter handle if you would like to find me there as well! It's private so please send a message with your request)

The other thing is my blog domain: jac-of-all-trades.
I'm a full-time working mom. I work in the transportation world as an Account Executive for a huge corporation. When I say huge, we're talking billions. So there's that, obviously being a round-the-clock mom, and I also run an Etsy shop (www.Etsy.com/shop/JaxxG) as well as do photography (www.facebook.com/jaxxphotography) - go check me out! So that's where the name came to be - I'm a DIY-er that likes to dip my toes in a little bit of everything.

This is a picture of us from back in October. Or September? Heck I can't remember exactly when, but it's a little dated:

Just kidding, I couldn't find the picture I wanted to show of us as a family. How about some solo ones... And yes, these are all somewhat outdated, but really the only one who doesn't quite look the same is Bash.

Jac:

Steven:

Bash:

So, those are my boys. I'm sure there will be plenty more posts about them. My husband and I both work in a sales corporate environment. We recently moved all the way from Arkansas to NYC for my job. It was a promotion I couldn't pass up! Not to mention we were in a total funk. As much as I LOVE Arkansas, we were bored out of our minds. So here we are, figuring it out as we go. Our move is what really inspired me to start blogging. There have been so many crazy times in my life and I wish I would have written about it all. But hey, a new baby and moving 1200 miles for a new job to a place that is NOTHING like where you are from seemed to be somewhat worth noting, yeah?

So to get to know me a little better other than I have a job and 2 boys (which they are my world so I will give you a small break from them - for now), here are 5 random facts about me:

1. A bucket list item of mine would be to visit Antarctica. For like 5 seconds. Then I'd probably be like let's get the hell out of here!
2. I have 5 siblings.
3. My favorite color is white.
4. I don't eat fruit or veggies. I have no idea how I plan to make my son when I don't!
5. As of today, I'd like to become an event planner.

I think with each of those 5 things, they definitely will shine through to be true once you learn more about me as the time goes on.

I'll wrap this up for now, and see if I can't figure out how the hell to make this thing look pretty. Until next time!!