Colleague Consultation and Weekends Redux

It feels like ages since I've posted -- usually I try to keep it up at least twice a week. But, I've got some stuff going on that I cannot post about, for fear of jinxing things. So, that's what has taken up the majority of my thoughts for the past 8 days. But, onto other things!

In an effort to secure free advice from my fellow MILPs out there, I'm looking for a bit of guidance (If you are not interested, skip this paragraph to hear about the rest of my riveting weekend). As I've mentioned before, I'm playing a bit of an HR role at the moment with my job, and I've been entertaining a few companies who want to sell their services to the Company's employees. Last week, I had a visit from someone looking to sell what I'll call "memberships" into a sort of "Legal Club". Without giving away too much about the service itself, the basic gist of it is you pay a monthly fee (low -- like, the price Netflix) and you have access to 24 legal advice. There are limits to the representation, such as a few pages of contracts reviewed, a certain number of hours of litigation, etc. I feel sort of uncomfortable offering this service to the Company's employees; something about it feels off to me. Anyone have thoughts on this?

On a more run of the mill note... we're three days away from leaving for Chicago for a much anticipated extended weekend. In addition to the wedding of one of my high school BFFs, we've got an early first b-day celebration planned with B's family, a playdate with Mia's (only) cousin at the Lincoln Park Zoo (weather permitting - alternate plan being the aquarium), and a super-secret pre-mani/pedi morning meeting (see first paragraph).This weekend was spent doing laundry (everyone's clothes but mine -- as usual) and buying baby travel-related items. The three of us were hit with another daycare bug, but this time just a cold that has depleted our apartment's supply of kleenex. I'll take 10 colds over another stomach flu, so I'm not complaining.

Mia's follow up at the pediatrician -- Strep Free, but confirmed daycare cold.

Last week, the Frenchie family took advantage of actually living in Vegas and visited the Siegfried and Roy Secret Garden at the Mirage. It was actually really cool! They had about a dozen dolphins in different pools, some white lions and tigers, and one (regular colored) cheetah. We were surprised that Mia actually noticed and watched the animals with the same enthusiasm she shows for Swarley. It was, of course, overpriced and very hot, but hey, it's Vegas. The following Tuesday, B and I celebrated our second wedding anniversary by having a family dinner at the Todd English Pub at the Aria, which was fabulously decadent pub food. I had lobster rolls and a Beergarita, and B had a fancy burger and a Beer flight. Mia ate my sweet potato fries. We thought about getting a babysitter, but decided against it. My parents almost always brought us on all their anniversary dates, so we thought this might be a nice tradition to start.

Last but certainly not least, while at Babies R Us on Friday, I strayed from my travel-list and purchased a lawn mower looking walking helper as an early birthday gift for Mia. I've been eyeing one of these types of things for a few weeks. I set it up when we got home, and she started pushing it around without hesitation immediately. She hasn't figured out how to dislodge it when it runs into furniture yet, but she got very confident in her abilities very quickly. She'd stand next to it and try to topple it over every time it stopped moving forward. After three solid days of pushing it around, she took her first steps without it!!! She went from holding herself up on the coffee table, turned around, and took four steps to her toy box. They were four unmistakable, unassisted, real steps. I tried to coax her into doing it again, but any distance further than four steps, she just drops down to her hands and knees and books it. It's not clear whether she can't go more than four steps, or if she just doesn't want to. Either way, it was very exciting and I'm so glad she did it at home and not at daycare. She turned 11 months last Wednesday, if anyone was curious. I was hoping she would be walking by the time her birthday pool party rolled around, so she's well on her way to it!

Not a picture of the actual event, but there's the toy box and the coffee table.