As aforementioned, Lake has been sick for seven weeks straight now. Michael jokingly refers to it as kennel cough. Additionally Lake’s non-purulent serous eye drainage started culturing bacteria and it was finally time for antibiotic eye ointment. We want nothing more than for Lake to be fully restored to health, but it seems elusive as long as he continues to be exposed in the daycare warren-like environment. 

So, for a multitude of reasons, getting Lake out of the warren among them, we are so excited to be welcoming our new au pair next week! It has been a fortuitous luxury to have had the Bright Horizons available for Lake in the interim. There were many advantages. It has allowed for me to return to work prior to us getting our new house and the au pair bedroom sorted. It has allowed me to maximize my feeding time with Lake before, during, and after work, because right now he commutes with me. The folks at the daycare center have been very interested to care for Lake and very complimentary of his disposition. Ultimately, however, we are preferring to have Lake cared for in our home. It will be nice to have him outside of a school like setting while he is still so young. 

So enter our au pair Jo. Jo is arriving here from northern Germany next week! She heralds from near Bremen, home to the famous Grimm traveling musicians. 

Jo will be coming to spend a year with us, maybe two if we are lucky. She will be living in our home as an extended family member and caring for Lake 45 hours per week while Michael and I are out “pharming”. We consider Lake and ourselves to be very blessed to have such a talented young woman joining our family. We selected her from a plethora of online profiles among three different international au pair agencies. Pardon the analogy but it was a bit akin to online dating. After just two Skype interviews, with both trepidation and excitement we decided to both choose each other. We matched! We are feeling very good about the match and are looking forward to Jo’s arrival next Wednesday night!