Nicole Tasker Woods

I am the first to admit that I am not a very good driver. I have had my fair share of car accidents, speeding tickets and flat tires. The flat tires I can not take any blame for. Nor can I take blame for sitting at a red light and getting rammed in the rear by a guy who wasn’t paying attention. Or for driving in rainy/stop-and-go traffic and the 16 year old behind me falls asleep and hits me.

This morning, I was riding along in my automobile and noticed a police car was about 3-5 car lengths behind me. I got into the right lane so he could pass because I was 100% certain that I was driving EXTREMELY well. I was not speeding, nor was I going too slow; I was driving at the same pace as everyone else on the road. My lights were on (despite it not being dark), both hands were on the steering wheel and the radio was at a low level. I hadn’t even looked at my blackberry since leaving the house.

The cop car passes me on the left and then gets in front of me and I think he’s going to get off at the next exit. Instead, he slows down and drives into the shoulder on the right. I pass in on his left and I see him pull back onto the road right behind me. It wasn’t 30 seconds before his lights came on. I was dumbfounded! I kept saying out loud, “I am doing NOTHING wrong!!!”

I kept my composure and pulled over to the side of the road. I fumbled in the glove box for my insurance and registration cards and kept going over the last 5 miles in my head–what could I have done wrong???

The police officer was out of his car in a matter of seconds and before I knew it, he was standing by my driver’s side door. I rolled down the window and said good morning and he proceeded to tell me that my tags had expired.

For those of you who do not know, I purchased a new car on Nov 23 and as a result of the DMV taking their sweet ass time in sending me my new plates/tags, I am rocking a great 2009 Nissan Murano with expired tags. Awesome. He proceeded to grill me on when I got the car and I have to admit, I was pretty composed. I was lucky it was a dude and not a chick-cop–those are the worst. How am I supposed to use my smile and girly eyes on a chick!?

The officer told me to call the DMV on Jan 23 to check on the status of the new plates/tags. Just add it to the list of things that I simply do not have time to do!

When I got to work, I took a close look at the dealer paperwork and read the DMV website; I discovered that the DMV states that you need to give them up to 8 weeks to process your registration and send you updated tags. Now I get to drive around for 2 more weeks and chance getting pulled over. Love it.

Variety is the Children’s Charity of Southern California. I have participated in this charity over the past 7 years in one way or another since it has heavy emphasis in the film industry and I work for a movie studio.

December 4th is the 2nd annual Santa Walk, which will consist of walking laps around the Westfield Topanga Mall. All of the film studios encourage their staff and their families to participate in the event and I heard that last year’s event was not only fun, but a huge success in raising funds for Variety.

This year I have decided to create a team–lovingly called ‘Aidan’s Elves’–and I am collecting donations so that when Aidan & I dress up like Santas with the rest of the masses, we can raise money for a good cause. In case you don’t know what Variety is or does, it is a charity that provides lifesaving support for physically-challenged, abused, and disadvantaged children in Southern California.

If you would like to donate, please click Aidan’s Elves and you will be directed to a secure website to make a donation–any amount is going to help, even if you can only donate $1.

If you are in the Los Angeles area and would like to be one of Aidan’s Elves, please email me (nicki.woods44@yahoo.com) and I will send you simple instructions for how to become a member of the team.

The coolest part about participating in this event (where all you have to do is walk, seriously, it’s not brain surgery!) is you will receive a Santa costume upon registering so you can blend in with the sea of Santas…

I’ve been on an emotional roller coaster for the past 10 days. Last Saturday I heard from my nanny that she wanted more money and less hours. As much as I loved her and how she cared for Aidan, after much debate and number crunching, Ryan & I agreed that we couldn’t give her what she was asking for and we had to let her go.

Making that phone call was one of the hardest things I had to do. As I play it back in my head now, I am confident that my voice was steady, but when I hung up I broke down and cried. Finding this nanny was difficult when I was only a few months pregnant–but that’s why I started looking for childcare so early. I did not want to do the nanny search when my son was 3 months old and I was back at work full-time–I wanted it all in place before even returning to work. But you can’t always get what you want. Not only am I sad to not be able to work with our first nanny ever again, but the thought of going through the nanny search a second time is stressful and overwhelming.

As a mom, I have learned that there will be stressful moments and even emotional ones when it comes to my child. I think it is important to allow myself the brief moment to be stressed and sad, but then I have to find a solution to the problem at hand.

I immediately re-posted the live-out nanny position on care.com (which is how we found the first nanny) and within an hour, we started getting email submissions from women in our area who were interested in the job. The good thing about this website is that you can screen the applicants prior to returning their emails. You can see their picture, review their job experience and get a background check and references from their online profiles.

We interviewed 2 people, but the first woman we met with was the first one who inquired about the job and she’s the one we ended up hiring. I am smarter the second time around and have learned some valuable lessons about employing a live-out nanny. The most important being the realization that this won’t be the last nanny we hire.

Do you ever feel like a reboot?

This summer was crazy for me. I went on maternity leave in early June, had 2 weeks off while very pregnant and then on Friday June 17th (the last day of my 2 weeks off from work–thank you Aidan for letting mommy soak it up) I gave birth to my son. From that day, I had a total of 10 weeks off from work and it was full of dirty diapers, breast feeding, visits from friends & relatives, doctor’s visits & check-ups, breast pumping, sunning pool-side, long stroller walks, short bjorn walks, alcohol whenever I wanted it, a Taylor Swift concert, a chili cook-off and two sushi lunches.

The visits with family and friends were probably the most exhausting. Although everyone was helpful when at the house (which was my favorite part about the visitors) and overjoyed to see Aidan, it was a lot of work entertaining so many people in such a short amount of time. And everyone wanted to take advantage of me being off from work in an effort to see me AND the baby, so when one person’s visit ended another one began the next week or even the next day.

Even outings to see friends locally for lunch with the little boy were hard because this summer was WICKED hot. The car rides felt long, the lunches felt long and there was lots of sweaty baby-holding. Sometimes he slept through the meal and then woke up just as we finished eating, in time to hand him around the table in a very serene squishy mood, perfect for hand-offs. But other times he was wide awake from the minute we parked the car until we paid the check.

Needless to say, I was anxious to get back to work and dive into a normal daily routine. So far, Aidan has shown signs of thoroughly enjoying our routine. He just adores his nanny and is always happy when we come home from work–what more could you ask for?

Today marks the end of my first two weeks back at work. Ryan, Carolyn, Aidan & I are rewarding ourselves with a weekend in Palm Springs. We rented a house in La Quinta with 3 bedrooms and private pool. We also booked spa treatments in Indian Wells for Saturday and plan on doing dinner at Ruth’s Chris Saturday night. So while Cali plays at Camp Woods with Clark and 3 dogs this weekend, we will be getting some much needed R&R–which doubles as Aidan’s very first vacation trip. Not sure if babies really need vacations, but I know I do!

It’s not any ol’ addiction to chocolate, but DARK chocolate. A few weeks after I had Aidan, all I could think about was dark chocolate–what brands were the best, who had the best prices.

I even got in the habit of buying different labels/brands to try out at every store I was at. Three from Target, 2 from Ralphs, a couple from Vons and a few from CVS. Every where I went, if they had a candy aisle or a kiosk or a display of gum–I searched for dark chocolate and would buy at least one bar.

Today, I was at the CVS and there was a sale on the Cadbury Royal Dark Chocolate where if you bought 2–you got 1 free–what a deal!!! I like this brand of chocolate–but my favorite is a no-name brand from the Ralphs grocery store. Not too bitter, but sweet and decadent.

I was able to twist the arm of my work friend Jennifer to have a couple squares of one of the cadbury bars. I asked her to split it with me so that I didn’t eat the entire thing myself, but let’s face it, I DID want to eat it all by myself and not share a single piece! And unfortunately, Jennifer knows what a nut I am about dark chocolate so she was more than willing to take a few pieces but let me have the rest.

I am not used to being hungry during the slow time of our afternoons at work. In the past, I kept a bunch of snacks at my desk, but with this being my first week back after maternity leave I have yet to stock up. I did buy some dry-roasted almonds yesterday so I have been snacking on those.

Despite indulging in almost an entire bar of dark chocolate today, I still had to top it off with a handful of almonds. I hate when you do that: you have 1 snack and then you can’t help but add a 2nd or a 3rd.

I don’t feel like I failed today, however, in my endeavor to not eat total crap all day long. I did have a super healthy lunch–salad with watermelon for dessert. I try to eat relatively well during the day while at work and then I don’t let myself feel bad if dinner is a food orgy of carbs, fats and not a lick of veggies. Besides, you only get one life to live, why waste it dieting?

Not to brag, but at my 6 week check up with my OBGYN (6 weeks after delivering my son) I was 3 pounds away from my pre-baby weight–yay me! I only gained 25 pounds during my pregnancy and was able to drop nearly all of it by the time my doctor gave me the go-ahead to do full-on exercise.

I didn’t start running again, but did continue to get 30 minutes of speed-walking daily with Aidan in his stroller and Cali on her leash. But after my nanny started working, I did less walking and more escaping from the house for me-time. Any mother would understand!

Now that I am back at work as of this past Monday, I have tried to take everyone for a walk once I get home, but it isn’t as easy as I thought it would be. Once I walk in the door, I say hello to my crazy basenji and then I pick up my baby boy. Sometimes his schedule allows me to change into work out clothes and sneakers for a walk right away, but sometimes he needs his bottle, in which case everything is on hold while he gets a late afternoon snack. While I enjoy pushing the stroller with Aidan facing me so that I can look at him taking in the sights (and I get a more vigorous work out that way) some days I just want to hold him close to me while Cali & I walk around our complex enjoying the cool afternoon air.

As a result of not looking like I just had a baby, all of my old clothes are fitting me again–even my designer jeans from London. I find myself enjoying waking up early to shower, style my hair and put on nice clothes and heels for work. I haven’t been able to wear these clothes and shoes for about 11 months so it is like I have a brand new wardrobe! Every Sunday night I pull out the clothes I plan to wear that week and I steam them and decide which shoes will go with which outfit.

Going back to work feeling as skinny and pretty as I looked made my first day back a fabulous one. I got a million compliments from my co-workers–and who doesn’t love being told how awesome they look?!

I called my Grampa on Friday to see how he was doing. The nursing staff had to track him down (he lives in a nursing home). For a split second I thought he had tried to escape again, but no, he was just having dinner in the dining hall. I told them I would call back but one second later, there he was.

I am always surprised by how ON he is whenever I talk to him. I used to have to prep a list of talking topics, but he ends up firing more questions my way than the other way around. Not only did he solve the crisis in Japan, but when I told him I gained 16 pounds so far in my pregnancy, he told me I needed to go on a diet! Never a boring call with Grampa.

Diaper Duty – by Jay Mohr