A Day in the Life: Staying home with two

Dear sisters,

I’ve thought of many different blog posts that I would love to post, but I’ll take baby steps back into blogging with this Day in the Life post. I enjoy reading other people’s posts in this format, it is fascinating and comforting to know how similar and different our lives are! So, here goes:

6am: Helen wakes up, PTL she’s finally sleeping past 5 or 5:30, it took a bit of time to get back to Mountain Time, Cal has been lying in his bed with Kevin for a while, waiting for his clock to turn yellow=time to get up! Cal comes in and asks me to go have breakfast with him in the middle of Helen’s diaper change, so Kevin and I swap children

 

7am: we’ve had our tea (Cal’s is milk with vanilla and honey) and gotten all of the pillows off of the couch to make a “snuggle zone” and had some breakfast, Kevin is getting ready to head off to work! I nurse Helen right about now and change the inevitable poopy diaper 20 minutes later

 

8am: Cal watches a video, usually some nursery rhyme songs or a paw patrol, etc, while I put Helen down for a nap. She’s been up a long time for her, so she falls asleep easily in my arms then gets laid on our bed. I go and snuggle with Cal while the video ends. Then we’re ready to play! He enjoys play time the most when I can focus just on him ;-).

8:50am: Helen’s awake from her nap! And ready to nurse. Cal pulls things out of our bathroom drawers while I nurse Helen.

9-10am: More play time! Then I realize Cal hasn’t really had much solid food for breakfast, a few bites of toast, a yogurt applesauce pouch, his milk tea and a bit of orange juice, so we go downstairs to have a mid morning lunch. Some plain noodles, grapes, carrots and cheese to snack on.

 

10:30am: Time for Helen to go down for another nap! Cal watches another video while this happens. If I try to keep him occupied with toys or something else he just starts yelling after he gets bored/runs into the room and wakes up helen, so TV time is our distraction of choice during naptime. I come back after getting her down around 10:45am and Cal and I play Settlers of Catan in his bedroom for awhile, and make a fort, then it’s time for his naptime. Around 11:15 he’s slowing down, so we read and cuddle and he falls asleep by 11:30am.

11:45am: Helen’s awake! I nurse her and rock her again, seeing if she’ll settle back into a longer nap, but no, the poop doesn’t stop for anyone, and she needs a diaper change. Helen and I hang out, cleaning up the kitchen, making some roasted broccoli for lunch, answering emails and the like.

Helen goes back down around 1:15pm, but as I’m rocking her, Calvin wakes up and calls for me. I try getting Helen down, but she doesn’t stay asleep, so both kids and I snuggle for a few song videos. Time to play again!

Cal insists he doesn’t want to leave the house at 1:45pm. But by 2:30 I’ve convinced him it would be fun to go to the farm! We head into town to visit the farm (one of the city parks has a farm in it!), but it’s closed on Tuesdays! Womp womp. We go to the Museum of Discovery instead, even though it’s gorgeous day outside (60!). Cal loves the museum,

Kevin meets us there at 3:20pm and we’re playing astronauts, we hang out there until 4:15pm, then head outside to walk in the park until 5.

We run around the baseball diamonds, enjoy the beautiful afternoon, then head out. Kevin and Calvin stop at the grocery store to get a few things, Helen and I head back for her to nurse. She slept a bit on me in the museum, but has been mostly napless this afternoon. That means she’s kind of a cranky baby.

5:40pm, Kevin and Calvin get home, start making dinner, Helen starts getting angry, I try putting her down to bed, but she won’t fall asleep, so I nurse her again. Turns out she was still hungry! Helen falls asleep by 6:15ish, we eat our dinner and get Cal ready for bed. By 7:30 I’m nursing Helen again and Cal is snuggling up with Kevin to fall asleep. Kevin and I are eating some fresh baked cookies (I keep a stash in the freezer) by 8 pm-ish and in bed by 9:00 pm after watching some Harry Potter and discussing our travel plans for 2018.

It’s not glamorous, not all of the pictures are even correctly focused, but it’s our life ;-). I’m enjoying the ups and downs of staying at home. I wouldn’t mind a part time job, but I haven’t found one that looks perfect yet. It might end up being me recording audiobooks more when Calvin goes to preschool in the fall! That’s a pretty great job I can do from home!

Hope you all are doing well and that each day has a few moments of joy in it!

Love,

Jewel