A Day in the Life

When I was younger I used to like to read fashion magazines (what am I saying, I still do!) and sometimes there was a column where the model would walk the reader through her day with pictures. This post will also be a day in the life of, just not the glamorous running around New York kind. 

So here is a snapshot of our day on Friday. 

7 AM  

Time to wake up already! 

All before this hour:

J has been singing/talking for awhile.

Way before this hour L has left for work. 

Sorry L I couldn't make it up at 5 AM to make you your lunch.

8 AM  

Making Coffee. 

Having Cranberry Almond cereal for breakfast. 

J is hanging out in her Bumbo chair playing with a lime coloured plastic Easter egg that my aunt put dried beans into and taped closed with packing tape. It is one of her favorite toys. She loves to shake it & it's the perfect size for little fingers. Does this mean she will be musical? 

All before this hour:

Have fed J & changed her diaper. 

Have changed J into a day outfit.

9 AM

Folding Laundry.

Talking to my mom on speaker phone.

All before this hour: 

Have changed J.

Added toilet bowl cleaner to toilets.

Dressed.

Made bed.

Combed hair.

Made a telephone call.

10 AM

J goes for her morning nap.

It lasts 1/2 an hour.

I look for bedding.

Oh West Elm! My heart swoons.

11 AM

All before this hour:

Have fed & changed J's diaper.

Put away 1/2 of load of folded whites.

Rinsed out washing rags with bleach.

Put in second load into washing machine.

Now, dishes from breakfast & last night's supper.

12 AM

Making lunch.

Lunch is lentil soup that I made & leftover quesadillas.

I ground up a quesadilla for J.

Last night she loved it. Today... well we resorted to pluots.

Mmm we love pluots.

All before this hour:

Dishes are washed.

Cue all the baby anger for me doing housework instead of playing with her. 

So 1/2 an hour of undivided attention playing with J.

1 PM

Off we go for a walk but not before another diaper change & outfit change.

J sleeps half the way.

2 PM

Home again.

Change diaper & outfit.

Take out fish from freezer for supper & loosely plan what I am making for dinner.

We post a picture on Instagram of our walk.

Play with toys & listen to a novel.

3 PM

Snack-time: I make a London Fog.

J has a messy cookie.

Playtime.

Listening to novel.

4 PM

J goes for a nap & I do some financial work in office.

5 PM

J is awake.

I try to eke out a few more moments of office work by putting J in the jolly jumper.

J is not amused.

6 PM

Making dinner.

7 PM

L is home for work & it's dinner time.

I made salad, fish, couscous, & toppings to add to couscous (feta, green onions, peppers, raisins, fried mushrooms, and chili flakes. L will add sriracha sauce to his. He adds sriracha to almost everything. You can almost pretend its Korean is his reasoning.)

J blows out the couscous. Its hilarious and messy. Couscous is not a hit. 

The white fish however she loves. Yay! 

8 PM

It is normally Js bedtime.

I am finishing up a blog post on the laptop at the island.

And then this happened. 

Chocolate sauce & frozen yogurt.

J was bouncing off the walls.

L changed her & washed her up.

We changed her into her bedtime sleeper & she took almost an hour to calm down before her bottle, stretches and bedtime.

No more sugar before bed from now on.

I sound like a grouchy grownup.

9:30 PM

Finally.

Bedtime.

Lights out.

For the count J had 6 outfit changes in this day (including the 2 sleeper changes). 

Obviously she is the model in this column and not me.

Life Lately

Life lately is lived in fits and starts. I have been trying to utilize a schedule for baby J.

I think baby J has a fairly good grasp of the schedule it is just me that is having a hard time adjusting. L said this morning at 5 am that I was grouchy and should get some sleep. Haha.



Here is our schedule in case anyone is curious and commentary by me...

• 4 AM  The baby is waking up 
• Quick get out of bed, go to the washroom and warm a bottle of formula before baby is really awake. 
• 4:05 AM Change the Baby. 
• Now the baby is really awake. She is generally all smiles while getting changed. This happy state can change in the blink of an eye though when you pick her up. Now she wants to be fed instantly.
• 4:07 AM Feed the Baby
• 4:30 AM Baby is fed, burped and in a dreamy state. 
• Even though baby is in a dreamy state this does not mean she is ready to go back to bed. She would rather dreamily smile, play, be entertained by singing or stories for half an hour until her eyelids start to drop and she enters slumberland.
• 5:00 AM L's alarm has gone off. Thank the Lord L is making me freshly ground coffee! 
• L is getting ready for work. Can I help him make his lunch? Where are his keys? Did I see where he put that paper three weeks ago? 
• 5:45 AM L leaves for work. 
• Back to bed for me.
• 7 AM The baby is waking up. 
• Is it really 7 am already? Actually it is usually 6:30 am. 
• 7:05 AM Change the Baby.
• 7:07 AM Feed the Baby.
• 7:30 AM Baby is fed, burped and in a dreamy state.
• I'm so tired at this point baby comes back to bed with me. She loves being in our bed. Is it warmer? I don't know why but the instant she is in the middle of the bed all swaddled up she falls asleep. Yay! 
• 9:45 AM The baby is awake. 
• Thankfully when she awakes around 10 it is a slow stretching type of wake up. It takes her almost fifteen minutes to actually wake up. Sometimes I get up and get everything ready but sometimes we just hang out trying to wake up. 
• 10:00 AM Change the Baby.
• 10:07 AM Feed the Baby.
• 10:30 AM Playtime. 
• Playtime means anything and everything from singing songs, getting dressed in a new outfit, tummy time, sitting up and chatting or listening to music, having a bath. I have purchased a baby wrap so hopefully when it arrives in the mail this will also mean we can go outside for a walk. 
• 11:30 AM Naptime.
• Here comes the fits and starts. I jump into the shower or take a salt water bath. Get dressed. Eat something. Steralize bottles. Prepare some formula. Make some phone calls or emails. Check out social media or reading blogs.
• 1 PM Baby is waking up.
• 1:15 PM Baby is still waking up. 
• 1:20 PM Change the Baby.
• 1:27 PM Feed the Baby.
• 2:00 PM Playtime.
• 2:30 PM Naptime.
• This naptime may or may not actually happen at 2:30 PM. Baby fights going for a nap about now. Usually she falls asleep in my arms and it is best not to move her or she will wake.
• 4 PM Baby is awake.
• 4:05 PM Change the Baby.
• 4:07 PM Feed the Baby.
• 4:30 PM Playtime.
• 5:30 PM Naptime.
• The second fit and start of the day. This is when I need to quickly think of something to make for supper. Do laundry. Clean the living room and kitchen. Wash the dishes. 
• 6:30ish PM Baby is waking up.
• 6:35 PM Change the baby.
• 6:40 PM Feed the Baby
• 7:00 PM L is home from work and off to shower.
• If we are finished feeding then baby hangs out with me in the kitchen while I get the last touches of the meal together. Usually the meal is mostly ready from prior nap time.
• 7:15 PM Daddy helps out and it is time for dinner. L might help with holding the Baby or take over making dinner. 
• 7:30 PM Baby falls asleep in Daddy's arms.
• We watch an episode of a television series on dvd. 
• 8:30 PM L's bedtime. Baby is transferred to bassinet to sleep.
• 10:00 PM Baby is awake.
• 10:05 PM Change the Baby.
• 10:07 PM Feed the Baby.
• 10:30 PM Playtime
• This one is challenging for me because I am dead tired at this point and yet baby wants to play and is definitely not ready to go to sleep. Sometimes by 11 she falls asleep. Sometimes 11:30 PM. Sometimes midnight. I'm so happy when I finally am horizontal in bed.
• 1 AM Baby is awake.
• Oh my! When is it that babies sleep through the night? Am I going to survive this?
• 1:05 AM Change the Baby.
• 1:07 AM Feed the Baby.
• 1:30-2 AM Will the Baby go back to sleep?
• 2 AM Finally
• 4 AM Oh dear Lord! Is it 4 am already?!?

Here are some pictures of yesterday's fits and starts at around 5:30-6:30 PM...

L wanted me to make an apple pie two days ago...I finally found the ambition. The apples my mom brought from the Okanagan were starting to get soft. I could not find the rolling pin. A wine bottle from our realtor makes a great rolling pin in a pinch.

Yes my kitchen can really get this messy. 

I always know when the last time I did dishes was by the number of toothbrushes by the sink. L wanders when he brushes his teeth and leaves his tootbrush at the kitchen sink. I think it is kinda gross but old habits die hard. L would have brushed his teeth before bed and in the morning. This means the last time I washed dishes was yesterday before supper. Oye!

Dishes are done!

Pies are in the oven. 

When I make an apple or fruit pie I also make a quiche. Quiche are the easiest to make and one of my favorite items to eat. I have converted L to eating quiche. I make it so often I no longer use a recipe but if you want a great recipe google Quiche Lorraine for the basics. Here is a link to the best pie crust from Sally's Baking Addiction. I add in 6 or so eggs some milk, a handful of greens, a bit of chopped sausage, some grated cheese, (if I have time I fry some onion...this did not happen this time), some fresh herbs or mushrooms if I have any, salt and pepper and voila! 

Mmm fresh apple pie while watching the latest episode in the series we are watching! 

And that my friends is life lately! 

This afternoon should be exciting as I am making my first trip out to go grocery shopping without L and with baby! 

Oh I hear the baby waking up! See you all later! 

A Day In The Life

1. I feel like I've just fallen back asleep when the alarm goes off at 4:45 AM. I get up and make L his lunch: homemade lasagna, an orange, a banana, an apple, a granola bar, two chocolate chip cookies, grapes.
2. It's 5:18 now I make L tea.
3. L leaves for work. I try to read some, a magazine, a novel in hopes of staying up.
4. I'm just too sleepy and it's chilly so I go back to bed. 7:30 am I am woken to a flurry of texts from L. He has all kinds of ideas.
5. I finally have breakfast, my current favorite, Cheerios. It's 8:55 AM. I try to access an account for L and make some calls.
6. I decide I need to travel back to our home to acquire some account details so quickly clean up the condo, load the dishwasher, gather my laundry, and pack my bags. I will be glad when we are finally settled and all of our belongings are in one place.
7. It's 10:00 AM now and I drive to the plant to meet L to exchange vehicles and keys.
8. On the road now. Five hours of driving to go.
9. I have a blueberry bagel with cream cheese for lunch. I regret it afterwards knowing I should have had something with more protein.
10. I take a break or two along the drive to stretch my legs.
11. I arrive around 4 PM, get the mail, the elusive statement I was needing is in the mail. I am so happy. I start a load of laundry.
12. Files and more files. Paperwork.
13. Math.
14. I have an egg sandwich for dinner and watch the movie Cinderella.
15. Almost bedtime. But first this blog-tember post.