Our day, start to finish

I often wonder what other full-time moms and their babies do throughout the day. [Notice I said ‘full-time’ instead of ‘stay-at-home’. I boycott that phrase.] What time do they wake up? What do they eat for breakfast? Lunch? When do their babies nap? How long? How often and how long do they play outside? Where do they go? What does their nighttime routine look like? You know…that sorta thing. I know I read quote unquote Mommy blogs, but the posts are always tidbits from a day – never the day as a WHOLE. Start to finish. What I really want to do is be a fly on your wall for just one day – not in a creepy way [though I’m pretty sure no matter how I spin it, there is no other way but a creepy way]. So let me alleviate your ‘willies’ by letting you be a fly on our wall first.

Our day, start to finish:

7:30 – 9:00am: We wake up. Don’t shoot! Don’t unfollow! I can’t help it. [and wouldn’t if I could!] Yes, sometimes my babies sleep until 9am. Sometimes they don’t. Ms. Molly sets the alarm clock in this house.

For breakfast: I could eat Frosted Mini Wheats EVERY SINGLE DAY and usually do. My coffee tumbler fills up at around 16oz. of the yummiest Community French Vanilla coffee – to which I add a teaspoon of sugar and 2 tablespoons of french vanilla creamer. Jack will usually settle for eggs in any shape or form – boiled, scrambled, fried in a blanket [toast], omelet with cheese. Other than eggs, he’s a ‘grits instead of oatmeal’ kid, like his Mama. Pancakes are a favorite too. Molly starts her day with a mashed fruit of some kind.

Molly takes her first hour-long nap exactly two hours after she wakes up. Jack watches Sesame Street every morning while I check my emails, read blogs and drink my coffee.

After Molly’s nap and after Jack starts to get bored with my face and all the toys at his disposal, I have a decision to make. IF we are leaving the house today, now is the time to do it. If I wait too long to make this decision, it won’t leave much time for our outing before Jack’s needs his first and only nap and Molly needs her second nap [anywhere between 12:30 – 2], It’s a small window of opportunity. This is when I am most anxious. If I decide to leave, I have to move fast. So I usually rush out the door sweating and panting from getting the two of them dressed and ready to go in record speeds all the while forgetting 5 million things because if I don’t hurry to get our sunshine, our smidgen of Vitamin D, the babies WILL melt down and demand their nap in their typical collaborative 2 under 3 style.

So…we will either:
A: decide to stay home to…

• make play dough shapes and/or play with any of the other gagillion toys the kids own

conduct mini preschool sessions practicing numbers, ABCs, colors, words and phrases, etc.
• tackle the general housekeeping chores of the day while including Jack in as much of it as I can. He is so cute when he is eager to help. It makes the chores that much easier to bear. 

B: rush like fiends to leave the house and…

• go to lunch with my mom and run various errands with her help
• go to Target

Which is just what we did today! I always love an excuse to go to Target and it just so happened to be that Jack needed more balls for his pack-n-play ball pit. He just NEEDED them, y’all!

…and I got a new purse! WOO-HOO! At first glance, you may be wondering….”so what, it’s just a purse.” What may seem irrelevant to you is what made my week! I NEVER buy purses. Maybe one every two years…if that. I’ve been looking for a new one to replace my Converse bag for weeks and today I finally found one – the right size, the right color, the right amount of pockets, the right EVERYTHING!

Silly me! I forgot to mention…the right PRICE!

Wait, where was I? Oh yea, our day…

Lunch: Almost always leftovers for me and Jack. Molly gets a mashed vegetable of some kind.

12:30 – 2 : Naptime: With both babies napping, I either start supper, clean house, waste time on my computer or play in my craft room.

2:30 – 4:30: This is the hardest part of the day. This is when we [or just I] stare at the clock waiting for Bobby to come home from work. I am usually cooking while trying to keep Jack entertained and trying to stop Molly from eating carpet fuzz or something equally weird [that child will find the strangest things in the strangest places to put in her mouth]. If I pull my hair out, this is the time I do it. If we go outside, this is the time we do it.

5:00: We eat at 5 o’clock sharp with all members of the family at the table in their chair because that’s just how I like it.

5:30 – bedtime: This is when Bobby and I double-team. We tag each other in and out. “It’s your turn to clean the spit up out of the carpet.” “It’s your turn to stop Jack from sitting on Molly’s head!” Occasionally we find ourselves both on the floor with one of the two children on top of us pretending to be an airplane and laughing so hard their drool is falling into our mouth OR we take turns building castles out of legos OR we watch Toy Story 3 or Cars for the 1,209th time. Bobby bathes them. I dress them in their jammies.

7:00 – 7:30: Molly bites the bullet first.

8:00 – 8:30: Jack gets one to three books, a sippy of milk and a thorough teeth brushing….then joins Molly-girl.

So there you have it, my little flies on the wall. That’s about it.

Your turn!