6:30 – I wake up. Phil had gotten up at 5 – took Barney on a walk, made coffee, and showered. I was able to say goodbye before he headed to DC for the day, then straight from the meeting he was flying to Chicago for an interview. After Phil takes off, I get oatmeal ready for the kids, feed Barney, eat my breakfast and have one sip of hot coffee before I hear Evie. Its Tuesday, so I am off of work and Wil has school.
7:15 – I head upstairs to get the kids. Evie refuses to leave her crib without 3 stuffed animals: Elmo, lamb, and doggie. Wil decides he needs a stuffed animal, too, and chooses Lucy- Moosey. We all head downstairs for oatmeal and Chuggington. Wil uses the potty and I change Evie’s diaper. While the kids finish up breakfast, I throw in a load of laundry and get Wil’s snack ready for school. The kids continue watching Disney Channel, Mickey Mouse is up next. I run upstairs to get dressed and hope the kids dont kill each other for the 10 minutes I am gone. Luckily they are nice to each other and I didnt need to run downstairs a million times to police them. I help them get dressed, brush hair, and change Evie’s diaper again.
8:15 – We are out the door! Wil’s school is in Canton, only 1.5 miles away. We head into his classroom and I discuss Wil’s recent speech evaluation with his teacher while Evie plays with the big kids. Then its time for his class to go outside, so I have to convince Evie its time to leave – shes always hates leaving school! This gives me hope that she will love it next year!
8:45 – Evie and I are back home. I throw on some Monsters University for her while I unload the dishwasher, we watch the recycling truck come by, I switch the laundry over, take out the trash, bring back in the recycling can, and take a look at my to-do list. I change Evie’s diaper again before heading out the door to run some errands.
9:30 Evie and I run to the vet to pick up Barney’s special food, Evie loves the fish tank and all the other dogs there. She weighs herself on the doggie scale – Shes 30 lbs! (Wil is 34 lbs). Then we head to Target so we can get milk, some plastic eggs for an upcoming community egg hunt, and a birthday card for my mom.
10:45 – Back at home, we watch a little more Monsters University. We write Mom’s card, grab a snack, stuff the eggs for the egg hunt, restart the dryer. I find my nearly full coffee cup in the microwave. I text with friends to see if anyone wants to get together for a lunch play date. We agree on the tot lot right near Wil’s school. I pack up a lunch for both kids. While in the kitchen, I swear a smell something a little ‘off’ – I’m pretty certain there is a dead mouse somewhere, but not brave enough to go searching for it. I light a scented candle and call our exterminator to come on Thursday (Yes, we have one of those. His name is Sasa and hes amazing).
11:45 – One more diaper for Evie – and then we are out the door to pick up Wil. Evie plays with all the other younger siblings while we wait outside for preschool 1/2 day dismissal. Wil had a good day at school (hooray!). We stop at the mailbox, Wil writes his name on Mimi’s card, then we send it off. I drop off the eggs at a friends house, and then we head to the tot lot. Kids run around in between bites of peanut butter sandwich.
1:00 – We are back at home – we clean hands and butts – then they are off to bed! Evie sleeps in her crib and Wil sleeps in our room in the ‘big bed’. By 1:20 everyone is asleep. Well – I’m not sure if Wil is asleep, but hes playing quietly, so thats good enough for me. I grab some lunch, call my mom to talk about Maggie’s upcoming baby shower, buy a plane ticket for Evie and I to go to bloomington, answer some work emails, take Barney out, and grab the laundry.
2:45 – Wil isnt being quiet anymore – I bring him back downstairs and he watches a little spiderman while I run upstairs to shower since I hadnt had a chance to do so since Sunday night and couldnt during nap time since Wil was in our room. I am able to shower and get dressed before Evie wakes up around 3:30. Shes not excited about being awake. She screams through a diaper and throws 3 different types of crackers on the floor. I try to appease her with Monsters University again – and even that isnt working. We finally settle on some a bagel and strawberries – her favorite. And she sits quietly for 10 whole minutes. Wil and I head to the back of the house to build blocks for awhile and Evie finally decides to join us. At 4:30 we start to get ready for a fundraiser thrown by some friends at a local restaurant. Phil and I hardly go to restaurants with the kids – they just cant sit still long enough, and dont really like to try new foods. So there are lots of things stacked against us, I knew trying to go by myself was a tall order, but I bring lots of toys to keep them occupied for long enough to eat some food.
5:00 – We’re out the door to Stackhouse – we are meeting a few of the friends we saw earlier at the tot lot, so I try to psych Wil and Evie up for sitting quietly with them. But when we got there, no one was sitting down and everyone was just running around openly! Score for the kids. It was a fundraiser for juvenile diabetes, so it was very kid friendly. Wil had a blast playing this hockey game with his friends. I ordered some food but never had a chance to sit down. The kids did not want to eat either – they were having too much fun running around. Finally Evie had an epic meltdown over not being able to play the hockey game. That, combined with no dinner, resulted in Evie laying on the floor screaming and crying. Completely inconsolable. We packed up the food as quickly as we could and headed home.
6:30 – We’re finally back at the house, after Evie screaming the whole way home. Both kids inhale their food (as do I!). After everything calmed down, I do another diaper for Evie and we cleaned up dinner. Then we cut everyone’s fingernails and then had m&ms, a reward for the fingernails. We played legos and then headed upstairs for bath.
7:30 – We start the bedtime routine. While the bath fills up, we take off our clothes (this actually requires a lot of time and effort), putting them away in the laundry, going potty, brushing teeth, put the ‘glowing toys’ in front of the light, and lay out our PJs. Then everyone goes into the tub. Usually Phil is in charge of bath time, and Wil lets me know that I am doing things ‘wrong’, and wants Daddy to wash his hair. Sorry buddy. We drain the tub and finally get out once all the water is gone. We head into the room for PJs, a little play time and books. Evie stacks blocks while I get Wil dressed, then we all reach Richard Scary. Wil is really into the counting page – and likes repeating the ABC song. I get the ‘glowing toys’ from the bathroom for Wil (some glow-in-the-dark lizards he got for Christmas), and retrieve the 6+items Evie is requesting for bedtime: Elmo, lamb, dog, Hello kitty pillow, 3 ninnys, and a book. We sing songs and say goodnight. Then Wil needs to go to the bathroom one more time. Then we sing a few more songs and say goodnight for real.
8:15 – Done for the day. Well – almost: I take Barney out (I’m sure I fed him at some point throughout the day?). I start the dishwasher and fold the laundry. Phil calls and says he made it to the hotel in Chicago. We chat about the day and Evie’s stellar meltdown in the middle of stackhouse. I eat 3 Reece’s easter eggs and head to bed around 8:50.
And thats a day in my life! I think the last one I did was during maternity leave: https://woznation.com/2013/07/20/a-whole-new-routine/ . I did 21 diapers that day. I was down to 8 in this post. And dont really keep track of Wil’s habits, luckily he takes care of that on his own now. But most importantly, I now get 8+ hours of sleep every night! Life is definitely much easier now that they are both a little older.
We still had snow in early March, but tried to venture outside when it was above freezing. I was able to take a quick weekend trip to see Annakate who is expecting a baby girl in May. Our water heater broke for nearly a week, and we spent evenings boiling water on the stove to heat up the kids bath. Phil braved the cold showers, but I went to friends houses before heading into work. We went to the science museum one more time before our yearly membership expired. I cut my hair. We signed Wil up for another 8 week session of gymnastics. That was about it for March!
Woznation 