A Day in the Life of a Mom and Wife

I've had people ask me why I rarely blog anymore. It's not that I don't have time; it's that I'm not choosing to blog with the time I have. My "me time" comes in small chunks, so it seems like I can barely start a thought and I'm needed elsewhere. Or I just want to veg my brain out more than blogging will allow when I have some quiet time. Or I have piles of laundry, tidying, cleaning, and organizing staring me down. I miss blogging, and I was really looking forward to documenting more of this stage of life to wistfully look back on, but for right now it's sitting on the back burner along with thoroughly cleaning the house :P. When Felicity is a little older, I'm hoping to pick it back up. But instead of writing about all the cute things she's doing, I'm choosing to just absorb it and be present in it right now, for the most part. 

But in case you wondered "What does she do all day?", here's a day in the life for me these days (times are very, very approximate). I keep thinking "boy, I'd love to get a routine down", but when I start thinking about it, I *do* have a routine, just maybe not the one I thought I'd have by now. But I'm enjoying life and the baby is happy, so the rest can wait :).

This blissful crib nap (her 2nd so far) lasted a whole 20 minutes!

8am: wake up; Felicity and I wake up together usually (woot, woot cosleeping). I give her a bottle and then try to get her to be happy on her play mat long enough for me to pump, or sometimes backwards depending on how long she nursed... she likes to nurse from about 6am on. If I wake up first, I rush out to pump before she gets up, then give her a bottle. Then I make and eat breakfast quickly and spend time with her on the mat playing and reading. 

9ish am: put Felicity in the swing for a nap. Try to shower and pump again while she's sleeping. Give her a bottle when she wakes up and, if I wasn't able to pump before that, try at that point. If I'm going walking with the neighbor, I do it around 9 and the nap/shower happens closer to 9:30.

11am: a bottle somewhere between the 10-11 hour, sometimes an activity like story time at the library but more often than not still trying to get my bearings for the morning... finally drying my hair or putting in a load of laundry, and keeping the baby happy. I might put her in the jumper to buy some time to get things done.

12/1: try to pump again, eat lunch, and another bottle for Felicity, and try her for another nap. Both this and the 9ish nap are pretty short- maybe 40 min to an hour. She usually falls asleep in the swing so I just do whatever I can get done quietly.

2ish: pump again, bottle at some point, and try to go somewhere. Either run errands, a fun activity, etc. It's usually this point in the day before I feel put together enough to leave the house! Bottle at some point.

2:30/3/4ish: what I call a 'nursie nap' for Felicity. She nurses to go down for a nap and won't sleep without me there. So I either nap with her, play on my phone while she naps (both of these in bed), or set us up on the couch, her on the nursing pillow, so I can watch a little tv while she naps. This used to annoy me, but now I enjoy the cuddles with her and the forced down time for myself.

4/5: I sometimes watch Ellen, pump/bottle routine, and usually Felicity goes on the mat or in the jumper while I do a couple more chores.

5/6: Steven gets home and takes over with the baby so I can pump and get dinner going or finished. She gets a bottle. If we bathe her (um... every once in a while) we do it then.

7-7:30: I nurse Felicity down to bed. 

8ish: pump, and we both have a bit of down time. 

9: together time! Talk, play games, watch a show, and usually eat ice cream :).

10: last pump of the night (well, until 1am and 4am!) and bed!