A Day in the Life {6.2.22}

As I type up this blog post, my family and I are enjoying our beach vacation with Justin’s family this week. We’ve been lucky to get to do this every other year for the past several years and it’s a trip we always look forward to and cherish the memories from. That being said, our lives aren’t made up of the mountaintop, super fun vacations and trips and exciting experiences that only happen once in a while. Ordinary days are truly the building blocks of our lives – the simple moments that show how we actually spend the majority of our lives.

Every so often I like to document a day in our life; I always choose a random day with no particular plan in mind. I snap pictures throughout and I don’t put thought into staging them or changing them from anything other than what they really are. I love looking back at these photos – the grainy, blurry, less-than-perfect snapshots of real life candid moments. This is our real life – my real moments with my children and family – and these are the posts I most love to look back on in the future.

So with all that being said, here’s how we spent Thursday, June 2, 2022!

We are currently enjoying fairly smooth mornings where our kids either sleep in a little later (and by later, I mean at least 7 am haha) or, if they get up before that, they go to the bathroom and head downstairs and play quietly or turn on a little show. They no longer come into our room right away (unless they need us for something) and that is a glorious feeling to get just a bit more sleep! I know this stretch won’t last forever and we’ll soon have a newborn throwing us back into a wonky sleep schedule so for now I am savoring these mornings.

This morning, the kids got up before me. When I headed downstairs, I fixed them breakfast – I forgot to take a picture until they were done but I try to give them 3-4 breakfast options and let them decide what sounds good. Today, LJ chose dry granola, Vi chose a bowl of cottage cheese, and they both had strawberries too.

As the kids ate breakfast, I tackled the mountain of dishes in our sink leftover from the night before – I didn’t take a picture until most were already done but trust me, it was a LOT.

When LJ finished breakfast, he came to play with his cars on the open dishwasher door as I loaded things into it.

A couple weeks ago, Vi went to her first eye doctor appointment and we were told to start patching her left eye for 2-3 hours each day. We got her some fun, colorfully-patterned eye patches and every morning she enjoys picking out one for the day. On this particular day, she and LJ dumped them all out to make the selection.

I have a part-time, work-from-home job as an administrative assistant and needed to tackle my emails, so I set the kids up with a show and headed into my office to get my morning tasks done.

It took just under an hour to get through everything, and then I closed down my laptop, got the kids dressed, and we headed to Target to grab a few last-minute things for our upcoming family beach trip the following day.

Two little kids in Target is no small feat (especially since I needed a new swimsuit for my pregnant body so our trip included a fitting room stop) so we treated ourselves to lunch in the Target café afterwards. The kids also got to pick out one special item from the dollar spot to take to the beach – LJ was so excited about the green football he picked to play with his older cousin!

We loaded up the car with our purchases and headed to the playground, where we enjoyed the beautiful weather and burned off a ton of energy.

The kids were both wiped out after the playground, so I quickly packed them up and headed home. It’s so tricky keeping Vi awake in situations like this and not let her fall asleep in the car, because then she won’t nap at home, but this time I made it and she crashed as soon as we got home without even asking for a story or snuggles or anything. Success!

While Vi napped, I wanted to take a few pictures of the kitchen for my “One Year Later” blog post and the small touch-ups I just did throughout. While I did that, LJ read a book in the living room behind me with the dogs nearby.

He also wanted to get in on the pictures – ha! Love this sweet and silly boy!

One unusual thing about today was that I had a scheduled training for work. This does not happen very often, but we are super close to switching websites and needed some training on the new system. I was able to attend some of the meeting while Vi slept and LJ was content in the playroom, but then Vi woke up. I always explain to them when Mommy is in a meeting, but honestly, it’s about a 50/50 chance of whether or not they’ll behave, get along, and not need intervention from me. Unfortunately, today was a day they needed intervention. Arguing, picking on one another, crying – it was a rough go and I’m not going to sugar coat it, it was hard. Working from home has definite pros, but there are cons too. Normally my job is super flexible with timing, but because of the training I wasn’t able to adjust as much. I had to excuse myself a couple times to address the kids, but we got through it.

After my meeting, I closed down my laptop for the day and got a quick dinner started for the kids before their swimming lessons. Justin takes them to swim lessons after work and today was an extra special day because my parents came into town too! All five of them loaded up the van and headed off to swim (nobody worry, I know LJ’s chest strap isn’t high enough – he likes to buckle himself in and I adjusted it properly after the picture!)

While the crew was at swim lessons, I picked up around the house and started a load of laundry. The reason my parents came into town was so they could watch the kids the following day to allow me to focus on packing everything up for our beach trip and getting the house cleaned and ready for our dog/house sitter. It was nice to get a jump on things while they were at swim!

After they came home, the kids got ready for bed and of course, wanted grandma and grandpa to be the ones to read their bedtime stories and tuck them in. I had to snap this sweet pic before pulling down the blinds – my heart just gets all squishy and full seeing these sweet bonds.

Once the kids were in bed, we chatted for a while with my parents and then all played a game. I’ve been checking out different games from the library lately and our latest pick was a game called The Sherlock Files – a murder mystery card game. It was really fun to play with my parents even though we didn’t solve the murder (we missed a key clue that would have changed everything, darn it!)

Sorry to Justin, who left the table before I thought to snap a selfie. Love these two and I’m so thankful for their constant love and desire to spend time with the kids and help out when they can.