A day in the life!

The baby girl and I have been quarantined to the house for much of this past week with the flu. Now for a stay at home mom who is an extrovert and who finds life and energy when she leaves the house and interacts with the outside world, and who has also canceled all of her social plans for most of the week because of a sick child and self, and who can't even go outside for walks because it's so cold outside it would surely prolong our sicknesses AND who's husband is gone for most of the weekend running a climbing competition, you can imagine how much I may be starting to lose my mind.

So yesterday in an attempt to DO SOMETHING, I started recording parts of my day so I could blog a day-in-the-life type of thing. A day in the life of a stir crazy mom of a toddler with the flu.

(Disclaimer: This somehow got crazy long and detailed but that is just how bored I'm getting. Please humor me. Or feel free to stop reading, it's all good.)

Paisley woke me up around 7am. I had been up with her for much of the night before, because trying to sleep when you have the flu is the worst and don't we all know it. I was very groggy so the next couple hours are kind of a blur, but I do know that I managed to feed us both breakfast, as well as get us both showered and dressed.

By the way.

"I always think there's something rather foreign about high spirits at breakfast,"
- Carson from Downton Abbey, season 4. This is my new favorite quote of all of the quotes.

So. There was a lot of booger wiping, book reading, little people arranging, and consoling of my poor, sweet, incredibly crabby toddler who in her fragile state chose to be offended by nearly everything I did. Other things that happened: I decided not to do yoga because I felt too sick, I forgot to do the laundry.

Then it was lunchtime. I watched as Paisley spread cream cheese from her bagel through her freshly cleaned hair. It was annoying, but I was glad that her appetite was starting to return. At the end of lunch she got incredibly mad at me when I started scrubbing her face and head with a washcloth instead of giving her a cookie like she asked for.

She was very, very, very mad.

Then it was naptime. I didn't make her clean up her toys and books before bed since she's been sick and since she was still distraught over the cookie and sometimes you just have to choose your battles, you know? Plus I was tired and lazy feeling.



Once she was in bed it was time to decide what to do with naptime. I really wanted to do pastels down in my studio while watching the latest Downton Abbey episode. But I also just really wanted to sleep because I was very tired. And sick and lazy feeling. So I decided to compromise and start with an hour long nap (even though I normally try to avoid them), and hope that I'd still have another hour of her naptime left once I woke up. Baby girl usually sleeps between an hour and 15 minutes and two hours, so it was a risky move. When I woke up from my nap I oh so carefully crept to the kitchen and stirred Emergence-C into my water with my finger instead of a spoon so as not to make any unnecessary noise. I was craving a dessert-like treat, as I usually am at this time of day, but our kitchen is fairly bare right now and I had eaten the last of the ice cream the night before. And we obviously had no cookies. I started digging around like a muskrat and my instincts led me to a 6 inch chocolate Santa back in the recesses of my cupboard, forgotten from Christmas.

Score! Excellent.

I headed downstairs to my studio and started Downton, ate three inches of Santa and brainstormed what I would draw. But then I heard a small, familiar, quivery voice over the moniter..."Mama..."

So I scurried back upstairs, kicking myself when I passed the laundry room and realizing I had still forgotten to put a load in. Downton and pastels would lie in wait for me until next time when I would definitely skip taking a nap, I told myself.

In order to make right the lack of dessert situation that had been bringing both of us down, I decided to make some cookies while Paisley rearranged whatever furniture she was strong enough to move in the living room. (I am serious when I say that girlfriend loves to organize, and arrange, and sort, and tidy.) I made banana oat cookies with chocolate chips (Brian insists they are actually muffin tops though).

So then we had cookies for dinner and egg salad sandwiches and clementines for dessert. Plus Paisley had peas, because sometimes I worry that if she doesn't have something from all the food groups for every meal then something might go horribly wrong. I know, it's irrational! Maybe it will wear off by my next kid.

By the way, how much longer do I have before she discovers that I am a complete hypocrite because I have her eat peas somewhat frequently but I myself will not put them anywhere near my mouth? Peas are seriously one of the worst things I could ever be asked to eat. Whenever they touch my hand I have to stop what I'm doing and run to the sink and scrub with soap because of the smell. If they are in a salad or fried rice however, I'm generally fine with it. And isn't that just funny, how these things work?

Paisley's a class-act pea eater though. She likes to eat lots of them at once, so she painstakingly tries to stack 4-5 peas between her little toddler pointer finger and thumb, dropping them several times and sighing, "uh-oh," before trying again with great concentration. It's somewhat painful to watch, but also sort of delightful, if you know what I mean.

After dinner we read books and did puzzles, and I was surprised by how she no longer needed my help to fit the pieces in. Then we walked around the rooms of the house and cleaned up our messes, with a promise of reading Corduroy Goes to the Doctor if she helped. Jammies were pulled on, toothbrushes were wrestled into mouths, more books were read, prayers were murmured and kisses given out.

Bedtime.

I breathed a sigh as I shut her door and then finally remembered to put a load of laundry in the wash.

Wondering what to do with my hot, exciting Friday night by myself, I wandered downstairs and turned on the TV, and realized it was the Olympics opening ceremony. "Cool!" I thought. I watched for about five minutes and then put in Bridesmaids instead. I laughed super loud when Annie said to Steve the flight attendant, "Are you an appliance..." Gepetto did her best to take up as much of my lap as she possibly could with her weird long body and elbowed the computer off my legs whenever I tried to check facebook.

I stayed up until the hubs came home so I could get ten minutes of adult interaction before we crashed into bed, which meant I didn't get to sleep before 1am, which turned out to not be the wisest decision since I was back up with Paisley at 5am because of her cough.

And so here we are! You now know far more than you ever hoped to about how my day went yesterday. I'll have the hubs read this later, since when he asked me what I did yesterday I was too tired to try and explain to him that it was basically nothing.

By the way, none of the pictures in this post were taken yesterday, or even very recently for that matter. I've been far too sick and tired to pick up the camera, and Paisley has had far too much snot crystalized to her face to get her picture taken.

48/52

I've found an excellent way to combat these cold winter days and I absolutely need to tell you about it. If you follow these simple steps, stepping out into the frozen Minnesota tundra will not be as bad as you remember it being before you had children. First when you are getting ready to go somewhere, you wrestle your toddler into all of her winter gear. Try not to lose your cool when she takes off her boots for the fourth time. Then you put on all of YOUR winter gear, but realize you don't know where your keys are. Then you frantically search the entire house as fast as you can (make sure you are running late at this point - it makes you sweat more), getting more and more frustrated for the next 5-10 minutes. Then, realize that the keys have been in your sweatshirt pocket all along, bite back the colorful language threatening to spill from your mouth, put your toddler back in to all of the winter clothes that she's long since taken off, and by the time you run out the door you will be so hot and flustered that the chilling cold air will be a welcome, refreshing breeze on your face.

There. You're welcome.

...If you don't have a toddler at home, putting on all your winter gear and then losing your keys when you are already running late should be enough to work up a sweat on it's own.

41/52

Here's a pic from this last week! It's becoming near impossible these days to get baby girl to both look at the camera AND sit still long enough for me to take the picture, so this mama takes what she can get. (In this picture Paisley thought the game was that she should stand up as soon as I sit her down so that I turn into a crazy person because we're already running late but I just want ONE! PICTURE!)

I had a particularly mom-ish week this week if you were using a mom-o-meter to rank your week. Which I usually don't.

Amidst the usual attending play dates, trying to keep up with the laundry and dishes, cleaning poopy diapers, wiping milk spills off the floor, changing sheets, wiping noses, and standing in the doorway until she falls asleep, there was also sorting of summer and winter clothes, shopping for cheap winter jackets and snow boots, being the nursery backup lady for the women's bible study this week at church, and picking her up early from a sitter because she didn't seem to be feeling well. I've been feeling quite motherly through it all but then the biggest jump on my mom-o-meter happened yesterday while walking through the parking lot at Target and a passing bird pooped on my head. "UGH!" I said and felt my wet hair, while trying to look at my reflection in my car window. I couldn't really see much so I figured it couldn't be too bad and I'd take care of it once I got home in front of a mirror and a sink.

But by the time I had loaded the girl and the groceries into my car and then drove home to meet my mom and brother who were dropping things off at my house and then quickly made dinner and then ate dinner and got Paisley ready for bed and read her some books and waited in her doorway until she fell asleep and did the dishes and cleaned the kitchen and living room and cleaned out the litter box and got some laundry started, I had forgotten about the bird dookie.

Until late that night when I was brushing my teeth about to go to bed and I noticed...a small, thin, whitish streak in my hair.

"What in the...OH."

But I was too tired to do anything about it then so I just went to bed, resolving to change the sheets in the morning.

I don't know why I equate being "mom-ish" to being too busy to remember that a bird pooped in my hair and then too exhausted to take care of it once I did remember, but I also kind of do know.

29/52

Ack! I'm falling behind on these weekly pics. This is last week's photo, which means I still need another one this week. It's just that I've been too busy scrubbing up little drops of milk from the floor to take pictures. Baby girl has decided that she is done nursing and now only drinks milk from her sippy cups. I bought the Playtex ones that are SUPPOSED to be leak proof...but no matter how hard I concentrate to get all the parts put together perfectly, milk still gets everywhere when she throws them. 

Which is often. 

!!

And did you know that dried milk stains are very resilient? They keep reappearing after I think they are gone. Like magic!

!!

Little tricksters.

25/52

Another pic snapped by the hubs during our July 4th celebration! Right in the midst of kiddie pool fun, covered with as much sunscreen as humanly possible. In multiple layers. Slimy. 

I think that if someone gave me the task of describing motherhood in ten words, one of the words would definitely be slimy. 

I'll have to get back to you on the rest.

20/52

I really super duper heart this picture. Sitting in a wagon, eating toast and rocking the crazy old guy hair. The crazy old guy hair is on account of girlfriend refusing to keep her hat on, so I had no choice but to slather sunscreen all over her scalp. It was gross, but also veeerrry funny.

I'm not as tired as when I posted last week's picture. Probably because baby girl has developed this new little habit that we like to call "sleeping through the night." It's been a week now so I think that means we can say it's official? 

(Cue the angel choir bursting forth from the clouds, singing and playing their harps and tambourines, wings all aflutter!)

!!!!

!

It's nice, we like it.

Hopefully I haven't just jinxed myself by making this grand official announcement.

I'll be posting photos from our Memorial Day weekend here soon! Because obviously, why would I post them the week after the fact when I could instead post them TWO weeks after the fact?

Birthday/Mother's Day Weekend!

This past weekend was a blast and a half.

First up! We had the hubs' birthday. To celebrate his journey into what I'm calling extreme adulthood (28 folks. Look out.) we went to Nickelodeon Universe at the Mall of America. To go on rides! To remind us of our youth. To irritate our poor, aging stomachs.



Our youthful evening included screaming and laughing on speedy roller coasters, waiting in lengthy lines amongst throngs of middle schoolers, trying out the new Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles ride (the hubs loudly sang the TMNT theme song the whole time we were riding this one, as was his prerogative, being the birthday boy), pondering the fact that the turtles are not only mutant ninjas but also TEENAGERS, going on the haunted ghost ride where you get to shoot the bad guys with laser guns (and as you can see from the picture above the hubs beat me by literally almost 1,000 points), and talking about how very tired and worn out we were.

My double dose of Dramamine lasted me about six or seven rides before it completely gave up and I declared myself unfit for any more shenanigans. But luckily I didn't puke, which is more than I can say for the last time we were there!

...

THEN! It was Mother's Day. My first one, positively. And it was filled with bright colors, tulips and sunshine, as a first Mother's Day should be.



After church and small group we headed over to my Grandma's house where the rest of the day was spent eating delicious food, getting my first Mother's Day corsage, squishing Paisley's squishy cheeks with kisses until she was completely squished and then passing her on to the next potential cheek squisher, and playing fun games.


Such good things to make up such a great weekend.

And how was yours?

A peek into the morning of a person who is not a morning person.

I will myself to get out of bed as I hear baby girl's cries. A difficult task as I had been up with her several times throughout the night before and also, because mornings always have been and always will be my enemy number one. The hubs has already left for work in the wee morning hours so it's just her and me.

Somehow I muster my strength and it's all I can do to get her into a fresh diaper and set her out on the living room floor.



Boy am I lucky that my little girl is a morning lark. She's SUPER happy in the morning, and she looks with excitement at the clean slate that is the bottom rack of our bookshelves containing some of her things, all cleaned up and put away the night before. She always goes for the books first (which pleases me because I love book worms and being a book worm and all things worms and books) and then her little box of colorful blocks. And it looks like this time she also had it out for Pink Bear, who is being suffocated under the Bumbo seat.



I am so thankful that she is content to play on her own for awhile in the mornings. (I think it's God's special and very merciful gift to me.) In my head I call it her "independent play" times, and I sit on the couch and watch with some breakfast and check my email and try to recover from the traumatic experience that is getting up in the morning.



By the time she tires of playing on her own, I'm awake enough to deem the prospect of getting the day started not so bad after all, and we head to the window to watch the snow fall.

Because it's been snowing here. And snowing and snowing and snowing.

And snowing.

On second thought, I think I'm going back to bed.


"Because of the Lord's great love we are not consumed, for his compassions never fail. They are new every morning; great is your faithfulness." - Lamentations 3:22&23

Motherhood brain dump

I am giving myself full permission to ramble in this post. Mostly about weird, new mom stuff. There! You have been warned.

Those of you still with me, meet you at the end!

Now that I have a child. I clean our house much, much less than before.

This is new for me. I used to be OBSESSED with having our house spotless for guests. Which proved to be an impossible task with two cats, wooden floors, and lots of natural sunlight to shine on any dusty imperfection and cat hair. We have people over fairly often as we love hosting and have always prayed that our home would be a safe and open place where people can feel free to stop by at any time and be welcome. BUT when we WOULD have frequent and sometimes unexpected visitors I would flip the flippity flip out with embarrassment at the "mess" our house was in and very often was in a state of stress about our visitors noticing the dust on our coffee table.

For realz.

Motherhood seems to have relaxed that part of my brain. Now I try and keep up with the mess as much as I can and when the unexpected youth group student or friend shows up at our door, I am able to welcome them with a (usually) calm demeanor without feeling that I have to apologize for our imperfect home.

Most days.

It's been quite the humbling experience.

Also.

I pluck my eyebrows way less now. I just forget to do it, which can cause quite the shock when I happen to look closely at my face while brushing my teeth. BUT it seems to be working for the best as I was inspired by my sister to grow out my eyebrows as she recently grew out HER eyebrows to try and go for a more natural and full shape. Which means way less plucking and upkeep - hooray! BUT the process of growing out one's eyebrows can be horrifying in and of itself as the hairs start to grow straight out of your face instead of the same direction as the rest of the hairs that are already there, plus it all comes in in patches. Obviously it's upsetting. (Although when mentioning all this to the hubs he remarked that he hadn't even noticed anything different. I decided to be pleased by this lack of observation rather than be offended.) But after being strong and waiting it out for awhile my eyebrows are finally starting to take on a more natural shape and have I been talking about eyebrows for too long now?

Plus there's my hair. Maybe you didn't know this. Maybe you did. But preggo ladies have super nice, full hair that never falls out. Because, I don't remember why. Then after they have their baby their hair falls out in multitudes for months which causes showering to be a generally disgusting experience.

And then, all together, the lost hairs start growing back.

Hence, small tufts of inch long hairs surrounding my face.

I was going to show a picture of the tufts but then I decided instead that I absolutely would not show a picture of the tufts.



Maybe what all of this is boiling down to is the fact that real life is not perfect. But real is better than perfect, in my opinion.

Thanks for the permission to ramble, self. And thanks for hanging in there until the end, reader! Let's do this again.