A Day in the Life | May 2019

So much laundry:

I am going to try and do “day in the life” post every couple of months because I always find it so fascinating how so many things change and how some things are exactly the same(like folding and putting away ALL the laundry!) I last did a “Day in the Life” post back in March and you can see that blog post HERE.

I have always been so interested in seeing “regular life” much more than special events or photoshoots when I follow along with a blog. There is something so fascinating about seeing the day to day minutiae and how people complete their daily work, life, and family tasks.

So if you like that too, you are in luck! The following is a look at a regular weekday at our house….like most everything else on here it really is about what I am up to but a lot of that involves the kids too.

Early Riser:

I have always been an early riser. When I was a kid I would wake up early and watch Flipper…does anyone else remember that show? It was the best!

I have never needed an alarm to wake up because my internal alarm is pretty strong! I usually wake up around 5am so that I have an hour before everyone else is up too. I use this time to savor my multiple mugs of coffee, catch up on work and emails and also create some the content for my bookstagram and this blog.

I am a very routine oriented person so this really doesn’t vary much…I usually run the Roomba in the evenings and I put the chairs up on the counters so that it can clean up all the crumbs that are never ending around here with the kids.

We set the coffee maker alarm fo to make 10 cups of coffee and Lucas and I split it in the mornings. I drink my coffee unsweetened but I always use half & half…milk just doesn’t cut it for me.

Buzz comes down to go outside at this time and then comes back in and goes back to sleep with Parker. He is not an early bird!

Morning Routines:

I also use this time to catch up with my other early riser friends…Kristy is one of them! Lucas leaves before 6 so this is also the time we check in quickly before we both start our days.

At 6 I go upstairs to shower and I find Parker reading in his bed. We recently made a deal (which included pokemon cards bribery)that they need to stay in their rooms until 6:30am. We were having way too much early morning sibling drama and me trying to referee from the shower and so this is a win for all of us!

While I get ready I listen to my audiobook and then have my breakfast of a perfect bar, green tea and my Care Of Vitamins. Both boys come down at 6:30am and they have their breakfasts and get ready for the day.

Buzz and those dang squirrels:

Buzz comes downstairs and places himself on his couch perch which is the perfect place to oversee the morning chaos. He is also a very routined guy.

While I pack the kids snacks (they have lunch from school) the squirrels have their morning meal at the bird feeders…they are quite the acrobats.

Also, does anyone else recognize this blue ice pack? It came with my Medela breast pump that I got when Parker was a newborn, and it is probably one of my most used baby items ever, ha! We leave for school around 7:20 if everything is running smoothly and this particular morning was super sunny and beautiful! We have had a very un-spring-like May this year so any sunshine is much appreciated around here.

School drop off, Pure Barre & more:

After school drop off I head to Pure Barre. Although my schedule ebbs and flows depending on the time of year, I try to go to barre 4-5 times a week…for both my physical AND mental health. It is one hour that sets the rest of my day off to the best start.

I started going to Pure Barre in 2015 and I haven’t looked back since! I probably talk about it too much but it really was life-changing. I had a bad back and head injury in high school and my almost life long back pain is almost non-existent since I upped my core strength through barre…and let’s be honest, 50% of why I go is to see my barre friends! They are THE best.

After barre, I get an iced latte. It is a bad addiction that also brings me so much happiness…it really is the little things. Between coffee and tea, I drink a fair amount of caffeine that my body is so used to it now…which I am not sure is a good thing or not!

After this, I head to Kristy’s. I am not working with her on this particular day but I had to pick up some books and I always love to see her! I also consider her house my South Burlington home, and I even have my own drawer in her bathroom. I get panicky about not washing my face right after I work out so I appreciate this very much! She is a very accommodating friend and co-worker. 😉

Books reviews & newspaper column:

I chat with Kristy a bit and admire her beautiful gardens and blooming trees…we have lived at our house for 4 years and we still haven’t done any landscaping so potted plants are the extent of my gardening. When I get home Buzz wakes up from his morning snooze to greet me. I get to work on finished a book review and then start working on my Charlotte News column. Next week I will be sharing my summer reading recommendations.

Multi-tasking & distractions:

While I appreciate having the flexibility to do some of both my photography and blog work at home, I have a very hard time not getting distracted. I am a terrible multitasker and so I appreciate that I do most of my work at our office at Kristy’s because I don’t get sidetracked by other things like I do at home! While I am working I have a bowl of Chex with a little maple syrup and milk for lunch and then I take Buzz for a midday bike ride/walk to check the mail.

Dog play date, wedding editing and visiting the library:

When we arrived home we were happy to see that our neighbor Mason Jar brought himself over for a dog playdate…the benefits of small town country life! I did a little wedding editing work for my amazingly talented friend Jenna and then it was time to go get the kids from school. My work is often pretty chopped up and means I do a lot of it during more “untraditional” work hours but I do appreciate the flexibility it gives me with the kid’s schedule.

After school, the kids played on the playground for a bit while I caught up with my friend Elisa. After we headed to the library so I could check with Susanna the librarian about our upcoming Libby on the Porch event next week!

Flynn was also excited to model our library bag which we use every week with our library book hauls. We were getting ready to go home and get ready for baseball when we got the email that Parker’s baseball practice was canceled due to the impending weather. While we usually play in all kinds of undesirable weather here in Vermont, it was about to really pour so we were all a bit relieved.

Rainy evening means canceled plans & ice cream:

The kids were excited to have some unexpected evening downtime and I had to switch around our dinner plans because we were planning on eating at the snack shack during Parker’s baseball…you can’t go wrong with a $3 cheeseburger! 😉 Lucas made dinner which was a mix of some random things (thanks Costco!) and then we decided to stop by Cookie Love which now has their summer evening hours. I had a coffee creemee with cookie crumble and it was amazing!

Laundry & Pokemon cards:

And it wouldn’t be a “day in the life” post without talking about laundry. We do at least one load of laundry a day which means the folding and putting away of clothing adds up quickly if we don’t do a little each night. We usually go upstairs around 7:15 and the boys shower and get ready for bed before having a little wind-down time, either reading, drawing or playing a game…recently it has been Pokemon of course.

So we took advantage of this and did a bunch of laundry folding and then both ended up reading on our Kindles. While the boys turn their lights off around 8(on an ideal night), Parker reads with his book light until 8:45ish and Flynn usually takes a while to fall asleep and likes having lots of extra kisses and check-ins before it happens. They also have been staying up a lot later because of baseball games so our bedtime routine is a little off and probably won’t improve much until fall when things slow down a bit again. I can’t believe that in a few years they will be staying up way later than us, but it really isn’t that far away!

---

So that was a day in my life! I hope you enjoyed this little snippet of randomness. Do you like reading “day in a life” posts? I would love to hear! <3