Day in the Life - 19 Months

Since I last checked in Emmett enjoyed his first beach vacation to Galveston for my mom's birthday. He LOVED the beach and the resort pool, but mostly time with the family. We also survived a weekend just the two of us while Luke lived in up in Vegas for his best friend's bachelor party.

I got back the photos from our 18 month photo shoot done by my friend Megan - I love them!! They were a Mothers Day/Fathers Day gift to Luke's parents, so it was extra fun having grandma and grandpa there for the pictures!

We've been having a blast this summer inside and out, but it definitely wears this mama OUT. Three things I'm thankful for - booze, ice cream and air conditioning. For another perspective, my friend Rachel just did her own day in the life with HER 19 month old, Amity! That said, here's another day in the life with Emmett:

6:30 a.m. Emmett starts crying and saying "up" - he's ready to start the day! His wake up times have been waffling from 6:30-7:30 based on how much sleep he got the previous few days and if they were heavier on night time sleep or day time sleep (he averages anywhere from 12 - 13.5 hours per day, and usually 10.5-11.5 of those are are night. Naps are usually 1.5 - 3 hours in the day). I go in to greet him and he immediately dives down to read a book (his current favorite is Luke's Father's Day present from him - My Dad is the Best Playground), then changes his mind and heads towards the stairs to go down to the living room and play! I make coffee and start making breakfast while he and Luke play and read. He runs over to the kitchen to climb on his stool and "manage" my cooking process while munching on strawberries.

7:05 a.m. Breakfast is served! Toast with jam, eggs, fruit and coffee for the adults. Kix with yogurt, toast and eggs for Emmett (but he only eats the kix and yogurt) ;)

7:20 a.m. All done with breakfast, so time to clean up, play and get dressed!

7:50 a.m. Emmett is into pushing his stroller lately, so we head out on a walk. He makes it a good half block pushing the stroller, but it's slow going and he gets distracted a lot, so we finally get him in the stroller and set off. We run into a neighbor coming back from mountain biking at Walnut Creek - I'm always impressed by friends who don't have kids who voluntarily wake up early on the weekend!

8:55 a.m. Back from our walk! Luke and I take turns getting showered/ready while the other plays with Emmett. I hang out with him in the backyard by the sand table for a bit.

10:00 a.m. We head to our friends' joint first birthday party for both of their younger children. It's in the neighborhood, but since it'll be a million degrees and almost naptime when it's over, we opt to drive there. Emmett has a blast playing with friends and toys, and especially loves their sand box and slip n slide in the backyard! Luke and I love the homemade breakfast taco and both start innocently with one but then head back for seconds (and thirds for him!) so our mid morning snack turns into lunch. We all enjoy a strawberry sheet cake - especially Emmett!

Noon Back home and realizing we need to feed our kid. I offer up some leftover kung pao chicken from tacos that he loved yesterday (not interested today), edamame and watermelon. He eats one slice and a few handfuls of edamame and then declares he's "all done" - well ok. We play around the house and in the backyard some more and read some books.

12:50 p.m. Out at the sand table the wind shifts and I get a wiff of a dirty diaper. I take him inside to change him and then we head upstairs for a bottle and a nap. Our pediatrician has been giving us a hard time that E still drinks his milk from a bottle, so we're trying to wean him off of it. The process hasn't been going too well and will likely end up cold turkey, but I'm not quite ready. So instead we offer 6 ounces in a bottle and have more milk in a sippy cup in case he really wants more - he's instead been contenting himself with only 6 ounces, so we will see.

1:00 p.m.m Emmett drifts off at the end of his bottle so I drop him in the crib without reading today. I'm wiped from being in the heat for so long, so I go to lay down for a little nap. I set my alarm but must've turned it off because...

2:50 p.m. I hear Emmett cry and realize I slept almost 2 hours. OOPS! I have hardly ever slept a whole nap time and am feeling frustrated at myself for not having any productive time. Luke was busy doing a little work on my car so didn't realize I slept for so long. Oh well, I'm still catching up from a LATE night out a few days ago to see a sneak preview of Bad Moms (so hilarious and worth it).

3:00 p.m. We head downstairs and I ask Emmett if he's hungry. He says yes so I sit him down with an apple (I peel half of it off because otherwise he spits apple peel everywhere - SO attractive) and a new snack - some dried okra. I don't tend to love offering foods in this format, but he's not eating a lot of green veggies right now so I give them a try. He loves them and eats 8 along with maybe a third of the apple. Luke opens up a can of hibiscus saison from one of the breweries just 1 mile from our house - Adelberts, who recently just started canning beer- woohoo! Emmett plays for a while and I attempt to shake off my epic nap and Luke and I decide what to do with the afternoon.

4:10 p.m. We hop in the car and head 10 minutes away to Mt. Playmore - kind of like Leaps and Bounds for children of the 90's. I brought Emmett here a month ago but the toddler area was closed, so we just ran around the whole place. He loved the arcade area but wasn't into the tunnels. This was our first time on the weekend and it was PACKED. Luckily Luke loves stuff like this, so he and E tackled the tunnels and he actually enjoyed it. Then we hit the toddler zone and he become obsessive about pushing this cart on a little roller coaster track - it was his job for sure. He eventually toppled over and got near tantrum zone, so we called it and headed home. Luckily he calmed down in the car!

5:30 p.m. We get home and E and Luke start playing. I hop into dinner prep mode. I had intially started thawing some bacon wrapped scallops to grill, but since we had a ton of bacon at the birthday party, I switched gears and did salmon instead. I added some spices and threw the fillets on the grill and tossed a light arugula salad. Then I got into recipe development mode. I'm partnering with HapPea Fries (frozen chickpea fries) to develop some recipes and do a video series with them, so I tested two concepts for dinner. They were great! Need a little tweaking so I'll be working on that later this week.

6:05 p.m. Time to sit down for dinner. Emmett pounds almost a whole fillet of salmon (we recently started making him his own instead of sharing 2 between the 3 of us, but he and I both don't quite finish ours - his lunch tomorrow! He eats a few HapPea fries and a handful of edamame and is content. He's most excited about the extra honey I put on his tray to dunk his salmon and chickpea fries in.

6:25 p.m. All done with dinner, so we quickly clear the trays then start getting ready for a family bike ride! We don't go as often as we'd like since if either Emmett or Benji didn't get to expend enough energy, we opt for a walk. But since they both had good exercise today, we did a gentle neighborhood bike ride instead!

 (note he's playing around in the carrier before we leave, obviously we buckled him up!)

7:05 p.m. We are home and Emmett is SO happy from the bike ride, but he doesn't want to go inside!! We convince him, however, and Luke takes him upstairs for bath time while I power clean the kitchen. I join them for bottle and book reading. Then Emmett does his sign to brush his teeth (which he LOVES doing right now). Back in his room, in the crib, and time to read his goodnight book!

7:45 p.m. Lights out for E. I do a quick toy pickup in the living room, then Luke practices a presentation in front of me for an upcoming work trip.

8:30 p.m. We settle down on the couch to watch The Martian, which neither of us have seen yet. We make it half way through and are loving it, but it's getting late, so we pause for tomorrow.

10:00 p.m. Time to head up to bed - later than usual but due to my long nap I wasn't in a huge hurry.

10:45 p.m. After reading my current Hercule Poirot novel, I'm finally feeling sleepy so lights out!

Day in the Life - 18 Months

Emmett finally went out of the state - we took an epic road trip to Iowa to celebrate my Grandpa's 95th birthday. Luke and I swallowed crazy pills and decided we could tackle a road trip. And you know what? it wasn't too bad! We divided the 900+ miles into three days of driving and stayed with my aunt one night on the way up and back. The hotel we stayed at upgraded our room from a studio to a 2 bedroom (SWEET!) so we could all actually get some sleep and not have to camp out in the bathroom to watch a show on pillows on the ground (which we did in the hotel on the drive up - would not recommend). Anyway, E is chattering up a storm, climbing like crazy and snuggling like a sweet little monkey, and I love it.

But there's no rest for a toddler's mama, so here's another day in the life:

6:50 a.m. Emmett is awake! Luke grabs him and E ran around and snuggled with me in bed for a while - a new development. I love snuggles! They headed downstairs and I mouthbreathed for a few minutes before heading down.

7:15 a.m. I'm downstairs and the coffee is made. Emmett stands on his stool next to me to watch me make breakfast while he munches on some peanut butter Puffins and strawberries. We sit down to breakfast - PBJ oats for me with plenty of berries, and E has Cheerios, yogurt and more strawberries.

7:35 a.m. All done! Emmett and I head outside to play in the sand table and garden while Luke finishes getting ready for work. We wave "bye bye" to him and keep on playing. He waters the garden (he's obsessed) and I eye the magnificent cucumber that I plan on picking for dinner tonight - yum!

8:30 a.m. My friend Marisa comes over with her 4 month old twins Austin and Jonas. We head out on a hot stroller walk around the neighborhood and cover 2.8 miles. We cool off back home with some tangerine La Croix and visit for a bit. Emmett had fun showing off his toys to the babies!

10:10 a.m. Marisa heads back home and I offer E a peach for a snack. He has a few bites and then surprisingly is done (peaches are the favorite right now). While he snacks I use a vegetable peeler to make some zucchini ribbons. Next, Emmett wants to go on a toddler walk with Benji. We walk down the street and run into our neighbor Dan who is homebrewing. He's making a double batch and Luke is brewing a double batch tomorrow, then they switch! Double the beer, half the work. :D

11:00 a.m. After a power shower, Emmett and I drive to Gymboree. And bonus, our favorite teacher from the fall/winter is teaching today! E has a blast climbing the ramps, shaking maracas and jumping on me. He starts to look really tired, so we peace out right as class ends. Despite my best efforts, he falls asleep the last couple minutes of the car ride.

12:15 p.m. Back home! E doesn't want to get in the crib for his nap so I throw together lunch. I took some salmon (in the cast iron skillet sprinkled with salt and pepper, cumin, paprika and chile powder - sear flesh side down, then flip and put in the oven at 400 for 8 minutes. Drizzle with maple syrup). I toss the zucchini with olive oil, white wine vinegar, lemon and honey and some garden grown tomatoes and basil. Then crumbled on plenty of feta :) I warmed up a few steamed sweet potatoes and toasted a bit of garlic naan. E has leftover quinoa and broccoli along with naan and salmon. He pounds his lunch - clearly he was hungry - and then chugs some water. I ask him if he wants milk and he says yes (score!) so I make a bottle and we start naptime. He drinks half the bottle (not surprising after a big lunch) and we read a few books, then I say goodnight.

1:00 p.m. Emmett is down for his nap - hooray! I put away some clean clothes that have been sitting in the laundry basket in our room for a couple days now - oops. I come downstairs to clean up the kitchen and then work on this post. Luke comes home early from work - yay! We chat for a bit, then I work on customized photo birthday cards for my Grandpa (belated, my bad!) and my mom (she's got a big birthday coming up and we're celebrating at the beach next week!). I was hoping to prep dinner but...

2:15 p.m. E is already awake. Wah wah. Yesterday was only a 45 minute nap, so I guess I'll take it. This new long 11-12 hours at night but only 1ish hour during the day sleep schedule will take some adjustments on my part. Luckily since Luke is here I've got help! We're walking out the door to go visit with our OTHER neighbor who is brewing beer when my friend Meg texts me asking if she wants to meet up for a pedicure. Um, YES! Luke agrees to hang with Emmett so I can go, yay!

2:50 p.m. I meet Megan at the salon. We both pick a shade of red for our toes and have lots of fun catching up and getting our pedicures.

4:14 p.m. We say goodbye and I head to the pool where Luke and Emmett have been splashing around. E was having a BLAST getting thrown around by Dada, and he enjoyed an apple for a snack. By the time I got there they were out and starting to dry off, so I helped get E changed into clothes then we headed home.

4:45 p.m. I start making dinner. I realized that the dinner I planned was actually a crockpot one (doh!), so I switch gears and start on another one - Seared Tofu with Sweet Chili Sauce and Broccoli (I didn't have bok choi but I steamed some kale and spinach with the broccoli instead. Two thumbs up for this recipe!). I always skim recipes to make sure I plan ahead, so I'm annoyed with myself that I didn't do that this time. Luke calls his dad to catch up since he just got back from a long worktrip, and he takes Emmett outside to play at the sand table and garden so I can cook without having to hold a toddler ;)

5:35 p.m. We sit down to eat. Emmett pounds the mix of white rice and quinoa I made. I planned on cooking brown rice but didn't realize we were out - fail. He enjoys some broccoli and a bit of tofu, but this isn't a huge meal for him.

5:50 p.m. Dinner is done. We horse around the house playing with toys, running with Emmett's lion push toy and playing with trucks. I also sneak into the kitchen to get most of the cleaning done.

6:40 p.m. Time to go upstairs for bedtime. E has a pretty mellow tubby followed by a big bottle while Luke reads us some Harry Potter. Then we sit down to a handful of books (including this Pride and Prejudice one that he loves right now!), brush teeth, read his goodnight book and turn out the light.

7:25 p.m. E is down! Luke and I whip up some martinis (vodka for him, gin for me) and play a game. Luke and his friend play video games together via google chat (Mike is in Corpus) as a way to "hang out" even though they can't see each other. They just discovered this ridiculous game and Luke convinced me to play for a bit - it IS his birthday weekend so I wanted to be a good sport. It was a fun, but he was definitely better than me haha! Then we sit back to watch Game of Thrones (we're halfway through season six) and I download another Hercule Poirot ebook (love a good Agatha Christie novel!) for my nook from the Austin Public Library site.

9:20 p.m. I head upstairs to read some Poirot while Luke stays downstairs to kickstart a few things for brewing tomorrow morning.

10:00 p.m. Lights out!