A day in my life - at home.

Hi! Today my blog looks different. I like how my blog has evolved, and I like that her new comb-over reflects that. For even more reflectabiltiation, here's a trip through 24 hours of my very own. 

Random thoughts in a random day.

I wake up at 5.15am after the cat makes a racket in the next room. This is not normal and I am not pleased. I listen to Bill Hicks on my iPod for the next 45 minutes before I decide to get up and blog because it was an important post and I wanted to do it uninterrupted. It's not like I'm going back to sleep! I get halfway through before everyone gets up.

Dad makes the kid hot cross buns for breakfast and delivers me some while I'm working. I finish my post.

I dress this crazy thing in her best paint-splattered clothes. We're ritzy here. She's singing and dancing on her change table. 

No wonder I'm having another :)

We play for a while.

While she's otherwise occupied, I make a new cup of tea and eat the rest of my now-cold hot cross buns. I have a look at my diary and to-do list. Baby starts getting shirty and I wonder if she's tired. It's nearing 9am and normally by this time she's ready for a morning nap. She's been off her usual habits this last week with teething, and naptime has been a struggle or non-existent. I don't like my chances, but I feed her and put her in the cot. 

Five minutes later I hear grizzling. Nap fail.

I come out to tidy the kitchen and clear away the breakfast things. Baby sits, looking at me with glazed eyes. Is exhausted. Obviously doesn't know how good sleep is. Is crazy.

Realise it's nearly 10am and I haven't dressed or brushed my teeth. Tend to these things. Make a mental note to clean the bathroom later on and to do some washing.

Child plays at my feet, saying "ta?" and trying to give me her bib. We go play with her books for a little while.

I'm starving so I make an english muffin with cheese and strawberry jam and attempt to see what's happening on twitter for five minutes.

Mock my cheese and jam at your own risk.

 She whinges at my feet the whole time. I inhale my food and play with her again. Teething sucks the big one. 

We play with some different toys and chat about what we can see outside. Well I chat, she sings and talks gibberish. Cutest thing ever. An hour later we try feeding + nap time again.

Fail. 

I'm pretty tired at this point so I lay on the floor of her room for fifteen minutes while she crawls around playing with things. Sometimes she will lay her head on my stomach and go to sleep, but not today. I'm tempted, though.

She hears a knock at the door and crawls off down the hallway to investigate.

It's a parcel for me!

We eat. She has weetbix, I have crunchy muesli bars with dark chocolate. We share grapes.

My mum calls while the baby is eating. I finish my conversation, sit on the couch and yawn for five minutes straight. Check emails on my phone for approximately 30 seconds before baby wails to be taken out of her high chair.

We tidy up and do some drawing. 

It is way cute.

She investigates a singing teapot while I see how many photos I can edit before she cracks again.

One.

I don't usually do any post-production on my photos, but that's only because I don't know how. I inherited a Mac with all the bells and whistles from a graphic designer and I've no idea how to use any of it. I really just try to get good light in photos to start with, but a lot of the time it's what we're having for dinner and the lighting is absolutely terrible. I attempt to fix this one by filtering it to cut down the shine. I fail. Kid is at my feet, getting her head stuck in between the chair and the armrest. I wonder how people with children legitimately work from home.

I put on Dr Phil as I do every day at noon to see what the show is about that day. If it's crap, I turn it off. The baby is usually asleep, so I would normally eat lunch and watch and potter around on my iPad. Today it is about mothers in jail for snapping and abusing their children. My day seems awesome in comparison and I cuddle the baby until she pushes my face away and crawls off.

I wonder if she's ready for sleep yet so we lay on my bed but she's way more interested in wriggling around and almost diving off the edge. I'm way more interested in having a nap myself and wonder how I'm going to make it through the rest of the day. First trimester is hard, yo!

Baby goes on the floor for her own safety and plays with some random things. I close my eyes for ten minutes, checking her periodically and daydream about sleeping and another cup of tea. I finally get up when she knocks everything off my bedside table.

We hang out in her room for a bit while I put her washing away but she looks really tired. I try to feed her again, this time holding her a different way than usual. She falls asleep feeding and I put her to bed. so very, very sweet.

Success.

By this time it is 1.30pm and my hunger is out of control. I'm glad this was all sitting and waiting for me. I've been eating a lot of antipasto-style meals as they aren't heavy and they don't make me sick. I can just sort of pick at what I like. I get through lunch and return some emails before I hear a cranky baby wake up from a way-too-short nap. What happened to the little girl who would feed and then drift off to sleep by herself for three hours?

Teething, you have robbed us of so much.

Afternoon tea time, and the little miss has Vegemite on crackers and watermelon. Most of the watermelon ends up on the floor. I realise we have no butter and cry because I just went to the supermarket yesterday and I don't ever want to go back for the rest of my life.

Ok, I don't cry, really.

She cracks before I even get a chance to sweep, so I put her in her walker and try to keep one step ahead of her so she doesn't roll through the dirt I've just swept and distribute it back over the clean floor. I mostly fail, but roll her away with one foot while I sweep bits into the dustpan. She follows me around, grizzling, so I take her out of the walker and we sit on the floor to sing songs.

Realise husband will be home any minute. I tidy my hair and put on some concealer and mascara so he doesn't come home to a wreck. Set feminism back 40 years.

Dad comes home and reads a story and sings some songs too. I sit on the floor and yawn for 10 minutes straight. He offers to take baby on the walk I was going to take her on so I can get some rest. I flop face down on the couch for a while before putting the kettle on and coming to blog for a bit (hello!).

I get halfway through my tea and ten minutes on the iPad and they're home. I drag myself off the couch and get outside for the first time in the day. It is to buy nappies.

Pass this guy. Briefly wish we could swap places.

Veggie Dad has to go back out for the evening, so baby goes into the high chair and I quickly start her dinner, put on some rice for tomorrow's dinner, and pack lunches for the next day.

 She is having Weet-Bix, Cheerios with blueberries and a cheese sandwich, among other things.

Baby looks at me through half-closed eyes, head in hand. I decide she's not going to last the 10 minutes until her dinner is ready so I give her something from a jar, skip the bath and go straight to feed her. You've got to get her right smack in that moment where she's tired enough to sleep, but not so tired she'll freak out.

I get approximately 40 seconds to put her veggie pasta and peas in a bowl and grate some cheese over to save for her dinner the next day before she screams.

I try the laying on the floor thing again for 15 minutes but she's not having it. The cat meows loudly outside the door so the baby gets excited and wants to play.

We admit defeat and go back to the kitchen. I save the rice from almost burning and put dinner on. Usually I would wait for Veggie Dad to get home before I eat, but I'm ravenous and I can't function like that. I put a pot of already-boiling water on to boil and wait interminably long for it to re-boil. Stomach growls. Notice after 10 minutes I've put it on the wrong setting and it would have boiled way faster had I not made that mistake. Sigh.

Throw packet ravioli into the water and tidy up the kitchen. Everything I throw into the bin immediately bounces back out and onto the floor. Sigh again. I drain the pasta and most of it slips out of the colander and into the sink. Triple sigh. I pick it up anyway and put it in the pot. I dump a jar of sauce over and stir it in. I don't even bother heating it.

I make the world's shittiest salad and dump everything on a plate I made in 1987. Like I said, we're ritzy here.

I sit on the couch and eat one piece of ravioli (ok, I know its agnolotti). I'm faced with this:

I lick all the sauce off a piece and give it to her to eat. I do this three more times until she accidentally bites her own finger and screams in pain. My dinner is abandoned while I swing her onto my lap for a cuddle and some songs. I eat one-handed after she calms down. I eventually give up on that too.

We try feeding and bed one more time. It works.

I eat the rest of my cold dinner, portion the leftovers, tidy the rest of the kitchen and put the dishwasher on.

Finally get to knit as I've been dying to all day while watching Roseanne. Get through about 10 minutes and realise I'm falling asleep. It is 8.50pm.

Acknowledge I've done pretty much nothing I set out to do - no bathroom cleaning, no laundry, the washing is still on the line (and it rains overnight and I wake at 4am in a panic), no blogging, no work, no blog cooking, no nothing. Write a mental to-do list for the next day. Promptly forget half of what I wanted to put on it.

Veggie Dad arrives home and comes in for a hug. I yawn in his face for five minutes and go to bed.

The end.

Having a second kid on top of this? Lucky they're so damn cute! How y'all do, like, 5 kids is beyond me.

It was a tough day, but I'm grateful I get to spend so much time at home alongside my family. Just existing together.

And these tough days are rare. I am so very, very fortunate. 

And so very, very tired.

xx