I have been wanting to document my day for quite some time now, but wasn’t sure how to do it… I’ve decided to break it up into one hour increments to make it easier for myself to remember to take photos. Also, I want to try to do this once a month so I can look back on what I was doing a month ago, 3 months ago, a year ago, etc.
If you read my blog post from a few weeks ago, you know that this is my last week of work in Corporate-ville, I have been at this job for almost 11 years! I made the announcement (click HERE if you missed it) that my job has been eliminated at my work and Brian and I decided to make me a SAHM. So, I really wanted to do a post about my regular day as a working Mom and I can go back and look at this and reflect on it after I have been a SAHM for awhile. 🙂 I know my whole little world is going to change so much next week!
So are you ready?
6:00 a.m.
Today is Tuesday, February 18th and I woke up at 5:50 a.m. I usually set an alarm clock on my iPhone and keep it on my nightstand. When I wake up, I usually quickly check my email and social media outlets (Facebook, Instagram, etc.). I see several messages from Nathan’s cubscout leader and leave them in my Inbox to deal with later. 🙂 I also take a shower, get myself ready, pack my lunch, sometimes pack Nathan’s lunch, sometimes check Nathan’s homework and load up the car during this hour. The kids are still asleep, so I get a lot done. 🙂 I also always drink a Premier Protein shake for breakfast, this is the best tasting shake I have found in chocolate.
7:00 a.m.
Once the kids are up, Nathan gets himself dressed while I wake up Autumn and help her get dressed. They are given their asthma meds, teeth are brushed, hair is brushed (Autumn’s takes forever as I have to brush out her tangles and style it) and then breakfast is eaten. We don’t really go overboard for breakfast, it is usually cereal. Once I become a sahm, I am hoping to do a hot breakfast once a week. Then, in the car we go… today the kids went over to Grandma’s house, because they didn’t have school.
8:00 a.m.
I usually start work around 8:00 a.m. and the first thing I do is pop open my email to see how many are in my Inbox. Since it is my last week, I didn’t have a lot of new emails… whew… but, normally I have anywhere from 15-35 emails that I need to go through during my first couple of hours of work. After I check my email, I go down to the cafeteria with my coworker Jill and I fill up on some ice water… she usually gets tater tots or a pancake. 🙂 Then, I return to my desk and chitchat a bit with my cube neighbor, James and I start attacking the emails in my Inbox. My work recently transitioned from Lotus Notes to Google Mail and so we are all still getting used to the new email platform.
9:00 a.m.
Wow. Another photo of my monitor… I know, my work day isn’t very interesting… I pretty much stare at a screen in my cube all day. I am in Marketing and I work in Eloqua a lot, developing and editing email campaigns that go out to our customers.
10:00 a.m.
I‘ll save you from another photo of my computer screen… but, this one is of my iPhone screen. 🙂 One of the best parts of my day is sending and receiving texts from Brian and also getting little updates and photos of the kids from my Mom. Soon I will be with my kids during their hours at home and I won’t be staring at a computer screen for hours of my day! Won’t it be fun to do ‘A Photo An Hour’ again next month when I can share something other then my computer screen? Can you tell I am an excited future sahm? 🙂
11:00 a.m.
Usually I eat at my desk for lunch or I go down and eat in the cafeteria with some of my coworkers. Today was an extra special day… I went out with 6 of my coworkers to celebrate my last week at my job. We went to my favorite restaurant close to work, it is called 1111 Mississippi, hence the address! I ordered the lunch trio, which was a salad, pizza and soup. It was delicious! I am hoping to still have lunch with a few of my coworkers every now and then… Soon I’ll be eating lunch with Autumn! I am really excited about that 🙂
12:00 p.m.
After lunch, I was craving something sweet. I found ONE Keebler Elf fudge cookie in my desk drawer and paired it with a nice mug of hot tea. I got some free tea samples from my latest D’Adore Vox Box from Influenster (more on that later)… and this is the richest tea I have ever had compared to my usual Lipton black tea. I received two flavors, the Creme Caramel and also a Lemon Chiffon. Both flavors taste and smell heavenly! I will definitely be looking for Red Rose tea at the store when I run out of these samples. Also, my Dean & Deluca mug sort of tells how long I have worked here… I’ve been here almost 11 years and I first went to Dean & Deluca when Felicity was on! Remember that TV show? Well, she would always get coffee and I think she even worked at Dean & Deluca on the show… so, when a Dean & Deluca opened up in Kansas City, I had to check it out! I bought this mug, too… is Dean & Delcua still around? I need to Google that.
1:00 p.m.
Wow… I never realized just how much of my day at work is spent in front of the screen. I am really struggling to find something to take a picture of every hour. So, near the end of the 1:00 p.m. hour, Jill and I went down to the cafeteria to get some ice water. Thank goodness for little chat windows at work and thank goodness for a little break to the cafeteria!
2:00 p.m.
The temperature in my office is weird… sometimes it is really comfortable in here, sometimes it is FREEZING and at other times it is HOT. All of a sudden around 2pm it started to get really hot… and, of course this is the day I wore a sweater and scarf… I am looking forward to having control over my own thermostat at home! You’ll notice my cube is starting to look really empty as I have been packing up a little bit each day so that I don’t have to take everything home at once.
3:00 p.m.
I have been trying to pack up a little each day before I leave… after being at this job for almost 11 years, I have a lot of junk that I’ve brought to work and kept there. As you’ll see in the bag I packed up today, it is a lot of random stuff… sewing kits (yes, there are two), a lint remover, mints, a Luna bar in a flavor I don’t care for… etc. The kids really enjoy seeing the little bag of treasures (to them) that I bring home every day and they always fight over who gets what. They are so silly. 🙂
4:00 p.m.
At 4:30 p.m. I leave work and head to my Mom’s house to get the kids. I arrive there a little before 5:00 p.m. Normally she feeds them dinner, because they get hungry before I can pick them up and take them home. Today I saw a box of Papa John’s pizza on the table… Brian and I are really excited about having the chance to sit down at the table as a family every night after I become a sahm. I am excited to start menu planning, prepping dinner and preparing it while Nathan works on his homework. It will be wonderful to introduce the kids to more foods and I am hoping for us to all eat healthier, too. It is really hard when both of us work later and we aren’t home in time to feed the kids before they are starving. I also want to work on creating an after school snack bin, with healthy snacks of course. I have a lot of ideas in my head, I can’t wait to execute them.
At 4:30 p.m. I leave work and head to my Mom’s house to get the kids. I arrive there a little before 5:00 p.m. Normally she feeds them dinner, because they get hungry before I can pick them up and take them home. Today I saw a box of Papa John’s pizza on the table… Brian and I are really excited about having the chance to sit down at the table as a family every night after I become a sahm. I am excited to start menu planning, prepping dinner and preparing it while Nathan works on his homework. It will be wonderful to introduce the kids to more foods and I am hoping for us to all eat healthier, too. It is really hard when both of us work later and we aren’t home in time to feed the kids before they are starving. I also want to work on creating an after school snack bin, with healthy snacks of course. I have a lot of ideas in my head, I can’t wait to execute them.
5:00 p.m.
It usually takes awhile to get everything loaded back into the car from my Moms house, to get the kids bundled up in their coats, their school belongings, other items they brought over to Grandmas, get them into the car, etc. This takes at least 15-20 minutes… Then once we are all piled into the car, we head home and then once we get home we get the car unloaded… I go through all of their school papers (which is always a lot!), they unwind, I start setting out their clothes for the next day, start laundry, etc. It is always a really hectic hour… if they haven’t eaten at my Moms, I get dinner started… Brian and I will usually eat now or after they are in bed. I know, crazy… I am really looking forward to having time to prepare us all a nice dinner, starting next week!
It usually takes awhile to get everything loaded back into the car from my Moms house, to get the kids bundled up in their coats, their school belongings, other items they brought over to Grandmas, get them into the car, etc. This takes at least 15-20 minutes… Then once we are all piled into the car, we head home and then once we get home we get the car unloaded… I go through all of their school papers (which is always a lot!), they unwind, I start setting out their clothes for the next day, start laundry, etc. It is always a really hectic hour… if they haven’t eaten at my Moms, I get dinner started… Brian and I will usually eat now or after they are in bed. I know, crazy… I am really looking forward to having time to prepare us all a nice dinner, starting next week!
6:00 p.m.
Usually from 6:00-7:00 p.m. we have a little play time with the kids, which is nice. Tonight we were all sitting on the couch and the kids had Hammie the hamster out of his cage. They just ADORE him and I must admit we really did luck out… he is such a sweet hamster. Sometimes we will start baths/showers they get them every other day) or go over Nathan’s memory and spelling words at this time. Since the kids didn’t have school today, it was a really laid back night… I love those nights. This was also a rare Tuesday night that Nathan did not have scout, as they meet 3 Tuesdays of the month.
Usually from 6:00-7:00 p.m. we have a little play time with the kids, which is nice. Tonight we were all sitting on the couch and the kids had Hammie the hamster out of his cage. They just ADORE him and I must admit we really did luck out… he is such a sweet hamster. Sometimes we will start baths/showers they get them every other day) or go over Nathan’s memory and spelling words at this time. Since the kids didn’t have school today, it was a really laid back night… I love those nights. This was also a rare Tuesday night that Nathan did not have scout, as they meet 3 Tuesdays of the month.
7:00 p.m.
Starting at 7:30pm, we start getting the kids ready for bed. They get their asthma meds, a last minute snack, their teeth brushed, stories read to them and songs sung to them. Bed time is starting to take a little bit longer then I’d like… but, it is nice to snuggle buggle with them in their beds. They are usually asleep between 7:40-8:30 p.m., it just depends what is going on that evening. Here is a photo of Autumn sleeping, I tried to get a photo of Nathan sleeping, too… but, it was too dark… and, I was too lazy to get back up to take another one! Sorry!
8:00 p.m.
After the kids are asleep, I usually sit on the couch with Brian and hang out, blog, watch TV or I will run. Since I am training for a half marathon right now, I need to stick to my training plan. Today called for a 5 mile run, so that is what I did on the dread mill. I have gotten used to reading while I run and this is the place where I do almost all of my reading. I get a heck of a lot of reading done on the treadmill… right now I am ‘still’ reading Stephen King’s 11/22/63. It is a long book, so it is taking me a little longer to get through it. It is really good!
After the kids are asleep, I usually sit on the couch with Brian and hang out, blog, watch TV or I will run. Since I am training for a half marathon right now, I need to stick to my training plan. Today called for a 5 mile run, so that is what I did on the dread mill. I have gotten used to reading while I run and this is the place where I do almost all of my reading. I get a heck of a lot of reading done on the treadmill… right now I am ‘still’ reading Stephen King’s 11/22/63. It is a long book, so it is taking me a little longer to get through it. It is really good!
9:00 p.m.
I am usually pretty tired by 9:00 p.m. I am almost always on the couch by this point and my little friend, Bratchey is always next to me. This kitty follows me everywhere, I am her Momma… She must sit by me on the couch, wait for me outside a closed door… I really feel like I have 3 kids, not 2! haha! Brian’s cat is sort of the same way, but with him. Oh, what would we do without our furry friends?
10:00 p.m.
I usually go to bed around 10-10:30 p.m. I always set my alarm clock on my phone before bed. Tonight I need to look up driving directions since I have a field trip I am taking Autumn to tomorrow for school.
Wow, this post was A LOT of work! I would really like to try to keep up with this once a month. I think I realized a lot while I was doing this… (1) I really stare at a screen all day at work and that is sort of depressing (2) I don’t spend enough time with my kids (so glad that will change soon!) and (3) Wow, I really suck at the whole dinner department and our evenings are pretty chaotic. That will change soon, too!
Wow, this post was A LOT of work! I would really like to try to keep up with this once a month. I think I realized a lot while I was doing this… (1) I really stare at a screen all day at work and that is sort of depressing (2) I don’t spend enough time with my kids (so glad that will change soon!) and (3) Wow, I really suck at the whole dinner department and our evenings are pretty chaotic. That will change soon, too!
There is A Photo An Hour link up, I am just not sure when they are doing the next one… so, I will link this up when that happens. 🙂
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