Our Schedule & Chores (A day in my life)

I've been considering posting our schedule. Not that it's a very scheduled schedule right now. So I kept procrastinating, thinking maybe I should wait until after the baby is born to post it because when I have a newborn, after the adjustment phase, things become very scheduled around here as a matter of survival. At least they have with my previous 2. :) But then I thought, our un-schedule is working pretty good for us right now while I'm pregnant so maybe I might like to look back on it next time I'm pregnant and take a few ideas. Or maybe just for your personal enjoyment you might like to see what a day in our life looks like and raise some eyebrows or laugh at us or whatever. ;)

I don't sleep well normally, and less so while preggo, so I toss and turn most of the night but my official "day" usually starts at about...
6:30am- This preggo mama makes a bathroom trip as SNEAKILY as possible since the bathroom is right next to the kids' room. Then I collapse back into bed and doze in and out until...
7 to 8am- Anytime between 7 and 8, Chicklet sneaks out of the kids' room and whispers to me from the foot of my bed, "Mama! Can I go potty?!" To which I reply, "YES! Go potty, silly!" and wonder why she asks permission to use the toilet every single morning! Lol! Silly girl... Then she returns asking if she may color. Her coloring station is a mini table and chair in the corner right beside my side of the bed. I try to answer coherently as she peppers me with questions and statements in a whisper and colors and draws. Gradually I wake up. I'm not a morning person. I have never understood anyone who can open their eyes and then perkily bounce out of bed in a fully-aware state in under 5 minutes. My brain doesn't even begin to work properly until 10am and I have to plan my day accordingly or I'm fixing my pre-10am sleepy-head mistakes the rest of the day. :p I'm thankful for my kids because before kids I would just keep dozing for hours because I couldn't summon the oomph to move and there was nothing to keep me from falling back to sleep since I couldn't move yet. Now with kids, Chicklet just talks incessantly so falling back to sleep is impossible and I can get my limbs to work to get me out of bed after about 10 minutes of her chatter. ;)
8:00am- Bug wakes up and sings out from the crib, "Maaaaamaaaa!" or occasionally something to be funny like, "Marco!" or "Dada!" :-s Hmph! I sing back, "Buggie!" or something in kind with his silliness as I waddle down the hallway, use the bathroom, and make my way in to get him. I peek around the corner smiling and he falls down laughing hysterically with delight at the first sight of me. Chicklet meanwhile has put away her crayons and beat me to the kids' room. She usually jumps up excitedly at the first sound of her brother's voice and is putting away crayons at 90 miles per hour while I'm waddling down the hall to the bathroom. She sits on her bed with a bright smile as I get Bug up and changed and get everyone dressed.
8:10am- Two sleepy people stagger and one chipper Chicklet bounces out to the kitchen. ;) Bet you'll never guess which one of us is the morning person. I fix us some quick breakfast. I do not cook for breakfast. As I said I do not function before 10am and would probably burn my hand off or put the wrong ingredients in or burn something. So for breakfast we have cold leftovers, or something microwaiveable, or cereal.
9:00am- I turn on the computer and play some Facebook games- something mindless that doesn't require brain power like Farmville (you know, click click click on each plot of ground to harvest, click click click to plow, click click click to plant; no brain cells required) so that I can focus my gradually building brain power on my tots. Meanwhile behind me the tots have dumped out the toy box and are dragging toys all over the living room. There is an occasional squabble or misbehavior which I try to address immediately. By 9:30 I'm bored with the mindless Facebook games and my brain is starting to work properly and I'm having to get after Bug more because it's getting close to first nap and he's getting close to crab-mode. Sometime beftween breakfast and 10am we all wind up in the bathroom brushing our teeth.
10:00am- I offer the kids a snack of fruit or cheese or something. Bug isn't a big eater and doesn't usually want it unless it's a banana. I put him down for a nap. Chicklet finishes her snack. Mommy's got her brain functioning enough to feel human again so it's time to do chores! :) Since Chicklet has started doing them with me I have begun to look forward to morning chores.
Morning Chores:
-Empty kitchen trash?
-Unload Dishwasher
-Reload and run Dishwasher
-Start a load of Laundry
-Sweep kitchen
-Fold some laundry
So I put Bug down for his nap and then wash my hands and head to the dishwasher where my little shadow follows me. :) She puts away the clean silverware while I empty everything on the bottom rack that she cannot help with, and then move onto the top rack. When she's done the silverware she starts in on what's left on the bottom rack and I finish the top and then we reload it. I direct her for the reloading because she doesn't quite grasp that things go in certain places in the dishwasher to get them cleanest and make most efficient use of the space. When we're done she gets a kicks out of filling the soap. It goes everywhere but she's so cute... :) She can't snap the soap dispenser shut so I do that for her, then she closes the door and turns the dishwasher on. I usually wipe out the sink while she's finishing up if we've managed to completely empty it in our dishwasher loading. Then we move on to the laundry room. I turn on the water and add some detergent, then sort out a load of laundry. Chicklet puts the designated pile into the washer and we close the lid. Then I have her grab an armload of clean stuff from the dryer and I grab what's left and we take it to the basket in the living room. I know it would be easier to take the basket to the dryer first but I always forget. ;)
For a job well done we have a beverage break! This is our special thing we do after our together chores. We might have sweet iced tea or lemonade or coolaid or she might have a hot cocoa while Mommy enjoys some decaff. She chatters my ear off while we sip and I enjoy every minute of it. Then when she's done she puts her glass on the counter and gets out the play-doh while Mommy's has some ice water and hits the blog zone to read or write. Some days there's too much to read to get to writing anything in the mornings and it has to wait until later. If something takes a bit to load I fold the laundry in the basket beside me as I wait. I like to listen to a sermon online while I fold, read, and blog. Chicklet keeps up a running commentary on what she's creating out of the play-doh in the kitchen and I respond encouragingly. I also drink lots of water and snack on almonds or jerky to keep my blood sugars level. Multitasking is the name of the game! Haha...
When she's done playing with her play-doh I consider the degree of mess. She always puts away the dough and tools but there are usually play-doh crumbs all over the floor when she's done. Not to mention normal kitchen floor stuff. If the kitchen floor isn't very bad, Play-Doh and all, I let her sweep it herself and then give her a rag to wash the table while I linger at the computer a little longer. If it's in need of a serious sweeping I have her wash the table while Mommy sweeps the floor. The person who doesn't sweep holds the dustpan for the other and then dumps the crumbs in the trash. ;)
If the kitchen trash is full we empty that sometime in the course of things. Chicklet puts a clean bag in the kitchen trash can while I drag the full one out to the outside can. Sometimes if it's almost full but not quite, I give her a rag to wash the lid while I sneak around the house looking for other smaller trashes to empty into the space at the top of the kitchen one to make it full enough to take out.
Noon- Buggie wakes up! Sorta... lol. Sometimes it takes him a bit to wind down at 10am before he falls asleep and then he's grouch-a-rama when I get him up at noon. Or sometimes he falls asleep instantly and wakes up a bit before noon and by the time I get in there he's removed his pillow from it's case and sang his ABC's three times and begun to holler, "Maaaarco!" for me to hurry up and finish sweeping so I can rescue him from boredom in the crib. Lol! I take the kids' folded clean clothes in with me when I go to get him up. I make a light lunch. Usually it's PB&J or bagels or fried eggs. Sometimes soup. Depends how hot it is and what we feel like eating. Gotta have some protein in there somewhere for my blood sugars.
For the next couple hours we do all sorts of stuff and in no particular order and with no particular consistency. Kids play with toys, Mommy finishes listening to her sermon, work on catechism with Chicklet and/or a reading/writing lesson, roll around on the floor with kids, play learning games with Bug like having him point to the body part I name or asking him what color this or that toy is. By 1:30pm I'm dragging, exhausted. I probably look at the clock 20 or 30 times in that last half hour before nap.
2:00pm- Snack. Bug's 2nd nap. I forget as much as I remember or more but this is the time I like to take the meat out of the freezer for supper. Chicklet goes to coloring station while Mama takes a nap! Yahoooooooo!!!!! If Chicklet has been naughty with crayons during the previous day's nap, she must take a nap with me instead of coloring. If she was responsible with her crayons and only colored on approved surfaces, she may color while Mama naps. And I do use Naps loosely. Remember what I said about her talking incessantly? Lol! So sleeping doesn't usually come into it unless she winds up napping with me, but I do manage to doze off here and there between her chatter. ;)
4:00pm- Sometimes it's later if Bug-bug had a short morning nap or his noisy sister takes a nap with me and is therefore not waking the house with her incessant conversation, but usually 4pm is the magic wake up time. I get him up and then sit in the living room refereeing kids while struggling to fully wake up and function. I'm seriously a zombie when I first get up. By
5:00pm- I've usually got myself coherent again and switch the laundry over, start a new load, start cooking the supper meat. Bug gets grumpy near dinnertime and starts picking on his sister. It gets a little wild trying to keep them sweet while making dinner and this is the time of day the phone is ringing off the hook too of course. Sometimes it all goes out the window. Especially on sick days. If I'm gonna get sick on any given day, you can be sure that between 5 and 6pm is when the puking is worst. Might have something to do with the smell of cooking meat being one of my worst triggers? So there are days when hubby calls to say he's on his way home and I have to ask him to pick up dinner because I just can't do it tonight.
6:00pm or whenever hubby gets home- We eat dinner. Kids play with Daddy for a while or take baths if they need them after eating dinner.
7:00pm- Bug bedtime normally.
7:30pm- Bug bedtime if he slept late at nap or doesn't seem tired. Chicklet bedtime if she's grumpy.
8:00pm- Chicklet's bedtime if she's being sweet and had a nap that day.
After the kids are in bed, Hubby and I talk, cuddle, watch a movie, hang out, veg out. Eventually the food gets put away and we play some more brain-powered games on Facebook than my morning brainless ones. ;) I scrub the toilet and pick up a little in the bathroom. Laundry, more laundry. I do alot of laundry after the tots are in bed. Anything that didn't get done that morning or is leftover from earlier in the week. Sometimes I take a shower. Sometimes I listen to another sermon. Sometimes he watches TV. Sometimes I blog. Sometimes he listens to music. Sometimes on Facebook we think it's funny to chat with each other even though we're sitting right next to each other. Hehe...
"We" usually hit the hay around 10pm but sometimes it's later or sometimes I don't go to bed with him right away because I'm finishing something up or sometimes I toss and turn for an hour or three and then get back up. When I finally do get to bed and get my body to fall asleep, it doesn't like to stay that way for long. I'm up at least every 2 or 3 hours for at least 10 minutes each time. Sometimes I wake up and can't get back to sleep for hours. On a good night I only wake up 3 times. Then along comes 7am and my morning sunshine walks in asking permission to use the bathroom and starting my day off with a smile! :)

So that's a typical day in my life! In all of it's partially-scheduled and partially-random weirdness.