Hi friends! I thought it would be fun to mix it up and do a day in the life post today. It will be nice to have this post to look back on later so I remember what a day was like when Riese was 8 months old! So, here’s what Riese and I were up to all day yesterday. As you guys know, I’m home with her on Wednesdays and Fridays, and they are my favorite days of the week. 🙂 This is a pretty typical day for us, except that one of the social outings is often replaced by a long walk with Riese and the dog instead. We had quite the social day yesterday – we both enjoyed it!
Okay, here we go!
4:10 a.m. – Riese is crying – I go in and give her her pacifier and hope she falls back asleep.
4:45 a.m. – Nope! She’s back up, so Matt goes and gets her and brings her in for me to nurse her.
5:15 a.m. – Put Riese back in her crib. She falls back asleep for a bit, and I go back to bed too.
6:30 a.m. – Riese is awake (not crying, just chatting to herself/making noise) so I bring her into bed with us to cuddle/play. She’s super wiggly now so she doesn’t want to just be cuddled, but it’s fun to have her crawling all over us. 🙂
7:00 a.m. – Matt and I get up, get dressed, and head out the door for a family walk with Riese in the stroller and the dog in tow as well. I forget to get a photo but it’s a nice morning for it! Humid but cooler. I bring a piece of toast with peanut butter on it with me to snack on while we walk. Needed a little something!
7:45 a.m. – Back home! Matt gets ready and heads off to work, and Riese and I have breakfast. This photo is from last week but it’s what she looked like yesterday – why bother with clothes when you are just going to smash food all over them, right?! 😉 I put on her bib after taking the photo.
Riese has whole milk cottage cheese mixed with some almond butter (she feeds herself with her bendy spoon – yes, it’s messy), plus some blueberries (I smushed them in half and put them on her tray to let her feed them to herself).
I was in the mood for something savory so I randomly have a chicken sausage (heated quickly in the microwave) on toast with dijon mustard and sauerkraut. Yummy! Plus an unpictured latte. 🙂
8:30 a.m. – Get Riese wiped down/cleaned up and re-dressed. (I have started keeping water wipes on our breakfast table to clean up her hands, face, etc. after she eats – very handy!) Once she’s clean, we play upstairs for a bit in the nursery. Riese is really into soft blocks right now – she likes when I stack them and she knocks them down. We also roll it back and forth between us to “play catch.” 🙂
9:15 a.m. – Riese is getting pretty fussy – time for a nap! I put her in a wearable blanket and get her down for a nap in her crib.
9:30 a.m. – Riese is a really short daytime napper, so I rush downstairs and get as much done as I can while she’s out. I clean up the disaster from breakfast (baby led weaning is SO messy), put away some dishes from the night before, tidy up around the house, and prep/stock the stroller for an adventure we’re going to have shortly.
10 a.m. – Riese is awake! I nurse her, change her, etc., and then we head out the door to walk over to a playdate at a local park.
10:30 a.m. – Park play date with some new mom friends! I meet up with two women who responded to the message I posted in a local mom’s listserv last week. They are both really cool and friendly and have babies around the same age – awesome! This is a photo from over the weekend because I didn’t want to have my phone out while we were playing, but we had the babies in the swings for a bit, and then hung out on a blanket and let the babies interact/steal each other’s toys. 😉 I also eat a Perfect Bar while we’re there for a snack.
12 p.m. – Riese is starting to get a little fussy so we say goodbye to the others and walk back to the house. Time for lunch!
12:15 p.m. – I put Riese in the high chair and then throw together a quick tuna salad sandwich for myself. I mixed the tuna with garlic hummus – easy and yummy! Plus some spinach for a little green. I let Riese feed herself some of the tuna salad on her spoon, but she’s not super into it. We will try again another day. 😉
12:45 p.m. – Nap time! Get Riese down in her crib and then switch into high gear. Clean up lunch stuff, prep the diaper bag for an outing we’re going to have after Riese wakes up, and take a super fast shower.
1:15 p.m. – Riese is up! Nurse her, change her, etc.
1:45 p.m. – Out the door to drive to our next playdate. We’re very social today! I snack on some trail mix while we drive because I’m still a bit hungry. I totally see now why moms I work with through my AnneTheRD private practice have a hard time staying on top of hunger levels/making time to feed themselves… the days are so busy, and I know I have it easy with just one little one to keep up with! I’ve found keeping “just in case” snacks (trail mix, shelf stable bars, etc.) in my diaper bag, in the stroller, in the car, etc. makes a big difference so I always have something on hand when I need it.
2:15 p.m. – Meet up with a couple PACE group mom friends that I reconnected with recently – we go to a little baby play gym class. One of the women goes there with her daughter and the other two of us are doing a free trial run to see if we want to sign up. I didn’t want to be on my phone so I didn’t get photos, but it was really fun – we did some fun songs with the babes and also had them doing little rolls and other developmental stuff. Riese loved it! As they get bigger it’s some gymnastics type stuff which I bet she will love. I think we are going to sign up for the fall session – they are opening a closer location that will be convenient!
3:30 p.m. – Get back in the car and give my mom a call to see if she’d like some visitors – I figure it would be fun to stop by since we are already out and about! She doesn’t answer but we head her way anyway and hear from her right before we arrive that she’s around/available and would love to see us – perfect! Riese takes a little snooze in the car and wakes up when we arrive/the car stops.
4 p.m. – Arrive at my parents place and snack on a few of my Oatmeal Banana Coconut Cookies that my mom made for me (thanks, mom!) while we play with Riese.
4:15 p.m. – Riese is getting a bit fussy and I think she’s hungry, so I nurse her and then we sit her down in the high chair (my parents have one at their place, too – convenient!) for a snack. She worked up an appetite with all the activity and playing! We share a peach – we cut it into little thin french fry size strips for her without the skin and she feeds it to herself – and I also feed her one of these little peanut butter banana coconut packets. Those things are so handy for on the go snacking (I keep a bunch in the diaper bag just in case), and I like that they have protein and fat vs. just fruit. She can’t quite feed it to herself so I just feed it to her. She loves them.
5 p.m. – More play time! She’s quite wiggly and cheerful and showing off to grandma how good she’s getting at standing while balancing on mommy.
5:45 p.m. – Time to head home! Once back, we play in the nursery for a bit and then she starts to get fussy and is rubbing her eyes – time to start the bedtime routine. I nurse her first and then give her her bottle (I never have enough milk for her at this time of day, and she always wants a lot before bed, so we do an evening top off bottle). When she’s done eating, I get her cleaned up and changed into her jammies.
6:30 p.m. – Bedtime! Usually Matt gets home right around 6:30 in time to say goodnight, and sometimes Riese is up later until 7 or so, but she’s super tired and melting down so unfortunately Matt will have to miss her this time – he’s running a bit late. She conks out pretty much immediately – our big day wore her out!
6:35 p.m. – Quickly check in on emails on my phone to make sure nothing came up during the day that requires immediate attention, then send reminder emails to my Thursday AnneTheRD clients.
6:50 p.m. – Start making dinner. We’re having a variation on my Sesame Ginger Turkey Lettuce Wraps (recipe is in my Healthy Lettuce Wraps post).
7 p.m. – Matt gets home! We hang out for a bit and then he offers to take over the rest of the cooking while I relax. What a guy!
7:20 p.m. – Dinnertime! We have the lettuce wraps plus a side of quinoa salad (quinoa + leftover onions, carrots, and herbs that were from the lettuce wraps). I end up mixing the quinoa into the wraps and eating with a fork as one big mess. Yum.
7:45 p.m. – Wash the dishes, hang out.
8:15 p.m. – Matt needs to do a quick work call check in so he heads out to take Freyja for a walk while he does that, and I settle on the couch with a cookie. 🙂 I’m obsessed with these Molasses Spice cookies from local company Whisked. They are HUGE so half is perfect, which is good because that’s all we have left!
Towards the end of the show I’m watching (Riverdale – so entertaining) I grab my pumping stuff and pump to get some milk for the next day’s evening top off bottle.
9:15 p.m. – Get ready for bed! I go to bed so early nowadays and I don’t hate it. 🙂 Gotta take advantage of the opportunity to get in some extra zzzz’s since I know I’ll be up early with the little one!
9:30 p.m. – Lights out!
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