The Schmitt Family Happenings: 23 months

a friend did this on her blog and it reminded me that in 20 years I won’t remember what my days look like right now. so here it goes. this what my day looked like today. now this is mostly for my memory – but read if you want some entertainment.

6:15am alarm goes off. ugh! hit snooze 100 times. it was a late night – bill got home around 11 pm and the kids were up a bit (unusual).

6:45am get out of bed. make it (only b/c the house is on the market). bill has already left. head downstairs to feed lily and throw first load of laundry in.

6:55am pour my first (and best) cup of coffee and sit down to do quiet time and prayer. a few minutes in and I start hearing claire yelling “EHYEE!! EHYEE!!! EHYEE!!” so incase she was still asleep she is now awake too. once they are both awake I start to hear squealing and giggling.

7:25am go into the girls’ room, pick out their clothes, chat with them then change their dirty diapers and get each of them dressed. sometimes I put them both in one crib and they giggle and play and fight for a bit. but today, they just went out into the kitchen to get their juice.

7:35am put girls in their highchairs. give them a half of banana and some cheerios.

7:40am change laundry over to dryer and start a new load. get charlie up and get him dressed (takes a bit because he now has opinions about what he wears – cars shirts are ok for some days, but I prefer crewcuts). make c’s bed just incase we get a showing.

7:50am back upstairs – wonder if the girls actually ate their food or if they gave it to lily. continue making more breakfast for charlie and the girls.

8am get charlie to use the bathroom before school. then up in his chair to eat breakfast.

8-8:20am pack snacks and diapers for the girls at the RAC, make my green smoothie to drink, get workout clothes on, slam last 1/2 cup of coffee, clean up kitchen. get girls out of their chairs and let them play in the living room while I wrap things up with charlie.

8:30-8:40am get the girls’ jackets on and put each on in the car. get charlie buckled in and load the car with bags.

8:40am snowblow the driveway – the joys of living in minnesota

8:45am drop charlie off at preschool

9am arrive at the RAC. carry girls in and check the into childcare. then I am ALONE! I put my stuff in the locker rooms and head to meet friends on the stepmill.

9-11:15am – I workout (today I did stairs and then FIT a hard strength class that I love) and shower/get ready. pick the girls up and then get them in the car to go pick up charlie.

11:30am – pick up charlie. head home.

11:35am – unload charlie and our stuff from the car. bring the clean laundry upstairs to fold during lunch. put wet stuff in the dryer. feed lily while I am downstairs and get her out of her kennel. while I am down there I realize I should wash her bedding – so throw that in the washer.

11:40am – get ellie and claire out of the car. head upstairs.

11:45am the girls are whiny because they are hungry. so take out some noodles from last night and have them eat those while I finish making lunch.

12 – charlie starts feeling ill and won’t eat. girls scarf their food. I fold and put away the laundry.

12:15pm clean up kitchen from lunch. change claire & ellie’s diapers and clothes (they are filthy from lunch). let them run around until naptime.

12:45pm get the girls in their sleep sacks, rock them and read a Bible story. then tuck them each in and sing a song. night night!

1pm charlie has some bathroom issues so we deal with those. then we watch a quick donald duck youtube clip on my phone in his bed (while he is watching it I quickly clean the bathroom, vacuum the living area downstairs, put away a few of his clean clothes). then I climb into bed with him and finish the last minute of donald duck. then we read a Bible story, sing a song and say a prayer and he is supposed to nap or lay in bed. usually he is in bed from 1-1:30 until 4, but today is off because he is not feeling well.

1:20pm I go back upstairs to eat lunch and do some emails, blog, facebook, etc. becca texts me to say she is going to stop by after the RAC.

1:25pm charlie calls me and says he has to use the bathroom. uh oh. this GI thing is really not going away.

1:30pm becca and nolan come over and we have hot chocolate and marshmallow fluff. just what I needed!

1:45-3pm charlie calls me a few different times to help him. finally at 3pm I just set up the DVD player in his room for him to watch and then he can call me when he has to use the bathroom (because during naptime/quiet time he is not allowed to leave his bed and he sticks to it). I put lily’s kennel bed back together after being cleaned.

3pm becca leaves and I crawl into my bed to just lay and type this blog for a few minutes. I always need a little alone time before the afternoon craziness starts.

3:45pm I can hear the girls moving around, talking, squealing.

4pm get the girls up. diaper changes get them water or juice and enjoy some time with just the two of them because charlie was content playing in his room. I love how happy the girls are at this time. they are usually playing nicely with each other and very fun.

4:45pm charlie comes upstairs and I get everyone a little snack to hold out until dinner. it’s at this point I realize I don’t have a plan for dinner. so I throw in some broccoli to roast, top a piece of garlic naan bread with my pizza sauce and cheese and voila – dinner.

5:10pm snack is over and the girls are getting whiny and nasty to each other. so I ask claire if she wants to color – her response (as always) – YES!!!!. so both girls go back in the highchairs to color until dinner.

5:45pm dinner is served. charlie is still not feeling well so I offer him bland foods and he eats a bit of butter toast. the girls scarf “pizza”, broccoli, beans.

6:10pm dinner is wrapped up and the girls are ready to get out. I finish as much kitchen cleaning as I can before I get them down.

6:20pm I take them right from their chairs into the bathroom for baths. since claire is on a “I think the bathwater is scalding my feet” stage it is quick. while I am getting claire washed up, ellie is pouring water out of the tub and charlie decides he wants to jump in.

6:30pm claire and ellie are out of the tub and dressed. I run downstairs to get charlie’s clean clothes since I didn’t know he was going to hop in. get him out of the tub and dry enough so he can dress himself. the girls are fighting in the living room over the doodler (thank goodness they are each getting their own for their birthday next weekend – I almost, just almost, busted the doodlers out of my closet for how tired I was of the fighting tonight).

6:35pm charlie is out of the tub and the real challenge of the night starts. some nights the kids play easily together. tonight was not one of those nights. there were lots of fighting/arguing over who is playing with what. whenever someone starts playing quietly with one toy the other two notice and decide they want THAT toy. wow – it can get ugly. there were plenty of time out breaks. separation breaks (I just make it up as I go). you name it breaks.

6:55pm nana facetime calls in, which is a welcomed break, but only adds to the craziness. now everyone is wanting to "howwd” the iphone.

7:05pm I decide it is time for the girls to go to sleep. even though they don’t normally go down until 7:30. I am tired. it has been a long week with bill being on call and we haven’t really seen him at all since sunday. I am also fighting a head cold that I’m pretty sure just morphed into a sinus infection. nuff said. so to the bedroom, where I wrestle the girls into their sleep sacks. then pin them down on my lap in the rocking chair so they can watch other twins chatting on youtube (don’t ask – bill got them started on it). we watch a little video (the only time they lay perfectly still on my lap), I read a Bible story and then put them each into their beds. they were not happy tonight so there were lots of tears, but I still tucked them each in just how they like it. thankfully, ellie didn’t jump out of her crib like she did the other night when she got mad. that girl is something else.

7:20pm girls are in bed – definitely not asleep by the noise I am hearing. charlie and I clean up the living room toys. I pour myself a glass a wine – intent on enjoying this. I dig around the kitchen to eat a bit more to qualify as a dinner (hint of lime chips – yes!).

7:45pm charlie and I read a book on the couch and bill texts me that he might actually be coming home in 30 minutes and was hoping to catch charlie. I bring charlie down to brush his teeth and get him ready in bed for bill to put to sleep.

8:20pm bill comes home and finishes reading charlie a Bible story, praying, singing, etc.

8:44pm writing the last of this post.

9-10:30pm enjoying my own time. talking to bill even though he is trying to finish patient calms, paper stuff, etc. watching some TV then crashing for the night.

**the one thing I didn’t completely put in here was the sibling management and timeouts that I did today.