6:00 am: Workout. Run outside or yoga/stretching upstairs. The big kids wake up somewhere in here.

6:45 am: Mike leaves for work and I do all the things (kids fed and dressed; nurse the baby again at some point; shower and get myself dressed; feed myself). I typically eat egg and avocado sandwich. Kids eat cereal and drink milk usually.

8:00 am: Start homeschool! The first day school was cancelled I set up a routine to do “school” at home. I am not really concerned about my two big kids falling behind (they are both still in preschool); rather, I was more concerned about creating a structured routine for them to kick off our day. It only takes us roughly an hour or so, but it is a good anchor for our day. Since my kids are so little, it does require me to work with them to keep them engaged.

Here is what school looks like for us.

• Bible study + read stories
• Show and tell (Maggie like to bring something each day)
• Video stories (We are doing the scholastic program, which also has word match and true and false activities on the computer.)
• Activity (This is usually relating to the video story. It is mostly pretending to be what we learned about in the video stories: ie – if we learned about rabbits we pretend to hop around. At the very least, I make them jump up and down three times to get some sort of movement in.)
• Writing and coloring
• GoNoodle
• Sensory play (Mostly play dough or shaving cream, silly putty, popping bubble wrap. We will often cut with scissors during this time too.)
• Puzzle (Maggie will often do the sensory play longer and Matthew will move on to puzzles.)
• Snack time (Fruit, pretzels, crackers, cheese, or something similar for kids. Oatmeal with fruit, a scoop of peanut butter and honey for me.)

9:30 am: Nurse baby, scroll my phone. Kids play independently.

10:00 am: Work. I usually triage my emails to see what needs to be done for the day and respond to any immediate needs. Kids play independently. Usually I push for them playing in the backyard or basement. Matthew can be tided over with more puzzles. Maggie is usually interrupting me every 10 minutes.

11:00 am: Make, eat, and clean up lunch. We always eat leftovers from dinner the night before so I don’t need to spend too much time prepping lunch. (Eating lunch together, with me, is critical. The first week or two of quarantine I would put food out for the kids and try to eat while I worked. This was an awful idea because I was often hungry and crabby in the afternoon and since we weren’t all eating together, the kids wouldn’t really eat and would instead ask for snacks. All. Afternoon.)

12:00 pm: Work. One big project a day is about what I can usually accomplish. Kids play independently. I bring out screens for them, if needed. Both kids have been loving ABC Mouse on my phone. They also love watching songs on TV. Peppa Pig is a favorite. Even for the baby, I hate to admit.

1:00 pm: Attend to kids at some point in here. Nurse, if needed.

1:30 pm: Triage email again and finish up my work day.

2:00 pm: Snack. I was gorging on candy and sweets, but I am trying to find healthier afternoon snacks like nuts and cheese. Sometimes I just do another bowl of oatmeal because it is easy. I will often put on Matthew’s school video from his teacher during this time too. Sometimes we will also do additional therapy provided by his school, although most of this tends to already be accomplished in the morning.

2:30 pm: Do afternoon activity with the kids. We have been loving Wii bowling and playing in the backyard. Theoretically, going for a walk would be my idea of a perfect afternoon activity. But I need to be mentally prepared for the kids begging to go to the park (and me saying no). One of my favorite afternoon activities is going for a car ride because two of my three kids usually fall asleep. So I can just sit, drive, and listen to music. One of the kids’ favorite afternoon activities is taking a bath. They will splash in there for about an hour. Sometimes I will bathe the baby at the same time. Or I will just hold the baby. Or watch him practice rolling over. He tends to be needy at this time of day.

4:00 pm: Make dinner and clean up dinner. I try to keep it simple during the week. If we can, we grill a boatload of food on Sunday so I don’t really need to do much on Mondays or Tuesdays, at least. We really like grilled chicken or salmon with veggies and charred veggie flatbread. We have occasionally done bison hot dogs and baked potatoes. During the week I will make salads, chicken sausage with veggies, spaghetti and meatballs, chicken tacos, chicken pasta, or salsa chicken with chips and avocado. Near the end of the week, I will do frozen pizza/sushi. We will often also do breakfast for dinner (pancakes, yogurt, French toast, peanut butter toast, eggs, etc.). We have only ever gone grocery shopping once a week. Perhaps I will do a future post about how I meal plan.

5:00 pm: Pray Mike is home? Ideally I will get a short break to just lay upstairs alone. We will sometimes do Skype calls with family. The baby is usually fussy and needs a lot of attention from me and at some point takes a nap, but usually for only about 10 or 15 minutes. But at least Mike is home to play with the big kids.

6:30 pm: Get Sean ready for bed.

7:00 pm: Get the big kids ready for bed and clean house.

8:00 pm: Kids are all in bed. I usually scroll my phone, watch TV, or read a book.

9:00 pm: I often go to bed early.

2:00 am (???): Nurse the baby. Really I have no clue what time it is because I don’t look at the clock.

4:00 am: Nurse the baby. He often insists on being held at this time of day, which I do while lying in bed until I decide to get up for the day. Sometimes I get up early to work.

As you can see, I usually only get roughly 3 hours of work done on a weekday. Previously I worked 20-25 hours a week. Thus, I typically need to pick up a day of working on Saturday to get all my hours in. I save any “deep” thinking projects for Saturday, if I can. I do more manual, tedious projects during the week. This has mostly been working for us. I have had to say no to some projects I wanted to take. I also haven’t been able to work on speculative work (like writing on this blog or working on book ideas). But this is just a season. So I am doing what I can and giving myself grace with the rest.