What do you do all day?

As a stay at home mom I get asked, "What do you do all day?" quite often.  Well, that's a great question.

I wake up around 9, eat a granola bar, tell my toddler to fend for herself, then I take a leisure bath that lasts about an hour long while my daughter watches tv.  Follow that by lunch (usually left overs from take out the night before) and then nap.  My daughter usually naps for 2 hours so I get a great nap in too.  That gives me the afternoon to read a book and facebook, play on pintrest, and write on my blog.  Soon my husband comes home and I let him deal with things for awhile while I go in the bedroom to watch a movie.

Jealous?  Don't be.  I don't even get that much rest on a Friday night/Saturday morning when she spends the night with her Mimi and Popa.

Here is my REAL day.
5am-get up, take a shower (some days I just can't get out of bed so I have to sleep a little longer and give up the shower...it depends on how well Daphne slept the night before), straighten up our bedroom.
6am-start on breakfast.  Usually we have pancakes, waffles or biscuits (all home made) with eggs and either bacon or deer sausage.  On lazy days, yes, we eat poptarts.  (Sigh, we wouldn't but my husband buys them when I'm not around and my daughter loves them.)  During this time Daphne usually wakes up so I have to tend to her as well.
6:45am-we eat and I make sure the hubby is ready to go to work.  He has to be out of the door by 7am!
7am-we rest and watch Curious George.  Daphne loves him and I love that they have a real life application section after every show.
8am-she's riding her tricycle around the house like a mad woman while building castles out of blocks, creating a doctor's office to give her babies a check up (she has an entire kit to play with), trying on dress up clothes, or something of the sort.  I start the laundry from the night before and that morning and start on cleaning the kitchen up from breakfast...but I never get finished because she always wants my attention for something (which I freely give).  Books are usually requested during this time as well.
9am-snack time!  It's usually fresh fruit or veggies and some kind of protein like nuts.  She love peanuts and cashews.  Then it's clean up time.  10 min to get it ready, 20 min to eat give or take depending upon how long it takes her to eat, and 10 min to clean everything up.  Plus, it's time to straighten up from playing.  Sometimes it over runs her entire room and you can't walk through it.
10am-She usually wants to play some kind of game even if it's just on my phone.  We have quite a few learning games that she LOVES.  Regardless, I can't leave her unattended because you never know what my munchkin would do on my phone if I wasn't standing right there.
10:30am-uh oh, she forgot the art easel was up and begging to be played with.  Is it crayons, markers, stamps, stickers or paint today?  She knows to be excited when the old plastic table cloth is out because it means paint time.  Will she get to use the scissors today?  Hmmm...mommy keeps those put up unless she asks for them specifically or I feel up to cleaning up a floor full of little pieces of paper the size of confetti.
11am-time to start on lunch!  This is usually something out of the freezer that I previously made with something like home made mac n cheese plus a fruit and veggie.  By the time I made lunch and we eat, it's close to nap time so she straightens up her toys.
Noon-I read her a nap time story, sing to her, and lay her down.  If I'm lucky she sleeps about an hour.  So during this time I clean up from lunch, sweep the kitchen and living room, put up anything she left out and (if I remember) switch out the laundry.  If she takes an hour or more nap, I have time to fold the laundry before she gets up.
1pm-she wants to cuddle so I get time to read or facebook while she cuddles on the couch and watches Mickey Mouse or something on Sprout.
2pm-she is asking for a snack of some sort.  I let her pick from the snack box for this one or cut up fresh fruit/veggies.  Then we spend the next hour or so playing.
4pm-Daddy gets home!  I may clean some while he plays with her or I may rest on the couch.  I'm exhausted by now!
5pm-time to start dinner!  Daddy will give her a bath during this time if he's able to.
6pm-dinner and time to get ready for bed.
7pm-bedtime.  Mommy and Daddy take a break together and then start cleaning up from dinner and getting ready for the next day.
Throughout night-get up to comfort a little girl who had bad dreams, fix the blankets that she knocked off and can't find in her sleepy daze, lay in the floor and get a toy out from under the bed that she dropped in her sleep and won't go back to sleep without it.

Please realize this doesn't include incidents like story time, going to the zoo, outside play time that gets shoved in the mix somewhere during the day, walks when the weather is nice, or other trips like the store or doctor's office. It doesn't include cleaning up spills of milk or water that happen with a toddler.  The one load a day doesn't take into consideration when she has an accident in her pants and I have to wash extra laundry that day, or when I forget about the load one day and have to rewash it the next.

I hope you can now understand why I don't have the energy to go out clubbing on Friday night or out to the bar on Saturday. You see, my job is 7 days a week.  If I am hung over the next morning, I still have to cook, clean and take care of my child.  And yes, I know sometimes you don't want to go out partying, but please understand this most of all.  My daughter and husband...they are my life.  Yes, a trip to the store once or twice a week is nice for some quiet time, but most of all, I love to be with them. My life may seem monotonous and boring to you frequently.  And I will admit, sometimes it is.  (A little secret...laundry isn't my favorite thing...it's not even in the top 100 of favorite things.)  But I do this because I love my family.  God has called me to serve my family and there is nothing more I would rather do.

I love fishing!

I had been contemplating how to make a fishing game for Daphne and finally figured it out.  I cut out different shaped fish on the craft foam sheets that were large enough to not be weighted down by magnetic eyes.  Then I super glued the magnet to the fish where the eyes would go and made some fishing poles with magnets on the end.  Here are the end results!

My big boy caught a fish!

Easter Eggs

When I bought my cricut I thought it would be used to make beautiful presents at a really cheap price.  (My mother gave my sister and I each some money and told us it had to be used for something frivolous that we wanted...no bills paid, or clothes bought, nothing for our husbands or children.  Just for us.  Being on a tight budget she knew I would use the money to pay bills or something but this was special money she wanted me to use to get something I wanted but would never buy on my own.)  My sister got a monogramming machine.  I got the cricut with some cartridges.  Fast forward to now, I never thought I would be using my cricut to make GAMES and puzzles.  But, I am!  However you don't have to have one.  It will just take longer.  I cut out 28 eggs (just in case I made a mistake) and then put letters on each egg.  Upper case version at the top of the egg, lower case version at the bottom of the egg.  Then I cut different shaped lines through the eggs to make puzzle pieces.  Daphne, who is learning her letters, is having a blast with the puzzle pieces.  Plus, you can put them in the tub with her.  The foam will stick to the bath tub wall once they are wet.  She LOVES playing with these things in the water.  I can't wait to post about the fishing game I made this weekend as well!!!  I admit, I made a few games for her this weekend...lol.

Much needed board!

I didn't want to spend $20 on a dry erase board that was solid white and rather ugly looking.  (I wanted a bigger one for a "things to do".)  So, I decided to make my own.  So, I made my own.  I bought a poster cover/frame that was plastic for $6, a spool of ribbon for under $2, and pulled out my scissors and cricut.  I'm thinking about cutting out a larger bird..he just looks so little and lonely down there.  (Maybe make him a baby and put his mommy on there?)  I also cut The Stevenson's out with the cricut.  (My husband and I debated over if the apostrophe should be in the name or not.  I'm still not sure, but he won the debate so it was put in there.)  I previously bought a curtain for the kitchen that was too long so I took it down and cut off the bottom to use the curtain as the background of the board.  Once the board was put together I hot glued brown ribbon around the edges.  Now, for less than the cost of an actual dry erase board, I made one that wasn't an eye sore and matched the kitchen!  It took less than an hour and looks great.  I love it!  Sorry about the glaring...I'll try to get a picture after sun set so there won't be window glares on it.

Everyone who knows me in my private life knows I forget everything so easily.  It's not that I'm a forgetful person, but once I got sick with Peripartum Cardiomyopathy (PPCM) and had a lack of oxygen for awhile, my mind just doesn't remember things at all.  I even forget to check the calendar to see if I'm forgetting something.  It really is annoying.  My doctors said if my memory hasn't come back by now, it probably won't.  So, I've been trying to find ways to remember things.  This big board was the latest in ideas.

 

What creative thing have you done for your kitchen to help make life easier?

Abraham Lincoln

I know he was born on the 12th and President's day was Monday, but we're a bit behind on things. (I still haven't let her make her Mardi Gras mask. Hmmm...sounds like a great Thursday project to me...lol.) But today we are celebrating President Lincoln. We are going to make a stovetop hat and learn some interesting facts. When nap time is over, we will get to making the hat and I'll post pictures. But for now...I'm going to post a copy of my hand out!

As always, please feel free to copy the item. This is something of my own creation although I did take the picture from Google. Please don't get me to lie as to which image it was. There were 10 of these in the first 50 pictures that showed up. But the rest is all me...lol.

George Washington

Friday is George Washington's birthday! So in honor of it, I've decided to do a little craft with my kiddo. We are going to make a hat and go over some interesting facts...which include where and when he was born, who he married, and a few other things. Did you know he married a widow with two children? They never had more so Washington only had his two step children. I found this quite interesting in a day and time when large families were the normal.

Please feel free to copy my little hand out and use it! I'll post pictures of the hats we make on Friday!

Meet the mastermind!

I would like to introduce you to the mastermind behind my blogging...Daphne.  She is the reason I spend time doing this.

Daddy was smitten right away!  Now she has grown up a bit and is quite energetic.  I want to help her grow and experience things in a child like way.  I just have to remind myself that it's busy and exhausting...but so much fun for all of us!

So come play with us!!!