My alarm goes off at 7:45am and I usually roll out of bed 1.5 minutes before 8am so I can get the girls out of bed at 8am! I am so not a morning person.

I get Sweet Pea’s milk warming (girl still has to have her milk warmed at 18 months old almost – can we say spoiled?!) and then I go to Sweet Pea’s room where I get her out of bed. She usually brings one of her blankets with her and wants to lay on my shoulder for a minute with her blankie. Such a sweet way to start the day for both of us. Then her head pops up, she tosses her blankie back in her bed and we head to the changing table to change her diaper and get her dressed for the day.

Then I set her on the floor and say, “Where is Sister?!”. She runs to Little Bug’s room and we open the door to usually a disgruntled 3 year old. She is getting enough sleep, so her grumpiness just comes along with being three, I guess. I let Little Bug pick out her clothes (if it is not a school day) and then get her dressed. Then we all head to the living room for milk time and breakfast together!

Then after breakfast the girls get down and play together in the living room. On this day (January 9th), Uncle and his friend were on their way back to Seminary and stopped in to say goodbye, so the girls were playing with them.

During this time of play in the living room, I clean up the kitchen, get a load of laundry started and then we all play together.

At 9:30am I go read books with Sweet Pea in her bedroom and lay her down for her morning nap at 9:45am.

Usually by the end of our reading time, she has gone to her crib and snagged her blankie!

From 9:30-10:30am Little Bug does her Independent Playtime in her bedroom. While Sweet Pea naps and Little Bug is doing her IP, I get myself dressed and ready for the day, check email/fb, post to the blog, and get Learning Time ready for that day.

10:30am Learning Time begins. Little Bug comes flying out of her room saying, “What are we going to do for Learning Time today, Mommy?!”.

At 10:45am I get Sweet Pea up from her nap and then she has Independent Playtime in her bedroom while I do Learning Time with Little Bug.

After 30ish minutes of Learning Time, we go clean up both bedrooms from IP. Then, Little Bug has her 30 minutes of TV time.

I try to get Sweet Pea engaged in something in the kitchen so she doesn’t watch the TV. I don’t want her watching until age two. She pretty much stays with me in the kitchen playing with puzzles and Tupperware! She will sometimes go into the living room (where LB is watching TV) but at this point, she doesn’t pay attention to the TV much at all.

While Little Bug watches her show and Sweet Pea toddles around playing, I fix lunch for everyone and fold laundry.

Around noon we sit down to eat lunch and then whenever we are finished with that, we head outside for some physical activity! We love to go for walks (where everyone now walks!), to the park, sometimes Little Bug wants to ride her scooter and sometimes we just play in our backyard.

Sweet Pea sat herself down on the slide so she could study the object in her hand. I think it was a bubble container! You can see her concentration.

We are outside for a little less than an hour before it is time to come in and get settled for naps.

I go read to Sweet Pea in her bedroom while Little Bug is usually picking what book she wants me to read to her (and getting herself into trouble!!! I am about ready to make her sit in the pack n play again and read while I put SP down for naps!!! That girl….). Sweet Pea goes to bed at 1:45pm and then it is time to read to Little Bug and tuck her in at 2pm.

Once the girls are both in their beds I do a quick “clean up” of the house from the morning, and spend about 15-30 minutes doing any chore I need to do for that day. And then…I RELAX.

Relax for me usually means blogging, reading, planning for Learning Time or working on some type of project (such as organizing something in my house – yes that is relaxing to me!).

Both girls get up between 4 and 4:30pm.

I’m not as structured with the time after naptime to bedtime, but we fill the time until dinner by: reading, going outside again, playing games inside or playing together in one of the girls’ bedrooms.

We eat dinner around 6pm and while I clean up the kitchen Dave takes the girls and plays with them in the living room. They often share a smoothie made by Daddy during this time. If there is time before baths, we love to go on a “family walk” as Little Bug calls it.

At 7pm Dave gets the girls in the bathtub and by 7:30ish they are out and all clean and in their pjs. I put Sweet Pea to bed by 7:45pm while Dave and Little Bug read together. Then we pray with Little Bug, read a Bible story together and then Little Bug goes to bed around 8:15ish.

I do another quick “clean up” of the house once the girls are in bed, talk to Dave uninterrupted by my little competitions for Daddy’s attention, and then go have my Bible study time. It is also not uncommon for me to do some more housework/chores once the girls are in bed since it is just so much easier to do that when I know I have 30 minutes without interruptions to get it done!

And once again, I try to have lights out at 11pm, but I am so bad about this. I love staying up late, and usually read in bed before finding myself nodding off around 11:30ish. I am reading Redeeming Love by Francine Rivers. Excellent read!

And that is a day in my life, right now. Of course, everyday is not like that because every day we do not stay home. Twice a week Little Bug attends preschool in the mornings. And I didn’t include all the “interesting things” that happen with a 3 year old and 1 year old on a daily basis! Like the effort it takes to get them out the door to simply go for a walk in the neighborhood!

I am very scheduled and structured with my girls. Very! I have found it to be easier to find a schedule/routine that works for us and run with it until it is time to switch things up a bit. My girls thrive on the predictability of our days and so do I because I have a specific time planned for every activity I want to accomplish in my day: from spending time with my girls to reading to them to getting my household chores done. There is a time for everything and my house runs smoothly (most days, ha!).

- Elaine