April Routine

Since Devin has been home with us this month, we have fallen back into a good routine.  He's up and out of the house by 6:30am.  He is rotating at a hospital on the West side of Chicago, so he has a bit of a drive every day.  Emily and I wake up between 8-8:30.  As I bring her into bed with me while we both wake up, she says, "Daddy work" when she doesn't see him.  She will say "Daddy work" all day long until he comes home.  We snuggle in bed for as long as she will permit.  This is when she bonds with the baby.  She pulls my shirt up, revealing my ever growing belly, and then proceeds to shower it with kisses, saying, "hi baby, hi baby!"  Yesterday morning was especially cute because the baby was awake and moving around while Emily was saying hello.  I put Emily's hands right where the baby was moving, and Emily looked at me in shock.  I think her brain made an even bigger connection that a baby is in my stomach.  She held her little hands on my belly for a long time being very patient to feel the baby.  It was really cute.

Once Emily is finished snuggling, she requests either oatmeal or cereal for breakfast, and I try to sneak a bite of banana or kiwi in her mouth in between milky bites of corn chex or quick oats.  She is in the phase where she wants to do everything by herself, especially eating.  I have had to learn to just let go of my mess controlling tendencies, and let her learn how to shovel runny oatmeal into her mouth.  As I type this, she has a high chair tray, face, hands and bib all smeared with oatmeal.  I don't think she got more than 5 bites in her mouth, but she refuses to let me help her.

After breakfast she heads to the living room to pull out all her toys that I cleaned up the night before.  She pushes her baby stroller all over the house, and is loving her baby laptop lately.  It has a Spanish setting, and it's so funny to hear her repeat simple Spanish words.  After about a half hour of playing, she motivates me to get my butt in gear by coming to me and saying, "Excise?! Excise?!" (meaning exercise).  I suit up in my workout clothes, she brings me my tennis shoes and requests her own water bottle when she sees me filling mine up.  I never would have thought that doing a 40-60 min workout video would completely entertain her, but she loves it.  I think it's because I'm jumping and bouncing around and she thinks it's funny.  We do INSANITY, and as soon as the opening music comes on, she starts running in place and gets so excited saying, "Excise!! Excise!!"  She will do the warm up with me, mimicking the moves, and then she will start roaming the living room randomly handing me my towel when she thinks I need it.  When the workout is finished, she loves doing the cool down with me.  She breaths in and raises her arms above her head, and then exhales and brings her arms down.  It's really cute.  Then she says, "All done excise."  On days that are warm enough we go for long walks outside that end at the "pay gound" (play ground).  During our walks, Emily is always the first to spot any dogs, flowers, water and cars that we pass.  I love that her vocabulary is expanding every day, and realizing the little words she picks up and uses all on her own.

We have lunch, I do laundry and clean up the kitchen and living room, and then Emily goes down for her nap.  Recently I have been working on a baby quilt for the new baby, so I put an hour or 2 into the quilt.  Emily wakes up around 4pm, and we play and read books.  She requests "song" until I play Pandora from my laptop and hook it up to speakers to make it really loud.  She LOVES dancing and listening to music.  We are usually dancing when Devin walks through the door between 5-5:30, and he joins in.  It is so great having him home in the early evening and having a few hours of family time before Emily goes to bed.  We then venture outside for another round at the play ground, come home and have dinner, and then plop Emily in bed after her bath around 8:30pm.

Our days are simple, predictable and extremely routine, but I have LOVED this month and the routine it has brought.