Just One Day

This post is for my own benefit so if you happen to stumble across it and wonder why I think you'd care about all these small details of our days, I don't. :) They just pass by so quickly and children change so much in no time, and I don't want to forget. This is a good place for me to quickly write down the little things, so I'll have a record of it someday when these days would otherwise be forgotten.

Doodle is our alarm clock most mornings, waking us anywhere between 6 and 7. Every once in awhile he'll sleep in till 7:30 or so -- typically on a morning we have to be somewhere early so have to get up before then anyway. If it's a Saturday, it's guaranteed to be 6 am.

Puffins flies out of bed the second she hears my doorknob turn. After a quick change of Doodle's diaper as he wakes up SOAKED, we head for the breakfast table. Doodle is currently in a stage where he really wants to feed himself but doesn't do a terribly good job.

After breakfast, I get Puffins ready for the day, then Doodle (9 times out of 10 he dirties his diaper after breakfast and there's no sense in dressing him before he does the deed!), then myself while the kids play in the living room, then it's off to the sitter's and to work we go!

When I pick them up in the afternoon, I try to have a plan for something we can do or somewhere we go. Really hot afternoons we usually spend at the pool. Nicer ones, we visit a park. If it's raining, the library makes a good stop, although we often run by there on the way home on pretty days as well. If it's later when I pick them up, we generally just go home and play in the back yard.

Doodle is crazy about balls. He spends his outside time digging every kind of ball he can find out of the storage shed. He especially loves t-ball and has mastered the art of putting the ball on the tee and hitting it with the bat all by himself. He will also throw a basketball at a hoop but just can't get it up high enough yet.

Puffins learned to swing by herself earlier this summer, much to my relief, as I got so tired of having to stand there and push her all the time, especially with an active toddler running around like crazy. She's now working on gymnastics skills in preparation for starting classes this fall.

I try to keep them outside and active until about 6:30. We come in for dinner and then I spend a half hour or so with Doodle doing fingerplays and songs with motions, working puzzles, shape sorters, and pop-up toys, and reading books while Puffins has her bedtime snack. He does all the motions to pat-a-cake and "If You're Happy and You Know It," will do some of the motions to "Itsy Bitsy Spider," "Five Little Monkeys" (both versions -- jumping on the bed and swinging from a tree), and loves to scream at the end of Row Your Boat (if you see an alligator, don't forget to scream!) He also loves Eye Winker and does the "gully gully gully" at the end of it and laughs. He's learning "Head, Shoulders, Knees and Toes."

Both kids are also crazy about singing and dancing. Puffins' favorites are those she sings at Kids Church, especially "Good Morning" and "Boom Chaka Laka." Doodle is WILD about "Mahna Mahna" and will sing the mahna mahna parts of it every time you sing it to him. He can't see a phone or computer without begging for it. His other favorite which he requests verbally all the time is, as he calls it, "Hey yeah, yeah" -- a song from VBS. So a lot of times during or after meals, we play music on the laptop and the kids dance in the kitchen.

At 7:30, Puffins and I put Doodle to bed. I change him and brush his teeth, and then hold him and sing his bedtime songs -- Jesus Loves Me, Rest Easy, Baby Mine, and finally Sleep Sound in Jesus. I say his little bedtime prayer for him, "Dear God, I love you. Thank you for loving me. Please keep me safe, and Puffins safe, and my baby brother or sister safe. In Jesus' name, Amen." Doodle always chimes in himself with the Amen. Then with a goodnight kiss, I lay him down, cover him with his blanket, give him his Mickey, and turn on his mobile. He says "ninight" and he gets one more kiss, and out we tiptoe.

Then begins Puffins' bedtime routine. We get her in her pjs and brush her teeth, and then we each pick out a library book to read. We read those two books first, then we read a Bible storybook, then we read a chapter or two from Little House -- currently on On the Banks of Plum Creek -- and then after some hugs, I tuck her in with her pink blanket first, and then the sheets and covers, read her her short bedtime devotional, then she says her prayer and I turn on her bedtime music and stay with her until she falls asleep, usually less than five minutes.

And that's a typical day in our lives right now.