Life with Joseph

If you are bored by minutia, yawn through details, and don't have kids, this entry is not for you.

I think it would have been nice to have had some inkling of what to expect in a typical day when I decided to be a stay-at-home mom. I do not regret my decision for one minute, but it would have been nice to have seen this from another mom, just to know what my future would hold. This has just been my experience, and it seems to be different for every mom, baby, and family out there. But this has been mine. This week, at least. It changes all the time.

6-6:30 ish: Joseph wakes up for feeding and Brian leaves for work. I put Joseph back to bed afterward, but his sleep, and mine, is fitful. I imagine that some day I'll have to actually stay up at this point, but not yet. :)

8-8:30 Joseph's fitful sleeping has turned into crying. We get up. I release the velcro on his swaddle wrap and he smiles and stretches for the next half hour. Lately, he has discovered the mirror in his bassinet and loves playing with it.

9:00 Joseph eats.

9:30 I eat breakfast, do dishes, brush teeth, workout, and finish getting ready. Joseph sits in his chair and kicks and coos, smiles and laughs. We get him changed and dressed. I put him on his tummy while I work out and he starts sucking on his fingers furiously. He'll lift his head while I'm holding him, but he doesn't equate that with tummy time yet. He works on one pushup while I'm working on fifty. Sometimes he gets sleepy, sometimes he gets fussy.

Tummy time. One day I'll get a push-up done!

We may go outside, pet Vader, water plants if needed, pick up apples in the yard, and get the mail together. When we come inside, if he's still in a good mood, we might read or dance.

This is also our best time for errands. If needed, we go to the library, the bank, the post office, the store, or for a walk in the park or down the road.

Around noon is a feeding, then a nap for Joseph.

Sometimes he sleeps with his eyes open. I think it's his superpower.

I: eat lunch, clean, organize, read, write, make phone calls, watch Netflix shows, browse online, work on projects. Today, a pretty typical day, I had lunch, washed dishes, called Charter about their terrible website, cleaned the spot in the garage where Vader peed, updated wish lists, wrote this and a Facebook note...and we have one more hour of nap to go.

Between 3 and 4: Joseph eats again, unless Brian is home to distract him or his nap runs long. He sits in his bouncy chair in the kitchen while we make dinner. Some days, he takes a shower with his dad, which he at least doesn't cry through, though he isn't laughing either. He's only had one actual bath so far in his life.

He sits with us on the couch or in his chair while we eat, watch movies, talk, etc. He might have one more nursing session if he woke up from his nap early, or he might make it until 8 or 9 at night. He gets wrapped in his swaddle before eating and goes to sleep between 9 and 10. I try to follow shortly afterward to get the most out of his sleep. He loves to play while lying in his changing area, maybe because he can see us best then. We love to get him laughing as hard as we can!

*I started writing this almost two weeks ago. Since then, Joseph has started sleeping in later (until 8 or so) and cut out one feeding per day. He also eats for twenty minutes now instead of thirty. He is now pro at lifting his head from his tummy and loves blowing bubbles. He is always changing!*