It's been a quiet week...

I realized the other day that ever since we started doing lessons in the afternoon, we really haven't seen many of our friends.  This is also partly to do with the fact a lot of our friends have newborns, have started pre-school, and have moved away.  Hopefully, this will change in the next few weeks as people settle into new routines and are not traveling as much.

But, this made me think that I should give a general outline of a day in the Buschelman household.  This is very rudimentary as I never actually sit down and document times and activities, but it should give a general idea of how our day progresses:

6 AM:  Molly starts to make little sounds indicating that at my convenience she would like a light breakfast.  Molly rarely cries.  More often, it's little mewing sounds she makes while sucking her thumb.  I collect her from her crib and bring her back into bed with us.  If I am particularly awake, I will then take her back to her crib, but more likely I will doze off and on for the next hour or so.

6:30 AM:  Eric's alarm starts to go off.  This will occur every 9 minutes for anywhere between 30 minutes and an hour, depending on how late we stayed up the night before.  Eric claims he never actually hears his alarm...

Between 7 AM and 8 AM, the alarm clocks without snooze come into our room:  Dom (followed closely by Will) come into our room to snuggle.  This can last anywhere from 5 minutes to 15 minutes.  At which point they generally start asking for something to eat.  They can be quite insistent.

Between 7:30 AM and 9 AM:  Breakfast.  This is generally cold cereal or oatmeal, juice, coffee (or in my case coffee with Swiss Miss, try it, you'll thank me).  On some mornings, Eric will make waffles or pancakes with enough leftovers to last us a good week or longer.  On other mornings I will make muffins that will last us until the afternoon.

9 AM: Kids are dressed and Eric departs for school.  Where he works hard all day.  Kids play and I clean up the kitchen and start on other chores.  If it is Monday, we go to the grocery store.

10 AM:  Molly goes down for her morning nap.  If I feed her ahead of this, the boys will snuggle in for a few books.  Once she is down, the boys go back to playing and I get ready for the day.  On Wednesdays, we will head to the library for story time, Tuesdays and Thursday are suppose to be my gym days, but that has yet to occur, and Fridays are a free day for trips to museums or parks or other locations that are children friendly.  As you may deduce, Molly rarely gets a full morning nap.

Between 11 AM and 1 PM:  Lunch.  I discovered the kids eat nearly all their lunch if it is closer to 1; however, they generally start asking for food at 11.

2 PM - 4 PM:  Molly goes down for a nap and the boys and I do our homeschool activites.  Every day we practice the day of the week, month, year, spelling their first and last names, and birthdays. M, W, and F this consists of Letter of the Day (we are up to K), and some sort of math activity, whether counting, shapes, or operations.  For the Letter of the Day, we do letter collages made up of pictures of things that begin with the letter, practice thinking of other words, and writing the letter.  If I am particularly on top of it, I will sing a song with the letter prominently featured.  For example, on Friday we sang : "I'm a Jay-Jay-Jay- Jay Jayhawk".  We do an art project on Tuesday and a science project on Thursday.  As Tuesdays and Thursdays activities vary in times, we will supplement with workbooks that I have been collecting for over a year.  We finish with about 30 minutes of reading (I don't time this, it just seems to end up that long) and the Gospel reading for the coming Sunday.

4 - 5:30 : The kids pick up all of their toys and watch a "movie".  Molly wakes up and I start supper (if Eric is lucky).

5:30 to 6:30: If it is nice, we will go outside and wait for Eric to come home.  If it is not nice, the boys get to watch a little more tv.

6:30 - 7:30:  We sit down for supper.

7:30 - 8 : Family games or wrestling

8 - 8:30 :  The kids get ready for bed and the day is ended with prayers and a bedtime story of Eric's imagination.  We are very lucky in that it is extremely rare to have a problem with the boys (or Molly) going to bed.  They will often be asleep before Eric leaves the room.

8:30 - 10 :30:  Parent time.  TV, books, cribbage, or Eric watching a sporting event while I fall asleep on the couch.

10:30 is always my goal for getting to bed, but it is more likely 11 or later.

One thing I did not document in this is that Molly does require me to sit down every 2 - 3 hours for between 10 to 15 minutes at a time.  I will either use this time to read my book, read to the boys, catch up on news on the iPod Touch, or to stare off into space thinking about what I have to do next.  Another thing I did not document is that my sister Katie and I will talk at least an hour a day as we both go about our chores.  We may call each other as early as 9 in the morning or as late as 5 depending on how our days are going.  For some reason, I am able to clean bathrooms much easier when I am talking to her. . .