Jumping on the bandwagon - A day in the Life

May 3rd, 2012

6:00 - alarm goes off, I push snooze

6:05 - alarm goes off, I reset it for 6:15

6:15 - alarm goes off, I push snooze

6:20 - alarm goes off, I reset it for 6:25

6:25 - alarm goes off, I get up (begrudgingly) and start getting ready. Thankfully, I showered the night prior so I only have to worry about teeth, makeup, getting dressed, and of course, going to the bathroom for the 3rd time

6:40 - wake the boys up; Aaron gets Kellen dressed and feeds him his 1st breakfast (he also has breakfast at daycare)

7:01 - tell Kellen it's time to leave for Indra's. He is still tired (see the yawn); so am I. But we manage to buckle ourselves into the car by 7:04. My goal is to leave the house by 6:55. Clearly didn't meet that goal today (nor do I ever).

7:05 - Pulling out of the garage; Kellen managed to grab a toy for the ride. This is why I have about 5 dozen toys in my car...he brings a new toy every morning. Milk - check. Toy - check. Good to go.

7:15 - stuck in traffic, per usual. Traffic has been unusually poor for the past couple of months with all of the construction on 169 and 494.

7:35 - pull into Indra's driveway. I was supposed to be at work 5 minutes ago. Drop Kellen off and tell him I love him about 10 times, give him about 10 smooches. Back to the car. Drive 3 miles to work, and pull in the parking lot at 7:46 (my clock is 2 minutes fast). I am late. Again. Not unusual. At least I arrive before the students. Thankfully, my classroom is in the back of the school, so no one ever notices. And...I always make sure to stay late to make up for arriving late ;)

7:50 - Arrive in my classroom. Unload my belongings for the day, start up my computer, and check out my lesson plans. Oh yeah, that's right. I'm taking the 5th graders on a field trip to the middle school today. I enjoy these occasional changes in my schedule - makes my days feel less bland.

This is the view from my window. Right behind those trees is Lake Minnetonka.

Another view of my classroom; pretty exciting, huh?

My day consisted of check-ins, a reading group, a math group, a 2 hour field trip with my 5th graders, lunch (there was carrot cake in the lounge today - saweeeeeet!), 2 more reading groups, a social skills group, and then 2 meetings after school. I get my stuff together and walk out of the door to the parking lot at 4:05. We're contractually obligated until 3:30, so I managed to stay 35 minutes late. More than made up for how late I was!

Check ya later, work!

4:12 - Get to Indra's to pick Kellen up. Find Kellen playing in the backyard with the other kiddos. Kellen is swinging. He loves swinging. He's excited to see me, but doesn't want to get out of the swing. I manage to get him to the car and we're on our way home around 4:20. I give him half of a cookie left over from the March of Dimes - March for Babies walk. He munches on it and looks at his books while I battle traffic. Here's Kellen admiring all of the awesome construction trucks on 169 and 494.

5:00 - Ugh, still in traffic. Today is pretty typical, but it gets old. If I'm able to get out of work by 3:30, we can usually make it home in 30ish minutes. When I leave after 4, though, we're screwed. Usually a good 45 minutes to an hour.

Finally get home around 5:15. We head right in after I promise Kellen we can go outside to play after dinner. I'm too lazy to do anything fancy, so I pop some ravioli on the stovetop. I sort through the laundry and throw a huge load in the wash. About half way into cooking dinner, I realize we don't have any pasta sauce. Damn. So, we make do with butter and ketchup. It sounds gross, but it actually worked just fine (not that I'd prefer it to pasta sauce, but we made do).

We finish dinner around 5:55 and head out to the backyard. I realize the lawn is still wet from the rain earlier that day and the night prior, but thankfully Kellen was more interested in playing with the rocks in our rock bed. I do my best to play along with him in my 34-week pregnant state, but eventually succumb to soreness and put my feet up for a little rest.

6:15 - Kellen attemps to climb up the rock bed to inspect the sump-pump, so I decide it's time to go out to the front yard. On the way there, I realize there's a puddle in the driveway, so I exchange Kellen's shoes for some sandals and roll up his pants. He plays in the puddle for a good 45 minutes while I take pictures and sit on the steps.

7:00 - We head inside for a much-needed bath (for Kellen). Bath time = exhausting...but this little guy loves it, so I let him sit in the bath and play until 7:20.

7:35 - After wrestling Kellen into his pajamas and struggling to brush his teeth, I'm able to sit down and read him a couple of bedtime stories before putting him in his crib for the night.

7:40 - 9:00 - I clean up from bath time, pick up the toys, load the dishwasher, then head downstairs to check my email and upload a bunch of photos to shutterfly. I realize I have pictures from months ago that haven't been downloaded yet, so I spend a good amount of time on the computer doing this. I also post some pics on facebook. Aaron gets home around 8. He was the only manager on duty today (his manager took a personal day, and his equal, who is located in Winston-Salem, N.C., called in sick, so he was stuck with the messes of 3 managers). He eats his ravioli and ketchup while I finish up on the computer.

9 - 9:30 - Watch the news with Aaron downstairs. Eat a bowl of cookies 'n cream ice cream. Nummm. I don't go a night without ice cream. It's the best. I head upstairs around 9:30 and do my nightly routine.

10ish - I'm in bed shortly before 10, and Aaron joins me shortly thereafter. I manage to listen to the first 5 minutes of news (lots of chatter about the Amy Senser case) and drift off into sleepyland.