Sunday Update: Reading, Sports, Sleep

It's a Sunday again!  This week had some definite highs and some lows.  Let's dive right in, shall we?

Reading:

I finished The Wedding People by Alison Espach and I LOVED it.  It was a book that was so good I wanted to read it slowly.  I want to hang out with the characters longer.  I want to go to a fancy hotel.  It was such a dark premise and then... joy.  MMD review here for more info.

I have so many holds for which I am first in line for BUT I didn't time it right because I wanted to read The Rom-Commers by Catherine Center and I had pushed that hold forward too much.  I would also read The Blue Bistro by Elin Hildebrand or The Stand In by Lily Chu, both of which I am first in line for.  But when I finished The Wedding People I was still first in line for all!  Then a copy of The Friend Zone by Abby Jimenez came through, which I started, but it feels too late summer for "he loves/she loves".  When I checked Libby today my copy of The Rom-Commers was ready and so I will hopefully finish both books in the next 21 days since they both have a lot of holds.  Libby hold balancing/planning is hard!

Sports

This week was not a sports week.  

Monday: 20 minutes yoga

Wednesday: Totally awful trip to the gym.  

Thursday: 20 minute run

I don't have enough childcare to do sports right now.  Our nanny started this week for two days, but it's primarily for settling in.  And the babies are... unsettled.  I am unsettled.  Lilah is still in nursery some days, but Isaac is home all days, and it is all unsettling.  Also it was a full moon last week! And I felt terrible. Wednesday was the most unsettling.  Thursday and friday were entirely childcare days.  I don't even have baby naps now to do sport because I have Isaac on Thursday and all kids on Friday.  

Also the gym confrontation has really knocked me back.  I haven't decided what to do about it.  But some other pieces that have bothered me since the event (where a trainer at the gym accused my friend of training me - blog here) have registered as follows:

• Why did the trainer not ask my gym buddy if he was training me?
• Why did he wait to catch me alone (while my friend was getting his weights)?
• Why did he assume I wanted a trainer or to be trained at all? 
• Why did he feel it was OK to be aggressive to me but not to my (male) friend?
• Why did he do this in front of everyone at the gym, such that so many people saw the interaction and strangers even asked me what happened?  Was it to make me extra uncomfortable?

I also realized that for the last month I always felt like people were watching me, but I always told myself I was being silly.... that I deserved to be in the free weights space as much as anyone else.  That even though I was doing "dude" exercises it was OK and I was allowed.  And that people were probably just minding their own business and it was all in my head.  Apparently... I was being watched.  It wasn't in my head.  And I just feel... embarrassed.  

Mostly I feel profoundly uncomfortable about ever going back there.  My friend says we should go as we haven't done anything wrong.  He thinks that by *not* going they will think they "caught" us or that we were doing something wrong.  But I don't think I have the resilience for this right now.

Also, my friend feels very complimented (as he should be!) that gym workers think he is a trainer, since he is actually a small business owner.  I think I feel equally crappy that gym workers look at me and think "she looks like she wants a trainer".  

Anyways, I want to do more Peloton workouts and running.  I need to get out of my head more.  Hopefully this week.

Sleep

Babies are waking up around 5:15 but sometimes staying in bed till nearly 6.  I had a lot of trouble sleeping after gym incident.  I am sometimes waking up too early.  And writing buddy came over one evening and we stayed up later.  So for a combination of reasons, some my fault and some not, I have been averaging 7.1 hours of sleep this week.  I would like a bit more.  But without baby naps and without childcare I have so little me time that 7:30 onward feels like my only time for myself and it's hard to get myself to bed before 9:30.

Speaking of that - time for bed!

Did you have an unsettled week? Do you think full moons are unsettling?

Friday 5 - Transitions. Food, Clothes, Laundry, and a Pillow Conundrum.

Laundry

I have more to say on Laundry!  Suddenly, we are doing slightly *less* than a load a day.  Until last month we were creating about 1.25-1.5 loads of laundry a day.  Yesterday I didn't do laundry!  For our laundry everything is washed together at 40 degrees (warm?) except delicates, which is all washed at cold delicate.  I was using laundry pods when the babies were little because I didn't have time to measure or scoop.  Life must be getting easier because I now have time to measure.  Or scoop.  I think that powder cleans better, but it also makes more mess.  Liquid laundry detergent smells better, but I think I use more and then it's more expensive.  

For your laundry do you use Pods? Powder? Liquid?  Do you have a preference?

Transitionss

The kids go back to school on the 4th.  I go back to work on the 17th.  I feel like that's a long time but also... it's not.  It's 5 days of nanny care, and 1 day of Andy care (Andy doesn't work on Mondays).  Transitions are A LOT.  Isaac is in a new class, Lilah is in a new school AND a new nursery.  Twins have a new nanny. It is the first time we will have a nanny.  We also need to swap bedrooms around in our house which is a huge giant job.  No wonder things feel unsettled.  The Lazy Genius talked about a opening and closing summer ceremonies recently and this sounds amazing.  

Do you do an opening or closing ceremony for summer?  What would you do if you did?

Pillows

We need new pillows.  I feel like our pillows are flat.  They are probably old.  I don't mind spending money on pillows but I'm pretty sure I spent money on these pillows and now they are flat and old.  

How long do pillows last?  How do you chose pillows?  Do you like your Pillows? And for extra credit - do you say PEL-LOW or PIL-LOW?

Clothes & Decluttering

Decluttering is going well - so well that I am wearing the same 3-4 tops every day.  Which is great but they are wearing out pretty quickly! I probably need more durable clothing. I discovered a hole in the armpit of one of my favourite shirts recently.  It's linen! It looks pretty! Can this be repaired?  Wont a patch look silly?  I emailed the company but they said it was outside their 6 month warranty. Waah.  

While decluttering my sports clothes drawer I decided I need to get rid of some of my road cycling gear.  I am not a road cyclist anymore.  I gave away my clip shoes.  I don't need a good pair of cycling bibs and a second crap pair.  I don't need 3 road jerseys (but I did keep 2... my old club jersey and a baggy one).

Last week I dropped a bag off at the baby bank that included 1/2 a bag of size 6 nappies and I was so happy to get them out of my house!  But I am feeling a bit sad on some of the charity pieces because this really is the *end* of baby times for me.  I definitely don't want or need any more babies... but also... transition!

How often do you declutter clothes?  Do you ever feel sad to say goodbye to your things?  Do your things represent your stage of life or are things just *things*?

Food

All I do is cook food and eat food and make meals and it's soo tedious and I feel like there is no rythem to it.  Why is lunch a thing?  Isn't dinner and breakfast enough for all these small people? And snacks too... so much food. 

I am currently obsessed with making tuna salad.  Also, I LOVE my food processor so much. I made a giant soup in 5 minutes of chopping.  I make tuna salad with extra veggies but whizzing up the veggies.  I made a shortcrust pastry! I grate a bunch of courgette really really quickly! It's such a magic machine.

Do you have a food processor? Do you love it?

Thursday Things. Stress things. Good things. Things you mustn't say in holiday club.

Things causing stress:

• My friends all being on different schedules.  Holidays.  The end of summer! the vast wasteland of time to fill, now filled, and feeling like I didn't catch up with people I hoped to.
• Gym drama.  I don't like drama.  As unfair as it feels, I will just have to be super careful that when we work out he never offers me help, or comments on my form.  I will try and speak with the general manager next time we go, to hopefully clarify my position, but I don't have high hopes.  My gym buddy emailed the gym and they replied with a long letter that included a note that they will be watching us train to make sure he's not coaching me, and I feel immensely uncomfortable know that we are being watched by staff in the gym.  
• New Nanny starting.  It's great to have help, but it's also a change.  Twins need to get used to her, I need to get used to twins getting used to her.  It hasn't been the magic "Rachel Freedom" I possibly hoped it would be
• Sleep.  Always sleep.  Last night I couldn't fall asleep.  The night before I woke up randomly at 4:30am.
• Lilah finishing at the nursery we love.  I miss them already.
• Lilah starting at a new nursery that will be fine.  It is connected to the school.  They all seem nice.  But we chose a terrible day to start her settling in.  She has another day for settling in tomorrow
• Not getting enough exercise (running & Peloton classes)
• Meal planning.  So much food. So many requirements.  Kid food, Grown Up Food, Baby food.  so much food.
• Being on the no pay part of my maternity leave.  I am lucky I was paid for so long, but a £0 paycheck is sad, even after 10 months of leave
• Starting back at work.  I'm excited but there have also been a lot of changes at the company and my team seem understaffed, which means it's going to be a lot of work for me.
• Everything I sold recently on Vinted hasn't had updated tracking.  The Post Office said they had an issue on saturday and nothing has gone out since, but I would really like my parcels sent

Things that are good

• I have had lots of play dates and caught up with lots of people.  I haven't had many "I have nothing to do days"
• I love working out with my Gym Buddy and he is keeping me from spiraling during gym drama
• I think the new Nanny will be good.  I need to give her time.  She has made our house really clean.
• Sleep has actually been OK.  Babies have slept until 5:30/6:00 recently.  
• No more £600 a month nursery bills for Lilah
• I went for a 20 minute run this morning.  I can schedule in some more running.
• Starting back at work.  It will be good to use my brain.
• It might stop raining soon.
• I've continued to declutter.  All my gym clothes now fit in the bottom drawer of my dresser.  I have listed and sold some pieces on vinted. I sold my last two nursing dresses.
• I dropped off a bag of things at the baby bank
• I took Isaac to the eye doctor and his eyes are fine
• I got my hair dyed and it looks awesome (I mean, I can say this right?)
  
• Good thing sub point: I have decided that hair care goes under the "Misc" budget because I cut everyones hair in the house and they can't/don't cut mine so I have to pay, but that's an Andy problem.  If he learned to cut & dye hair then I wouldn't need to pay for it)
• I am really enjoying reading Wedding People
• There is new Emily in Paris on netflix for when I ever get a chance to watch TV again
• Bad thing sub point - the Netflix Family Plan isn't a thing anymore apparently so I may need to get my own account.

Things that are great

My writing buddy came over this evening, as I was writing this post, and we talked for TWO HOURS and I have realized that I am in a massive transition, as are the kids, and transitions are hard.  And writing buddies (who are real buddies, and not training me on being a writer, but helping me on being a human) are great.  

Two random photos:

All my gym kit in one drawer! sorry for the terrible photo.

Isaac brought this home from holiday club.  It is a list of the words he mustn't say in holiday club:

Poopy Pants

 Poop Face

Poo

Stupid

Stupid Poopy Pants

Poop Face

Poo

Morning drama at the gym.

Here is a rant incoming!

This morning I was working out at the gym with my gym buddy (as in, my friend from University who I have been gymming with since 2012).  He was setting up his wide armed pull up while I was failing to do a normal pull up (or even a jump and slowly lower)

While gym buddy went to get more weights, a trainer from the gym came and asked if he was training me

"definitely not!" I said "we have been gym buddies for years"

"well it looks like he's training you" said the trainer

"I can assure you he is my gym buddy.  He has trained for 15 years while I've had four kids.  He is much stronger than me"

"the thing is" said the trainer "we have trainers who pay to train here so he can't train you"

"he's not my trainer.  He's my friend" I said

At this point, gym buddy came back. the gym trainer told him he couldn't train me.  We both insisted he wasn't training me.  We asked him to leave us alone, but I was really angry at this point. 

Gyms are generally not safe spaces that encourage women, and I assume he came to harass me because I was one of the only women in the rack area at the time?  Certainly the only late thirties mom of four in the rack area.

Would we have been told we were breaking rules if I was with a girlfriend?  Or is it because was working out with a super strong dude?

I asked the trainer for his name so I could write a letter of complaint.  He asked why I was upset and I told him that I get to go to the gym once a week with my gym buddy and it's upsetting that he spent 10 minutes of that arguing with us.  his response? "Yeah yeah you have kids whatever".  He then proceeded with:

"Well you need to listen to my side now because that's what a conversation is, and if you want to have a conversation you need to listen to me"

At that point I went back to training, but I felt intensely uncomfortable for the rest of the workout.  

I could not explain to the trainer man how incredibly infuriating it is that when women enter men's spaces - such as the free weights section of the gym - it's so quickly noticed.  How targeting me tells me that I am the "other" and that my presence needs to be accompanied by a trainer.  That it would be impossible for two people, for a woman and a strong man, to train together as friends.

I looked around me and saw so many men.  There are two older men who train together who asked what is wrong.

I couldn't answer "the patriarchy" or "feeling excluded from this space because I've I have boobs"

I told them my friend has been accused of training me and we all laughed.

Those two trained together all the time and have never been told they were training each other.

There were women in the gym.  Most women were alone, following programs on their phones.  

My gym buddy asked the gym to clarify, and they said that it looked like he was training me, and it was a situation they had been monitoring.  They noted that he could no longer give me any instruction, or guidance.  

Since my main reason for going to the gym is to see the gym buddy I am not really clear on how this will work.  Can I do the same sport as him? Can I work out after him on the same equipment? Can he pass weights to me as I've seen lots gym buddies do for each other?  Are we allowed to talk? Are we allowed to talk about workouts? Am I allowed to ask what his next excercise is?

I know I should figure out how to complain, but maybe the corporate gym world is just too big and too scary and too full of men unhappy that a woman isn't paying them to tell them what to do.  

The problem with injustice, as minor as this one is in the big scheme of things, is it can be quite profitable for many.

Sunday Update: Reading, Sports, Sleep

Summer is so... disjointed.  Weeks are busy and also have too much empty space.  Summer itself is flying by, and each day is lasting 100 years.  It is... weird.

On Tuesday when I dropped Isaac off at summer holiday club the teacher asked if it was his last day. "no" I said "he's in next week".  There was a pause. "we are closed next week" said the teacher.  Oops.  I had forgotten that holiday club was only 3 weeks long.  Oops Oops Oops.  

I looked at the calendar and realized that Lilah was meant to finish nursery on the 22nd, to give her a "week off" before school.  What is a "week off" when I have babies and Isaac at home? I called Nursery and her last day is now on the 29th.  Childcare for the win.  However I feel this is a sign of how disjointed my planning is at the moment... how come I didn't realize I had 4 kids and no childcare for a week?  Why am I able to plan pizza on friday but not what my kids are doing on a day to day basis?

On Tuesday I had a Keeping in Touch day at work, where I met with my boss and checked my computer still worked and started my return to work mentoring programme (yay!!).  It went GREAT.  And it was also shockingly similar to this Cup Of Joe comic.  Luckily I got to practice a few different replies to the question "how are you? How was maternity leave? "how are the kids?"

Answers that didn't go well:

"I wipe 3 butts every day that aren't my own"

"We talk about informed consent for maternity care but I did not consent to having twins"

"I can put a finger through the 1cm gap in my stomach muscles and feel my own intestines, but otherwise it's great"

I'll have to think of some better answers before I go back.  Or maybe the answer is "it's great"

Also, "I'm really good at time management now" is a pretty decent answer.

Anyways, onward to Reading, Sports and Sleep!

Reading

Really enjoying The Wedding People.  About 30% through. 

Sports

Monday: 20 minute Peloton Barre.  10 minute Peloton Core.  90 minute hike up and down local hill. 

Tuesday: 90 minutes bouldering with gym buddy (yay, bouldering!)

Wednesday: 1 hour hike with baby in backpack (andy had the other baby)

Thursday: 1 hour gym with workout buddy (Push session - fun!)

I feel like my general disjointedness of my days is reflecting in the general disjointedness of my exercise.  Without childcare for all the kids I really don't have much Rachel time.  I also have had quite a few play dates recently which are great, but take up time that could otherwise be used for sport.

also...

Sleep

I was going to write "Sleep has been awful" but really what happened is one night I had trouble sleeping at 2am and then the babies woke up at 4:30am and it was all terrible.  They've been waking around 5:30 and we've sort of pretended they sleep till 6... but we can't pretend when they're crying at 4:45.  And we can't let them wake up the big kids either.  

For the first time in my parenthood life I did the "drive around at 5am to get these babies to sleep" trick.  100% do not recommend.  I did go to a Starbucks drive through at 5:20am and the window barista said "I hope your night gets better" which made me laugh because in my view anything after 4am is morning.  5:20 is definitely not night.

Overall I've averaged 7 hours of sleep.  I noted before that I need north of 7 hours.  I can now say officially that I need greater than 7 hours average, and not 7 or greater average [/SleepMath].  I need to be better about being in bed around 8:30pm and asleep by 9:30, rather than in bed by 9:30 and asleep by 10.  I need to remember that I'm a human adult with the ability to go to sleep earlier.  The babies are human babies who are still learning how to sleep later.  The current situation isn't ideal but I think it's up to me to compromise for now.  We can revisit baby sleep in a few weeks.

How We Organize Everything - the FLOM, 2024 Update

I know I mention our Family Logistics meeting (FLOM for short - Family Logistics and Operations Meeting) fairly frequently here, but my last FLOM summary was written in November 2022.  A lot has changed since then, with the addition of the twins (Oct 2023), the start of my maternity leave, summer holiday, Isaac starting school & various childcares, and more I'm surely forgetting.

After a few months hiatus after the twins were born we started our evening FLOM again.  It's great to get back into planning our week, because there is now a lot more to plan, and a lot less headspace for planning.  Our current FLOM agenda is as follows:

1 - Look at Week ahead and Food plan.

    We used to look at the week and then plan the food, however we've now realized that we can't just plan the food, we also need to plan HOW the food will get made.  When I was working from home I knew I could have a 30 minute lunch break to prep food, one parent would do kid pick up while the other cooked dinner. This worked well, but now there are a lot more kids, so we have to figure out exactly how and when meals will get made.

The first step for food plan is to make a list of 5 or so meals we want to eat in the week.  This can be things we have in the house, things we meant to make the previous week but didn't, or things we thought of and noted down on the calendar.  We also have a list of family favourites, and we try and fill the following meal matrix:

• 1 Pasta thing
• 1 thing in buns served with chips 
• 1 thing cooked in the oven (tray bake or casserole) 
• 1 slow cooker thing
• 1 mac and cheese or pizza dinner.  

Once we have our meals we then assign them to the day, including who is going to make the meal and *when* they are going to make it.  I'm on maternity leave, so I have two naps a day in which to make food.  Maybe some people can make dinner while watching 9 month old twins... I cannot do this.

2 - Grocery Order

We get a grocery delivery on Saturday morning, so we do the online order as soon as we have made the meal plan.  The order has to be final by 9pm for morning delivery.

3 - Look at sport

Andy and I both love exercise, so we try to make sure we can both get some excercise in the week.  Usually I get to do exercise during baby morning nap once or twice a week, but when the kids are home that means the other parent has to watch a lot of kids.  We try and find times where one parent can get out without detracting too much from family life.  Andy likes riding, I enjoy running more at the moment.  I also can do exercise during baby nap if the big kids are in childcare... but not if I'm using baby nap to make dinner.  It's tricky, but I am definitely getting my sport in now.  Light evenings help too, as Andy does a weekly mountain biking night.

4 - Look at weekend and weekend ahead & kid plans

We try to make a solid plan for the impending weekend and a rough plan for the following one.  Including thinking abut who we want to see, and how to get the kids and babies some time apart and time together (and, ideally, give the big kids some time apart from each other, although that is not always possible)

5 - AOB (Any Other Business)

Our AOB right now can be HUGE.  We collect all the things we need to review, or that we think of during the week, and write it down for the meetings.  This bit can take upwards of an hour, depending on the list.  Sometimes we move items into future AOB, sometimes we agree no action is needed, and sometimes we delegate to one person to followup.  AOB can be little (should we get our oven cleaned?) was an AOB a few weeks ago, and sometimes AOB can be big (Do we need to move the kids bedrooms around and what is the timeline for this?).  

6 - Date of Next Meeting

And that's it.  Usually the meetings are friday nights.  before the Twins, and when kids were in the same nursery, FLOM took about around an hour.  It currently takes 1-2 hours.  We still miss things.  It will surely change when kids are back in school, when I'm in work, when the Nanny starts.  But without this check in I know our life would run worse.  We wouldn't get to do the sports we do, and we wouldn't eat the food we eat.  I am fairly confident two hours of weekly planning saves us many more hours of weekly chaos.

Plus, now that the babies sleep better, FLOM can include beer or wine again.  Cheers to that.

Sunday Update: Reading, Sports, Sleep

I had to use my time log to remind me what happened this week.  A lot!  The twins dropped their 10:30am feed, so I am now free to roam the world from 7am to 3:30pm.  I used this freedom to go for a 6 mile hike with a friend on Wednesday while the two big kids were at camp. Andy took a day of annual leave to watch the babies. I told Andy it was the longest time I've been away from children (6 hours!) since before the twins were born.  He said that I spent at least 8 hours with no kids while I was in labour, so that also counted as a Rachel day too.

My dad is currently visiting so I have another person to witness the chaos that is twin life.  My apple watch tells me I stand an average of 16 hours a day.  That sounds about right.  We took Isaac to a museum, we failed to find parking at multiple cafes, and now we are looking forward to a few days of kid fun before he heads back to California.  

Reading

I am currently reading and LOVING Sandwich by Catherine Newman

For whatever reason I couldn't find this on Libby so I got an actual copy from my library.  It's got the UK cover of course, which is... weird.  I like the US cover better

Sports

Oh what a week! No real consistency with anything BUT I've done a lot of things I enjoy

Monday: 20 Minute Run, 30 minute Peloton Full Body strength, 10 minute stretching.

Tuesday: 30 minute Pilates with Kristen McGee

Wednesday: 6 mile hike. 1 hour bouldering at the climbing gym pm

Thursday: 1 hour Core and Cardio gym session with gym buddy. 

Friday: Watching kids and babies all day

Saturday: 30 minute Peloton full body strength, 10 minute postnatal Rehab, 5 minutes stretching 

The highlight of the week was definitely going to the climbing gym.  It was so fun to do bouldering again! I used to go climbing with Andy when we first met.  I was never a very good climber but I was always a very enthusiastic climber.  I would love to get back into climbing (of the indoor, bouldering variety.  I am too old and have too little time to faff around on rocks)

Sleep

My time log says 7.2 hours of sleep a night.  BUT, most of my sleep is consecutive now, which is great.  The kids have been exhausted from life, which has meant early bedtimes (7pm) and the babies are being their usual great bedtime babies.  

Now is probably the bedtime era I will look back on fondly in the future.  Except for the part where we spend an hour and a half putting kids to bed and tidying the house every evening. I might not look fondly back on that.  

"What is life like with 3 kids under 5?" - the google search that gave me no answers to a question I didn't need to ask.

Before we went for a 3rd kid I spent a lot of time googling "What is life like with 3 under 5?" and reading stories and blogs.  Most people seemed to be stay at home moms, or worked part time.  Most were also writing when their youngest was 2+ years old.  Every article or blog generally commented on craziness and chaos.  I distinctly remember one blogger writing "someone is always awake"

I'm not going to write some "What it's actually like!" post because if you want that experience just come stay at my house for a day or two.  

But I often think of the "someone is always awake" post.  Now that the twins are 9 months old, someone is definitely not always awake.  In fact, between 7:30pm and 5:30am, everyone under the age of 6 is generally asleep. From 10pm to 5am everyone is generally asleep.  The good thing is I don't get to choose a slightly later bedtime for myself and catch up on the other side (like I did when I was younger).  I just get to play around with how much sleep I actually need.  I'm thinking that in consecutive sleep I need just north of 7 hours.  I don't really need 8 hours.  I do very poorly on less than 6 hours.

As much as the phrase "someone is always awake" stuck with me, I think what I mostly observe is "someone is always preparing food, eating food, or cleaning up food"

From waking up at 5 to cleaning up dinner at 7pm there are around 5-6 kid meal and snack times.  The high chairs need wiping 5-6 times.  The floor needs sweeping.  The babies can crawl now, which means if we don't clean directly after meals they will try and snack on their own floor-based off-casts.  They have mats under their high chairs which we shake outside sometimes, but the seagulls know the sound of mat shaking and it's an actual feeding frenzy.  When we ate outside you could see the birds gathering on the garage roof.. watching.

Once a seagull started pecking at the dining room door after breakfast, I guess asking me to hurry up and clean?

On days where I have all 4 kids (which I still maintain is impossible, and I mostly do not even attempt) I realized it's easier if I make them all a packed lunch.  I am a person who packs lunches for at home.

FYI, I still LOVE our Planet Box Lunch boxes, as does everyone else I meet.

Earlier this week I took Isaac and the babies out with my dad.  We decided to go to a family friendly art gallery and cafe.  There was no parking.  With twins, parking is necessary.  I drove to the museum instead.  The museum was fun.  The museum cafe was terrible.  We visited a second cafe.  The second cafe did not have any high chairs.  We drove past a third cafe, which didn't have any parking, but did have high chairs.  We finally went to the cafe which had parking and high chairs, the same cafe we ate lunch at on Tuesday.  

Even when not packing and thinking about lunches I seem to spend my time thinking about cafes that have parking and high chairs.  Also, they have to have enough high chairs.  There's. a lovely family run italian cafe near us with two high chairs.  There's an awkward look when I walk in with twins and spot a baby in one of the high chairs. 

One high chair, for the purpose of cafe lunches with twins, is no high chairs.

It's 6:30am.  It's breakfast time.  What's breakfast like with four kids 5 and under?  Chaos.

Nora (top) and Audrey (bottom) enjoying some pasta

Sunday Update: Reading, Sports, Sleep

My brother left on Wednesday, which was also the first day of summer camp for Isaac.  He's in camp 2 days a week for the next 3 weeks.  Lilah is still in nursery 3 days a week. The house was suddenly very quiet.  The twins were suddenly on good form as well.  They dropped their 10:30am feed and I am suddenly free to leave them with Andy for bigger adventures... such as taking Isaac and Lilah out to a local open air museum for 4+ hours, which we did on Friday.  

The weather has been HOT and then slightly less hot.  It's hovering around 70 for the next week which is perfect for me.  Last week I did not want to cook anything because apparently 75 degree weather means my brain doesn't work and the last place I want to be is in the kitchen.  

Anyways.. 

Reading

I finished The Postcard and it was immensely good.  I bet it would be even better if I could read French.  I highly highly recommend this book and it will probably make a best read of the year book for me.  Next I have a paper copy of Sandwich by Catherine Newman, which I find hard to read because I do most of my reading at night and in bed when other people might not want me to have the light on.  Maybe I will borrow certain other people's reading lights.  I've also got a Libby copy of This Summer Will Be Different by Carly Fortune, but I haven't started it yet because Libby says I am first in line for The Wedding People by Alison Espach and I *really* want to read that next and I keep checking the app to see if it's available.  1st in line with 8 copies in use.  It must be coming soon right??

Sports

I got my office workout room back on Wednesday (this is another downside of a combined office/guest room/gym) and so I have done a tiny amount of sport this week!

Thursday: 15 minute Flash 15 with Jess Sims.  Turns out workout out when it's 75 degrees makes everything super hard.  This was also a super hard workout to do after not exercising for a week.  I probably should have moved back into it more slowly.

Saturday: 20 minute run.  20 minute Peloton arm workout with Robin Arzon.  Also, I feel like this instructor is kind of annoying.  I used to find her inspiring and endearing.  I'm so mildly and inconsequentially conflicted! I need to try some new instructors.  I finished with a 5 minute stretch.

I've got more excercise scheduled in for tomorrow and this week, so hopefully I will get some more sport/me time now.  Especially with childcare for the big kids 2 days this week.  If the twins continue their solid 8:30-9:30 nap I should be able to do at least some exercise on Tuesday and Wednesday morning.

Sleep

I have averaged 7.2 hours of sleep which seems low BUT I feel like it's been pretty good sleep.  I wake up naturally at 5am now, before the babies start making noise at 5:30.  Babies havent needed to get up until after 6am all week.  Fingers crossed this continues.  Kids are also going to sleep well at 7pm again, so everyone it my house mostly sleeps from 7 to 5, and I am aware of how good this is.  I don't feel like a sleep deprived mess all the time. Sometimes I don't have my first coffee until *after* breakfast! And most of the time I don't take ibuprofen and coffee as a first breakfast at 5am like I used to. 

Highlight of the week:

This week we went to an open day at our local fire station.  Fire and Police and Ambulance were there.  It was really really cool

Nora Police

Sometimes you just have to ask random people to take family photos because with this many kids there will never be a right time for a family photo.

Isaac and Lilah learn CPR from the friendly paramedic

Have you ever heard of or been to a Fire Station open day?  Is 75 degrees too hot for you or too cold? Have you read The Postcard?

Hello August!

August is basically "Summer" - which makes me feel oddly off kilter with my north american friends who are either finishing summer or part way through.  I am currently 1/3 through my first school summer, having finished almost two weeks.  Summer holidays are 22nd July to 4th September.  Also the sun suddenly came out in the last week of July so it really *feels* like the start of summer.  We ate ice cream! We got the paddling pool out! I switched from our 9 tog to our 4 tog duvet *yesterday*.  I have my fingers crossed that August will have a much nicer *summer* feel.

Fun things in August:

My dad is visiting! Hopefully we will go to a castle and take Isaac to the bank, which will check off one of my yearly goals.

Our nanny starts 2 days a week from August 20th.  I will actually have some days of full childcare for all the kids

Lilah's last day in Nursery.  Isaac started July 2019, and Lilah finishes August 2024. The twins are not going to nursery as we are getting a nanny.  It feels like a big deal to say goodbye to nursery after 5 years straight.

(as an aside - a few weeks ago Lilah painted the following set of pictures:

"she's pretty good at painting" Andy said.  "I should hope so - she has £30,000 of nursery tuition behind her" I said, and then reeled in shock at the expense of childcare. 

Things I am looking forward to in August:

Having childcare

Continuing Running

Getting my hair dyed (I'm going back to my natural color but using semi-perminant dye to do it... which I have definitely left too long between treatments)

Going out to lunch with Andy

Eating dinner outside

Visiting museums with the big kids - other adventures with the big kids

Meeting up with my far away good friend who is coming to visit

Eating ice cream in our garden

Continuing to read awesome books.

Take the kids to the library for their summer reading challenge

August Goals:

• Run one 5K
• Take the kids to the bank
• Purchase a pair of flattering shorts
• Continue to declutter things - re-open vinted shop
• Eat more fruits and vegetables
• Try not to stress about the following
• Having no friends (because I have a lot of time to fill and because other people are on different life/summer schedules, and sometimes meeting up just doesn't happen for a while)
• Organizing kid activities for all 4 kids.  It might just be too hard to enjoy all 4 by myself.
• Going back to work, work politics, things changing in work.  All these things may have happened, worrying will not affect any of these things.

I have a feeling August will go by quickly.  I'm back in work in September, with a "soft start" from around the 10th, but officially back from the 17th. I have a lot of thoughts about returning to work, but that will be for another post.  In the meantime, I should try to enjoy some of my last few weeks of maternity leave.  It's my last maternity leave ever.  And this is my last summer on maternity leave.  Even if I don't super enjoy watching lots of kids, hopefully I can enjoy this transitional time for the liminal space it is.

What are you excited about in August? Is August mid summer, end of summer, or start of summer for you?