Saturday in the Life

This weekend is totally not normal so let's do a day in the life!

5:00am - Wake up, think about getting up, fall back asleep

6:30am - Wake up again. Toddlers are shouting from next door.  Andy says he will get them up if I sort breakfast.  Sorting breakfast means I can make coffee so this sounds good

7:00am - Breakfast for all. It's peanut butter on toast.

7:30am - Get toddlers dressed

8:00am - Andy and Ezra leave for an overnight adventure(!!).  Solo parenting 75% of the kids commences.

8:15am - I take Lily, Aubrey & Clara to the store to pick up some hats I ordered and some bagels and some other random things.

I'm taking part in a research study about the mobility impacts of having twins.  Part of this study is recording things that happen in a day which make getting out harder.  Going to the supermarket is a perfect example.  I shop at a supermarket that has parent parking spaces near the door.  The hardest part of going to the store is finding a twin trolley:

I end up leaving the twins and Lily in the car while I walk around the car park looking for the twin trolly. This store usually has at least 3 but they can be hard to find - they have two red seats up front rather than one.

I see the twin trolly in the car park and collect it.

8:40am - Shopping done

We normally get grocery delivery because there isn't really room to do a family shop once you have a family in a trolly.

8:50am - Drop off groceries at home and quick toilet stop for Lily.

9:05am - drive to imagination play center for 9:15 booking.  Park in car park and pay for parking before realizing that the first 2 hours were free and I wasted £4 for parking I didn't need to pay for.  In my defense, that parking machine had a lot of words and I can't really pay attention to anything and I'm so used to paying for parking now that I just... paid.

9:15am - Imagination Play! It's raining and the twin pram does not fit through the door of the building.  So I have to get the twins out, thankfully another parent helps me get the twins in with Lily.  

Imagination play has lots of cute areas for the kids like a disco room, a pretend hairdresser, a firetruck room, and a play shop and play kitchen area.

11:00am - Leave imagination play center and head home.  Getting out becomes really tricky when I remembered I need to put the pram outside (in the rain) before I can get the twins in it

This is actually the first place I've been where my twin folding pram doesn't fit through the door - since the pram is the size of a standard wheelchair I am usually OK.  However, in older buildings it's not mandatory to have wheelchair access... but this entry is especially bad.

11:20am - Get home, serve scrambled eggs and strawberries and pitta bread for lunch.

11:50am - toddler nap time

12:00pm - Tidy downstairs, clean up lunch mess.  Take out compost, put laundry in dryer. Eat random things. Put away groceries.

12:45pm - Eat my own lunch (beans and rice and sauteed red peppers) then make a fruit salad with Lily to take to dinner

1:00pm - Read a story to Lily, almost fall asleep, make a cup of tea, start a film 

2:15pm - Toddlers awake! Remember I haven't brushed my teeth yet and do that.  Also floss.  Then get toddlers downstairs for snack (yogurt and cereal) before getting ready to leave

2:55pm - Drive to a friends house who has invited us for dinner (I did say this was crazy many times and gave her many chances to cancel!) I said we would arrive at 3. 

3:00pm - Realize I forgot the fruit salad I said I would bring, turn around and drive home

3:25pm - Arrive at friends house only 25 minutes late.  They have a 2 year old and a 4 year old (same age as Lily) and it was only mildly controlled chaos.  19 month olds are such chaos.

6:10pm - Leave friends house in total disarray after very enjoyable play date and dinner.  These are fairly new friends and I really hope that I didn't ruin this friendship by having chaos twins at their house. I can also count on one hand the number of time the twins have had dinner not at our house.  All in all it went well!

6:30pm - Arrive home, get twins changed for bed.  Bedtime for twins

7:00pm - Twins in bed, bedtime for Lily

7:30pm - Lily asleep, go downstairs to sort out the chaos of the day

7:45pm - Chaos can wait, first eat cheese on crackers.  Then get laundry from dryer, empty dishwasher, put out bag of dirty nappies, tidy and hoover downstairs.

8:15pm - That's better

8:30pm - sit down and write blog post!

And that's... a day! A day of solo parenting!  Tomorrow I don't have big plans for the morning but I'm thinking a park with a coffee shop. We've been invited to a friends house (I mean, is it "invited" if I say "OMG I have all the kids please help please can I come over?") for the afternoon, although not for dinner (because they are not crazy).  We will probably do packed lunch for dinner (ham sandwiches?) and then Andy and Ezra will be home around 9pm and I will have survived 36 hours of solo parenting 3 under 5!

I wonder if this weekend would feature in this NYT book of 36 hour weekends in European cities? 

This book is 100% for DINK couples and I 100% wanted it when we were a DINK couple.