Monday

5:30 a.m.: Chet's alarm goes off.  He gets up, gets dressed for work, goes downstairs to eat breakfast, and leaves the house before any of us emerge.
6:00 a.m.: My alarm goes off.  I press the 9-minute snooze button.  (Isn't that a crazy word -- snooze?)
6:05 a.m.: Lorelei wakes up and I drag myself out of bed to feed her.

After Lorelei eats, we retreat to the master bedroom so I can make the bed, put on my contacts, etc.  Lorelei plays on the rug under the windows.  Now that we sold our old living room furniture, there is more "play" room in the master bedroom, what with our coffee table out of the house instead of in our bedroom.

This is what the room looked like in October 2011.  I need to take a more recent picture...of this and of our new living room set up...

We go downstairs so I can make coffee, and Lorelei plays on the floor.  After a while of playing quietly by herself, she starts to squawk, so I sit on the floor with her and we read a book.  She gets even more cranky, so I take her back upstairs to put her back to bed.

7:35 a.m.: Lorelei is asleep.

At this point I should deal with some laundry or dishes or mail or something, but instead I blog, and come up with this brilliant idea.

8:00 a.m.-ish (because I ignore her for a while): Sydney wakes up, but I continue to frantically blog.
8:30 a.m.: I finally get Sydney out of bed.

Sydney and I read a book together before breakfast.  This is new.  As much as I love to read, I feel like we don't do enough structured reading with the girls.  So this is a new goal of mine: to read with Sydney (and Lorelei too, if she's awake) first thing in the morning.

9:00 a.m.: I serve breakfast to Sydney while Lorelei continues to nap.  Sydney scarfs down her leftover oatmeal (yes, leftover), but balks at the turkey sausage links and the strawberries.  Therefore, MY breakfast is two-and-a-half turkey sausage links and strawberries.  And a piece of burnt toast (don't worry, I like it sort of burnt).

9:06 a.m.: Lorelei wakes up (in a good mood -- thank goodness) from her nap, and I bring her downstairs to play for a few minutes while Sydney finishes breakfast.

After Syd and the breakfast dishes are clean, we all head upstairs to get dressed for the gym.  By this time it's about 9:30 a.m.  We finally get out the door just before 10 a.m.  In the car, before we even leave the base (the gym is off base), Sydney gets mad at me because I can't understand what she's saying, and I yank the car off the road to readjust her attitude.  The look on my face must have scared her, because I didn't have to do much "readjusting" in order for her to clean up her act.

10:25 a.m.: We arrive at the gym, where I run three miles on the treadmill.  I need to run WAY more than that WAY more often, because I've for sure decided to run a half marathon this year.  The race is the Saturday after Thanksgiving.
11:25 a.m.: I pick the girls up from the gym daycare and we head to the library.  Lorelei screams for the first two minutes after I strap her into her carseat...every single time.  Usually, thankfully, she snaps out of it.
11:30 a.m.: Arrive at the library.  Sydney insists on me taking her picture with the big bear every time we go.

12:10 p.m.: Leave the library for home.
12:20 p.m.: Lorelei falls asleep in the car.
12:25 p.m.: We arrive home and Sydney and I get out of the car.  Lorelei gets to stay in the car (with the engine running) to finish her nap.  I don't mess with naps.

Sydney acts a little crazy during lunch and nap preparation.  Chet is home for lunch during this time too.  Usually he has physical therapy right after lunch on Mondays, but this week his physical therapy is Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday. 

1:20 p.m.: Sydney goes down for a nap.  Blessed silence.
1:25 p.m.: Lorelei is awake from her car nap.  She is in a good mood.
1:35 p.m.: The lady I sold our jogging stroller to stops by to pick up her purchase.  This was a great stroller.  We sold it because we have a double jogging stroller now, and haven't used this one since before Lorelei was born.  (This is a picture of Sydney, by the way.)

After the nice lady leaves, Lorelei plays while I tend to dishes and eat a quick lunch.  She starts squeak-squawking (Chet's phrase), so I sit with her on the floor and we play together.  I am trying to get better at "being present" with the girls, instead of constantly rushing around, doing chores.  It is hard for me to just sit still, especially when I know there's a never-ending list of things that need accomplishing.  So we played, but I still snuck in a little laundry.

Did you notice Lorelei's necklace? It is made of Baltic Amber, and is supposed to help with teething pain. (You can read more about that here.)

3:20 p.m.: Lorelei is acting cranky, so I attempt to put her down for another nap.
3:25 p.m.: Lorelei is rolling around, awake, in her crib.  Chet arrives home.  (Yes, I am fully aware of how blessed we are regarding Chet's work schedule, especially since he is supposed to be on deployment right now.  We do our best to cherish this time together, and to not take advantage of a single minute.)
3:30 p.m.: I (finally) take my post-gym shower.
3:40 p.m.: Chet gets Sydney up from her nap and saves Lorelei from the confines of her crib (she never fell asleep).  Sydney is royally cranky.

Sydney watches "Barney" as she wakes up, and randomness ensues until Lorelei decides she's finally ready for a nap at 4:50 p.m.

Once Lorelei is asleep, I come downstairs and start cleaning up the kitchen/preparing dinner.  Sydney plays on the kitchen floor with her Aquadoodle.  Chet is on eBay, monitoring the watches he put up for sale yesterday.  Sydney gets mad that I am not giving her my undivided attention, so Chet rescues both of us and entertains her until dinner is on the table.

5:30 p.m.: Commence dinner.  I am happy because it is "leftover night", which means very little preparation on my part.  We ate chicken noodle casserole last night and tonight.

5:35 p.m.: Lorelei wakes up from her evening nap.
5:52 p.m.: I abandon Chet to work on this blog post.  Two minutes later I hear Lorelei spew yogurt everywhere, so I should go help him...instead, I blog until 6:21 p.m., while he finishes cleaning up the kids and the kitchen.  What a good man!

Yes, Sydney is in the baby walker.

6:22 p.m.: It is raining outside, and Chet and I know the rest of the evening will not be pretty unless there is a change of scenery, so we pack up and drive to the NEX.  We often go to the NEX when we need something easy to do.
7:15 p.m.: Arrive home.  We checked out the DVD "The Princess and the Frog" at the library, so we decide to start watching that since we can't go on a walk outside or anything.
8:00 p.m.: Sydney has a meltdown because she realizes I'm sitting in her chair.

(This picture was taken at a happier time.  Just wanted you to know which chair I was talking about.)

8:35 p.m.: We head upstairs for bed.
8:45 p.m.: Sydney is in bed.
9:10 p.m.: Lorelei is in bed/asleep.
9:15 p.m.: I sit down at the computer.

Whew!  I'm not sure all seven blog posts this week will be like this.  Perhaps I'll do something a little different, format-wise, each day.  Hopefully this didn't bore anyone to tears--thanks for reading!