When I wrote my day in the life post back in August, I mentioned that I wanted to try to do it again when Cooper was 8 months old and then again at 12 months. So I put it on my calendar to pick a day in December. Yesterday we didn't have any plans so I thought it would be a good day to document a day in our life.
7:30 am
My wake up time varies drastically every day depending on how well I slept the night before. I've been trying to get into a habit of getting up in the mornings and doing a short workout video before Cooper gets up and I've been doing pretty well. This morning however, I had woken up around 3:45 and was awake until a little after 5:00. So then I decided sleep was more important for getting through our day than working out and I slept until David's alarm went off. Then I quickly checked email and got up to get ready for Cooper. He was awake and moving around and talking in his crib, but I usually wait until 7:30 to get him up.
He is usually happy and ready to go in the mornings, but he has been having some grumpier days the past week so he took some time to warm up. Diaper changes have now turned into time to practice rolling over so we did some of that too. He mostly gets bottles now, but I still nurse him for the first feeding of the day. He'd probably be fine with a bottle then too, but I like that he still gets some breastmilk and it gives us a slower start to our day!
8:30 am
I put Cooper down on the floor in his room and go start a load of laundry. Usually he follows me now that he is crawling, but today I went back in there after I was done and he was playing with the stool in his room. So we played in his room a little and then headed to the living room.
I go into the hallway and call him and he comes crawling out. He followed me to the living room. We spent the next hour or so playing with his toys and bringing him back to the living room when he tried to get Lily's water bowl over and over! Then I made us some food for my breakfast and his morning snack.
9:30 am
Breakfast time! He starts with a puree (today was sweet potatoes and black beans) and then we usually share some scrambled eggs. He also had a Apple, Banana, Carrot muffin. And he ate all of it. After he ate, we went to his room and did our Advent song for the day.
10:00 am
Naptime! Cooper is usually ready for a nap right around 10:00. So I put him in his sleep sack (with his arms unswaddled), sing him a couple songs and put him in his crib. He usually falls asleep easily and today was no exception. Then I hit the ground running with chores. I did the dishes from breakfast, made sure we had everything ready for dinner, updated our calendar in the kitchen so it's finally December, and caught up on some emails. I never know how long Cooper is going to sleep--usually it's about 40-45 minutes, but sometimes it's longer. He was still asleep at 11:00, so I decided to try to get some of our Christmas shopping done online. I ordered gifts for our niece and nephew. Around 11:25, Cooper started stirring and was sitting up talking in his crib. I was just finishing checking out online so I left him for a minute since he was happy. Around 11:30 I went to make his bottle since he seemed up and ready to go. By the time I was done, he was laying really still and I realized he had fallen back asleep! So I worked on a few things on my blog and waited for him to wake up. When he was still asleep at noon, I decided maybe I should do a day in the life post every day since Cooper seems to show off for them and take super long naps! He just wants the world to know that he's really easy to take care of ;)
12:30 pm
I finally woke Cooper up from his nap around 12:30. He was a little groggy at first, but as soon as he saw his bottle he was ready to eat! We have switched to feeding him formula for all of his feedings except for the one nursing session in the morning. At his last weight check he had fallen to the 3rd percentile and with all of his difficulties sucking and latching we just felt like he wasn't getting enough when he was nursing and he loves bottles so it was an easy switch for him. We had tried doing bottles instead of nursing back in July but it was really hard for him. Now that he is eating more foods, the formula wasn't as hard on his stomach and he is able to handle the pace of bottle feeding better. A lot of days we are out and about at this time--meeting friends for lunch or going to swim lessons or running errands. But today we were home, so he got a bottle and then we headed to the living room and kitchen.
1:00 pm
It's time for another round of homemade purees for Cooper. I should have worked on this while he was sleeping, but since it has to steam for a very specific amount of time I am hesitant to start it when I think he's about to wake up. So I waited and made them once he was awake. I decided to try a few new flavors this time, so today I made Mango + Kale and Blackberry + Kale + Apple purees (recipes from the Baby Foode website--one of my favorite resources!). Cooper played in the living room for a few minutes, but quickly found his way into the kitchen with me; and Lily is always in the kitchen with me--so here's a view of my 2 "helpers" and the apples I was cutting up on the counter.
1:30 pm
I typically eat lunch either while we are out or when Cooper is napping, but because his nap ran late he was awake for lunch time which meant I got to share with him. I had leftover chicken pot pie soup from the dinner the night before. Cooper ate quite a bit of the chicken and vegetables from my soup--as you can tell he's pretty happy about eating!
2:00 pm
After lunch, Cooper got a diaper and clothing change. Since we were heading out to run errands and it was cold outside, I put him in a pair of fleece footed pajamas for the rest of the day and he was nice and cozy. We went to pick up a prescription for me and then off to the post office. I needed to send in a return from something I bought online and buy stamps for our Christmas cards. Luckily the line went pretty quickly and I ended up buying the last of their Christmas stamps! Cooper smiled and entertained all of the people in line with us.
3:15 pm
After errands we came home for Cooper's nap. Usually he takes 3 naps a day that are all about an hour or less and then he eats after each nap. Since his first nap lasted so long, I kept him awake a little longer for his second nap because I knew we wouldn't have time for 3. So I went ahead and gave him another bottle before his nap so he didn't go too long without eating. He took his bottle and then we followed our naptime routine and he was down and asleep pretty quickly. Then I went back to clean up the kitchen from our morning/lunch. I put away all of the dishes I had used to make his baby food and wiped down the counters. I also put the lids on all of the jars I use for his food and separated them into the fridge and freezer
4:00 pm
Cooper was still asleep, so I settled in with a Hallmark Christmas movie and our Christmas tree lights and got to work addressing our Christmas cards. Cooper (of course) took another long nap, so I was able to get all of our cards addressed, stuffed, and stamped while he was asleep!
5:00 pm
I put spaghetti squash in the oven to roast for dinner and then got Cooper up a little after 5:00 so that he didn't nap too late and mess up bedtime. I have never in 8 months had to wake him up from 2 naps in 1 day-- I even took his temperature after this nap to make sure he wasn't sick! No fever, but just in need of some extra rest, which is totally fine. I'm just glad it was on a day when we had no plans so he could sleep more. After his nap, he had a little bottle and then we played in the living room. This picture perfectly sums up a lot of his life right now. First-- when you put Cooper down on the floor, 95% of the time the first thing he does is find a pacifier and put it in his mouth. Second--his favorite game is to climb on me. He loves pulling up his knees and even his feet and be right next to me. I am all for the snuggles and enjoy these moments of not chasing him down!
6:00 pm
David got home a little after 6:00 and I put the finishing touches on dinner. We had spaghetti squash with meatballs and spinach salad. It's always nice to sit down as a family and eat dinner together. We try to do this every night right now and it's just a fun time together. At dinner we usually just give Cooper parts of whatever we are eating and skip the purees so that we're not feeding him the whole time. Last night he had bite size pieces of meatballs and seemed to be a pretty big fan of them.
7:00 pm
Playtime with daddy! Cooper was enjoying practicing his standing between Daddy's legs. A lot of nights Cooper is tired around 7:00, but this night he was still pretty awake since he had napped so much. So we had a little longer playtime on the living room floor. Then a bottle around 7:30 and bedtime. Bedtime routine is pretty much the same as nap, we just have daddy around too! David gets Cooper changed and dressed for bed and then I rock him and sing 2 songs to him and then we say prayers and put him down.
8:00 pm
Wednesday nights are our unofficial date night in. We usually try to stay away from TV since we watch a lot of that most nights--so we typically use this time to talk through different things, listen to podcasts together or do an online course we're working through. But we hadn't watched any Christmas movies yet this season, so we decided to make that our date night activity. We found a Netflix original Christmas movie that had good ratings and was only an hour and a half (score!) and settled in to watch. It was a cheesy romantic Christmas movie, but was a lot of fun.
10:30 pm
Most nights I am asleep by 9:00 or 9:30, but we stayed up to watch the movie and then I read a little before going to sleep. I took this right before I drifted off-- time for bed!
And that's a look at a day in our life--still somewhat unpredictable. I've thought about doing a more set schedule, but we both do fine with things how they are. Life is definitely full and fun at this stage with Cooper!
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