This is such a bizarre and scary time now for the world. Everywhere you turn, there is bad news and startling information emerging, and more uncertainty than anything else. We are 8 weeks in to this ‘new normal’ of being socially distant/quarantined and it still feels surreal. Add in the rough times we’ve had, losing Mike’s mom, trying to support his dad from afar, and preparing for Baby #3, and it could be just too stressful all around and not at all enjoyable.

And yet, that isn’t the case for us. Not to say we don’t feel for those who are hurting or suffering or stressed. We certainly do and we have so many friends and loved ones we check in on, and we feel the weight of it all on a constant basis. But–call it looking at the silver linings, or appreciating the many blessings and resources we do have…we are holding up pretty well in our little corner of the world.

We are lucky in so many ways…that we have live-in child care to watch our tiny people while we work. This time would be a NIGHTMARE without Suelen. I honestly don’t know how we would do it. We are also lucky to be in an area where groceries can still be delivered same-day, meaning we literally have to go nowhere for critical items. I have gone out in public for 2 doctor’s appts and one shot at CVS–and that is it. Mike and I both have secure jobs that are relatively easy to do from home. So we are very, very lucky.

We are enjoying slowing down, staying home, and savoring our little ladies before we add a newborn in the mix (oh the fun! and sweetness! and the exhaustion! and the work!). We are enjoying our lazy, commute-free mornings with all four of us piled in our bed. I love that I can pop down at lunch and get a sneak attack hug from Vivi or do a quick watercolor painting with Caroline. I can take work calls while walking Finny in the sunshine at 2 pm. And when it’s Quittin’ Time at 5 pm, I commute downstairs, grab the kiddos, and we scooter off to the park before coming home for dinner, books, bath, and bed. Then Mike and I relax together watching funny shows and talking about how he thinks this baby is coming any minute. Of course, some days are harder than others, but we are genuinely enjoying this time in our lives.

A Typical Day for Us During Quarantine:

7:30 am: Vivi makes noises over the monitor and Mike brings her into bed with us. She immediately squawks for the little Russian stacking dolls we got in St. Petersburg on our Baltic Sea cruise and she sits there playing with them quietly. Her hair looks crazy, especially in the morning. She has a lovely Quarantine Mullet.

7:40 am: Caroline makes noises from her crib and we bring her into the mix too. Usually she arrives with a few stuffed animals–some for her and others (the ones she finds less-desirable) for Vivi to snuggle. Popular choices are Puppy, Mermaid Baby, Waddle Waddle, and Grass Stain. Usually Mike and I have to get involved with these in some fashion. On this particular morning, Mike was tasked with putting a diaper on Unicorn. (I got out of the job by pretending to still be asleep.)

8:00 am: We get up and start getting the girls ready for the day. This particular day, I decided it would be Ballet Thursday 🙂 Because why not? The girls got dressed in leotards and ballet shoes and then Vivi had Mike read her current favorite book, Pout Pout Fish. Her other current favorite is Brown Bear and the interactive aquarium book is still hot and heavy in the rotation.

8:15 am: I head into the bathroom to get ready while Mike takes Finny out. My little shadows follow me. They like to do alll the things I do. Brush teeth with me, put on lotion, “do makeup” and use chapstick and drag out 219393 hair product bottles and leave them on the bathroom floor.

Other days, the choice morning activity is trying on all the shoes or hats in my closet. Whatever whim comes over Caroline! Caroline does like her clothes to match Vivi. She will usually ask me, “can I make a match with Vivi if I choose this?” or “What are you putting Vivi in?”

8:30 am: Suelen comes upstairs and starts her work day. She takes the kids down for breakfast while I finish getting ready, make the bed, and put away all the things they have dragged out. Mike usually grabs a cup of coffee and heads down to the basement to start his work day. The girls feed Finny and set their sights on breakfast. They both like to make their own waffles–even Vivi. They drag over their little chairs to the toaster and get to work.

Vivi literally eats as much (often more) than me at breakfast.

9:00 am: I eat breakfast with them and Caroline dishes out all of my vitamins for the day–my prenatals, iron pills, and allergy pill. She loves this job and does NOT like when we skip it. Future pharmacist?

I then head back up to the master bedroom, where my office is situated, to start my work day. Sometimes my esteemed co-worker joins me for a few minutes and I can’t complain! She is cheerful and always gets the job done on time and on budget.

9:30-Noon: I work upstairs, Mike works downstairs, and Suelen takes the girls on the grandest adventures. She is absolutely wonderful with them. They go to parks, nature centers, soccer fields. They ride scooters, blow bubbles, play soccer, have picnics, and throw rocks in the water. Suelen sends me pictures like this all morning long and I am so grateful that they have this time just to play–the highest form of learning!

Ahh, yes, another quarantine trend has been Caroline digging out hand-me-down wedding dresses from the back of her closet and wearing them for everyday activities. Again-why not?? It’s not like she is going to be in a wedding anytime soon!

One day I pulled out old baby bottles while I was prepping for Baby #3. I thought Caroline would like to use them for her babies. (She has been very into her babies recently—we even ordered baby doll clothes so her babies could have outfits. She was so happy when they arrived!) But then Vivi got her hands on one of the baby bottles and instantly loved regressing back to bottles…so away those went!

Caroline selected this lovely Christmas dress for Vivi to wear. She might as well, since we spend a LOT of time during Quarantine asking Alexa to play Jingle Bells, asking about Frosty the Snowman, and wondering why Santa needs a belt. Christmas is welcome anytime at our house!

Noon: The crew returns home from their adventures and sometimes we have lunch outside on the little table. It is so fun to have this mid-day break with the little ladies! Here they are in their new matching outfits, courtesy of the Easter Bunny 😉

1:00-5:00 pm: Suelen puts the girls down for their nap and I head back up to do work. Every now and then, Vivi has a hard time falling asleep so I go in, pull her out of her crib, and snuggle her in the rocking chair until she can fall asleep on her own. She always pulls the blankets over her and she lays her head on my shoulder. It’s little moments like this when I really love being home.

Vivi usually wakes up first from naptime and sometimes I pop downstairs to see what she’s up to. It’s always adorable. Suelen is working her way through Vivi’s closet, making sure she gets a chance to wear all the adorable clothes before she outgrows them. Suelen is also quite the face painter:

Soon she’s joined by Big Sister waking up from naptime, and the fun & antics continue…Cosmic Kids Yoga has been a great success–especially on rainy days–and Caroline is very familiar with saying “Ma-ma-stay!”

This IKEA watercolor kit has been one of the best items in our house. We got it as a gift I think and I would order 100 more to have ready for kiddie birthday gifts once we start going to parties again (remember those??)

These two spend a LOT of time together in the bathroom. Sisterly bonding time?

5:00 pm: Quittin’ Time! I head downstairs. Mike usually is done too, unless it’s a teaching night. Caroline and Vivi have a snack. On this particular day it was graham crackers and peanut butter, which Caroline made all by herself while Vivi supervised…

We take Finny out and then hop on scooters for some fresh air. We walk to the park and of course stop to say hi to the lions…

Photo courtesy of Caroline:

Mike living the dream!

We fly the butterfly kite that the Easter Bunny brought Caroline:

While Vivi practices her Hollywood starlet look:

We inspect the plants Mike and Caroline planted, enjoy playing with bubbles, making button necklaces, and relaxing on the steps…

Vivi makes a few important calls to her agent…

6:00 pm: We all have dinner together. Usually Mike cooks, I prep the girls’ plates, and we all eat at the same time. Caroline sometimes asks everyone questions of the day that directly refer to things we have done very recently. For example, after we had a rowdy game pretending that bees escaped from a hive, she asked, “What was your favorite thing you did playing with me in the basement when you threw the (stuffed) bees at me?” It is really funny. Our dinner conversations are pretty entertaining, and overall, mealtimes are fun, except that Vivi still throws her milk cup on the ground a thousand times.

One night my sweet boss dropped off tacos for everyone and these two were in heaven!

Another night, a coworker brought by some smoothies that were a HUGE hit! My friends and coworkers have showered us with very thoughtful food gifts when we lost Mike’s mom. Caroline got used to having desserts every night (since people included them with the meals they gave us) and started asking each night, “so what are my dessert choices that your sweet co-workers brought us?”

7:00 pm: We put Vivi down for bed and sometimes let Caroline stay up later. On this particular night, we had Popsicles on the porch and she happened to climb into an empty cardboard box we had out for recycling and wanted to drag it inside to make her own car. She colored it with her Mr. Sketch markers, added buttons for her “instrument panel,” and requested a steering wheel that really turned. She also insisted on driving the car to Brazil, with all of her newly-outfitted babies, “because it’s funny.”

Other times we will play Hide and Seek where Caroline and Mike hide on the couch and I come sit on her, then act super surprised. She looooves this game. Also, as extra incentive to keep her undies dry, she gets to go on a marshmallow hunt at the end of the night. She loves finding the marshmallow in the little bag after I play hot and cold with her to find it.

There has been no shortage of snuggles with Pooh Bear:

Nor has there been a shortage of wedding dress wearing, puddle splashing fun!

7:30-8:00 pm: Bath (sometimes, but rarely, since Suelen usually does this during the day), jammies, books, and bed. Mike and I are usually both helping move Caroline along, since she is so hard for me to lift into her crib. We usually read 3 books and whenever she convinces me to lay on her floor for the books, I end up falling asleep (while she just hangs out, awake next to me) so now we try to stick to reading in the glider in her room. Books Caroline chooses over and over: Library Lion, Sisters First, Tinka the Dog, The Brave Princess, Rosie Revere, Engineer, I Wanna Be A Cowgirl, and The Brave Princess. Regardless of the book situation, 95% of the time we have LIGHTS OUT and children quiet (if not sleeping) by 8 pm.

On rare occasions, I will let Caroline stay up later and sneak her into my room for a special activity. This is still tricky because she loses her mind when the special activity is over and she has to go to bed. But while it lasts, it is sweet and memory-making and lovely. One night, I pulled her into my bed to watch the 1996 US Womens Gymnastics team win Olympic gold. She loved it and asked good questions (“Why aren’t they wearing any pants??”) and showed me some of her own sweet moves. Another time, we pulled up a video of Ms. Michele, her preschool teacher, doing yoga, and Caroline got to follow along.

About once a week, Caroline has a Zoom session with her preschool friends. Once day the activity was for all the children to do play dough during the call. Caroline announced she made a drink (she likes cramming the play dough into these tiny cups) and told everyone it was WINE. I joked with the teachers that there has been NO wine at our house for 8.5 months and Caroline interrupted me to say, “Mommy, this wine is not for you…you cant have any because of the baby. It’s for me because it’s my favorite drink.” So there’s that…

One night she was really good (and had taken a long nap) so we let her watch a Pete the Cat show. I think Mike enjoyed it more than she did because she wanted to sit with him and hold hands:

8:15 pm: Mike and I are done with kid things for the night, hooray! We sometimes sit outside, drink mocktails, play Rummikub, joke about funny things the kids did, talk about how we should pack a hospital bag, watch Mad Men on TV (or Parks & Rec, depending on our moods), eat ice cream, and hang out. There is nothing really to plan, or organize, since we have no events to attend. I didn’t realize how much time I spent before on those sorts of things. Rarely do we have to go back upstairs for kiddie issues (thank goodness) and we almost never have to keep doing work. So it is a very relaxing part of our day.

Quarantine, you are a very odd time indeed, but while we have to do this, we will certainly make the best of it!