14 Jun
DITL: Last Laundry Day in Chicago
7:45 am. I gather up the laundry and take it downstairs.
8:10 am. T1 is awake. I get him dressed because we are meeting up with friends and taking pictures.
9:05 am. It takes us close to an hour to get 4 kids and 2 adults out the door and down the street a few blocks to this little secret garden area next to Lake Shore drive. The light is stunning and the pictures turn out really beautiful!
9:57 am. We make it back to the apartment with only minor melt-downs from the kids. I wash my feet.
10:09 am. T1 goes down to the babysitter. It’s only a dozen floors down, but he insists that I wheel him in the stroller.
10:18 am. I head downstairs to move the laundry from the washer to the dryer.
10:58 am. I make myself brunch. My favorite smoothie as of late. While I drink it down, I work on my Brit Lit class.
2:18pm. When I pick up T1, he tries to steal a toy from his friend. This is an everyday occurrence, but when I politely ask him to give it back he immediately does so.
2:21 pm. Back at the apartment he finds an electronic device to play with. No surprise there.
2:23 pm. I attack the pile of laundry. I can’t remember when I went down to collect it. Maybe while T1 was at the babysitter’s place?
2:48 pm. My caped crusader (he wants to have that blanket tied around him like that all the time) comes in to help me by jumping on my just-folded piles.
3:11 pm. While I finish putting the laundry away, his eyes droop lower and lower as he plays on the iPad.
3:32 pm. I make myself a salad while he naps. I work on my Brit Lit class some more.
5:47 pm. He is awake, and we go down to the resident office to turn something in. I’m impressed with the direction they are taking the remodeling. On the left you can see one side of the hallway, and on the right you can see the other side (the old version).
6:00 pm. He eats dinner. T1 is unhappy with how quickly I am responding to his demands for milk. (See the sippy cup in the foreground? It’s water and he doesn’t want that.)
6:39 pm. I round all of the necessary items up, and we head out for a trip to the park and the grocery store. I try to get out for a daily evening walk when the weather warms up.
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7:05 pm. We stop at the park and play on the swings.
7:26 pm. He is tired of riding, and wants to be the one pushing now.
7:53 pm. We come out of the grocery store with carrots and frozen fruit and milk for my daily morning smoothie.
8:20 pm. Time for a bath.
8:39 pm. While dad watches him splash away, I attack the dishes in the sink. Thank goodness we have a dishwasher.
8:55 pm. There go those droopy eyes again. We get him dressed, turn on the white noise, sing “twinkle twinkle” and put him in bed. I play on my computer until it’s bedtime for me as well.
I'm a farm-raised almost-crunchy stroller-pushing picture-taking lifestyle-blog-writing gastronomy-obsessed divine-seeking thrift-store-combing cheese-inhaling pavement-pounding laughter-sprinkling lover of individuality and taking chances.
Do you eat dinner with your son or husband? What about lunch? I was surprised that you ate your salad while T1 napped. I always eat breakfast and lunch with R and have a snack while he has dinner so it feels like something we do together. Tell me more about mealtimes - I love hearing about how other moms do it.
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Piper Reply:
June 14th, 2012 at 8:52 pm
Just answering as another rmom since you said you were interested
I eat meals with my kids most of the time but there are days (like today) when I eat while they are asleep simply because it is lovely to have a quiet meal where I can do my own thing and not have the constant barrage of questions and requests for things 
I didn’t even notice the no toys in the stroller thing because my own kids do not take toys in the stroller unless they are teething and need something to chew on-they are too busy watching and pointing at things
My little girl is nine months and she chewed a toy the entire time we were walking but aside from the chewing, she paid no attention to it. There were birds to watch and water to stare at and wind blowing the leaves and grasses to wave to 
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Also I see that T1 has no toys in the stroller. Does he not get bored without anything to play with during his stroller rides? I need to bring several toys with us when we go out and about.
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2Aw, I love the photo of T1 jumping on your folding clothes
It reminded me so much of my oldest son “helping” with the laundry when he was younger-when he was done climbing around on my folded clothes, he would put them back in the basket since rumpled unfolded clothes belonged in the basket LOL He was too cute :p He is almost seven now and his laundry help is grabbing the folded clothes and putting them away 
They grow up quick!!!
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3I was surprised by this as well… maybe it just didn’t get photographed?
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4I see that T1 is sleeping on the futon! That’s great. Are you doing a Montessori type approach for his room? I know the bed that toddlers can manuver themselves are a big part of that.
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5I also was surprised you didn’t read books to him. I know you have discussed his developmental delays in the past and readIng books is great for speech development. Also, (and I’m not trying to sound snarky here) but could he possibly try to bring toys home because he doesn’t have any? I’m not saying you need to bring home all of Toys-r-us, but some puzzles and books and toy cars would be nice. We keep 2 fabric bins in our living room, one for books and one for toys. I also keep a big plastic container in her closet with toys that we can roatate them when she gets bored.
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