Well, relative silence. The radio is playing softly in the background.
Ella and Miles are both napping at the same time and I am holding neither of them! It’s a wonderful, glorious feeling. I got dishes washed, dinner in the crockpot, my lunch made and eaten while still warm. Oh, and used the bathroom BY MYSELF. Truly miraculous, I assure you.
I had a bit of a revelation last night and this morning. By the time Aaron got home from work, I was physically and emotionally at the end of my rope. My responses to any and all situations or questions were way out of proportion and I physically felt drugged. It was horrible. Aaron whisked Ella off to bed and I crawled into my own with Miles. Amazingly enough, he worked through Angry Baby Time with record speed and was out like a light by 8 pm! Instead of fulfilling my desire to stay up and do something for myself like read, knit, or watch tv on hulu.com, I turned off the lights and went to sleep.
This morning, I was able to get up without falling back to sleep for a few minutes. We ran errands to the local butcher shop and farmer’s market this morning, all before 10 am! Dinner is perking away in the crockpot with fresh pork chops and produce harvested locally and I was able to prep it while soothing Miles and involving Ella in the cooking process. The kids were the only ones to fall asleep during nap time, so now I am rewarded with a real lunch to be consumed while sitting down.
I need to remember that meeting my physical needs, no matter how desperately I crave some solo time, always has to come first. If I get enough sleep and eat appropriately, I am a better mom to my kids, a better wife to my husband, but most importantly I am better to myself.
And this picture has nothing to do with the topic of this post, but I find it super cute. I hear Ella calling from the kitchen for me to bring her the salt because she’s cooking. I was a bit alarmed, thinking she might be getting into something dangerous. Instead, this is what I found:
Mmmmmmm baby. Yumyumyum!