I can tell Mom Life has infiltrated my brain because I’ve found myself thinking of Mondays and Wednesdays as “Preschool Days” rather than random weekdays. Since we missed a bit of school thanks to Chase overcoming a cold and potty training, he seemed more amped than ever to see his beloved teachers and play with his buddies yesterday morning.
“Preschool Day” began bright and early for me. I woke up and ate two pieces of a frittata along with a banana to fuel me through my first stint of work at the computer for the day.
Chase was up around 7 a.m. and the two of us spent the morning reading stories, playing around the house and assembling a new stool for Chase to use so he can wash his hands all by himself after he goes to the bathroom.
His “special stool” served as the perfect motivation to get him to successfully use his potty right before we had to head out the door. Woop!
Also, I must give you guys a quick thank you for weighing in on the underwear dilemma. I ended up ordering a book about underwear and some toddler boxer briefs which I think might help a lot! Ryan wears boxers and since Chase is all about everything Dad does, I think boxers might be the key for our little man. I’ll be sure to report back!
Once Chase was settled at school, I had plans to work up a sweat at Burn Boot Camp. I am modifying almost all BBC workouts in some way right now and while I dialed back Wednesday’s workout quite a bit, it still felt good to move my body. That’s pretty much all I’m after right now!
By the time I said goodbye to my friends at the gym and made it back home, I was ready for a snack. I threw together another smoothie bowl with frozen banana, frozen cauliflower, peanut butter, light coconut milk and chocolate protein powder but this time I added a little bit of dark cocoa powder to the mix to make it extra chocolaty.
Topped with pumpkin seeds and cacao nibs for some crunch!
I ate my smoothie bowl while sending out a couple of invoices and responding to emails and blog comments before the sunshine proved irresistible and I had to get outside.
I leashed Sadie up for a quick walk around our neighborhood and listened to my favorite Wait, Wait Don’t Tell Me NPR podcast. It made me laugh a lot, as always!
By the time I arrived home, I had about five minutes to unpack my most recent Thrive Market order that was waiting for me on our front porch before heading off to preschool pickup.
The number of chocolate chip cookie dough larabars we go through in our house is borderline ridiculous so I’ve taken to ordering them in bulk. They’re $16 for a pack of 16 on Thrive Market which is the cheapest I’ve found. (FYI, any Thrive Market affiliate links in this post will give you 25% off your first order!)
I scooped Chase up from school and loved hearing him talk all about his day and sing me the song he learned at chapel.
Since Chase was awfully amped after preschool, I figured settling him down for a nap immediately would be futile, so we did a little dinner food prep in the kitchen and played for a bit before it was time for stories and nap.
I made myself a grilled cheese and served it with two helpings of white cheddar popcorn for lunch before working at the computer for a bit.
Plus some cottage cheese with all the fixings!
As I worked, I heard Chase chattering away and singing on his monitor. It became clear fairly quickly that there was no nap happening yesterday but he seemed content for “quiet time” in his crib with his stuffed animals and cars for a while until he started yelling out, “Mom! MOM! I miss you!” Talk about tugging at my heartstrings!
I got him up from his nap right as Ryan arrived home from an off-site team building activity at work. Since he was home super early, we were all awfully excited and took advantage of the sunshine by enjoying some family time outside.
We took Sadie on a walk to a local park, meandered along a boat dock so Chase could look at fish and played at a playground.
Hooray for sunny spring days! I hope this gorgeous weather sticks around for a while!
By the time we made it home, we were all more than ready for dinner. Ryan took care of grilling up some chicken sausages outside while I prepped our sides.
Everything came together fast and tasted great! I followed up my dinner about an hour later with a small bowl of Rice Chex cereal since cereal is my BFF right now.
Once we were all showered and pajama-ed (can that be a word?), we settled into bed and I couldn’t keep my eyes open for long as I read The Last Mrs. Parrish. I think I nodded off around 10 p.m. which felt amazing.
I hope you all have a great Thursday and I hope to see ya around here tomorrow. Enjoy your day!
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Cookie dough larabars are one of our favorite flavors, too! My store recently had them on sale for 88cents each if you bought 10…so you can bet I bought at least 20…..(I am starting to thing about my basket of snacks I’ll need to keep by the rocking chair for nursing.)
I can’t wait until my daughter is potty trained!! We’ve been working on it for awhile, but since I can’t afford/am not able to take off work for a week it’s a slow process. I read Oh Crap!, immediately felt like a failure and have since regretted even buying the book. I know at some point, my child will no longer wear diapers 🙂
Enjoy your day!
I know this is not popular but I would suggest, not stressing about potty training! Honestly we just never pushed it and both my kids did it when they were ready and there was never any work/bribes. One kid was 3 years and 2 months and one was 22 months! Really, when they are ready it not difficult.
This might not be popular but I like it :-). We’re watching for cues and basically following our daughter’s lead. I’m open to changing this if it’s not working over time but this is our plan, or non-plan for now.
One trick we’ve used with my almost 3 year old with potty training – put a cheerio in the toilet and have him try to hit it with his pee. It’s weird, but it makes it really fun. Of course this only works if Chase is standing up on a stool at the toilet. My Tommy did great with potty training at first, then seemed to get bored and lazy, so having him try to aim for the cheerio made it a lot more fun for him.
When he first started we also had a really hard time getting him to go #2 on the toilet – it was just scary for him. So we tempted him with a new truck. Only later did I realize that I bought him a dump truck and couldn’t stop laughing at how appropriate that was.
Aww – screaming that he misses you?! That is WAY too cute. Also, love adding cocoa powder to my smoothies – I also add it to oatmeal and yogurt for a chocolate/antioxidant punch 🙂
Potty training is tricky! I’m a behavior therapist and used to run intensive potty training clinics, so i would be happy to trouble shoot if needed! 🙂
Hey Julie! I know you often talk about podcasts you love…have you ever listened to The Happy Hour with Jamie Ivey? It’s my favorite! It’s Christian based and has great mom truths and really just great life talk. I think you’d love it!
Also–I’m about to venture into the world of potty training with my 2 year old boy so I’m loving seeing everything that’s working (and isn’t working) for you and Chase! 🙂
Have you ever tried making your own Larabars? I got tired of paying the high price, so I tried out a Chocolate Chip Brownie version and it was amazing! Plus, I went full nerdy and calculated the cost of homemade bars vs buying at the store. Only $.60 each compared to at least the $1 per bar I’m used to paying. Win!
I’ve heard such good things about Thrive Market! I’m curious to hear if Chase’s sweet little boxers are the magic trick or not!
I am literally drooling over the thought of chocolate chip cookie dough larabars! I used to eat them by the box too! But my 3-year-old is allergic to cashews (which we found out when she was 1 after she ate a few bites of a larabar!) so now we don’t keep them in the house anymore. Waaaah. I’m afraid even to have the ones that aren’t cashew based around since I feel like the chance of cross contamination is probably pretty high. I think I might have to pick one up next time I’m out shopping for old time’s sake! Yum 🙂
I always enjoy your day-in-the-life posts. What’s in the side dish next to the chicken sausage (avocado/rice dish)? I’m so intrigued and I love your recipes.
Hi Julie! I always love reading the day in the life posts! I have a question- my husband works long long hours like it seems yours does and on the rare occasions he does come home early it is always used as a break for me to get work done (I work part time as a speech therapist 2x a week but use the days I’m home with my toddler to write up treatment notes and evaluations). I know you probably always have work that also needs to be done, so how do you prioritize going on a walk with the family versus having Ryan take Chase so you can get 1-2 hours of solo work time?
What a lovely day Julie! Made me smile to read about it 🙂
Happy Thursday!!
I love your daily recaps! Chase is getting so big!
I also loveeee Thrive Market – I didn’t even think to browse for Larabars on Thrive. We eat a lot of the cookie dough ones too as well as coconut cream (my husband’s favorite) and peanut butter chocolate chip (my favorite). Enjoy the rest of your Thursday!
I posted on Instagram about starting potty training and got the BEST suggestions! You need to check it out! @livehalffull is my handle.
The “mom I miss you!” over the monitor is the sweetest! Toddlers can be tiring and challenging but they’re also so awesome.
Primary has boxer briefs too, I haven’t ordered any of their stuff for my daughter yet but it is on my perpetual to do list. They are all up in my Facebook feed. Hanna Anderson has cute stuff, curious to see if you like their clothing.