Daily Life as SAHM to a 20 month old

SAHM, from the title, for those of you who may not know, stands for 'Stay at home mom'.  That was greek to me before I had Lily so thought it was worth putting it out there :).
In any case, I constantly struggle with juggling day to day life and activities with a toddler in tow, but thought I'd take a few minutes to let you all peek into our little world and what a typical day is like for us.  Keep in mind, our typical day is constantly changing, as Lily continues to grow and change. 

For now though, a typical day might look as follows.

7:00 a.m. I get up and, on a good day, find that my husband has already cooked breakfast for us :).  We have about 30 minutes to sit and eat together before Lily gets up and has her breakfast.  Then Lily and I get ready for our day and walk our dog, Sushi.

8:30 a.m. after our morning walk Lily gets some room time (i.e. I put on music and let her play with puzzles etc in her room) while I tidy up, check emails, etc.  Then I pack a bag of snacks for the road.

9:00 a.m. we usually head out, sometimes to the gym, but other times to run errands or just get out and enjoy some San Diego sunshine. 

Here she is riding the carousel and looking a bit nervous on a recent morning outing to Seaport Village in downtown San Diego. 

Around 11 a.m. we have lunch either out, or back home, and then Lily goes down for her daily nap.  These days she usually sleeps from around 11:30 - 1:00 p.m., which is heaven for me since she was a 'cat napper' up until recently!!  During her nap I try and get stuff done such as pay bills or make calls, or I blog, as I'm doing now :).

1:00 p.m. After her nap Lily usually plays happily for a while as I do housework, scheduling, meal planning, etc.  Then I pack another bag of snacks, let Sushi out to pee, and we head out again. 

2:30 p.m. I try and do something fun with Lily every day, whether it's heading to the playground, the zoo, swimming at the YMCA, or meeting up for a play date with friends.  Afterwards, there's usually another errand to be run.

Here's Lily 'giving noses' to Janie, a 50 year old female orangutang at the San Diego zoo.

3:00 or 4:00 p.m. Lately, Lily has been eating her 'big meal' of the day around while we're out, but she'll have another light meal once we're home, around 5:30 or 6:00 p.m. 

Here she is discovering for the first time ever what her mommy has known for a long time, that Ruby's 1950's style diner in Mission Valley Mall is the BEST place to go for a late afternoon burger and milkshake :).

Around 6: 00 p.m. after dinner at home, she'll have her one daily bottle of milk, her little luxury.  I allow her a bottle in the evening because we brush her teeth right afterward.

6:30 or 7:00 p.m. is bath time and then Lily gets story time with Daddy before bedtime at 7:30 p.m.  I'm usually cooking dinner for my husband and myself at this point, or at least that's what I should be doing ;).

At 7:30 p.m. we gather up her 'bing bings' (i.e. her pink teddy bear and two pink fuzzy blankets that she must have at bedtime!) and sing 'Twinkle Twinkle' as we lay her down in bed.  I love that these days she goes right off to sleep, or at least doesn't fuss or cry when it's time to go to bed.  I know this may not last, so I'm relishing it now :).

Well, I don't want to spend her whole nap time blogging, so I must dash and check off some of my other to do items for the day!!  Hope you all have a wonderful day, friends!!!

Bathroom Update: there's a black hole in our house!

Some of you may be curious to see how our guest bathroom renovation is coming along, so I thought I'd provide some photos :).

Here it is right before we began.  Not so bad, right?  Honestly, this is why we figured we'd wait to rennovate, that is until it started rotting!!

And here it is now, on day 4 of gutting the place!  Yikes, it looks like something out of a horror film!  You can literally see right down to the earth under our house!  The whole floor and partway up the walls around the bath was completely rotten.  G said it's probably been leaking ever since it was installed back in the '80's!! 

In any case, I've been firming up my design choices and shopping up a storm online while G has been diligently working on the renovation. 

So far I've ordered:

Double-sconce from Restoration Hardware.  I wanted a single sconce on either side, but alas there wasn't enough room.

We changed gears and decided to go with a square rather than round sink.  I'm excited to see how it works in our mostly feminine bathroom. 

The faucet I originally wanted had an 8-10 week backorder so I opted for a simple yet elegant alternative by Moen.  I'm now convinced it will look better anyway!  I think the other one, which was quite a bit more ornate, might have overwhelmed the small vanity and sink!

It took forever to find a basic carerra marble vanity top for use with a vessel sink, but I finally found this one by Pegasus - phew!

And yes, we purchased this rustic reclaimed wood mirror from Lowes.  I still love it.

So anyway, that's about it on the update.  Can't wait to post pics of the final project :).  Until the next time my friends, have a great day!!

Guest Bathroom Re-do

Some of you may remember from a previous post that I've been planning to rennovate our master bathroom for some time now.  Well, fast-forward several months of procrastinating later and now it's our guest bathroom that is at the top of my list! 

We had some electric work done on our home and the electrician mentioned that our vintage 80's jacuzzi tub was leaking internally.  I smiled and thanked him for the info and wondered how long I could ignore the issue.  Answer: about a month.  Evidence: the smell of mold and the appearance of bloated wood.

The timing was perfect, however, I must say, as I've recently found my favorite go to handyman ever! An engineer by training and a reformed general contractor who now enjoys the more laid back life that a handyman job offers.  G, as I will call him (his real name shall be withheld until after he is done with my bathroom!), is professional, courteous and capable, and best of all he's actually affordable!! 

In planning my master bathroom renovation I gathered several estimates for labor alone, all of which were exceeded the $10,000 mark.  Really??  Just for labor?  That doesn't even include a faucet, people, just the intangible elbow grease of the contractor. 

So, when my new favorite handyman said he could do the renovation if I wanted to take on designing the bathroom and selecting all the materails I hired him on the spot!  This was Wednesday.  It's now Saturday and we begin work Monday - yikes!!  That means I need to firm up my design and have everything selected and on order asap.  Hence, this blog posting where I will detail all my plans :). 

So once again I referenced my favorite site, Pinterest.com, for ideas and inspiration.  I then researched some of my ideas further using Google Image search.  I gathered most of the bathroom pics below from one of these sites. 

IMHO (in my humble opinion), the vanity or sink area makes the most sense as a starting point for any bathroom renovation.  Due to limited space, I was considering a clean and classic pedestal sink, but my husband thought it would be too old-fashioned.  Instead, wev'e decided to go with a custom vanity to be made by, you guessed it, best handyman ever!  I am now in search of a perfect granite or marble remnant, which will become the vanity top.  We plan to have a vessel sink, similar to the one in the picture above. 

Our custom vanity will (hopefully) be similar to the one in this picture (above), only painted white.  I'm not sure we'll actually get wood details, or drawers, but it should resemble a small table with a marble (or quartz or granite) top.  I really like the openess of this style vanity.  Solid pieces have such a heavy look and this is clean and light and airy, a must for our small spaces

We also plan to have a wall mounted faucet such as the one you see above, and I love the rustic wood of the mirror, a nice juxtaposition to the very chic wall sconces!

And here's another custom vanity very similar to the look we hope to achieve.  I love the classic elegance of this bathroom and the extra thick baseboards, another item on my wish list!  The hardwood floors in the picture are also very similar to our current bathroom floors, which we hope to retain in the design.  Why change such a classic and beautiful floor? 

We plan to buy a 'drop in' bathtub and have G do custom panelling along the front like the tub in the pic above.  Doesn't it look classy?  This bathroom showcases a couple other classic bathroom ideas we plan to incorporate into our design including beadboard along the walls (ours will hit a bit lower) and classic white subway tiles in the bathtub surround.  Seriously, you can't go wrong with beadboard and subway tiles - ever!!

Once I had a fairly good idea of the look I was going for, I set out to find the perfect pieces.  I searched sites like Pottery Barn, Restoration Hardware, Lowes, Lamps Plus, Home Depot, Overstock, eFaucets, etc. 

Kohler Memoirs toilet for $299 at Lowes.  Because every bathroom needs a toilet.

A beautiful and classic 'goose neck' wall-mounted faucet from eFaucets for $363.  I fell in love with these 'goose neck' faucets when I saw them on Restoration Hardware's site, but then found this comparable one for $200 less!

Vessel sinks can be found for as cheap as $78, but for some reason I'm really liking the look of this one from eFaucets for $188.  Really they're all just plain white bowls, but some have more appeal than others, don't ask me why!! 

And these gorgeous little sconces are from Restoration Hardware.  $85 each doesn't even cover the lamp shade, but I'm pretty sure they're worth it.  Don't you agree??

And now for our dash of rustic elegance we found this gorgeous reclaimed wood mirror at, you'll never guess ... Lowes!  At only $44 this piece is a true bargain!!  I think my chic little sconces will look absolutely sublime on either side of it.   

So that's the design in a nutshell. I can't wait to see how it all turns out!!  Stay tuned for before and after photos coming soon!!  Hope you all are enjoying your weekend and happy Saint Patty's day to all you Irish friends out there :). 

Easy Lunch: Stuffed Baked Potato

Here in America we like to keep our baked potatoes pretty simple.  Butter, cheese, sour cream, chives, bacon bits or all of the above for a calorie-laden 'loaded' baked potato.  During one of my trips to England, however, my eyes were opened to the numerous baked potato possibilities by the good folks at Marks & Spencers Cafe :). 

Marks & Spencers, for those of you who don't know, is the quintessential British shop, selling everything from clothes and furniture to high-end groceries and prepared foods.  The top floor of the large department store houses a wonderful little cafe where you will find half of the British elderly population taking their morning or afternoon tea.  They also have lunch items on offer such as sandwiches, salads and the aforementioned variety of stuffed baked potatoes!!

My British in-laws have been here visiting for the past ten days so the other day when my mother-in-law (MIL) and I were contemplating lunch from a very empty cupboard and fridge (after several days of skipping the needed grocery shop), we decided on baked potatoes.  I planned to put out the usual toppings, but then my MIL whipped up a wonderful stuffing that I thought I would share with you all.

Ingredients:

1 can tuna (I prefer solid white albacore)

1 small can whole kernel corn

diced celery

diced bell pepper (preferably red or orange)

mayonnaise (about 1/4 cup)

salt and pepper to taste

Mix all ingredients together and spoon over baked potato.  This would also make a lovely sandwich stuffing. 

Another one of my favorite healthy lunches right now is a baked sweet potato with cottage cheese, sliced kalamata olives and sliced jalapenos.  I know this may sound like a weird pregnancy craving, but it is seriously amazing.  Try it, I dare you :).

 

There are so many other options for stuffing a baked potato for a healthy and satisfying lunch or even a light dinner.  Try tuna, cheese and capers or sliced radishes.  Baked potato smothered in baked beans is another British favorite.  The baked potato really does make a quick easy and delicious option.  That's all for today, friends, have a great day!