A Week in the Life: S, a working mom of 3
S, a working mom of a school-aged son and 2 year old twins juggles summer care, enjoys a weekly date with her husband, and ponders an evolving childcare situation.
S, a working mom of a school-aged son and 2 year old twins juggles summer care, enjoys a weekly date with her husband, and ponders an evolving childcare situation.
What’s your kid/family situation?
Married (13 years) with 3 boys: ages 6, 2 and 2 (twins)
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What is your job situation? (Job, hours, WFH vs butts in seat)
WFH 3 days, in office 2 days. I’m on this office project until September, when I’ll switch to WFH 5 days a week.
What's your childcare situation? (daycare, wraparound care, nanny, magical grandparents)
Twins attend day care 8:30-4:30. Oldest attends public school (going into first grade this fall) and YMCA aftercare. I have no formal childcare for him this summer: DH and I switch off. He has a lot of screen time and playing with neighbors.
A Week in the Life
Monday
Everyone sleeps in (7AM) because we’re tired from the weekend, so 7-8:30 is a bit chaotic. I recently switched to packing lunches for the twins in the morning instead of at night. DH makes breakfast and gets the twins ready for a bike ride to day care. I get oldest ready for VBS: make sure he’s wearing a swimsuit, pack water bottle and towel.
I go upstairs at 8:15 and start working. I’m not a lawyer but I bill my hours, so any time I’m not working I’m not billing. My internet is down. DH offers for me to go to his office (10 minutes from our house) but I opt to use my hotspot instead.
Oldest leaves for VBS and forgets his water bottle. Face palm. Our amazing neighbors have offered to do drop off and pick up from VBS this week since their kids are also attending. I will return the favor in July by transporting her kids to our VBS.
For work this week I’m mostly doing data entry. I get in a solid chunk of work until kiddo returns at 12:30. I make him and myself lunch (15 minutes for me) and then go back upstairs to work. After he eats, he comes upstairs and plays a few “educational” games on his iPad alongside me.
At 4 I take a 15-minute break to prep dinner. Then I finish up work, and at 4:30 we leave for jiu jitsu (Monday/Wednesday). DH picks up the twins and brings them home at 4:30. They usually play (wreck the house) until the oldest and I get back from jiu jitsu at 6:30.
We all eat together (sometimes the twins have already eaten) for 10 minutes then I take the twins upstairs for a bath (we brush teeth in the bath) and bedtime routine: diaper, pjs, book, lights out. I think this evening my oldest opted to take a bath with the twins, which is unusual but was fun.
DH cleans the kitchen while I do twin bedtime. Our oldest usually plays outside or watches tv until 8:30 (lately it’s been 9) and then I put him to bed. DH and I used to switch off bedtime routine but I’ve taken it over in the last 6 months because honestly I prefer it to cleaning and he prefers to clean. After the oldest is in bed DH and I sauna together and then shower and are in bed by 10.
Tuesday
This is my in-office day, so I get up at 6, shower, dress, do makeup and then head to the kitchen to prep twin lunches. DH has made coffee and a breakfast burrito for me. I’m on the road by 6:40 - in office by 7:45. I don’t love going into the office (traffic, our office is out of space so I’m sharing a conference room with four other people) but I honestly get a ton of work done on these days and the facetime has been good for my project. I brought lunch today so I eat for 15 minutes then I’m back to work. Since we have no kid activities on Tuesdays, I work until 5. This was a mistake as it takes me 1.5 hours to get home because it’s raining.
DH has dinner made by the time i get home: reheated ribs from the weekend. The twins have eaten so I scarf some ribs and do bedtime routine. Oldest is at the neighbors playing so I go get him at 8:30. I stay over there for an hour chatting. We’ve lived in our neighborhood for four years but only recently gotten to know these neighbors as our kids were in the same kindergarten class together.
They also cobble together childcare and grandparent help and we (moms) both generally feel like our lives are chaos. It’s nice to feel like you’re not the only one. I think we’re also the only moms on our block who work. I have several SAHM friends but it’s just not quite the same.
Anyway, I do a shortened bedtime routine for oldest since it’s very late, then DH and I start a movie and get in bed at 10:30.
Wednesday
WFH day. I honestly get a lot of work done today. It’s pretty much the same routine as Monday. DH takes the twins to day care then goes to work. Kiddo comes home from VBS at 12:30, we have lunch together, he goes to the neighbors to play instead of iPad time, then jiu jitsu at 4:30. The twins are extra challenging after school so when I get home DH says he’s going to do a yard project to get some alone time while I eat dinner with the kids. We’re both introverts and having three kids is a lot more challenging that we anticipated. We rely a lot on grandma and babysitters and each other when we need a break.
Thursday
In office day. Traffic is light for some reason so I’m in early. My kids normally have swim lessons on Thursday at 5, but my instructor has to cancel today. That’s fine because it ends up storming anyway. Tbh swim lessons plus jiu jitsu is too much activity for us, but we have a pool so swim lessons are super important. And we already paid for a year of jiu jitsu so we try to make it as often as we can. I’m going on vacation next week, so right as I’m trying to leave the office a bunch of people want to ask me questions. This gets me stuck in rain/traffic again.
I race home to pick up my husband. He’s booked a babysitter for every Thursday this summer so we can have a date night. We head to a Cuban place for dinner, then go get drinks. Sometimes during date night neither of us has much to say but this time we actually have a lot to catch up on.
We head home at 9 to let the babysitter get to her reverse happy hour (good for you girl, lol), then we finish our movie and head to bed at 11 (late for us).
Friday
WFH day: kiddo has no VBS so he and DH work on our yard project. He notably avoids the neighbor in the afternoon: I think they’re ready for a little break. Most of my colleagues are off on Fridays, so I enjoy lots of focused work time today with no meetings or calls to interrupt. I log off at 4:30 and DH goes to get the twins. I pick up pizza and we do pizza movie party. We try to do this every Friday we’re not traveling. Same bedtime routine, but slightly later.
The Weekend
Saturday: we’re all up around 7. Eat breakfast: eggs and frozen waffles. I get myself and the kids dressed, then we all head out to the back yard to play/finish some projects. DH finishes assembling planter boxes we’ll use next year, then we all move rocks around to facilitate a drainage ditch.
At 10 I head inside to shower and get ready for twin mom brunch! I head out at 10:30. I recently joined a twin mom group and they’re really fun. It’s nice to have moms who have been through the same things as you tell you it’s all going to be fine. I head home from brunch at 12:30. The twins are napping, oldest is at the neighbors. I decide to wait til the twins wake and take them to the grocery store. We also decide to have my parents over for burgers.
Sunday: up, mad rush for breakfast and get ready for “early” church service that starts at 9. Church is over by 10:45, head home to putter and make lunch. Kids and I nap after lunch (DH cleans the pool). We go swimming and have chicken nuggets for dinner. I do kids’ routine, prep for next week then get in bed by 9.
Reflections
What was your biggest success this week?
Having oldest entertained by VBS, and really getting some good focus time in at work.
What was your biggest obstacle?
Being in the office really feels like a waste of time: the commute is long, there’s no dedicated space for me to sit, I can’t get face time with people because they’re working from home or on vacation, etc. It’s a 12-week project, so I’m making the best of it, but I won’t be volunteering for another hybrid schedule if I can avoid it. We also need more childcare for the twins. I need to sit down with DH and come up with a solution.
How are you making it work?
I honestly lean on DH a lot for childcare atm. This needs to change as he’s getting burned out and his work schedule may change soon. I’m also realizing I will need extra hours of care even when I got back to WFH full-time.
Since I wrote this post, I caved and signed my oldest up for three weeks of camps (to be fair, one is camp Grandma where he will visit my MIL). This will round out the summer for us.