These are strange times… We should probably document it. ?
I bet many of us are doing a lot of the same things (Movie rentals? Zoom meetings? Taking walks outside? Going for drives? Waiting in long lines at Target and Trader Joe’s?). I’m curious, how do you spend your weekdays? Do you have any new family routines? What do you do on the weekends? What’s a typical shelter-in-place day like for you? Let me know in the comments.
Perhaps one day we’ll be able to look back at our answers and laugh about it… Hopefully. ?
Here’s what it’s like at Casa de MBB on a typical weekday. I’ve been sheltering with El Hub, Connor and PGR (Pretty Girl Rosie), who, collectively, are known as “the coworkers.”
We maintain a strict schedule. It starts at 5:15 when El Hub gets up for work. His commute only takes a minute, because all he does is go downstairs to his computer in the dining room.
I get up a few minutes later and go downstairs to get my coffee, make a bite to eat, and then I go back upstairs to my desk, where I check my email, glance at the news (yuck), fill out any paperwork or pay any bills (bluh), before I do my makeup or write a new blog post.
We’ve tried to keep Connor’s regular preschool schedule through all this to retain some sense of normalcy for her, and that’s been great (but keeping a schedule also helps us too). Her day starts around 7:45 with breakfast (like an Eggo waffle with sliced strawberries, blackberries or blueberries, and maple syrup) and some quiet relaxing music (Spotify is great for this).
Connor’s (home) school starts promptly at 9 on the dot.
Structure helps my sanity, because without it my day devolves into meandering casually from a workout into a long walk around the neighborhood into baking cookies into the next thing into the next thing… Before I know it, it’s dinner, and I haven’t gotten anything done, so structure is good for both me and Connor.
With our schedule, we all know what’s coming next, so there’s a rhythm to our day.
It also eases the load of watching Connor and trying to get work done. El Hub and I each have set hours where we watch Connor, and we pass her back and forth (kinda like a basketball, ha!), so that the other person can have blocks of uninterrupted time for work and to concentrate.
El Hub usually has her first in the morning, so he feeds breakfast, gets her dressed and does her hair…which has resulted in some CRAZY daddy hairstyles, ha ha ha! We’ve learned to just go with it. ?
I can usually get a workout in during this time, which is a relatively new thing for me, but those early morning sweat sessions are, no joke, completely necessary for my mood, and if I don’t exercise, I’m crabby for the rest of the day (El Hub would attest to this).
Heading off the crankiness has become more challenging every day we’ve been cooped up, so I absolutely NEED help, and the workouts help.
I have until 9am to finish, clean up, eat and complete any writing or other tasks, and then I take over on Connor duty.
At 9, we start homeschool preschool, which I should be technically calling “crisis schooling,” because that’s what the preschool administrators call it. For a couple hours, we stay busy indoors. I help her with an art project or with a simple lesson (like numbers, colors, letters or shapes), and then we read books. Then, we’ll do some kind of tactile activity — usually making lunch, but sometimes it’s baking or engineering (Play-Doh).
Before lunch, we’ll go outside for an hour or so for some outdoor play. She’ll ride her bike, water the plants or do sidewalk chalk, and sometimes we’ll take a walk. We try to emphasize the daily school theme during our time outside, so if the theme is spring flowers, we point out all of the flowers we find.
At noon, we all break for lunch in the living room, which is when El Hub takes over again. He’ll help her with her lunch and get her ready for rest time (otherwise known as “the golden hour!”), which is from 1 to 3, during which time Connor quietly reads, naps or plays in her room.
After rest time, the school day is mostly over. One or both of us will take Connor outside to play again, and then I’ll usually start dinner around 4. If I wait much later than that, I tend to get hungry and maybe more than a little cranky…
Side note: I am SO SICK OF MY OWN COOKING. I don’t mind making a meal, but we’ve basically been existing on the same three dishes for so long that I’m over it, and I miss how much better food tastes when someone else makes it for you!
A few nights ago, El Hub and I fell asleep listing all of the takeout food we wanted to eat (“honey walnut shrimp with vegetable chow mein; carnitas burritos with extra guac, sour cream and cheese; pad thai and yellow chicken curry…).
Anywho! After everyone’s fed, I’ll sneak in a few household chores, then take a shower, then prep for the next day.
After Connor goes to bed at 8, I’ll watch a little TV, then pass out between 9 and 10.
And then we get up the next day and do it over again!
The days are definitely blending into each other…although Saturdays and Sundays are a bit looser, since there’s no “school” on those days.
It’s weird to not have something to “do” or to drive to on the weekends, right? We would usually treat ourselves to a movie or a dinner or a trip to the bookstore or window shopping at a mall, but now that we don’t have those, we end up doing things like sewing homemade masks or taking stock of the food in the pantry… Whee!
What has sheltering-in-place been like for you?
Your friendly neighborhood beauty addict,
Karen
P.S. TGIF!
We are routine/schedule based here as well in order to keep everyone on track. The kids start at 9am everyday and end roughly around 3-4pm. Hubby and I get up between 5-6am and do our coffee/breakfast prep routine. I have a 5th and 7th grader so they have been doing daily zoom meetings with their classes and for the middle schooler, his teachers provide a daily syllabus with assignments and due dates. My pre-schooler works primarily with me and we have workbooks in the am, independent playtime (so I can do some work), she reads to me, outside activity and nap (that’s when I can usually knock out everything). Since sports are dunzo, my older son works on a training schedule (which we use as his PE period) where he stretches, runs and alternates between pitching/hitting/fielding drills. My younger son does the same but also incorporates soccer drills (dribbling, footwork, shooting). Every evening as a fam we do a bike/scooter ride or walk. The biggest challenge is keep the boys focused on doing their work and not getting distracted with gaming and digital distractions (snapchat, facetiming). We give them time to connect with friends/gaming and disconnect from structure in the evening before bedtime which has moved from 9 pm to 11pm. It has been quite an adjustment to have everyone home and working but I think the kids have acquired an appreciation for what hubby and I do since they can hear us having our calls (some of which aren’t so “nice”) and so the idea of mom and dad going to work isn’t as abstract as it was before. This quarantine time as allowed for us to have longer talks at dinner and given us the chance to really get to know each other which is awesome. I say that but I’ve also included day drinking (Disney’s dole whip with vodka or coconut rum is delish) as a somewhat routine activity and use the laundry room frequently when I need a mommy time out. I think it’s a good balance.
Oh, same girl, same.
Just replace the preschool girl with an aggressive, testosterone filled 17 year old boy.
He’s doing great, I don’t want to complain about him. If I was 17 going through all this and unable to see my friends, I’d be totally sneaking out in the middle of the night to meet up with people. He hasn’t at all, to our knowledge.
Husband is a super early riser so he gets up and does stuff.
I get up around 7, do yoga, try to meditate, have coffee, get dressed and do my face, then go for a short walk to reset my brain.
Then I sit down at my home office, aka, a corner of the kitchen, and start working.
We’ve all been eating lunch together most days, which is kind of nice on the days that no one is cranky. (haha)
I might take a few minutes in the afternoon when it warms up a bit to rake leaves or weed the garden.
I’m counting my blessings that a. I’m still employed and can work safely from home and b. that we have a few acres to spread out on when we all start to go nuts.
I try to work until 3 or so. It depends on whether I’ll have any meetings to cover in the evening via Zoom, of course.
Then I start getting dinner ready, maybe take another walk.
Oh and cleaning, I usually find something in the house that hasn’t been scrubbed in eons and eons and clean that for a short break. OMG my life is sounding really pathetic!
I watch a little TV in the evening. I’m trying to go for just total escapism. Like I’ve been watching old episodes of Fantasy Island on IMDB or something like that I forget the initials.
Then I fall asleep and if it’s a good night, I dream about the day that Sephora re-opens. If it’s not a good night, I might have bad dreams about armed men surrounding our house with machine guns.
Hang in there. We can get through this.
We have a loose schedule, more like a daily theme (cleaning day, big project day, etc.). It hasn’t been going well the past few days because it’s the height of allergy season and it is misery. (Our area is one of the worst in the country for spring and fall allergies because of our beautiful, abundant flowers and pine trees. Blessing/curse.)
I heard there are heavy restrictions in California; can you not do takeout at all? Florida restaurants are takeout only, so I’m cooking a lot more, but not all the time. Fortunately, we have a friend with a restaurant a few blocks from our house. He also caters, so they plan about five dishes per week, you order however much you want, and then warm them up when you need them. I tease him that he’s catering our local pandemic.
Actually , I have been telecommuting so my shelter in place is not as isolating as others . I can’t eat out or do the normal things I would like to do but actually working and having to move between two locations is a blessing and a curse
Obviously, I am worrying about catching the virus but at this point I have to work
Happy Aloha Friday, Karen.
Honestly, the days have been like typical weekend days, with the exception of me sitting on the couch working (I’m a judicial law clerk so I research and write proposed orders/memoranda).
I get up with the dawn chorus, around 5:30-6 AM (instead of the prior 4:30 AM) to practice yoga for about an hour and a half.
By the time I’m done, hubby is awake and has made us coffee, and I’ve then showered and hung my sweaty gear outside to dry.
Hubby finishes his coffee, goes for his run/pull ups along the ocean and I start work.
He makes us lunch at noon and for the rest of the day he’s practicing music. He’s a drummer/educator — no work at the moment — so he’s been programming various kinds of music (like Latin horns, for example) and practicing techniques/genres outside of his comfort zone.
I work until 4:30 PM. I’ll take off my eyeglasses and practice German on Duolingo and then have dinner. Sometimes we’ll go for a walk on the beach (with masks, taking wide berths around other folks). The rest of the evening I’m reading, or YouTubing/Amazon Priming. Hubby eats later.
I’m in bed by 8:30-9 PM.
Rinse, repeat.
Very fortunately, we rarely eat out and are used to eating the same foods everyday (we’re like dogs, love routine), although I totally get what you mean about having food other than your own. Every once in awhile we’ll get Subway and regularly we take out from the Whole Foods food bar. I do kinda miss that. And Starbucks.
I love your red yoga mat! Although I could not practice on red because I think it would get me too agitated; I do love that cool red color, though; great for a lipstick!
Thanks for sharing your typical day with us. Your household sounds happy and healthy. Grateful to hear it.
I work from home from 5:30 to 3:15 with just a short break to have lunch. I live alone so it’s very dull and monotonous. My dogs love having me here all day to let them out and back in every few minutes when it’s cold (we just broke some records) or every few hours when it’s 60 degrees warmer (we had that this past week, too).
This morning I spent an hour and a half online, on the phone and going to UPS to send back my defective phone charger (remember when things used to be so simple you could just take something back to the store where you got it and they would exchange it for you, without you having to create another new user ID and PW?)
I’m glad they say on the radio at least once a day what day of the week it is. Otherwise I would lose track and probably be working on Saturday and Sunday, too!
The really weird thing is that I’m starting to have this perception that we are living through a time that is unique in history. The last really bad pandemic was 98 years ago. We are living through something that will be remembered 100 years from now – provided we don’t manage to completely wipe ourselves out before then.
My days are the same as they were, I’m considered essential so I still go to work at the Water Treatment Plant Lab everyday. I’m all alone because my co-worker is on maternity leave. I will listen to podcasts or pandora all day. I do miss my after work exercise classes. I was doing spin, Pilates, and yoga. At home I have no motivation to do workouts. I do puzzles. I will hopefully be able to go for walks this weekend as the weather is warming up here finally in North Dakota. I am very sick of thinking of meals so we do lots of take out and delivery. Some of the restaurants here are still open for take out only. The weekends I really miss visiting my grandma in her assisted living facility and getting together with friends for drinks.
I may be in the minority, but I love working from home. I’m grateful to have a job and a paycheck, but I’m working longer hours because there’s so much to do. The past few days have been the first in the last month where every new thing didn’t have to be done immediately. I’m hoping things are settling out.
I normally have a 45-minute commute each way, so I’m loving my new commute from the second floor to the first floor. Also liking that I don’t have to set the alarm for 5:20 and instead I get up when I wake up, which is usually around 6. Still going to bed by 10 to keep some normalcy to my routine.
The lack of commuting time in the afternoon lets me cook supper and we eat around 5.
Makeup wise, I was wearing no makeup for the first couple of weeks. Then we started getting “suggestions” to show ourselves in meetings, so on those days I just put on It’s cc cream, Bobbi Brown cream blush and use It’s brow pencil. Then I put 3-4 drops of Josie Maran’s argon oil in the palm of my hand, rub my hands together and pat it on my face. Keeps my makeup from looking cakey. I did this when I was wearing more makeup, too.
Stay safe, everyone!
Very strange times indeed! I’m working from home for the first time ever and it proving quite difficult to adjust tbh! I need to set myself a strict schedule as I keep getting to lunch time and then lose all motivation!! Definitely making use of my 1 hour daily exercise too! Stay safe xx
Georgia Rose x
http://www.justgeorgiarose.com
Seems like you’re doing a great job with keeping some structure during the day. It must be so hard for kids to have their normal schedule turned upside down.
My husband is still going into work, so I get up with him around 6:30. I’ll head downstairs to feed the cats and throw in some toast for my husband to eat on the way to work.
In addition to the five indoor kitties, there are two outdoor strays/semi-feral cats I feed. So seven cats! I have to play referee to make sure Billy and Max don’t eat everyone’s food.
After my husband leaves, I’ll log into work. Sometimes I’ll have early meetings with people in India. I try to get in a workout during “lunch hour” whenever that is.
One good thing about not commuting is that I can start dinner early. We’ll get carryout every now and then from local restaurants. My Mom just gave us a bunch of home cooked Indian food and it’s like Christmas day!
The days do start to feel the same, which is tough. Hang in there and happy Friday!
I love how happy the three of you look in the coworker photo!
I’m an essential employee and somewhat of a homebody, so my days don’t feel that different. There are some things that have changed at work. We have to take our temperature everyday when we get there and wear a wristband to show that we took it. We also have to wear surgical masks the entire day. One of the doctors that I work with, made me a super cute, rainbow colored, cat face mask. I’m not allowed to wear that at work, but I’ve been wearing it on my rare trips out to the stores. I have to gas up my car once a week and I go to the grocery store every two weeks. I cook most of our food, but restaurants here are open for takeout. We have done that a few times. My husband’s mom cooks a to-go dinner for us every Sunday. She is in her 70’s and immunocompromised, so she can’t leave her house or have guests over. Cooking for her family makes her feel useful. She sets the food out in her garage, so she doesn’t have to have any contact with him when he picks it up.
I would like more time to do some creative projects and get things done around here (I imagine a lot of people having the cleanest houses that they’ve ever had right now), but I’m grateful that I still have a job. I’ll try to fit in that other stuff when I can.
Take care out there!
I love reading about your day! I’m working full time from the house. I get up around 7:30 or 8:00 and feed Hettie and Jiji (sometimes they insist on eating earlier) and eat breakfast myself – usually cereal. I then go upstairs, wash my face, do my makeup for some semblance of normalcy, then go to my laptop. I often work on the couch, but I go to our second bedroom upstairs for conference calls (Zack is working remotely too and we both have meetings during the day). I work until 4:30 PM or so. I’m still really busy at work, so that’s good. I listen to music and podcasts (Noble Blood is my favorite podcast). After work, we feed the pets, watch TV, and relax. I’ve been reading and baking in the evenings. I listen to Harry Styles and dance while I bake. I take a bath or shower before the end of the day and read in bed.
Mine definitely needs to be more structured. I’m not working but the husband is so he’s gone all day. I clean, talk to the cats and take a long walk everyday. We are in a rural area of PA on the Delaware River so I can walk the path along the river without crowds. The first 2 weeks were like Groundhog Day – start a fire, breakfast, shower etc. we were self quarantining since we had returned from Iceland. Luckily the grocery stores are fairly well stocked with no lines – small town living. We do take out on Saturdays to help support the local restaurants that have switched to take out. The boredom is getting to me
My boyfriend and I do both work at different banks so we both have to work here in europe. So luckily we both are still being paid. He has to go to the branch and I work from home. It is a hella lot to do for both of us – we both work long hours.
I love working from home although I miss my colleagues. I save over three hours a day for my usual commute – so I work longer AND got time to do some household chores and prepare a healthy dinner before my boyfriend comes home.
I try to structure my day: I start working when he leaves the house, have a lunchbreak at 1 p.m. and stop working after 10 hours or when I get a headache whichever happens first 😉 I tried to have a break in the afternoon and go for a walk, but I don‘t remember it until it is time to stop…
I’m able to work from home but my hours were cut to 4 days per week so I just think of it as one more evening where I’m allowed to drink wine. HAHA! You know I’ve always said I didn’t think I’d be able to work from home but it’s actually been great. I get to sleep in an extra half hour in the AM and still get a ton more done. I’m more productive, work-wise, because I don’t have people in and out of my office with problems all day ( I do run in at least once per week because there are things I really need to do there) and it’s super quiet all day. The Hubs is essential so he works his regular hours; the boys get up at about 2 in the afternoon and go to sleep at about 5 or 5:30 AM so it’s pretty much me and the cats all day. I get up, shower, but don’t worry about makeup or doing my hair (just air dry), then make coffee, unload the dishwasher, throw in some laundry and start work at 7. My breaks in the morning are usually laundry related and I found I could clean the kitchen and bathroom while on conference calls with my cell on speaker (with my line muted, of course) so I’m much more productive at home, too. Plus, being here all day, it’s easy to see what needs to be done so, instead of coming home and being like “ugh, maybe tomorrow”, when 3:30 rolls around I can’t wait to pick up or vacuum. HAHA! I still walk with my coworker at lunch and, if it’s not nice, I do a half hour on the treadmill. I also try to do 45 minutes of more intense workout in the evening, which is much needed since my calories and carbs are NOT being counted. 🙁 All in all, things are going well. We’re very fortunate to still be working almost full time so I can’t complain. We also try to order in once or twice a week to support our local restaurants. I really do miss the kids’ sports though. Even baseball, which I never thought I’d say. 😉
My husband and I are enjoying this quarantine time so much, we almost dont want this to end! He is furloughed but can collect unemployment, so his schedule is completely open. We usually work opposite schedules and never ever get weekends together because those are his busy days. My part time job is 20 hrs a week, and I can work from home. We do not have kids or pets, so every day is different! I have watched exactly 1 hour of Netflix during this time, and we have done ZERO puzzles because I have been so busy with other things!
The hubs and I go for hikes when it is nice out, and he loves to cook so dinner is always good. Between updating my itunes, digitizing my photos in albums and deep cleaning, I am never, ever bored. There’s always something to do!
We love enjoying each other’s company, but also give each other the space to do our own thing. This quarantine has been such a blessing in terms of getting to spend more time with each other!