Now that Lila is 2 months old, I feel like we have a somewhat predictable schedule and routine down. Lila has been a pretty easy baby since, well, birth, so it didn’t take long to figure out a routine that works for she and I. There are definitely days that are less organized, and glorious days where everything happens according to plan (not very many of them, but they do happen). When I was pregnant, I remember watching YouTube videos and reading blogs about a typical day with a newborn, or a 6 week old, or a 10 week old baby. I loved seeing what I might be able to expect. And because my husband and I are both so active, I wanted to share how I have been able to fit in running and CrossFitting with an infant. So I thought it might be fun to share a day in the life with a 2 month old.
This is what our Tuesday looked like this week. I don’t always get a run and a workout in. Some days it’s more like a shower and a nap. We took the newborn class from Taking Cara Babies, which I highly recommend, and I think a lot of our routine is in line with what we learned through the class. So here is a fairly typical, for now and for us, day in the life with a 2 month old.
Day In The Life With A 2 Month Old
- 5:30 – I wake up, brush my teeth, and sneak out of the room to make coffee
- 5:40 – 6:45 – My time to read my Bible study, enjoy my coffee and breakfast in silence, and catch up on some dishes
- 6:45 – 7 – Pump. I don’t always pump before I wake Lila up, but on mornings where I am trying to get out the door during her first nap, I pump before I wake her up. If I don’t, I spend too much time after putting her down pumping, since I usually pump for about 30 minutes in the morning after she eats.
- 7:00 – 7:30ish – Wake up Lila, get her changed, and nurse her. Sometimes she takes a little longer than 30 minutes, very occasionally a little less.
- 7:30 – 8:00 – Lila and I hang out a little bit. She plays on her playmat while I move some of her things into the nursery from our room, wash my face, and get dressed for the day. I squeezed in a little bit of tummy time before her first nap.
- 8:00 – Lila goes down for her first nap in her nursery, and I put on my Willows so I can pump while I finish getting ready for CrossFit. I got out the door at about 8:20.
- 8:30 – 9:30 – CrossFit. Unsurprisingly, I was about 4 minutes late. Mom life.
- 9:30 – 10:00 – I drove home, made a quick smoothie, got all of my pump milk organized and stored (we keep about 10 oz in the fridge and freeze anything left from the day before).
- 10:00 – 10:30ish – Wake up Lila, change her diaper, and nurse again. She blessed with me a second dirty diaper about 3 minutes after she finished nursing. She’s a sweetie!
- 10:30 – 11:15 – Lila and I read a little bit, played with some of her rattles, and checked out her play mat again for a little bit, then we got ready to go run. I like to take her to a greenway spot that is about a 10 minute drive from our house so she can fall asleep pretty quickly before we start our run. To get out the door, I have to change her diaper one final time, find a blanket, get her into the car seat, double check the diaper bag (just in case), load the car seat into the car, and head out.
- 11:40 – 1:00 – I got in a one hour run on the greenway, while Lila napped in her Bob stroller. At about 12:45, I get her and the stroller loaded back up into the car and head home.
- 1:00 – 1:30ish – Lila nurses for the third time (after a quick diaper change).
- 1:30 – 2:15 – Lila worked on some tummy time and assisted sitting. She and I had a little chat in the rocking chair. I love how she’s babbling lately. Her outfit did not survive a recent diaper, so we got her changed. I made some oatmeal and Lila hung out in her BabyBjorn chair.
- 2:15 – 4:00 – Lila had her third nap of the day in her nursery. I cleaned up the kitchen (pumping creates more dishes than one would think), folded some towels, and took a much needed shower. Henry picked up Enrique around this time, and both boys got home around 3:30, so we talked about their days until it was time to get Lila up.
- 4:00 – 4:30 – I woke up Lila, changed the 27th diaper of the day (not exactly accurate, but it felt that way), and nursed Lila for her fourth feeding.
- 4:30 – 5:15 – Lila played on her playmat for a little bit while I picked up the bedroom and had a snack, we read a couple of her books, and she told daddy all about her day while he started making dinner.
- 5:15 – 6ish – Lila took a shorter nap and I made a CVS run. This is her most variable nap. On most days, I have to wake her up from her first 3 naps, but this last one is a wild card. Some days she sleeps until 6:30 and I wake her up. Other days she wakes up some time between 5:45 and 6:30 on her own. This day she woke up a little after I got back around 6. She was still acting tired, so I rocked her until about 6:15.
- 6:30 – 7:45 – This is when we get in our bedtime routine. I give Lila a bath while Henry’s finishing up dinner and hanging out with Enrique downstairs. I usually get her out of the tub around 6:50, get a diaper on her, and then put a little lotion all over her. I started her 5th and last nursing session around 7:00, and this one usually takes the longest. She finished up around 7:40, and I got her in her PJ’s, and we read a book while Henry got her white noise and monitor out of the nursery and into our bedroom since she still sleeps in our room at night. After a quick swaddle, and a little rocking, I put her down for bed.
- 7:45 – 8:30 – I had dinner while Henry finished getting Enrique in bed. We hung out on the couch for a little bit. Around 8:30 Lila broke her arm out of her swaddle and wasn’t super thrilled, so I went back upstairs to reswaddle and put her back down. It took about 15 minutes, and then I came back downstairs for the rest of our night.
- 9:00 – 10:00 – I watched some tv on the couch and took a little nap. I think Henry cleaned up the kitchen.
- 10:00 – 10:40 – Henry gave Lila her dreamfeed bottle while I pumped the bottle for tomorrow’s dream feed. Henry holds and rocks Lila for about 20 minutes after she eats to make sure she doesn’t spit up, he changes her diaper, re-swaddles her, and puts her back to bed right around the time I’m done pumping. I get a few things ready for tomorrow, and get in bed around 11.
What I hope this shows is that days with an infant are weird. We try to fit in as much as possible during her naps, which thank God are decently long for her age. Since I nurse her for most of her feedings, I try to be home every 3 hours. Henry is great about giving her a bottle if I want to spend some time away from home during the weekends, but most weekdays he is in and out of the house, so I plan to be home with her. The 3 hour feedings kind of give us a cycle that repeats for most of the day: she eats, we have a little play time, and then she naps. It can be stressful and boring simultaneously, and it always amazes me how long it can take for any cleaning to happen when Lila and I both need to eat every 3 hours. I’m very thankful that we’ve found a routine that works for us, and that Lila is happy to sleep in the stroller while I run. When I go back to work next week, our schedule will change pretty dramatically, but I’m sure it will do that a few times over the next couple of years.
I honestly don’t know how or if I’ll be able to cram all of my training around a 40 hour work week. At this point, I have a rough draft plan that we’re going to shoot for. If it doesn’t work out, we’ll figure it out. I know the next one to three years are going to be chaotic and messy, and there’s a good chance that some of the things I love will take a little bit of back seat for now. That’s ok. I know I’ll still be able to train somewhat consistently, and this is a small window of time in the bigger picture. I hope I can share another day in the life once we get our routine down with my work schedule. I feel like it was really helpful for me to see some examples of life with a newborn while I was pregnant, so I hope some of this info will be helpful to anyone whose curious how our days are structured.
On days where I only workout once, or don’t work out at all, I usually blog or clean during Lila’s naps. It always amazes me that even on the less filled days, there are so many things on our to do list that get pushed to a day later in the week or the weekend, or just don’t happen at all. Life with a tiny human is a constant game of trying to fit a lot of puzzle pieces into a very small puzzle, but so far we’ve had no casualties!
The rest of this week followed a pretty similar structure as the Tuesday I shared. We didn’t have any doctor appointments, so our week was pretty relaxed. Lila is working on sleeping with one arm out of her swaddle, since she was consistently breaking out and waking herself up with trying to get out. One arm out has helped her get back on track with her naps, most days. Some days she still startles herself with just the one arm, and has a harder time getting back to sleep.
This Weeks Workouts
Total Miles: 19.35 Miles
Total Workouts: 4
How the Run Felt
Sadly, I did not get any trail runs in this week. My husbands schedule just didn’t work, and I wanted to try to run more consistent intervals for my long run this week. My goal is build back to running a 10k without too much difficulty, and then I’ll be more flexible with running my long runs on the trails. I added some slightly longer intervals during my weekday runs, and felt really good. My Friday run had to happen on the treadmill, because our day was just too hectic and I was home with both of my kids (Enrique was home with a cough). It was my first postpartum treadmill run, and while it wasn’t the most exciting way to get my miles in, it got the job done. Overall, I’m really happy with how my running strength is building.
How the WODs Felt
I was really happy that I was able to get in three CrossFit WODs in the box this week. Monday’s workout had weighted box step ups, and I was sore for DAYS afterwards. I’ve noticed that anything single leg is tricky for me. Lunges, step ups, and everything else involving weight on one leg still feels unstable. I need to keep focusing on rebuilding strength in my hips and getting used to moving without without a big belly in front of me. I wasn’t able to get in to the box on Tuesday, so I settled for a simple KB workout that kept me moving. Thursday’s workout was written as handstand push up practice, but I am definitely not ready for that, so I focused on just getting upside down and shifting my weight from one arm to the other. I feel like I’m making slow progress in regaining my strength and getting comfortable with weighted movement again. The core strength is definitely coming along slowly, but I expected that.
What I’ve Been Listening To
I started a new show this week called Death Resulting. It covers an ongoing court case where a man who supplied drugs to a woman is being prosecuted for murder after she fatally overdosed. It’s such a sad story, but also a really political and touchy subject. Do we feel like other people are responsible for an adult overdosing on drugs? What consequences does that have in the medical and pharmaceutical industry if we do? These are the subjects I hope they cover through this podcast, because it is definitely not black and white.
What Went Well
Continuing to increase my running endurance.
What Went Shitty
Zero trail runs happening.
Plans to Improve Next Week
Increasing my core strength workouts from once a week to twice a week as much as I can.