Week in the Life 2019 | Wednesday Photos + Words

Wednesday - hump day and halfway through the work week! I'm feeling it. The last few weeks have been irregular - lots of travel and holidays so this full work week is hitting me head on.

Today's lens is "Working on". What are the things I'm working on?

So tired this morning. It's really hard for me to get up. I'm working on going to bed a bit earlier, but there are some nights - like last night - where I get so involved in a book I simply lose track of time. Last night I didn't get to bed until after 11:30pm.

Today I get to sleep in about an hour. It's the pico y placa day for the other car, so I can't leave for work until after 9:30am. Shushú is going to come get the kids at 7:15 in order to take them to school.

My job this morning is to feed these kids breakfast before their grandma comes for pick up. I'm working on getting them to be more self-sufficient in the mornings. I still have to "do their hair" though. Neither of them much cares what it looks like and if I don't wet and style it they will basically go to school with bed head.

Grandma is here and pick up is underway. I had originally thought I would go back to sleep at this point, but I decided to make some coffee instead.

Next up is breakfast. I'm working on (but not really succeeding) eating better. I've never been a vegetable hater but lately I find myself having a strong aversion to most of them. I can't really figure it out. Andres had made this for me last night, so all I had to do was heat it up. It was filled with egg and was quite good. Full disclosure - I ended up eating more crackers with peanut butter as well. I need to work on portion size. Sigh.

I love how big and full the geraniums in our window boxes are. Gorgeous. This is the view I get as I wash up from breakfast.

Working on keeping up on the housework. We have had someone coming every Thursday for the last month and I absolutely love having help with the upkeep of the house, particularly the cleaning and deep cleaning. I'm finding that it's a lot easier to keep things picked up when I know I don't have to worry about the deep cleaning each week. So thankful we can afford it at the moment.  And that the cleaning lady is available (she's between jobs so this might not last forever).

Working on the dishes. 

Working on the laundry. This is a load of Andres and mine's, but I swear - we only have two kids and I feel like I do 1-2 loads of laundry a day! I don't know how bigger families can keep up with it.

It's 9 am so time to start getting ready for work. Looking at this picture I know I need to start working out more. I am working on less negative self talk and more self love, but seeing some of these pictures this week has me rightfully frightened!

Second load of the morning comes out and will have to wait until we get home. 

Finally I am on my way. I notice a bunch of other neighbors leaving at the same time. Oh pico y placa, how inconvenient you are.

At work after an hour-long commute and I'm cleaning up my inbox. I should probably just unsubscribe to all the junk mail and spam. 

I had to leave work early because of (wait for it...) pico y placa, so I waited to eat until I got home. Leftover ravioli from last night.

Stepped out to the car to go pick up the kids. It's only about a block or two away (uphill on the way there), but if they have a lot of homework it's hard to walk with it, so I decide to take the car. These window boxes are so full of blooms.

Working on finding new angles for my photos. Ha. The sun or a light always seems to be somewhere. This is the best I could do. (I am parked by the way.)

Beeping the card to let me out. They recently updated the system but left us with the same old cards. 

Entering Boy and Shushú's conjunto. It's a beautifully sunny afternoon with amazing fluffy clouds and a cool view of Pichincha.

Lailai was here for lunch so we visited a bit. Everyone seemed a little on edge - maybe it's the heat, or the time of year, or the moon, I don't know, but everyone seemed a bit snippy (including myself). There is a lot of stress at work with unknowns as Henry is retiring soon (it was October but after trying to force him to retire on April 30, they've "extended" his contract to end of July. Rude!) Shushú and Lailai get into a little spat and it's time to go...

I give Nico the camera to take some photos from the back seat and he snaps this one. I had meant of us in the car, but I think the composition is really great.

He did get a couple pictures of them. 

This is the face he likes to make. He also likes to say - really loud and with a British accent - "HALLO!"

As we were getting the things out of the car I asked Nico for a selfie, and Agus stuck his head in there too (he isn't always interested but I guess if he thinks he's "ruining" your photo he is, haha. Ultimately the joke is on you, Agus, because I got you in a photo and it's really really cute!).

I started feeling really really sleepy and was looking forward to taking a power nap while the kids were working on homework at the dining room table. Andres wouldn't be home for another hour and this was a great time to snooze.

I had basically just dozed off when... "Sara?" (that's Mommy in Agus and Nico talk), "Can I get some help with my homework over here?"

So I moved over to the table, somewhat reluctantly and braced myself for...ugh. Math.

It turned out t be a little easier than we thought (all except for one problem that no one - not even Bati, Agus, or Checho, could solve easily) so we got it done, but the book is so unfriendly. You basically have to resort to Google and YouTube to figure these problems out. 

Meanwhile, Agus was next to us, reciting passages under his breath and basically just doing his thing. He's been pretty self-sufficient with his homework for the last few years, which is good, because I can't understand most of it anyway! I purposefully cut off his eyes because he's been so camera shy lately (when I take the picture), but he noticed me and gave me a big smile. 

Andres got home and immediately got the grill going (charcoal). He was planning on going to the Liga game with his brother and dad so he needed to have dinner early.

Hamburgers. Really good. Of course I forgot the picture until it was half eaten. Ha. The kids opened a can of Veggie Chips and spent most of dinner discussing the artificial and processed ingredients in the chips, amused by the fact that the main veggie used was potatoes. 

After dinner it was time for a thorough cleaning up of the house. I like to have things neat and organized for the cleaning lady tomorrow, so she isn't spending time decluttering (which we can do) and has more time for actual cleaning. Last week she did the windows and the week before she did the laundry room. So great. I also got my purse cleaned out. Working on keeping that space more organized.

Tuck-in time was the usual. Some video games/YouTube/music, "A Closer Look", and peluche talk. During this time Daddy came home with good news: Liga won 4-0 and is going on to eighth finals. Of course, with the Internet, Agus had already received a notification on his phone and let the rest of us know, but we were all excited nonetheless!