A Day in a Parenting Blogger’s Life with Newcastle Family Life

Welcome back to my second week of “A Day in a Parenting Blogger’s Life”. I had a great number of responses for blog series and it looks like it will be going for a very long time. So I just want to thank everyone who signed up so far.

Today we have Lindsay from Newcastle Family Life. I have been following her blog for quite some time and vice versa. Here she is telling us about a typical day in her busy life.

1. First of all, tell me a bit about yourself.

Hi I am Lindsay, a 32 year old stay at home mum from Newcastle Upon Tyne. I live with my
partner Lee, who works as a manager at Greggs and are three children Chloe who is 13,
Sophia who is 3 and Jacob who has just turned 2. We also have a crazy ginger house cat
called Marmalade. I started blogging two year ago when I was pregnant with youngest as a
way to record my pregnancy and I blog at Newcastle Family Life.

2. How many times were you woken last night?

None, of my children luckily. My youngest was such a bad sleeper and he used to wake up
every two hours during the night until a few months ago. I am so thankful he now sleeps
through from 7pm – 6am.
I really love sleep and I am much less grumpy when I have had a full 8 hours.

3. Do you cosleep?

No we never have with the little two, my youngest has never spent a single night in are bed
and my 3 year old only has twice when she was unwell. I am really lucky that my little two
have always loved their own beds from being tiny newborns. I did cosleep with eldest
though from her being around 9 months until she was 3 years old. I was a single parent then
and did not mind, I was a little bit sad my little two have never wanted to cosleep.

4. What time do you normally wake up?

My son wakes me up every single morning at around 6am, I so wish that he would sleep a
little later as I am not an early morning person at all! In the summer he normally wakes at
5am, which is a killer.

5. How much average sleep do you get a night?

8 hours, I get grumpy when I get less. I rarely have lie ins though, even when I get the
chance to have a one on the other half days off I am normally awake by 8am. I think the
latest I have had a lie in until is around 9.30am. I think anything later than that is a waste of
the day.

6. What’s the first thing you do when you wake up?

I normally have a little person jumping on me shouting at me to wake up. I have to start
every single day with a coffee, or three!

7. Tell me about your typical morning routine.

We have always had really lazy mornings at home, however that is all set to change as my
little two will be starting nursery and preschool in the mornings. We will have to be up, dressed and out the house on weekday mornings by 8.15 at the latest to leave for nursery which is a 20 minute walk away. I will drop my 3 year old off at her nursery school at 8.40 and then I need to drop my 2 year old off at preschool
for 9.15, luckily his preschool is on the way home. I will then have around an hour and a half to myself to do some blogging or housework before heading to pick them up again. Luckily the timings work out well so I can pick them both up in time.

8. When and how often do you prepare the family dinners? Give us a few examples
what you would cook.

Six nights a week I will cook from scratch, we will normally get a takeaway once a week. The children have grown up on home cooked meals and won’t eat any kind of ready type meals. We always have a roast dinner on Sunday, we also have a lot of pasta dishes, Mexican foods like Chilli & Fajitas. I am always trying out new Slimming World recipes too from the magazines.

9. What’s on the menu for lunch?

We were really naughty today and had a Mcdonalds for lunch after softplay. I thought the kids would have loved it as they have only been to Mcdonalds a few times but they refused to eat it and only ate half a chicken nugget each! Their dad was happy though as he polished off the left over happy meal.

10. What activities have you got planned for the day for the kids?

Today we went to soft play with one of the nursery mams, we had the whole soft play to are self and it was nice to be able to sit and relax for once instead of constantly having to supervise them.

11. Do you generally eat dinner together as a family or get the kids fed first?

We almost always eat as a family, we normally have a meal at around 4.30 – 5pm. Sometimes my other half works late so he will just get something at work. I like us all eating as a family and I think it helps encourage the little ones to eat the same as us too.

12. What do you do after dinner?

I normally let the little two watch TV whilst I do the dishes and tidy up, my teen will normally be in her room on her ipad. We have some quiet time watching Tv for around an hour, normally a Disney film or Disney Jr.

13. What is your bedtime routine?

If my other half is off he will always do the bedtime routine, he has since the children were born as that is his time with them after being at work all day and not seeing them. We have quiet TV time after dinner followed by a story and then the little two will have a bath at round 6.30, they then get dressed for bed and they both have some milk and go to bed together. We are really lucky that they have both been in the same routine since birth and fall asleep in their beds pretty much straight away. I then tidy up and spend some time with my eldest when the little two are in bed.

14. Most importantly, when and where do you normally blog in those 24 hours? Do you
have a schedule?

No I don’t have a schedule, I keep writing a one and it never ever happens so I have gave up on a schedule and just blog as and when I get the chance. I normally blog on an evening when the kids are in bed on the nights the other half is working late. Sometimes I have a few hours to blog when the other half is off work if we are not going anywhere that day. I am hoping I can start using the hour and a half the little ones are at nursery to catch up. I have so many outstanding reviews that I really need to start catching up, I am starting to feel a bit overwhelmed at the moment. As I have so little time to blog I find that when I do have time to blog it is always taken up with brand work and I just never have time to blog about what I want too, I really want to start doing less brand work and a lot more personal type posts now that I will have a little extra time. I really need to start making more of an effort with social media too as I am rubbish with that at the moment, I wish their was more hours in the day.

Thanks for your time Lindsay and sharing a day in the life of Newcastle Family Life with us. I’d love to have the time and skill to cook six meals a week from scratch.

Blog URL: http://www.newcastlefamilylife.co.uk

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