pretty photo of the dirtiest screen ever by Christa Rene
5 Things I Do Each Night So That I Don’t Turn Into A Crazy Person
1. Maid Service
I have happily copped to being a terrible housekeeper many times before so don’t get any wild ideas about me scrubbing floors or dusting window sills. I do go through the playroom as soon as the baby goes to bed and toss every single item back into our awesome white storage chest thing. Meg said we had to have it, so obviously we bought it, and she was right. G loves it because he can clear every.single.thing. out of it in approximately 7 seconds and I love it because I can “clean” the playroom by putting everything back into it without rhyme or reason. I also grab my various Starbucks and Chick Fil A cups, his snack keepers and sippies and the random dog toys that always find their way over the baby gate. Seeing that space in some semblance of order really keeps my crazy at bay. 
2. Blog It Out
Every night Justin does bath time – yes, he’s a hero – and the minute that water starts to run, I feel myself relax just a bit. I’m in charge of making the bedtime bottle and pulling out jammies that still fit and after that, bedtime is all Dad. As soon as story time begins, I grab my laptop, a glass of wine and get into my bed. Yep, at 7pm. It’s where I’ve always blogged and it works for me. I turn on really bad TV (ok, fine, I turn on the newest episode of Dr. Phil, which I DVR’ed. Sorry not sorry.) and get to work. The relative silence and the child free moments really bring me joy (not an exaggeration) and being creative seems to keep my brain relatively engaged. I often worry that the Baby Brain will never truly subside and sitting down to write helps me feel like I’m at least capable of one of the things that I used to do pre-baby. If I think of all the things that I don’t feel that I can do as well now that I’ve produced an offspring, the crazy really comes a knockin, so I take the creativity for the win and move on.
3.Play Secretary
Most days I feel like I struggle to make a coherent thought with the baby trying to jam animal crackers into my mouth (I don’t actually hate that) so keeping up with emails and blog comments throughout the day can be difficult. I hate having open ended correspondence hanging over my head so I try to run through my email accounts (I have 7! Three for Willow Crowns, one for the old blog address, one for Olive and Tate and two personal accounts) and tie up loose ends. I don’t always catch everything but that at least keeps me from waking up at 2am wondering who I left hanging that day.
4. Single Silence
After I wrap up my blog post, we may eat dinner (which I didn’t bother to cook. Domestic Diva!) or I may choose to drink my calories and “snack” on one billion little things in the pantry, but not long after, I hop into bed for good. There is nothing that makes me happier, and the least amount of crazy possible, as being alone. Justin chills in our living room and watches ESPN and I lay in our bed with my wine glass, my phone and whatever crap TV is playing on TLC. I honestly just shut my brain off and it feels oh so good. If Justin tries to come in and have some deep meaningful talk with me (ie: a budget discussion), I just can’t. My brain is off and it won’t be back on until tomorrow morning (after coffee). 
5. Burn Up The Data
I really miss my friends sometimes. My working mom friends are the hardest for me to keep up with because we are on such opposite schedules and my best friends all live far away from me. It may not be traditional, but I spend a ton of time texting my girlfriends in bed each night. Meg and I work a lot at night (especially right before a launch) and we try to sneak in non-work stuff too. Caroline and I have kept up with one of our old roommate traditions and watch TV together – while she’s in Virginia and I’m in South Carolina – and we text the entire time we’re watching a show. I may not be able to call someone up for an hour long chat but I can squeeze in a text convo to maintain my friendships. Feeling like I’m still apart of my friends’ lives makes me feel stable. 
And stable is good. 
The end!