A day in the life...

For this month's Green Moms Carnival, Beth of Fake Plastic Fish, challenged us all to give our readers a peek into our daily rountines. I love doing photo journals - of course the last time I did one I had two less kids - so I thought it would be fun to show you my day in pictures.

At the end of the day, I realized that it's not so easy to do photo journals any more. But as we say in our house, "You get what you get and you don't throw a fit."

So here is the insanity I call life...

I started my day today with a hundred yard dash up the driveway to catch the garbage man. I forget to put the trash out at least every other week.

All three kids are in early morning swimming lessons right now, so the mornings have been a mad dash to get them ready.

Breakfast was oatmeal today. They used to love the flavored stuff in a box. When I switched to plain organic oats bought in bulk they protested. We went about a month without eating it (long enough for them to forget just how sugary the boxed stuff was) then tried again. Success! They like it with a little brown sugar, cinnamon and fruit.

After packing up the kids towels and snacks and pushing them out the door, I log in to get a little work done, converse with some Freecycle folks I've promised items too, and get together a bag for Goodwill.

I've volunteered to man a booth at the farmer's market for an hour this afternoon, so I headed into town a little bit early to see the kids at their swimming lesson. Isn't our rec center purty? It overlooks a lake with the mountains in the background. I'd join that spin class you can see on the deck...if only I wasn't so lazy. I wonder if they'd let me sit there with a margarita and watch the class. I could cheer for them?

There's my little man climbing his way out of the pool. The two older kids have done so well that they were bumped up to the next levels of their classes.

I have some time between lessons and my next commitment, so I dash by the recycling center for a quick drop off. There's a big issue right now with the recycling center. It used to be a manned station where everything was separated. It ran very smoothly that way.

Now the company running it is moving towards an unmanned station that will eventually be single stream. It's not working all that well so far as you can see by the always-full dumpsters.

The local sustainability group that I joined has been working with the hauling company to try to work out a good solution.

Since I'm supposed to be actually working today, I head across the street to my favorite coffee shop, Common Grounds, where I can use the wi-fi and grab some breakfast. Common Grounds is a locally owned, family run business with a cozy mountain cabin feeling to it. They're pretty eco-friendly, serving dine in orders in real coffee mugs and food on real plates with silverware. They even source their coffee locally.

To my dismay, this is how my order came out this morning - styrofoam and plastic. Evidently they were "overrun" because of the farmer's market (which is held in their parking lot) so they went with disposables. Such a disappointment.

I was able to get in almost two hours of work before heading out to the farmer's market for my "shift". I volunteer with Evergreen Alliance for Sustainability, which is working with the parks and rec district on plans for a community garden in town. Things are moving along and we hope to get the area landscaped and compost down this fall, then have plots available for next year's growing season. At this point, we're collecting signatures to show community support. I also manage to pick up some veggies for the family. I wish I could stay longer, but I need to get back to my real job.

Back home again I make a sweet potato for a late lunch and settle in to get my work done.

Around 5:00 I go out to the garden to sit in the sunshine. The kids are running around playing and Mr. Greenhab is building a raised bed.

We haven't thought about dinner so Mr. Greenhab whips up matzo brei and I steam some asparagus. I realize writing this that I haven't eaten any meat in three days. I've settled into a pretty good flexitarian routine.

Our evenings are always a chaotic blur of baths and games and books and chasing little ones around. After the bedtime rodeo is over I eye the berries I need to turn into jam and decide to leave that project for tomorrow. Instead, I crash on the couch with my laptop and write a book review then crawl into bed.