slow down day

Do you ever have a day that you devote to moving slower and doing less? On occasion, as my husband is heading out the door to the office, he passes me a magazine article to read during the day or offers the suggestion to take a nap and I usually laugh.  The idea that I have a moment to do this is as comical as the idea that I would have time to turn on the TV or sit and eat a leisurely meal.  From the time I wake up until the time my children are asleep I am organizing, cooking, chasing, cleaning, and just moving. I don't take moments to sit and do nothing.  Doing nothing feels like a waste so I am usually busy even if it's picking up shoes, changing spoiled t-shirts or even jotting notes to myself about baking ideas.  I like to stay busy and yet sometimes it gets a little too much.

It's not often that I set aside a day to be still, so I savored my slow day today even more.  What does a slow day for you look like?  I'll give you a window into mine.

I didn't have to go in the car anywhere today.  Bella is at home Tuesdays so we made homemade play dough.  It was so fun and she made a huge mess with it which is to be expected.  She presented me with an amazing play dough cake decorated with leaf sprinkles.

I took lots of time to sit and just play with Ashlynn and Arabella.  Most of the time I am playing in passing.  Playing for a few minutes and then directing my attention elsewhere.  Today I just sat and we played and it was nice.  My girls like to wrestle so we did a lot of rolling around on the floor.  I sat and played fetch with Lucy.  She appreciated the extra attention.  Ash loves playing with Lucy too.

I ate lunch alone. It was only 10 minutes in silence but it was a blissful ten minutes and I had a glass of wine which felt luxurious and devious all at the same time.  Maybe the highlight of my day.

I made a big double batch of soup.  Arabella had a blast helping me peel the skins off the roasted red peppers.  I absolutely love having my girls' help in the kitchen. It's such a fun way to spend quality time together.  They love getting involved and I love that little things like stirring or pushing the button on the food processor excites them about cooking.

Since I wasn't in a rush to do anything today I made the long slow double rise dinner rolls that I usually don't have time for.  Having time and patience for dinner roll dough to rise produces the most amazing fluffy rolls.  They are delicious and a million times better than what I usually do.  It was nice to spend the time to do this. Therapeutic almost. Arabella helped me roll the dough and sprinkle it with salt.  We all dug in to a fluffy airy-on-the-inside roll when they came out of the oven.  Even Ashlynn enjoyed them.