Weekend Self-care Routine
Wake-up time
Sleep in…till 7 am. A typical weekend morning these days, both kids have found their way to our bed, one asleep and the other quietly reading a book. We lay silently for a while while I gain more consciousness. My husband had day in the OR yesterday, so today I will do breakfast duty. The two kids suddenly suffused with energy (“Wake up time?!”), bounce down the stairs, reviewing breakfast options. I toss on glasses, rub eyes (or the other way around), rearrange my hair into a top knot and pad to the kitchen to prepare breakfast with the kids.
Morning routine
This morning, they had endless suggestions. Today, it was bagels, cream cheese and smoked salmon, sliced apples and cherries, cheerios with milk. And a last minute request for scrambled eggs. The kids perch on kitchen bar, chatting, providing helpful suggestions for my egg cooking technique. Milk for one, warm water with honey for the other. I sip warm water with lemon and honey, scrambling eggs as I grab a bite of warm everything bagel and cream cheese. With the ample spread before them, I run to the bathroom for quick face wash (Clarins creamy face wash), slap on Clinique Moisture Surge and brush my teeth. Fresh and minty and moisturized.
My husband is already up, making coffee for himself (I don’t drink coffee), but it’s a ritual for him, foamy milk and everything. I return downstairs. The four of us eat and chat around the breakfast bar, refilling milk and hot water, cutting extra apple slices as the sunlight streams in. It is a strangely warm Saturday in February. After breakfast, the kids change, brush their teeth and make their beds. They decide to run outside for a bit, declaring “I’m not cold at all!”
Writing corner
My husband and I finish breakfast. He parks himself by the window to watch the kids, sipping a second cup of coffee and finish his notes. (I had finished my notes for the week). Then, I quickly make the bed, toss in a load of laundry, and settle in my reading/writing corner to journal and brainstorm for the blog. I write for about 2 hours, stopping here and there to tend to laundry and bring the kids back inside (it was a *little* cold). My husband went to repair the lighting in the bathroom. The kids decided to play with magnet blocks and Playmobil, briefly detouring to an art project, and returning (as usual) to playing school.
Clean and delutter- yes, you heard right
It is slow, unstructured and a breath of fresh air compared to our weekday lives. Yes, my older one still has a math assignment to complete and to practice a little piano. We did work that into the morning as well, with a bit of repeated encouragement. I tidy up the living room and our bedroom. For me maintaining a state of declutter is self-care.
I dream of udon and hot pot
I daydream about lunch. Curry udon soup with carrots and sweet potatoes? Yum. I see Tiffycook‘s Instagram reel. This is a sign. But I don’t have curry. We decide to do hot pot instead, which we hadn’t done in a while, and deliciously hit the spot and took a luxuriously long amount of time. Nourishing food and unhurried conversation is self-care.
Who knows what the afternoon will hold?
So this is self-care
These are the weekends I always wanted and will hang on to for as long as I can. I know as the children get older, they will have more interests and activities that will translate into classes on the weekends. They will have more birthday parties and social gatherings and these unstructured days will seem distant. For now, I plan these moments with intention and look forward to them all week. I feel physically lighter, shedding invisible weight off my shoulders and sense my blood pressure settling.
This is a self-care routine that requires very little fancy additions. It has taken a while to orient our family’s finances and my own work mindset to allow this to happen a bit more organically. Reality still exists, but there are so many simple things to alter in our busy, working lives to allow these beautiful slow moments to happen and linger .
Slowing down time, making eye contact, preparing food from scratch, eating together, uninterrupted writing and an open-ended day is my idea of an ideal day. Actually, seeing Jesse Sutanto’s Instagram stories about her writing retreat makes me want to go on a writing retreat stocked up with snacks, room service and gorgeous views. Another time perhaps.
Oh, and tomorrow is my turn to sleep in.
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