Day in the life | In black and white | Documentary Family Photography Bath

A few Sunday’s ago I decided to document a ‘Day In The Life’ of our little family as a #phlockliveinblackandwhite challenge set by the wonderful Phlock Live community.

We wake up, we go downstairs. We make cups of tea (for me) and coffee (for my husband) and warm milk for my son. We turn the TV on for my eldest and set up the baby on his play mat with his baby toys.

Wake up times can vary, my sons wake anytime between 6am and 7am. Sometimes if we’re lucky they may sleep in till 7.30 but this is a rarity! My husband and I usually take it in turns to get up with the children if it’s an early one. I have to admit he’s been doing more of the earlier wake ups recently as I’ve had a lot of broken nights with my 9 month old; I think it’s more teeth coming through. And for that I am eternally grateful to him for allowing me the extra hour or so in bed. It doesn’t seem like a lot and I wouldn’t have usually thought sleeping till 7.30 is a ‘lie-in’, but my goodness does it make a difference to how I feel that day.

Around 8am we usually have breakfast. This can be anything from cereal, toast, porridge, smoothies or a cooked breakfast. As with every meal time, it’s a messy affair, with most of my baby’s breakfast landing on the floor. I spend a lot of my time (3 times a day!) clearing up meal time mess. It’s a perpetual annoyance but unavoidable at this stage of our lives with little ones. As with it all, I try to go with the flow and suppress my want to have a neat and tidy house all the time. Im trying to learn to love dust!

After breakfast we go back upstairs to get dressed, shower (for mummy and daddy) and brush our teeth.

The day then spreads before us. With nowhere fun (other than the play parks) to take the kiddies to, there aren’t many options of how to fill our day. So it’s usually either a choice of play at home, or go for a walk out and about. 

This morning, however, we decided to mix it up and go into the centre of Bath, get some takeaway coffees and let our eldest scoot around the empty town whilst littlest one napped in his pushchair. It’s amazing how used to this strange new ghost town we’ve got used to. Our son doesn’t question any of it, takes all the new strange normals in his stride and continues living his life in his little four year olds mind. I’m intrigued to see if this pandemic will have had any long term effects on him down the line, I hope it doesn’t. I’m sure he will remember it though and he is old enough to have known of a ‘time before’ covid and a time after. 

Once we get home it’s coming up to lunch time. I make us a lunch of sandwiches, crisps and fruit. There is laundry to put on (as there is every day) which Rex loves helping me do and watching as it spins round and round.

We meander through the afternoon. Not an awful lot feels different about the weekends at the moment compared to the week days, except I have an extra pair of hands which is always welcome. We watch some TV, we play some piano which the boys love. We do a bit more playing.

And then we decide to head out to our local park for a late afternoon blast of fresh air and a play. My son see’s some of his friends from school which is always a joy watching him socialise despite the restricted times we are in. It’s so lovely seeing them just being able to be kids.

The afternoon then disappears and it’s dinner time (another messy affair) and bath time. Not before we’ve had a little pre-bedtime dance / chase in the kitchen, something that’s becoming a bit of a ritual!

It sometimes feels like bedtime is never going to come. I’m always wishing it to come, and I know before too long my children will be safely tucked up in bed and the couple of precious child-free hours I have before bed will happen. Today was a good day. Exhausting, but good.

This is just one day of course, in and amongst so many days. So many days that look so similar, yet my mood can vary so much as I dance across a myriad of emotions and feelings. 

It’s funny how each day feels important, I guess because you are in that day and you can’t see what’s coming next. As we mark the ‘anniversary’ of lockdown, all I can think of is how my perception of time seems to have changed or become totally skewed. 

There have been so many days. So many of the same days. So many days that have blurred into weeks, that became months, that became a year. And even when I think really hard I can only remember, really clearly, in detail, a handful of days over the last year. Of how we filled our days and what we ate, what we watched on the TV. 

So many days have gone by that are just forgotten. Days where I would have put so much effort into that day to make it fun and enjoyable for my children, so much playing, so much tidying, so many meals made and cleaned up. 

So much mothering. So much parenting from both of us. So much of everything. 

Big intense feelings crammed into our four walls with nowhere to go but at each other. And when those big upsetting feelings spill out they reverberate around our house like an echo chamber. 

Some days I peak at lunchtime, having given the morning all the energy I had for that day and used it all up in a vigorous imaginative play session. Some days I get through relatively unscathed. Other days I’m so depleted I have to crawl along at a snail pace, gently doing a bit of playing here, a little walk there, an easy dinner to make and no laundry that day. The dust always gets me down though, it always seems to be there. It reappears sometimes minutes after dusting. 

Sometimes I think I’m strong. I always want to help people. Sometimes I think, ‘you f*cking idiot’ for ever finding any of this hard. For finding playing with your child tiresome or boring. The years before where I’ve held things together for what ever reason. Not this year. 

There were moments when I just cracked. I overflowed. I burnt out. I cried. I raged. I laughed manically. I became depressed. I became angry and frustrated. I desperately wanted to escape my four walls sometimes. I wanted to do something, anything, to help. 

And I know if I don’t write it down I’m scared I’ll forget how I felt. And if I forget, then what was the point of going through it all? What have I learned? 

So many days. 

Normally I like to try and end on an uplifting message that I can see light at the end of the tunnel. And that is true, I can see light at the end of the tunnel. But today, on the anniversary of lockdown, I think it’s important to focus on the past year for what it was, an incredibly tough and testing year for each and every one of us.