This week, I am documenting my life in a series of “Week in the Life” posts. I hope everyone enjoys this little peek into my day-to-day! Read all about Monday and Tuesday.

This morning, I woke up a little before my alarm went off at 5:30 a.m. I was having an anxiety dream, and it involved Dutch, my mom, and my brother (read: the three most important people in my life) so I was more than happy to wake up from that!

I took Dutch on his first morning walk, fed him and emptied the dishwasher while he ate (he won’t eat unless I’m physically in the kitchen with him, so because he’s spoiled, I stay in the kitchen and if I can make my time productive, even better!), took a shower, did my hair and makeup, got dressed, packed my lunch, and then took Dutch on his second morning walk.

I left for work around 7:10 and managed to score a prime parking spot in our parking garage. Woohoo!

Once at work, I made my breakfast shake, chatted with my coworkers for a bit, and then got started on my day. I edited the rest of the articles I had written yesterday and sent them off to my proofing partner, and then wrote four more articles.

A little after 11:15, I left work to drive home and take Dutch on his afternoon walk. Fairly uneventful – we walked, we snuggled, I left. I did manage to snag my same awesome parking spot when I got back to work, which never, ever happens.

I had the most unproductive afternoon at work – it was seriously impressive how little I got done! I managed to finish one last blog article, and after editing the articles I had written earlier, I sent them to my proofing partner. (Another client finished for this month – yay!) From then on, though, it was a struggle. I refreshed Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram approximately four billion times. Played at least a dozen games of Candy Crush. Read blogs. Sigh. At the end of the day, I managed to edit and send off monthly content to one of my clients, and write a half-page of content for another client. Not ideal.

Since I’m technically still on schedule this month, I didn’t beat myself up for this unproductive afternoon because they definitely happen here. There are only so many days where I can sit and write, write, write. It just means I have to maintain my focus for the rest of the month. I can do this!

I left work at 5 and got home a little after 5:30. While the commute to work is easier than it was when I lived in St. Pete, the commute home is definitely worse. I guess it all balances out, though.

Once home, I took Dutch on his walk and then chatted with Roomie for a little bit. Right before I decided to sit down and do my NaNoWriMo writing for the day, Dutch threw up! He hasn’t thrown up since the night he was super sick, so it was a bit troubling. But he seemed okay, so we snuggled on the couch and I started writing.

After I wrote 1,000 words, I decided to take a break for dinner. I took Dutch out for another nighttime walk, fed him (I gave him some bland GI-safe food that he scarfed down), and then put a frozen pizza in the oven for me.

As my pizza cooked and then while I ate it, I finished Monday’s episode of The Voice, and then finished up my NaNoWriMo writing for the day (1,668 words total).

It was around 9 p.m. at this point, so I cleaned up the tiny mess I made in the kitchen, took a bubble bath, did my nighttime routine, and then snuggled in bed with Dutch and my book.

Lights out tonight at 10:30 p.m.!

Thoughts on today: As you can probably see, my nights aren’t exactly the most thrilling. Sometimes, I feel bad about that but most times, I don’t. I really, really like having low-key weeknights. My job can sometimes take a lot out of me, and I like the days when I can just go home and relax on the couch. Plus, with Dutch, I hate leaving him at night when I’ve left him all day. (I try to avoid this whenever possible.) I’m not someone who thrives on being busy (in fact, it’s an anxiety trigger for me!) and as an introvert, I need these low-key nights to recharge. The last thing I will ever do is apologize for doing something that feels good to me, so you can have your busy schedules. I’ll take slowness any day.

Do you find that you follow up super productive days with an unproductive one like me? Are you someone who thrives on busyness or slowness, or do you fall somewhere in the middle?

This week, I am documenting my life in a series of “Week in the Life” posts. I hope everyone enjoys this little peek into my day-to-day! Read all about Monday here.

My alarm woke me up at 4:45 a.m. today, and it was the most unwelcome. I snoozed for 5 minutes, then got up, got dressed, and took Dutch on his first morning walk. After giving him a treat, I headed down to the gym for a workout. I did a fun 2.3-mile loop on the spin bike and then 15ish minutes of strength training.

Once back in my apartment, I fed Dutch, took a shower, did my hair and makeup, got dressed, packed my lunch, and took Dutch on his second morning walk.

By 7:05, I was commuting to work and got there right around 7:30. (My work hours recently changed, so now I work 7:30-5:00 Mondays-Thursdays and 8:00-11:30 on Fridays. I love it!)

My morning at the office was fairly straightforward. I planned a full day of writing (9 articles in total was my goal). I wrote 2.5 articles before I had to stop to attend a company-wide meeting about our health insurance renewal. Luckily, that meeting only lasted five minutes since nothing had changed. Hooray! I am on a tight schedule this month and don’t really have time for interruptions to my day.

After the meeting, I got right back to writing and finished 2.5 more articles before lunchtime. (I didn’t edit any of the articles, just wrote them and moved on to the next! I’ll go back and edit them later. But that’s why I can write them so quickly!)

At 11:15, I left work to go home and take Dutch on his afternoon walk. I get an hour lunch break and only live 15-20 minutes from work. So, I’m able to spend 20-30 minutes with him in the afternoons, which is great. I love this time of day! It was also supremely nice out (82 degrees – laugh all you want), so we enjoyed the sunshine longer than usual.

When I got back to work, I heated up my lunch (Santa Fe Chicken leftovers with brown rice), which I scarfed down while editing a coworker’s pages. Then, it was back to writing for me! I was incredibly focused this afternoon, so I got all my writing done by 3:15. At that point, I took a break to go downstairs and bask in the sunshine.

Ahhhhhh.

The rest of my day was spent editing. I edited a coworker’s pages and then started reading through the articles I had written earlier and editing them. Since I wrote the articles so quickly, I was worried that they were terrible, but they weren’t too awful! They could use some work, but I’m not concerned with perfection here. And sometimes, I get really great feedback and editing suggestions from my coworkers, which is helpful for allowing me to see a sentence I have been struggling with in a new light.

I left work at 5 and thanks to much better traffic patterns, I got home right around 5:30. Roomie was already outside with Dutch, so I took him off her hands (while giving her my bags to take up to the apartment) and the Dutchers and I went on a nice long walk around the complex. I got the mail and found two bills for me (boo) and the sweetest card from San (YAY!). Her card completely brightened my day!

Back at home, I fed Dutch and then took a relaxing bubble bath. I read a chapter of The Martian while doing so. All the science-y stuff in this book is going over my head, but I love the voice of the novel so much. I’ll be able to devote more time to reading this weekend and I can’t wait!

After my bubble bath, Roomie had dinner prepared (lightened-up beef stroganoff), which we ate while watching part of last night’s episode of The Voice. Then, she cleaned up the kitchen (I offered to clean since she cooked, but she insisted) while I started on my NaNoWriMo writing for the day.

It took me less than an hour to get my writing done, which I consider a huge, huge win. I wrote 1,680 words, so I’m slowly closing in on the 20k mark of total words written! Whee!

It was a little after 8 p.m. when I finished, so I took Dutch on his second nighttime walk and then ate a bowl of ice cream while finishing up this post. Afterward, I went through my nighttime routine and read in bed for a little while before turning in for the night at 9:30.

Do you snooze your alarm or get up right when it goes off? What’s one good thing that happened to you yesterday?

This week, I am documenting my life in a series of “Week in the Life” posts. I hope everyone enjoys this little peek into my day-to-day!

I woke up a little before 6 a.m. and from there, it was a rush to get ready and out the door. I took Dutch for his first morning walk, fed him, took a shower and did my hair and makeup, got dressed, packed my lunch, and then took Dutch on his second morning walk (yes, he gets two walks in a one-hour period in the mornings. And both are necessary, if you know what I mean!)

It was a little after 7:15 when I left for work, which means I’ll probably be a bit late this morning. Oh, well. Mondays are hard.

Once at work, I put away my lunch and drank my breakfast shake while I prepared myself for a morning of writing. I wanted to finish up monthly content for a client, and then spend the rest of the day editing.

Mid-morning, after I finished my writing task for the day, I made myself a small bowl of oatmeal and then started on the editing work I needed to get done. Lots of pages to edit, especially as I arranged a proofing trade with a coworker in the midst of my writing task earlier.

At 11:15, I left work, went home, and took Dutch on a walk. This used to be my mom’s job when I lived with her since her work was so close to our apartment. And now it’s mine! It’s annoying to have to leave work every day, but I do like getting away from my desk and getting some sunshine and exercise during lunch.

After our walk, I put the ingredients for Skinnytaste’s Santa Fe Chicken in the Crock-Pot and snuggled with Dutch for a little bit before driving back to work.

Back at work, I heated up my lunch in the breakroom. Today, I had Lean Cuisine taquitos, string cheese, corn, and a Trader Joe’s treat. I read some blogs while eating my lunch, and then jumped right back into the editing task I needed to complete.

Around 3 p.m., I finished editing and started working on monthly content for another client. This client is a little bit different from my other ones, as I write blog-style articles rather than SEO-style website content. It’s fun, but also a little bit challenging.

I got sidetracked by chit-chat with my coworkers, so I only ended up writing one article before it was time to go home.

I left work at 5, and got caught in terrible, terrible traffic. The kind of traffic that makes you want to cry and question if you’ll ever see home again. I ended up taking a detour to get gas because I was running low and didn’t want to have to stop before work or during my lunch break tomorrow, but this ended up being a bad decision because the traffic on that route was nearly at a standstill.

It was a little after 6 when I finally got home and I nearly wanted to kiss the pavement. Ha!

Once home, I took Dutch on his first nighttime walk and then put my things away, put on comfy clothes, took off my makeup, fed Dutch, and started finishing up dinner. Since I made a Crock-Pot meal, it only entailed shredding chicken and making rice. Hooray!

My roommate and I ate dinner while watching a couple episodes of The Tonight Show, and then we cleaned up the kitchen.

By then, it was around 7, so I took Dutch on his second nighttime walk (and prayed he wouldn’t need a third… yes, sometimes he needs THREE!), and then ensconced myself in my room to finish writing this blog post and to write my daily word count for NaNoWriMo.

Around 8:45, I finished up my writing (1,700 words today!) and then did my nighttime routine of brushing my teeth, washing my face, and taking my allergy meds. Then, I finished writing this blog post.

I read for a little bit (just started The Martian!) but I was way too tired to focus on the words, so it was lights out by 9:30 pm.

Thoughts on today: It was a good day, where I felt like I got a lot accomplished. I was productive at work, actually made dinner (it was my first time cooking for Roomie, too!), and met my word count goal for NaNoWriMo. This writing challenge is so intense, and it would feel so good to take a night off from it, but I am so motivated to complete this challenge. I was more tired than usual, but hoping an early night means waking up feeling more rested tomorrow!

What are you currently reading? What time do you normally wake up on the weekdays?