Prompt: What was Astra's routine with baby Vega when she was mostly staying at home with her?

It takes Astra a month or two to really get into the groove of taking care of Vega full time. She had underestimated just how much work being a full-time parent could be, really, and she had to come up with almost a military tactical approach to getting everything done that needed done in a day. Or perhaps more like getting everything she wanted to get done in a day. She always has been quite the over achiever.

When she does settle into a routine, it looks something like this, give or take an activity or two depending on the day or if she's desperately needed by the DEO for some alien mission.

Astra wakes up at five am every morning, not because she sets an alarm, but because after all the years in the military, she's incapable of sleeping past seven am even at her most tired. Five am is around usual otherwise. She doesn't mind so much because it's quiet out in the world, or as quiet as National City ever is. Alex isn't up yet and baby Vega is still fast asleep dreaming of whatever it is infants do. Astra looks in on her every morning before she goes out to the living room and goes about her morning exercise routine. It's not that she needs it on this planet, but the routine helps her.

By the time she's done she starts the coffee and fifteen minutes or so later, Alex stumbles in from her bedroom, bleary-eyed and grumpy until she sits down with a cup of coffee and drinks about half of it, and then she's an actual human being again. By that time Astra slides a plate of food in front of Alex and sits down with her own huge portion. Usually it's some derivative of eggs and bacon, but sometimes, if she finds the right things, things that are almost the same as on Krypton, but not, she makes imitations of the dishes from her home. They almost taste the same, but the almost sometimes leaves her more homesick than before. Alex, she knows, of course, and on those mornings she compliments Astra's cooking quietly before offering a comforting squeeze on her shoulder and cleaning up the dishes.

After Astra feeds the both of them she gets Vega up at six forty-five. Vega is much like her second mother in that she doesn't like mornings until after she's up and around for a little while. Astra just carries her around for a half an hour or so while she does some of the lighter chores so Vega can get used to the waking world. Once Vega starts playing with her hair instead of lounging lazily against her shoulder, Astra knows she's up for the day and goes to fix breakfast.

When she comes Vega is already starting on soft solids. She mashes bananas and other fruits into paste and feeds it to her daughter spoonful by spoonful. Sometimes half of it gets in her hair or on Vega herself. It's why she doesn't shower after her workout, but when Vega's down for her morning nap. She learned very quickly to adjust her schedule to such things so now she just shakes her head at Vega's antics.

"The food is supposed to go in you, Inah , not on me."

Vega just smiles at her and claps her hands.

Astra shakes her head and wipes them both off before cleaning up the kitchen once more and setting Vega up in the living room with her favorite toys. Most mornings she plays with the little girl for an hour or two, making up for lost time. She speaks all in Kryptonese and Vega seems to be picking it up fairly quickly. She calls Astra Ieiu more often than not now and she's picked up other basic words as well. It makes Astra wish that she had been there for her first word, but this is enough.

When Vega starts to seem sleepy, Astra gives her the first bottle of the day and burps her before putting her down for her morning nap. Then and only then does she shower. She'll stay clean until past lunch if she's lucky. She'd heard the phrase being a mother is dirty work, but she never realized how literal it was.

After the shower she goes about more chores. There's always so much laundry and she always finds herself in the basement of their apartment building with a god awful amount of the human currency called quarters, putting in load after load. If Vega stirs while she's away she's up the stairs to get her child in a flash before returning. Vega seems to like the laundry room, though Astra can't imagine why. She'll sit happily on top of the washer by Astra and look around as if everything is brand new. Astra watches her sometimes and smiles softly. Her daughter.

In-between laundry loads she goes up and picks up toys and cleans another room, she has a rotating schedule for things. Bathrooms on Mondays, change the sheets on Tuesdays, and the like. Then it's onto lunch, mashed veggies for Vega, peas are her favorite, and at least four sandwiches for Astra herself. Mashed peas, consequently also happen to be the most difficult vegetable to scrub out of her hair. She wonders sometimes if Vega knows that and just likes them so she can giggle more at Astra. Her daughter is rather smart after all for a tiny one her age.

After lunch Astra settles Vega in front of the TV for an hour or two of educational programs while she herself logs onto the internet and scrolls around, taking in as much information as she can. There's politics and history and Earth ecology and human biology, and their laughable chemistry and physics, though sometimes there are glimmers of things that Krypton hadn't yet figured out, but those are few and far between. It's important to her that she never stops learning and so she reads all that she can. Alex's association with a local university that she consults with gives her access to all the peer-reviewed journals and she reads those, she reads classic literature that has been scanned online, she reads everything, truly, with little discretion all while Vega happily laughs along to the show that Astra chose because it will teach her Spanish.

By the time Vega's afternoon nap rolls around it's time to start working on dinner. Astra may take Vega with her to go shopping. She sleeps in her car seat easily and does not stir, even in the loudest of environments, but on days where she doesn't need to shop, she quietly gets everything ready. With all the time that she has, it's usually something fairly complicated. Learning new Earth dishes amuses her and keeps her mind occupied. Sometimes, though, Earth tastes mystify her. Why is there so much butter in southern cooking? She doesn't understand.

Vega wakes up around the time that Alex usually gets home. Alex waves hi to Astra, giving a quick word or two about how her day went, before going back and scooping up an already awake Vega and carrying her back out to the kitchen before she talks more. Alex definitely misses their daughter while she is away. Astra can see it in the way she cuddles Vega close. It makes Astra smile and her insides warm up. Of all the people on this planet, she is glad that Vega was taken in by Alex. There is no better person.

They all eat dinner together and this time it's Alex who gets mashed food in various places and Astra just laughs while Alex pouts. After dinner it's a bath for Vega, though mostly it's just Vega sitting in a tub full of water with a myriad of toys playing while Astra and Alex look on fondly. After she's dried off, Alex plays with her for a little while and when she starts to nod off, she takes her back to her room and reads to her, easy picture books most of the time, but sometimes Alex pulls out other things like Harry Potter and The Chronicles of Narnia because honestly, you can only read so many picture books.

When Vega is asleep, Alex walks back out and joins Astra on the couch for another couple hours. Sometimes they watch TV, Astra does need to catch up on her pop culture after all, sometimes they sit together, each on their own computer, sometimes they read, and Astra's most treasured nights of all are when they talk about everything that crosses their mind. She learns a great deal about the other woman, about Kara growing up, about human life, about Vega's first months, about so many important things. She tells Alex things too, what it was like on Krypton as an adult, her time in the military, all the things that came before her life was thrown into chaos because those other things are for the dark of the night, not the tranquil evening.

But even that comes to an end eventually as Alex slips off to shower and get ready for bed. Astra turns the couch into her own bed and settles down. She grabs one of the paperbacks that Alex has, and reads some more until her eyes grow heavy and she too falls asleep to start everything again in the morning.