2020 week 14: Zoom meetings and painting

We must be relatively accustomed to this stay at home situation now, because we survived and were even able to fit in a project over the weekend. After a couple weeks of no scout events, the Girl Scouts and Boy Scouts both decided to start Zoom meetings. Gabe's fourth grade homeroom also started optional weekly meetings. School work went much more smoothly the second week, both from an organizational perspective and a motivational one. For the boys, who are mostly on their own, they are challenging themselves to complete the workload in few days. For Charlotte I realized that copying text from the computer and printing "worksheets" was much easier and quicker to do than reading from the computer. Frank seems to be able to work pretty well from home, even when kids go down to the basement to play.

Other activities included making tracks for hexbugs (or as Charlotte says, "hex-a-bugs"), video game and phone time with friends (see photo of Zach), and searching the neighborhood for Easter eggs. Participating families get three eggs to hide in their yards, visible from the street, and a few who find and photograph the most by Easter will win prizes. We also had a movie night to watch Onward. It was pretty good...you can always count on Disney/Pixar to make you tear up!

Thursday and Friday we moved everything out of Charlotte's room to paint. Saturday I painted the ceiling and primed the walls, Sunday we painted the walls, and by Sunday night we had Gabe's bed in his new room. Yesterday I moved the rest of his stuff, and Charlotte is still working on her gigantic room, but there will be pictures. In between coats of paint we planted flower seeds we'd been collecting from Gabe's plant since last summer. It was nice to get a bunch of stuff crossed off the list!

using up leftover paint and primer!

2020 week 13: Spring

The biggest excitement last week (a new video game) was coupled with the biggest dread (online school). Sunday we let the kids download the new Animal Crossing game on the original switch for Charlotte and the boys switch lites. They have had a lot of fun working on their islands and visiting each other, and they also get online and play with our friends down the street. During the week the routine has been get dressed/eat/electronics/TV until 9, working on school for a couple hours, lunch, then they are able to have electronics for about three hours in the afternoons (some of that time in rooms so it is quiet for me). Zach's friend has a phone, and I've sometimes let him borrow mine to text back and forth with him or get on speaker phone so they can communicate while they play the video game. Sometimes all 6 kids at once!

They have adjusted to their online assignments pretty well. Some of it is reading or watching lessons online, some of it is working in books they brought home, and sometimes it is writing or drawing something and submitting a photo of it. Not too bad, considering. Zach is very familiar with accessing everything from his school-issued iPad, so he's very self-sufficient and pretty quick at completing things. Charlotte is set up at the family computer and is pretty good but needs me to keep her on task. Gabe was working on my computer most of the week, but he is now happier and more focused on an old laptop we resurrected and set up in his room. Frank was at work through Thursday but has been working at home since then.

The weather warmed up, and we got outside: for Frank to cut the grass, for the kids to listen to story time, for Charlotte to dance and blow bubbles, and for me to photograph the tree. On Saturday the kids rode bikes. Zach had some friends show up, and at least they were slightly more distanced than they would have been off of bikes. It was the best we could do, and our social middle schooler was overjoyed with having the interaction, short as it was.

almost completely deserted Target

They have slept all together on the guest bed multiple times.

Girl misses dance class. They are debating moving the recital to next January--I'll keep you all updated.

2020 weeks 11 & 12: Transition to quarantine

The week of March 9th was still pretty normal for us. We were hearing the news stories and buying a little extra when we got groceries, but school and all the activities were still on. I went to the elementary school to pop popcorn for the weekly PTA sale on Thursday the 12th. That evening at Charlotte's dance class all the moms could talk about was how the states around us were shutting things down. The next day the kids went to school, but we got the word midday that they'd be out for the next week, maybe two, maybe more. Luckily Frank was already home at that point, and despite the long lines we were able to grab a few more groceries before the kids got off their buses. Then we went back out with them to pick up a fire pit we'd been thinking about buying.

It's been a transition to quarantine this past week. I took Charlotte to a friend's party at the bowling alley on Sunday. Frank and I both had gym classes on Monday, by Wednesday when I went back to Zumba it was limited to 9 students per class, but then they had to close the gym altogether. We had dental cleanings Thursday afternoon and were only slightly surprised to learn we'd be their last patients for at least two weeks. This morning I was able to still do my Zumba class via a Periscope broadcast from my phone to the basement TV. So we've been doing lots of art, video games, reading Harry Potter, made s'mores, watched seven episodes of Lego Masters on Hulu (and can't wait for the next one), have skyped a few people, and Zach baked gluten-free chocolate chip cookies. The kids did not have to do school work for last week, but the plan is in place for online learning and assignments starting Monday the 23rd. Frank is still going to work, but it seems like things are changing daily, if not hourly, so who knows what next week will be like. Aside from missing our friends, we are all healthy and doing well. We're hoping it will quit raining and warm back up so we can ride bikes or at least go for a walk.

Popcorn popping and selling, visiting with Charlotte, and lots of hand washing.

Charlotte, immediately after getting off the bus the day schools decided to close: "Hi, Mommy, have you heard about the coronavirus?"

Waiting for the Lowe's people to get our fire pit.

We did not know what the next week would hold. She decided she better at least write out the three weeks of spelling words her teacher sent home.

While everyone else was searching for toilet paper, we were concerned about gluten free graham crackers.

Dentist

Zumba!

2020 weeks 9 & 10: Science fair etc

We had an algae situation!

We finally got the tank cleared up, but we'd a lost a few fish...

...we got some more.

We went to the mall three days in a row. Charlotte's Girl Scout troop sold had a cookie booth over the weekend then held their Monday night meeting at the arcade. The boys tagged along.

Charlotte had her gastroenterologist followup (and labs). She hasn't grown much yet but is otherwise doing well.

The dance costumes have started to come in!

Frank spent Sunday to Friday in D.C.

I spent a few days pulling everything out of the cabinets and purging A LOT!

Chick-Fil-A dinner (pre-COVID-19 dining room closure).

Zach's chocolate frog from Universal's Wizarding World of Harry Potter.

The real excitement for the weekend was Zach's friend/science fair partner staying the night for ease of participation in the county fair Saturday morning. They came away with third place ribbons and were just super excited about the whole day!

The awards ceremony filled to almost no standing room...it was good that we got there early!