These past three weeks have been very strange. There is a worldwide pandemic of Covid-19, caused by the coronavirus, which started in Wuhan, China and is currently spreading around the world. Many thousands of people have died from the effects of this virus, and some countries (China, Korea, Italy), have had a horrible time of trying to provide health care for everyone who needs it. People have gotten sick so quickly, and people of certain ages and health backgrounds are at greater risk of the effects being fatal for them. There have not been enough doctors and hospitals to help everyone who needs it. When Covid-19 came to the United States, each state has been taking certain measures to slow down the spread of the virus, in hopes of slowing down how many people are infected at the same time. Public schools were alerted that their teachers would be trained on how to do online learning, with plans of closing schools on March 18th. But on Friday, March 13th, Governor Herbert announced that all schools would be closed for the remainder of March beginning Monday, the 16th. We have been strongly urged to stay home as much as possible, and to social distance by staying 6 feet away from anyone outside our immediate family who lives in the same house whenever we are out in public. Churches have closed, and ours has moved to home-centered worship, where we administer the sacrament in our homes and continue to study Come Follow Me with our families. Everything else has been canceled/postponed one by one: soccer, ballet, gymnastics, preschool, haircuts, the Little Big Town concert, BYU Women's Conference, everything. Restaurants and stores have moved to no-contact purchasing, where most things are ordered and purchased online, and delivered to your car or home by someone wearing gloves and a face mask. It's all very strange. I've never experienced anything like this. Stores have been cleaned out of all paper products, especially toilet paper, cleaning products, hand soap, medicine, and many food items. We've been ordering our groceries online for pick up in the parking lot, but even that was shut down for a time while they tried to restock and reorganize to fill the crazy demand of people ordering online. We feel very blessed that we have everything we need so far, or have been able to get it with some small delays.
So far the hardest part for us has just been staying home for such a long time. We miss our family and friends very much. Thank goodness for texting, Marco Polo, and FaceTime! People are so clever, and have made some hilarious memes about this whole adventure, and our text threads with our family and friends keeps us laughing through it all. These have been a few of my favorites.
Since the teachers had not been trained for online learning by Monday the 16th, the kids didn't have any school work until Wednesday the 18th. That combined with beautiful weather made for a fun weekend and Monday and Tuesday.
The kids rode bikes, climbed trees, and played with sand while I pulled the weeds in our yard.
The kids made treasure hunts for each other. They each took a turn writing clues for the other two to follow.
Damon sent the big kids to the truck to find their treasure, and they totally thought it would be in the back, but it was actually on the footstep on the passenger side. When they got there they looked so surprised that it wasn't in the back, and Damon turned to me with the cutest little satisfied look and a finger over his mouth telling me not to say anything about where the fruit snacks really were. I really thought I had captured the perfect moment on my camera, but when I looked at the picture Damon had just turned his head back around. I was bummed I missed it, and so I asked the kids to recreate it. I usually do not ask them to fake stuff like this, but they did it and I can't stop laughing at it. They really did recreate it perfectly. :)
Tessa spent a good amount of time helping Damon put all the magnetic letters in ABC order. He's definitely learning more of them now that he cares more about it. Later that night I noticed the notes Tessa had hung by the letters. She's such a sweet sister.
Paul had the kids choose a meal that they wanted to cook with him. Tessa chose two, so I helped her make cream cheese chicken.
She did not love touching the cream cheese. Her face here takes me back to her at about two years old. That is a classic baby Tess face. :)
The other meal she chose was homemade pizza. Paul helped her and Rockwell make pizzas for the family. They were delicious.
Damon chose to make bacon, eggs, and hashbrowns.
Mrs Roxi put out a leprechaun hunt in her front yard, along with a packet of activities the kids would have done in preschool that week. Damon had a lot of fun with that.
Since Paul was home on Saturday, I dusted off my rollerblades and went blading on the Murdock Trail. It was so fun! I forgot how much I love to rollerblade. The next day I took Rockwell and Tessa over to the church parking lot to ride bikes. I took my rollerblades and rode around with them. We had a lot of fun!
Rockwell loved climbing the trees there.
The first three days of online school were pretty challenging for Rockwell. His teacher definitely assigned a full day's work, plus homework. He is still writing essays, taking tests and quizzes, learning new math concepts, and making science projects. The frustrating part for me was that she didn't do any sort of teaching. Tessa's teacher posted videos where she was teaching the math lessons and writing lessons, so Tessa could follow along and know how to do her assigned work. All the teaching was left up to me as far as Rockwell was concerned, and converting within the customary system is not an easy concept to teach to a 10-year-old who is trying to understand why all of the fun things in his life have been canceled and he won't be able to see his friends for who knows how long! We both felt overwhelmed by the workload. I let him cry it out for a few minutes in the middle of a math lesson and took this sneaky picture to capture what this crazy time really looks like.
Tessa and Damon still needed my attention too, so I felt like a crazy person trying to keep them all engaged and entertained and fed and somewhat happy. I've been so grateful that Tessa is able to do most of her work on her own, and will read to Damon and help out with whatever she can.
There was a lot of screen time, and a lot of Tessa and Damon playing together while I worked with Rockwell. Luckily the following week Paul was able to stay home a few days. That was a lifesaver! Another frustration was that the weather turned cold and wet. We woke up to snow a few mornings. We all do so much better when we can spend time outside, and that was hard to feel like that was canceled too. The kids would ride their bikes in the garage for recess, or play in the hot tub.
On the weekend, I tried to make it as carefree, fun, and relaxing as I could for the kids. Rockwell wanted to have the hot tub to himself, so he spent quite a bit of time out there on his own. He said it was awesome not to be splashed and have all the space to himself. :)
The weather was cold, but Tessa spent time playing outside. She still loves to swing.
It's kind of hard to believe this is how we're living life right now. I do think it's important that we all help each other out and do what we can to protect others. It's just still a little hard to believe this is our reality now.
