Snake

Today, Nathan brought in a snake.  It was a baby snake, but still gross.  Ugh.

We let him stay long enough for a picture and then he was kicked out.  Ugh.

Laundry During the Pandemic

Things are crazy in the world right now, but on the plus side, for me, laundry is at an all time low.  Jason and Nathan have no reason to change their clothes...until it's time for a shower.  Since I'm so sick of seeing their lovely faces by the time 8:00 rolls around, I have no patience for things like forcing them to shower, so they go to bed in the clothes they've been wearing for days.  Who knows how long it's been since they've showered.  Needless to say, I've been getting a bit of a break on the laundry front.  Good thing because this pandemic has been dragging out.  I've got to take the breaks when I can get them.  

Science Class?

Allie has been wanting to make elephant toothpaste for a long time now.  We finally made it happen today.  I guess it can be considered science class?  :)

Worldwide Fast

We were asked to participate in a world wide fast today.  We are supposed to fast for all those affected by the virus.  For those medical workers who are on the front lines, for the economy to recover, and just for relief.  It's pretty cool because although it started out as just members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, it has grown beyond just us.

In preparing our dinner tonight, we also made a cake...

The boys were sad that they couldn't lick the beaters, but we saved them for later.  I was so proud of all the kids.  They made it 24 hours and hardly complained at all.  Even Jason.

Every time he felt hungry, we reminded him to have a little prayer in his heart for those affected by the virus and he said it made things easier.

Notice, the littles pretty much just live in their pj's now.  :)

Homemade Pizza

Today we made homemade pizza.  

We tried our hand at tossing the dough...

Our pizzas ended up tasting pretty good!

More good things coming from Covid-19.  We have time to bake fun things like this.  :)

Pyramids for PE

Today, we hiked the pyramid for PE.  We had blue skies and sunshine and all was right in the world.  I'm not going to talk about how rough it was to get some school work done.  I'm certainly not going to admit that I've given up on Nathan's homeschooling education.  I'm not going to talk about how some days I feel like I am suffocating because I never get any time to myself. 

I will talk about the fun trail and how cool it is to watch Charlie run full speed from the boys up ahead to check on me, and then run back to catch up to the boys.

I'll talk about how much better these boys do when they have fresh air and a place to run.  

I'll talk about how the boys wanted a picture of them holding the Wellsvilles in their hands, but it didn't work out that well.

I'll talk about how they didn't complain about how far we'd gone once.  

I'll talk about how much Charlie loves to run free with out a leash, and how he's such a good boy and stays with us.

I'll talk about how these boys wanted to pose for more pictures than a 14 year old girl. :)

I'll talk about how fast I can recover from a crazy morning when we can go out and do something like this in the afternoon.  Life is good.

The Good Things

There are some really good things to come from the quarantine.  We have the older kids around more.  Sure, it's a bummer for Allie to be missing dance, young women activities, and hanging out with friends, but it's so good to have her here every night for dinner.

She's fun to have around.

Jake's around more too now that swimming has been cancelled.  Today, he got cabin fever and took the scooter out for a ride.

That's bought him some independence.  

Sidewalk Chalk

I don't have any pictures of our neighbor's creations, but people all over are drawing on their sidewalks with chalk.  That way, when people go out on walks, they can enjoy art at their neighbor's homes.

I saw these two things on Instagram and thought it was funny.

Our wifi has been pretty crappy.  If someone is doing anything live, the rest of us can't do anything.  There are zoom calls where we get on live with a class or other groups of people and our wifi won't let us do those without major lag.  It's rough.

Crazy times, I tell you. 

Art Class

Today the kids got out the art stuff and painted.  

Jake thinks he's too cool to paint with the others, but he did sit with us and chat while they painted. 

Making Favorites!

I feel like we have to think about food a whole lot these days.  We're always home.  Always staring at each other all day long, and we also have to eat.  I know we ate before, but for some reason, it feels like I have to fix formal dinners more often.  I haven't gone to the grocery store since this started, and Mike hasn't been able to get fast food.  We're never too busy to make dinner because suddenly we have all the time in the world.  So, we've had to get creative about the food we fix.  Perishables aren't available and we have to be skimpy on other ingredients so I'm not worrying about running out of things.  

Since the kids are always around, I've been having them help out more.

Jason wanted his favorite meatballs.  So, I taught him how to make them.  He was shocked that our recipe calls for grape jelly.

Nathan wanted to help bake cookies. So we did that.

There are all sorts of memes out there talking about the weight we are all gaining as a nation.  I don't doubt it.  It feels like we are always eating, or preparing to eat.

This picture is included because I love watching my kids read.  Jason and Nathan have been into these Dogman books.  It makes me so happy to look over and see a kid reading...

We're Not Going to Hawaii

We were supposed to be on a plane to Hawaii on Wednesday.  Today, I had to cancel our flights. We're sad.

This darn virus is affecting things.  We held out hope for a long time, but they say if you fly into Hawaii right now, you have to self quarantine for 2 weeks.  All the beaches are closed.  So we cancelled our flights and are holding out hope that we can go again sometime.  Our tickets were super cheap (301 a person) and we had free hotels because we have accumulated our points.  We'll watch for cheap airline tickets and see if we can try for another time, but it's doubtful we can find them that cheap again.

It's officially spring break in a few days, but we can't really go anywhere.  They're saying we can't travel outside our county.  I can't think of another time lately where we have all the time in the world to go travel without it affecting school or work, but we just can't go anywhere.  Ugh.

So, today, the kids got out the hammocks and hung out in the back yard for a while.

Allie hung the hammocks for the boys and got them situated.  She's so good to them.

I'm just glad that it's not frigid out there anymore.

Things will change for the better when they can go outside to play and not freeze.

Life is still great.  We're disappointed about Hawaii, but we're glad we're healthy and happy.  We'll get there one of these days.