Is it weird to say that we've gotten used to this now? It feels weird to be around people again. This past week, the Stay At Home order was lifted and changed to Safer at Home as the state tries to gingerly wade back into some sense of "normalcy" (whatever that's going to look like now). For 6 weeks we stayed completely away from everyone.
I was the lone tribute who went to the grocery store once a week with my mask on (I gave up on the grocery pick up service after week 4 since they never had everything on my list). And that was it. That was the extent of our contact with the outside. Minus a random day or two within the past 2 weeks when Chloe and her friend would go for a social distance walk around the neighborhood. Taking Ninja for a walk around the neighborhood became exciting because you could wave to other people and say "hi" across the street. It was a nice change of scenery.
But now the restrictions have been lifted to some extent (I honestly don't know why because our death/infection numbers are not going down yet). For us this looked like letting the kids get together with a friend/s who has also been seriously quarantining for the past 6 weeks. This is almost like the worst grounding they ever had, they were in desperate need of being with their friends.
Chloe and Brooke went to see their friend Maggie. This is the same girl we did the drive by birthday wishes for a couple of weeks ago. All of us moms were like, "I think it's ok? Y'all have been super careful and so have we. So let's try this and see what happens?" Integrating again feels weird. But we have to start some time. The kids just stayed at her house and took a walk around the lake behind it. Not a lot of risk involved - except for being around people outside your house again for the first time in 7 weeks. We agreed to let the kids get together once and then give it a week to make sure everyone is still healthy.
Bennett is a doer. He doesn't like just sitting around talking. He wants to play or do something. So when his friend Brooke (yes, both Chloe and Bennett have a Brooke of their own) asked if he wanted to hike Horsetooth with her, he was desperate to go. He had 7 weeks worth of energy stored up for just such an event. Plus, you don't come into contact with hardly anyone else hiking. And her family had also been very strict with the quarantine so we felt we had to let him go before he slowly wilted to death inside. As you can see from the picture, the outdoors and time with Brooke filled him up again. The kid hasn't seen the inside of a gym, a basketball hoop, or a tennis court for 7 weeks, he needed this. Obviously, they weren't social distancing (or wearing masks), but they did keep their distance from any other hikers they encountered.
And because Chuck was at work on our first foray into the world again and had FOMO of hammocking, we went again on Friday afternoon so he, too, could hammock in this most blissful and peaceful setting. As you can tell from the photo, I'm still working my way through A People's History of the United States. It's a very long book, but well worth the read.
This is what work has looked like for me over the past 7 weeks. Each teacher set up their own Google Classroom and we interact with out students over this platform. It is quite challenging given the level of digital literacy of some of our students. But the students who have continued to be committed to class have been enjoyable to engage with over these past few weeks.
And Chuck has been having fun at work creating confusing background screens for his zoom meetings.
Bennett and Chuck wasted lots of perfectly good time working on this. More power to them. This is my personal nightmare.
The games that have been keeping us entertained this week are Quiddler
and ping pong. I have to say that Bennett and I are the better team here. But often Chuck and I beat Chloe and Bennett when we team up and it just feels good to beat your kids at something, you know?
Of course we have been watching this incredible documentary as has the rest of the world. This was the golden age of basketball. This is my all time favorite team.
Watching highlight reels of these two puts a gigantic smile on my face. This group of guys was the ultimate in teamwork. There was no such thing as "hero ball." Everyone knew Michael was the GOAT, but he let his teammates shine and do what they do best. That was the genius of Coach Phil Jackson. It is a fun walk down memory lane and fun to share with the kids and indoctrinate them on why the 97/98 Bulls were the best team ever.
I can't even tell you what this music does to me. I get the goosebumps everytime I hear it. We loved it so much that this was the music that the DJ played at our wedding when our wedding party was introduced at our reception. I told you we were die-hard fans!
We also introduced the kids one of our favorite movies, The Great Debaters. I've mentioned multiple times on this blog that this is where we got the best parenting advice about "do what you have to do before you do what you want to do." But after watching it again last night, I'd have to say this was my favorite quote this time: "St. Augustine said, 'An unjust law is not law at all.' which means I have the right, even the duty to resist. With violence or civil disobedience. You should pray I choose the latter."
We ate food again. Barely. We totally didn't follow this menu. We maybe ate 3 of the things. We opted for cheese and crackers one night, left overs another and who knows what else. By the way, I can never cancel pizza night - I would have a mutiny on my hands. But I have been informed I can postpone it. So that's a relief. Pizza was postponed until Sunday.
I just love this photo! We were all having a group hug moment when Ninja decided to participate and join our circle of love.
