Isaac's "How this week has gone for you?" Essay

This week has been fun and exciting. 
We have done a lot of cool things as a family.
We have jumped on the trampoline when it’s sunny outside.
And sometimes when it is snowing and raining.
We have played downstairs and played lots of games.

Having school at home has been crazy.
We have done lots of work signing into everything and doing all the work.
We have more breaks at home, and get to go outside more.
But I don’t get to see my friends and play with them.
It’s nice that our whole family is here doing school together.

I like spending extra time with my family.
We can jump and play outside and talk more.
I like eating lunch together every day.
It is weird to not see my cousins and grandparents.
We usually see them frequently.

The hardest part about this week has been life changing so suddenly. 
There have been a lot of crazy things happening like coronavirus and earthquakes.
My Grandma had surgery and needed to go back to the hospital to have oxygen.
That was scary.
That made me feel like everything was just different.

So this week has been fun and exciting, but also crazy and scary.
It has been so much fun, but I feel like things are missing from my life.
Some of the things that I feel are different are not being able to play with
friends and staying home for so long.
Everything keeps changing and it makes me feel like
the world turned upside down. 

Crazy, Memorable Day

I think often of what it will be like to look back at this time.

The time the whole world slowed down, everyone went home, and things became both noisier and quieter all at once.  A global pandemic changing life so completely, as we all wait to see what the fall out of the COVID-19 virus ends up being.  Watching the markets tumble, everything shut down, and seeing news from people all around the world facing the same things we are.

Then this morning I got up a little early to get Isaac and I ready to go for his orthodontist appointment.  And I felt a rumble.  I wondered for a split second if Isaac had just jumped off something.  Did a big truck just go by? Was the wind really bad?  It isn't stopping.  We're moving.  An earthquake.  I forgot EVERYTHING I ever learned about what to do in an emergency and just yelled for my kids, asking if they were okay, and ran to the hall between all of our bedrooms.  They were all emerging as the shaking stopped.  I sent Ellie down to grab Annie.  Who we woke up (and she is pretty bitter she missed a 5.7 earthquake down in the basement) and I bundled up all of my children and drove them to the orthodontist with me, because there was no way I was leaving them home.  

We're living in weird, kinda scary, a little unsettling, and constantly changing times.

Due to the viral epidemic, kids are out of school for the foreseeable future and today was the first day we all got online and started digital school.

And it was a beautiful day.  We learned together, read together, cooked together, ate together, played together, laughed together.  My kids seem so completely without fear.  We paused home school midday (for our third recess) because the sun came out and there was basketball to be played.  Bill Nye on Youtube was needed for a refresher about how the Richter scale works.  And we wanted to have a dance party.  

I hope and pray that when my kids look back at the time their school was cancelled and they couldn't see their friends or cousins due to a global pandemic, and their was an earthquake, and life was chaotic and ever changing, and they started doing school in their front room, that they smile and look back fondly.  Because I know I'm never going to forget this day.  And how weirdly, unbelievably, crazily good it was.  

Valley of Fire

It's so crazy to think we left on this trip just as things in the US were starting to escalate with the coronavirus, then were basically off grid for several days, only to get random texts that would come through updating us with snippets of everything changing back home. We found out school was closed when we got back while starting a hike, because Talina happened to get some texts that came through in the parking area. I'm SO grateful we got this amazing family time in before everything would change so utterly and completely as soon as we got home. This is one of my favorite camping trips ever -- and we couldn't have possibly gotten more gorgeous camp spots! :-)

Valley of Fire Family Vacation