Sarah's Corona Break Update

What I’ve Been Doing During 

CORONA BREAK

(Oh no! Not Corona Break!)

By: Sarah Norton

The first week of Corona Break, my family and I went to Canada.

Victoria, to be specific. We stayed in a classy hotel with a gigantic pool and a hot tub.

We also did a ton of walking around. On the first day, we walked around,

went to a few stores, and then went swimming in the hotel pool.

On the second day, we walked to the Natural History museum,

walked inside the Natural History Museum, walked around some more,

and then went swimming again.

On the third day, we packed up and headed home on the ferry. It was super fun.

The second week of Corona Break, my family and I stayed home.

We still walked around sometimes, but that was to get somewhere specific,

not just walking around. We also watched TV (a lot of TV).

Some of the things we watched are Sherlock, Star Trek, Oceans 11,

and Fighting With My Family.

I totally recommend all of them.

Another thing we did was get mad at each other and drive each other insane.

All in all, it was a great week.

During week three, all we are doing is home school and being bored.

Sometimes, we do family video chats. I am reading a lot, too.

Some of the books that I’ve been reading are Spirit Animals

(and Spirit Animals Fall of the Beasts and the special editions),

Percy Jackson and the Olympians,

Myth-O-Mania, and Call of the Wild (young readers edition).

We are watching season three of Sherlock. We have to do a chore a day, too.

I miss all of my friends and family. 

The end

Libby's Covid 19 Update: Canada Trip

The first week of the break we went on a spontaneous Canada trip.
We heard about school being closed on Wednesday and left for Canada Thursday morning.
The first day we decided to “Window Shop”. This was my least favorite part of the trip.
It was cold and really windy. The second day had similar weather but this time I wore a jacket.
Both nights we went swimming. We also went to the Natural History Museum.
Coming from someone who gets bored easily and likes to interact,
it wasn’t much fun. My Dad and Sarah had fun though.

The hot tub at our hotel 

Carousel at Butchart Gardens

Marshmallow fun

Good Day in 8 different languages.

Carona reading Challenge

     The second week was ok. I realized I couldn’t see my besties or hang out with them so I was
SUPER BORED! A bit more tension grew as we all realized our fate.
We were going to be stuck in the same house for 6 WEEKS.
Mom is having us do schoolwork to keep our minds alive

It is week three and we are all bored out of our minds.
We are moving out of I love you sis and moving into hunger games.
Only one will come out of this alive. Sometimes I think that everything is fine and sometimes
I feel like I am going insane. I love my family but I also like my sanity.

Ben's Corona Virus Update: So Far on Covid19 Break

I have learned how to play Fallout Shelter from Dad.
I play prodigy (math game).
I draw.
I color.
I do chores around the house (my favorite was helping to paint).
I went to Victoria which is in Canada.
I also went to Grandville (this is in Vancouver CA).
I've done poetry and I have done homeschool.
I have been playing the guitalele every day.
I can play "Yellow Submarine" and "Jet Plane" and "Blowing in the Wind."

Ben's actual text.  We added a few things and I edited a few spelling errors as we typed.

And that is what I have done over covid19 break.

Fallout Shelter, he insisted that we take this picture.  

The Stay Home Break

Amazingly I have been very busy.  Actually, this is not amazing.  It is totally normal.  I am very good at finding things to fill my time.  School has ramped up, as we are now supposed to be making contact with all our students and making sure they have access to the resources.  And of course I am doing a bit more than that.  I helped with one assignment for the next packet coming out from the district.  I've been learning to use zoom.
I had several meetings for school and camp stuff.  It feels really good to see people.
I also had a telephone doctors appointment--still trying to chase down the cause of my fatigue.  So I met with Sarah's metabolic doctor.  Libby also had an appointment.  Then we had to do the blood work.  This doctor requires extensive blood testing (starting fasting).  Usually she does this in house, but we had to go to a walk-in lab.  The poor lab tech was new.  We were there for 4 hours for the 2 hours of testing.  And, later that day they called me and let me know that there was one un-labeled vial of blood, meaning I had to do the whole process over again.  Thankfully it wasn't Libby--who hates having her blood drawn and struggled with it.  (Although she did better than she has in the past thanks to full blast youtube videos in her headphones.)
We participated in a virtual talent show that helped us feel less isolated.
I finished scraping wallpaper, patched, sanded, patched, sanded, primed, texturized, sanded, and finally painted Sarah's room.  I'm almost done.  One more coat.  Then I'm hopefully going to put the baseboards back on. This can be tricky, so we will see how it goes.  They put them up with some pretty intense nails, not the little nail gun nails that I can usually just snip off with wire cutters.
We participated in the world wide fast--it felt wonderful to be doing something.  And I'm not usually a fasting fan, but it truly felt good.
Every day I've been playing guitar with Ben.  He's improving rapidly.  It is really fun.
All in all, we are healthy.  We are surviving each other.  We are implementing stronger screen time limits and had to reset the iTunes passwords after an expensive breech leading to one of our kids purchasing many in-app purchases before we caught it.  What is the saying? Idle hands are the devil's workshop?
I'm committing to no more projects.  My focus needs to be on school for my students and my kids.
Today for school they are each writing a post.  Hopefully I'll get them all uploaded today.
Yesterday for writing we created book covers for the Westing Game, which we listened to and finished while we were creating them. 

We also played a fun math game.  

On Sunday we did Singing Time with Soren

Libby took lots of pics of herself. Photography Class? 

Ben sent a note to his teacher.

We did a fun game where we tried to explain our creations to each other (there was a barrier in the middle).

In some ways, this is a dream come true.  So much time to spend together.  Just staying focused on the good.

Homeschooling??

I am so not ready to be a homeschool mom.  But I decided on a strategy that will work for all 3 kids and me.  And I can live with it.
I created a schedule or outline for them to follow.
It has all the subjects including art, science, pe, music, reading, writing.
  Homeschool Schedule
Libby made herself a new one (she of course didn't like mine) that broke the day down into the 6 periods.  (Which is actually a win because she got on the computer and started typing and thinking--all that I'm really after here.)

All kids have to do something in each category (and make their plan for the next day) before they can have screen time.  So here's how it goes.  Ben, diligently works through his subjects, doing something in each one with recess breaks.  Checks everything off.
 Sarah:  Reads.  Does some work.  Reads some more.  Recess.  More reading.
Libby: Tries to avoid the whole thing by staying on the trampoline most of the day.

Since my true motivation is having them learn something, and to not get hounded for screen time all day, I'm calling it a win so far.  They have enjoyed so much time together (on the trampoline, having picnics, etc.).  They have had some serious-ish squabbles too.  But overall, it is working out.  They are supposed to do an hour of Home Ec (helping mom time) and the day we all worked on wallpaper scraping together was probably my favorite. 

I did teach a writing lesson (I think I'm going to teach one lesson each day that fits into one of the subjects) that we all enjoyed.

And I'm teaching Ben to play the guitar.  So fun.

We are going to make it.  And there will be some learning too! Learning to avoid schoolwork is another way of learning, right?

Grandpa Turns 80

As our last event before going into quarantine (which isn't really a thing for us since Derek has to work) we celebrated Grandpa Brion's 80th birthday.
We are so blessed to have him with us!

Quarantine Week 1

I stop myself several times a day and think...Is this really happening?  Could this be happening?  This IS HAPPENING!  I feel so scattered.  And so weird.  And so blessed all at the same time.

I feel weird because it is like the flashback to only a few years ago when being a home all day was the norm.  True, I would have clients coming in, but I didn't go out all that much.  Not compared to now when I work 5 days a week and my kids have a million activities during the non-work hours.  I loved that time.  But I didn't really miss it.  So being back there is pretty WEIRD!

I also feel scattered because I have a lot of things I want to do with this amazing gift of time.  I want to finish Sarah's bedroom.  (At least most of it.  Some of it needs to be a post girls camp surprise, right?)  I want to clean up my yard while the weather is beautiful.  I want to spend time with each kid. I want them to all work on school.  I want to clean.  I want to read. I want to do a little something for my students each day.  AAAHHHH!  So how to prioritize?  And keep my neck and shoulders relatively healthy (as in, don't do too much wallpaper or gardening at once).

Anyway, this is what's been going on around here.  I finished Tattoos on the Heart, A Place for Us, and Surviving the Applewhites.  I also started Talking to Strangers (almost done), Belly Up, The Westing Game, and The Stupid Things Smart People Do with their Money (that was a library book and didnt' finish it in time.  So I only got to thing 10 of 13. So expect me to do at least 3 dumb things with my money 😜.)

I spent so much time on FB...it feels good to be connected, in humor, in sharing sadness, in sharing joy.

I did a training, a girls camp meeting and a work happy hour on Zoom.

We celebrated St. Patrick's Day!

I worked pretty hard on Sarah's room this week to get it ready for our contractor to come in and fill in the window.  A couple of pictures:

Libby and Ben wrote some sweet notes for Sarah on her walls.  Ben: Sarah is asome!!

At this point I moved her out so I could take down curtains and blinds.

Our contractor came on Friday and filled in the "window." 

I'm really excited for our plans for this side of the wall.  You'll have to wait and see! 

We played lots of games--Scattergories, I Dissent, and Settlers.  Thankfully Maren has decided she is in our quarantine circle.  So we can still hang out with her and get out of our house. ;)
We did some sidewalk chalking outside her house yesterday after we walked there.

Libby

Sarah

I didn't get a picture of Ben's awesome Bear. I want to do some more of this today.  It was fun to see people walking by and enjoying them.
Here is to another weird quarantine week. Praying that the virus curve drops and we can start to resume normal activity soon.  Both Ben and Libby had meltdowns last night.  I was right there with them!  This is hard! (And we don't have it bad at all!  It could be so much worse.) I am praying also for a quick economic rebound for all those who are losing their wages right now.  What a hard trial!

And my favorite night was campfire night.  I love a good campfire!

Forget the graham crackers.  Bark Thins S'more. 

Ben also schooled me on my fractions, telling me this was not 1/4 of the wall, but 1/3.  I think, sadly he was right.  I got more of it done yesterday afternoon.  But taking a day of rest today! My neck needs it!