Easter walk

We took the kids to walk around the arboretum for something fun to do on Easter. And to get out of the house. I’m glad they haven’t closed that yet.

Then we went home and dyed eggs

Easter morning

Norah was very worried the Easter bunny wouldn’t be able to come because he could spread corona virus around from house to house. I told her he wore a mask and gloves and had magic that keeps him from getting sick. She left him candy and a note just in case he was able to come.

The Easter bunny came. And left a note, breakfast (Easter donuts) and lots of candy for an egg hunt because I haven’t been to the store to get any supplies. 

Norah is a little suspicious of the handwriting on the note and has asked me to try to write the same note again I’m my own handwriting in front of her...

Neighborhood Egg Hunt

Our neighborhood Easter egg hunt looked different this year. Instead of hunting real eggs we all colored paper Easter eggs and hung them in our windows around our house. Then we went around and counted them. Most people put out treats at the end the their driveways too for the kids. It wasn’t the same but it was still fun for us to walk around and talk to neighbors (from a distance)while we were all walking around and counting eggs. 

We counted 137! We’ve all had a lot of extra time to sit and color Easter eggs this years!

Essential

So far Brent has been able to work most days. And for that we are extremely grateful. It’s a scary time right now to be small business owners. 

But we also have an asthmatic child so we decided to make sure Brent isn’t bringing any virus germs into our house

The kids had so much fun doing this one day. They waited all day for Brent to come home so they could ambush him.  Normally Brent comes home and leaves his shoes in the garage and showers as soon as he gets home

School

Norah calls me Mrs. Goedecke during our school time. Joel is keeping up with absentee and tardy slips. They are striving for a student of the week prize. Norah and Joel show up each morning with their backpacks on ready for learning. We are getting into a pretty consistent routine of school work from 9-12 in the mornings.

Norah and I have piano lessons through FaceTime. We’d both rather have Miss Melissa sitting right next to us. 

Afternoons are spent outside and lately Colin and Joel have been building massive LEGO bases.  

And we’ve taken several car rides together to enjoy getting out of the house.

April

So our calendar is filled already this month with Corona Virus. Usually its all filled with different activities and school stuff. Joel is excited for National Banana Day so we will celebrate that. The funny thing is that Chesapeake is still observing spring break. Its not like we can go anywhere. Then after spring break all learning goes online. Right now they are working on worksheet packets. 

The day after the governor closed schools for the year we went to the botanical gardens to walk around and forget life for a little.  The kids were all devastated to know they aren't going back to school. As Colin said he had no clue that Friday when he left that he wouldn't ever be back. Its hard to make sense of all of this right now.

There have been many tears from everyone.  The kids are grieving in their own ways I think. Joel misses his teacher and his friends. Colin broke down gut wrenching crying the other night. Norah has been very emotional as well and misses her friends.  She and I went with the other girl scout leaders the other day to all our scouts houses in a car parade and had the girls hold signs out of our sunroofs and wave to the girls. It was great to see all of them and helped a lot.

Until they close we hope to go to the botanical gardens as much as we can. Its good for all of us to just walk around and get outside.

We took the kids down to the beach the other afternoon and it lifted all of our spirits to just walk up and down the beach. The kids were excited to get to do their school work in the mornings and then go down to the beach in the afternoons. And then the governor closed the beaches until June 10 and that was another hard concept to deal with.

I have a feeling things will get worse before this is all over but I do hope when the kids look back at this crazy time in their lives it will be filled with memories of carefree afternoons spent together.