The initial cases of COVID-19 in China hit the news the beginning of 2020. It wasn't long before concern mounted as the case numbers rapidly increased and began spreading internationally. No one knew about the virus and there was widespread fear as to how dangerous it was. Come February, Nick encouraged me to load up on groceries and household goods at Costco, he was concerned about a shut-down. I reluctantly agreed, feeling super self conscious of my overflowing carts at Costco, Trader Joes and Target. We created a stockpile in tough boxes and on the shelves in our garage. Turns out, I was two weeks ahead of the rest of the world when the lines to get into stores wrapped around buildings. The shelves were emptied in the rush, things like toilet paper and cleaning supplies were scarce.
Nick's office building shut down in the beginning of March and we got a text that the kids were going to distance learning March 16th. There was so little known about the virus so fear was widespread. Businesses closed their doors and people generally stayed home unless they were deemed to be "essential workers" such as first responders, hospital staff, grocery store workers, etc. Masks were required, lots of people wore gloves and face shields if they absolutely had to leave their house. Everything was sanitized, some people would even sanitize their groceries because it was believed that the virus could live for extended periods of time. I would leave the house every two weeks to go grocery shopping and the roads were empty.
Elderly people were identified as the most vulnerable population and were told not to leave their homes or to be exposed to any one. It was several weeks before we saw anyone outside of our immediate family. Initially, we started strong. We cooked all of our favorite recipes and tried lots of news ones (there was LOTS of eating at home!) We learned how to do new arts and craft projects on You-tube. We read books and watched lots of nostalgic movies. I reorganized all of my loose photographs from childhood into two enormous (1,000 photo) albums in chronological order. I also organized our home videos and made video compilations of all the kids. Nick built a "shoe shelf" for the garage and a playset in our newly renovated backyard. We got to work organizing the house as well, tackling house projects that had been put off for years. We laughed heartily as we memorized Quarantine parody songs (Hello from the Inside by Chris Mann), but after the second month or so and it seemed as though there was no end in sight, it became a bit more of a grind to keep our spirits up.
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| Wall sits are the work of the devil. |
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| Puppets-In-Progress |
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| Wrestling shenanigans with Daddy |
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| Kinder Sight word and 2nd grade spelling word practice! |
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| We watched a young ventriloquist on American's Got Talent and were inspired to learn ventriloquism ourselves. We had nothing but time! The kids each designed their puppets and we found and awesome tutorial. Shipping times were understandably slow given the burden on the delivery services with brick-and-mortar businesses closed, so we waited patiently-ish for our supplies. It was our biggest sewing project yet, but we sure did have fun with it! |
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| Julia and Hopsie :) |
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| Emmy with Abigail Swineson :) |
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| Hannah and Maisey Mutt. :) |
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| James' new puppet, Ben. :) |
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| Wrestling with Daddy after a long day in his home office. |
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| Fourth grade upstairs. |
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| Rainbow after the rain. |
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| The biggest winner in all of quarantine was Molly. |
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| P.E. with Mr. Stegell...No mercy! His workouts and challenges were intense, especially the 5 minute wall sits and 1000 jumping jacks ;-P. |
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| Learning sight words...Pretty awesome having two Kinders in the house for learning games! |
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| They had a "recess" on zoom each Friday including color scavenger hunts and show and tell...The contributions for show and tell were endless given that it was done from home! The Kindergarten pets got LOTS of airtime! |
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| Kindergarten in the Kitchen! |
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| Learning and practicing Pointillism. Thankful for You-tube how-tos! |
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| Pringle Challenge: DONE |
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| There was a "traveling party" driving through the neighborhood playing music with a light show and bubble machine. It was so incredible to see the creative ideas that were born out of quarantine. |
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| Tea Party! |
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| Hannah goes to 2nd grade in the Dining Room. We also made a "Horn School Home School" gratitude list...it spilled into a second page.:) |
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| "We Will" posters submitted to the school video. |
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| I got out my piles of scrap fabric and got to work making masks, Em helped me too. This was the second generation, there were a few more generations before we found a good fit! :-P |
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| The kids were charged with making "we will" signs to show how we will persevere though the quarantine. |
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| Sourdough pancakes were my very favorite breakfast when I slept over at my Grandma Hagg's house as a kid. In the spirit of nostalgic recipes, this one came to mind (my cousin Betsy had sent it to me years before.) When I started doing research on sourdough starter, I got a little overwhelmed by the idea of making it, and decided to shelve my idea Well, no kidding, the NEXT DAY, Auntie Jackie texted out of the blue and asked if I wanted any sourdough starter! She had made a jar for me! WHAT?!? I couldn't believe it! |
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| The final product! It went over well! |
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| Daddy's quarantine project! |
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| Private Puppet show on our new playset for sweet Day. |
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| Buddy patiently allowed me to cut his hair...We had no other option because hair salons were closed for many months with surging COVID cases in our area. |
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| Mother's Day with my kiddos! |
