Week 6
Exciting week!
Monday I spent doing laundry and then all morning organizing my two closets and that was so fun. I love organizing but don't do it often because I always get interrupted and that is annoying to me but the kids were busy with school and playing and only came in a few times. They both look beautiful and that makes me happy. Then that night I got to see Michelle, Sarah and Joni on the house party app. It was so wonderful to just talk to them and play games together. We had planned an hour or so and ended up being on there for three, just like a regular girls night. :) It really lifted my spirits.
Tuesday night was so fun because we had book club. We tried it out on zoom and it went way better than I thought it would. We had a great discussion about Little Fires Everywhere and I just love talking about books and it made me so happy to see everyone, even Rachael who was in the hospital! She had just given birth on Monday and still tuned in for book club and to show us her cute little baby. My friend, Olivia, picked the book for book club and I just love how into book club she is. Josh works with her husband and she is way younger than me but we have become good friends. I invited her to book club back in the fall and she has been coming since. I love that she isn't intimidated by the face that she is the only one not a member of our church and she really seems to enjoy associating with awesome women (my humble opinion :). She fits right in and I love it and she did a great job leading the discussion. The only bummer was no treats but after I got off Josh and I had leftover cheesecake so that was fun.
Wednesday was a beautiful day and I was feeling antsy so I finally decided to go on an adventure. I went to a local nursery to get all the plants I wanted for my flower garden. It is open air and was not crowded so social distancing was easy. I just had Emma and Brandon hang out in the car the whole time since I don't have masks for them and didn't want them to touch anything. They had fun playing in the car and I could see them the whole time since the lot is right in front of where all the plants are. We got a bunch of plants and dirt and then got lunch at the school on our way home but it was insane with so many people. We had to wait 35 minutes and then they ran out of lunches (we got some of the very last ones). It made the kids happy but was way too stressful to do more than once or twice a week for me. Then we came home and spent all afternoon working outside. I generally don't love yard work but after days of just cleaning inside it felt good to get out and get dirty and physically tired. I planted a few new irises, two new azaleas (one of mine had died), two new dogwood bushes and Josh took out the holly tree that was ugly and I replaced it with a butterfly bush that will have red flowers. The kids also helped me with some smaller flowers and the tomatoes, green peppers and cucumbers. My neck got really sunburned since I had my hair up but it was a wonderful day of hard work, sunshine, quality kid time and beautiful flowers. That night Lily and Josh had youth activities and they both had a good time.
Thursday was not such a great day. Nothing terrible but it was gloomy and rainy and I had to teach piano lessons and my kids were all a bit grumpy. At one point during a piano lesson I heard this huge crash and then all four of my children were screaming and crying. I sent them all to their rooms while I finished my lesson and then I had them all come into my room and tell me what happened, one by one. There were still more tears but we talked about what each kid could have done to prevent the situation and I had them each apologize and then I told them that they obviously needed more exercise or more sleep so I told them they could pick to either run a lap around our neighborhood or go to bed 30 minutes early. They all picked to do the lap so even though it was sprinkling all four of them set off. Curtis was the only one who actually ran but the other three walked and everyone was in a better mood when they got back. I played Blokus with Brandon and read some stories to Emma and we ended the evening with an episode of the Great British Baking show. I was pretty exhausted once the kids were in bed and Josh was having bishopric meeting so I vegged and watched TV alone, which was actually kind of nice.
Friday I had signed up for a science class at the Franklin Institute. Since we are members I get an email every other day with links to videos and such. This was one we had to register for and it was a live class about weather, which is exactly what Lily is learning about in science so I signed us up. At 1pm we logged into the zoom class and it was a guy who usually goes around doing assemblies at schools for the Franklin Institute. He was super fun and entertaining and the class was great. He taught about air pressure and clouds and tornadoes and did four or five really neat demonstrations from his kitchen. He showed some fun videos and responded to questions from kids through the chat feature. I loved it (so did the kids) and will definitely sign up for another one if they do more.
I also found out I messed up my grocery pick up so instead I had to go to the store. Josh came home early to meet with a guy about getting a sprinkler system so I left as soon as he got home. I was so nervous but went to Harris Teeter and it wasn't crowded, I got a clean cart, I was able to get everything I needed except flour (even vanilla ice cream, tortillas and vinegar-hooray!) and I got out of there pretty quickly. While I was gone Josh dug the last few holes I needed for some bigger plants and he put together the new garage cabinet we got, which was awesome. We got Cafe Rio for dinner and watched another baking show episode. Josh and I started watching Songland, which we really like. It is so positive and fun to hear people's creative process. Oh yeah, I also went over to Sarah's that night to put forks in her lawn that spelled out happy birthday. Joni met me there and helped me and we put up the big banner that she had made. It was so fun to see her and talk for a few minutes and work together doing something nice for our friend that we love so much. Michelle went later to add color and style by adding a bunch of knives. My part didn't look how I wanted it to but my stuff never does and I got all the forks Harris Teeter had so I couldn't make it any bigger. I was so worried Sarah was going to catch us but she was oblivious.
Saturday my new vacuum was delivered and it is heavenly. My old one hasn't really been working since Christmas and so we vacuumed almost the whole house and it was so joyous to actually feel like my carpets were clean for the first time in months. Its the little things! I also decided I really wanted to finish the yard work and all I needed was mulch so I decided to go to Lowes just to get mulch. What a mistake! It was so crazy crowded and I had to wait in three slow lines just to get 14 bags of mulch. The mask kept making my glasses fog up and it was so stressful being around so many people. I didn't have to touch anything so that was nice but man, so crazy and it took forever. I got back around noon and worked hard for an hour (Lily and Curtis helped) putting the mulch in my two big flower beds and cleaning them all up from the all the planting. Then it was time for Sarah's surprise party! We hosted a virtual house party for Sarah and invited Shelly, Christina and Kori, all who have moved away. It was so fun to see them and all be "together" to celebrate Sarah. I love playing games together and talking. We spent two hours together but then I had to get back to work. I had to weed around our five little trees, add dirt and then mulch around them. I finally finished after four, took a shower and got back in my pjs. Josh made pizza for dinner and then we watched the season 3 finale of the baking show.
Today has been another wonderful Sabbath day. Two good church classes (I always listen to the youth one) and then we had a fun primary today. I had each kid (and Josh took turns too) stand up by the piano and we would start to sing a song, then I would stop and the kid had to fill in the next line. I was pretty impressed with how well they did. Brandon needed some prompting but Emma knew all of the words and Curtis only missed once. We reviewed all the songs they have learned in primary this year, including the ones I taught them for April. Josh really makes it fun. He isn't great at remembering words and never went to primary as a kid so they love to tease him when he messes up and makes up silly things. Then we had our sacrament meeting and had lunch and the kids are all nicely building their Lego city downstairs while Josh is being bishop and I have some quiet time to write.
While I don't love this new life, there are some things about it to be appreciated. I love sleeping in every day and I love having Josh home more. I love that Lily isn't hearing a bunch of bad language every day and that Brandon gets so much time to play with his siblings. Hmmm. Okay, I could make a much longer list of things I don't like but that's my effort to be positive. One funny thing is that I am kind of sick of seeing my back yard neighbors. They are usually hardly around because they both work and their two young kids go to day care but now I see them all of the time and it is awkward. They are polite but not friendly and I just feel like they are in my space all of the time. I would be happy for them to go back to work instead of trying to ignore each other so that we don't have to make stupid small talk and acknowledge that we have no privacy from each other.
Monday I spent doing laundry and then all morning organizing my two closets and that was so fun. I love organizing but don't do it often because I always get interrupted and that is annoying to me but the kids were busy with school and playing and only came in a few times. They both look beautiful and that makes me happy. Then that night I got to see Michelle, Sarah and Joni on the house party app. It was so wonderful to just talk to them and play games together. We had planned an hour or so and ended up being on there for three, just like a regular girls night. :) It really lifted my spirits.Tuesday night was so fun because we had book club. We tried it out on zoom and it went way better than I thought it would. We had a great discussion about Little Fires Everywhere and I just love talking about books and it made me so happy to see everyone, even Rachael who was in the hospital! She had just given birth on Monday and still tuned in for book club and to show us her cute little baby. My friend, Olivia, picked the book for book club and I just love how into book club she is. Josh works with her husband and she is way younger than me but we have become good friends. I invited her to book club back in the fall and she has been coming since. I love that she isn't intimidated by the face that she is the only one not a member of our church and she really seems to enjoy associating with awesome women (my humble opinion :). She fits right in and I love it and she did a great job leading the discussion. The only bummer was no treats but after I got off Josh and I had leftover cheesecake so that was fun.
Wednesday was a beautiful day and I was feeling antsy so I finally decided to go on an adventure. I went to a local nursery to get all the plants I wanted for my flower garden. It is open air and was not crowded so social distancing was easy. I just had Emma and Brandon hang out in the car the whole time since I don't have masks for them and didn't want them to touch anything. They had fun playing in the car and I could see them the whole time since the lot is right in front of where all the plants are. We got a bunch of plants and dirt and then got lunch at the school on our way home but it was insane with so many people. We had to wait 35 minutes and then they ran out of lunches (we got some of the very last ones). It made the kids happy but was way too stressful to do more than once or twice a week for me. Then we came home and spent all afternoon working outside. I generally don't love yard work but after days of just cleaning inside it felt good to get out and get dirty and physically tired. I planted a few new irises, two new azaleas (one of mine had died), two new dogwood bushes and Josh took out the holly tree that was ugly and I replaced it with a butterfly bush that will have red flowers. The kids also helped me with some smaller flowers and the tomatoes, green peppers and cucumbers. My neck got really sunburned since I had my hair up but it was a wonderful day of hard work, sunshine, quality kid time and beautiful flowers. That night Lily and Josh had youth activities and they both had a good time.
Thursday was not such a great day. Nothing terrible but it was gloomy and rainy and I had to teach piano lessons and my kids were all a bit grumpy. At one point during a piano lesson I heard this huge crash and then all four of my children were screaming and crying. I sent them all to their rooms while I finished my lesson and then I had them all come into my room and tell me what happened, one by one. There were still more tears but we talked about what each kid could have done to prevent the situation and I had them each apologize and then I told them that they obviously needed more exercise or more sleep so I told them they could pick to either run a lap around our neighborhood or go to bed 30 minutes early. They all picked to do the lap so even though it was sprinkling all four of them set off. Curtis was the only one who actually ran but the other three walked and everyone was in a better mood when they got back. I played Blokus with Brandon and read some stories to Emma and we ended the evening with an episode of the Great British Baking show. I was pretty exhausted once the kids were in bed and Josh was having bishopric meeting so I vegged and watched TV alone, which was actually kind of nice.
Friday I had signed up for a science class at the Franklin Institute. Since we are members I get an email every other day with links to videos and such. This was one we had to register for and it was a live class about weather, which is exactly what Lily is learning about in science so I signed us up. At 1pm we logged into the zoom class and it was a guy who usually goes around doing assemblies at schools for the Franklin Institute. He was super fun and entertaining and the class was great. He taught about air pressure and clouds and tornadoes and did four or five really neat demonstrations from his kitchen. He showed some fun videos and responded to questions from kids through the chat feature. I loved it (so did the kids) and will definitely sign up for another one if they do more.
I also found out I messed up my grocery pick up so instead I had to go to the store. Josh came home early to meet with a guy about getting a sprinkler system so I left as soon as he got home. I was so nervous but went to Harris Teeter and it wasn't crowded, I got a clean cart, I was able to get everything I needed except flour (even vanilla ice cream, tortillas and vinegar-hooray!) and I got out of there pretty quickly. While I was gone Josh dug the last few holes I needed for some bigger plants and he put together the new garage cabinet we got, which was awesome. We got Cafe Rio for dinner and watched another baking show episode. Josh and I started watching Songland, which we really like. It is so positive and fun to hear people's creative process. Oh yeah, I also went over to Sarah's that night to put forks in her lawn that spelled out happy birthday. Joni met me there and helped me and we put up the big banner that she had made. It was so fun to see her and talk for a few minutes and work together doing something nice for our friend that we love so much. Michelle went later to add color and style by adding a bunch of knives. My part didn't look how I wanted it to but my stuff never does and I got all the forks Harris Teeter had so I couldn't make it any bigger. I was so worried Sarah was going to catch us but she was oblivious.
Saturday my new vacuum was delivered and it is heavenly. My old one hasn't really been working since Christmas and so we vacuumed almost the whole house and it was so joyous to actually feel like my carpets were clean for the first time in months. Its the little things! I also decided I really wanted to finish the yard work and all I needed was mulch so I decided to go to Lowes just to get mulch. What a mistake! It was so crazy crowded and I had to wait in three slow lines just to get 14 bags of mulch. The mask kept making my glasses fog up and it was so stressful being around so many people. I didn't have to touch anything so that was nice but man, so crazy and it took forever. I got back around noon and worked hard for an hour (Lily and Curtis helped) putting the mulch in my two big flower beds and cleaning them all up from the all the planting. Then it was time for Sarah's surprise party! We hosted a virtual house party for Sarah and invited Shelly, Christina and Kori, all who have moved away. It was so fun to see them and all be "together" to celebrate Sarah. I love playing games together and talking. We spent two hours together but then I had to get back to work. I had to weed around our five little trees, add dirt and then mulch around them. I finally finished after four, took a shower and got back in my pjs. Josh made pizza for dinner and then we watched the season 3 finale of the baking show.
Today has been another wonderful Sabbath day. Two good church classes (I always listen to the youth one) and then we had a fun primary today. I had each kid (and Josh took turns too) stand up by the piano and we would start to sing a song, then I would stop and the kid had to fill in the next line. I was pretty impressed with how well they did. Brandon needed some prompting but Emma knew all of the words and Curtis only missed once. We reviewed all the songs they have learned in primary this year, including the ones I taught them for April. Josh really makes it fun. He isn't great at remembering words and never went to primary as a kid so they love to tease him when he messes up and makes up silly things. Then we had our sacrament meeting and had lunch and the kids are all nicely building their Lego city downstairs while Josh is being bishop and I have some quiet time to write.
While I don't love this new life, there are some things about it to be appreciated. I love sleeping in every day and I love having Josh home more. I love that Lily isn't hearing a bunch of bad language every day and that Brandon gets so much time to play with his siblings. Hmmm. Okay, I could make a much longer list of things I don't like but that's my effort to be positive. One funny thing is that I am kind of sick of seeing my back yard neighbors. They are usually hardly around because they both work and their two young kids go to day care but now I see them all of the time and it is awkward. They are polite but not friendly and I just feel like they are in my space all of the time. I would be happy for them to go back to work instead of trying to ignore each other so that we don't have to make stupid small talk and acknowledge that we have no privacy from each other.
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| The only pictures I took all week! My kids turned our family room into a restaurant and played nicely for hours together |
You guys made my birthday wonderful. 💕
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