And Now For Something Completely Different . . .

Reading my last post, all I can think is how much has changed in three short days! Covid-19 is here, and suddenly we are in the Upside Down. After giving my notice at my prior firm, when selecting my start date with my new firm I decided to give myself a long weekend between jobs – time to relax, binge watch Netflix with no kids around, maybe clean out kitchen drawers and closets or maybe just be lazy. Then the governor shut down all schools K-12 for the next four weeks and I had one hour’s notice before they came home from school FOREVER. *You may recall that last time I took a little time off between jobs, the Prof and older boys were in Ireland and it was just me and Craig and Craig got PNEUMONIA. heavy sigh*

So the kids are home. Home now, home tomorrow, home every day until April 13. I fluctuate between “this is precious, precious togetherness time” and “Oh My God my house is too SMALL for this, why didn’t we get a house with a YARD, they’re already FIGHTING, they won’t stop EATING, how am I supposed to bill time while also homeschooling three kids in different grades and we’re all in the same 2,000 square feet?”

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“I wish it need not have happened in my time,” said Frodo.
“So do I,” said Gandalf, “and so do all who live to see such times. But that is not for them to decide. All we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given us.”

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Have you seen the news reports of people in Italy singing out their windows together? Streets eerily empty, no human in sight, but they’re all singing in unison from their apartment windows.

We are not quite as high density a population where we live, no high rises, but we are in an urban neighborhood. We are very diverse in our immediate vicinity – diverse in income, diverse in race, diverse in age and family makeup. Across the street, the boys’ best friend Mayes lives with his parents, and next door is his grandma, who has rheumatoid arthritis and takes immunosuppressants. Just a door down from us is a duplex, on one side live two immigrants in their 80s who seem hale and hearty enough but also smoke like chimneys and don’t have much money. On the other side of the duplex are a couple in their 70s who regularly fall out of bed and need helped back in it, and are frequently toted off in an ambulance due to breathing issues. Meanwhile, the Prof’s colleague has a fever and dry cough, and is awaiting results of his Covid 19 test. Until we know the results of that test, and whether we are vectors, we are staying away from our entire street. We may be singing out windows at each other soon enough.

Meanwhile, I know that without structure and/or the ability to just punt them out the door to the park, our boys will end up on screens 10 hours a day if I’m not proactive. My biggest concern with this social distancing exercise is that I am going to have to drive the schedule day to day for these kids, to shuffle us through the days, whatever they end up looking like. I have pre-emptive decision fatigue. In order to front load some of that decision-making work, on Friday afternoon I dashed to Wal Mart (along with every other resident of Orleans Parish, it was straight up Hunger Games style, there were no carts left to I had to carry it all in my arms) and loaded up on items to create a one-room schoolhouse. The little girl behind me in the (endless) line at the register looked at the items on my belt and said “Hey Lady, you a art teacher?”

I got vinyl tablecloths (for easy art cleanup), scrapbooking supplies, a couple of trays/bins to hold stuff, some posterboard, and a white board which now hangs in our kitchen. After I got home, I dug through our buckets of art supplies and pulled that out, too. Behold, the One Room Schoolhouse:

We got to enjoy our pretty Easter table for a few days at least – but no more. Our dining room table is now the school table, so I redistributed the decorations and set the table up for long term distance learning. I also put up a rickety card table we have, to store games and toys that normally sit in their closets. My thinking was to make non-screen fun time as frictionless as possible.

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I also brainstormed a bunch of ideas of activities, and sorted them into color-coded categories. I wrote each activity on a slip of construction paper in the corresponding color – if we’re stuck on deciding what to do, we will just draw the paper out of the Activity Jar.

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In case it helps you, here are my lists:

STUDY TIME – PINK (they have lesson plans from school, so not a lot of thought in this one)

• Math
• Reading
• Writing
• Science
• Social Studies

P.E./RECESS – BLUE (gotta get these kids outdoors in our tiny backyard as much as possible)

• Hide and Seek (indoor)
• Hide and Seek (outdoor)
• Gardening
• Flower Pressing
• Long walk with the dog
• Long bike ride in City Park or at the Levee (places that will not be crowded with people)
• Exercise time (Burpees, Jumping Jacks, Supermans, Sit Ups, Jump Rope, High Knees, Sprint up and down the driveway)
• Camping in the Backyard
• Sidewalk Chalk in the driveway

CHORES – GREEN

• Practice Piano
• Practice Guitar
• Clean out coat closet
• Collect trash
• Organize bookshelf
• Clean out the toybox
• Dinner prep
• Laundry (Jack)/Dishes (Liam)/Clean Room (Craig)
• Disinfect counters

QUIET/ALONE TIME – WHITE

• Listen to something on Pinna.fm (two months free using the code PINNA4KIDS)
• Play records/CDs
• Meditation & yoga
• Virtual museum tour
• Scholastic Magazine lesson
• Stream the Seattle symphony
• Lesson from this symbaloo page posted by a teacher friend

FAMILY FUN LEISURE ACTIVITIES – YELLOW (tbh I kind of randomly distributed the quiet time and leisure activity ideas, but whatevs, I had to move fast)

• Make a movie
• Puzzle
• Write letters
• 3-D art project (out of tongue depressors, clay, etc)
• Drawing art project
• Board games
• Card games

EVENING FUN – BROWN

• Percy Jackson night (the boys are all into reading the Lightning Thief series)
• Harry Potter night
• Cook-out or picnic
• Glow stick dark bath time
• Make cookies
• Movie and popcorn
• Read/tell stories aloud
• Pizza making contest

I will keep adding to these as time goes on, but it helps me to essentially pre-make some of these decisions for myself, so if I’m feeling too tired to drive the Family Party Bus through yet another day, I can just let the jar tell us what to do.

A few last thoughts before I go. First, the boys are all in. They’re excited about school at home – not even just about not having to go to school, but about getting to learn here. Craig is desperately trying to recreate his kindergarten classroom. Last night when I had a family meeting and told them what would be happening, he kept raising his hand and saying “Can we have Centers over here? Can we get a Morning Meeting Rug? Where should we put the cafeteria?” It was pretty cute – him trying to map his school experience onto his home experience.

And finally, I’m very glad that I started my Lent stuff before all this happened, and established a routine. I wonder how much I’d be drinking right now if I hadn’t stopped it altogether! I’m stocked up on bubble water and loose tea, so that helps me make better choices for my liver. Also, the structure of the Divine Hours is helping keep me moored during an unmoored time. Even before coronavirus threw us in the spin cycle, I’ve enjoyed flipping to a new page each day – it helps mark the passage of time in a way that helps me focus on today.

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Off I go, to garden with the boys. Yesterday right before my panic WalMart shopping session, I also went to a local garden center and loaded up. We’ll spend some time today potting these beauties and then part of our outdoor activity will be tending to them. The boys can’t wait, and neither can I. Stay well, stay active, stay sane! Singing to you all, out my window. Can you hear me?